UK Tour 1999- Day 1 : Southport Arts Centre

Mike writes...."First night of the tour and it goes off without a hitch. Great venue, wonderful audience, and staff at the Arts Center are most accomodating. What a great way to start the tour.A little mishap in the afternoon as Martyn was changing the strings on his 12 string guitar. After he'd stripped the old strings off, he discovered that the new package was missing 2 strings - a slight problem to say the least. However, this was quickly surpassed by the fact that while taking off the last string, it snapped and sent one of the pegs that kept the strings in flying who knows where. After recruiting the entire household searching on hands and knees throughout the living room, we were still unable to locate it, so Nigel and I assumed resposibility for picking up strings and a peg before the gig, as Martyn had to leave for a radio interview. Nige and I got the strings and peg, and he and Martyn played an electrifying performance to a very apreciative crowd.The humor continued after the show when, while I was packing Martyn's guitars, I heard a rattling inside his 12 string. I looked through the sound whole and what did I see? You guessed it - the guitar peg! Not only had Martyn managed to re-string his guitar and do an hour sound check without noticing the peg, but he played through both sets and an encore too! The fun has begun.