Time: February 20^th 2003

Place: The Pop Factory at the Welsh Hills Works, Porth, Rhondda Valley, South Wales.

Event: Cable TV, second series of Stuart Cable’s chat show.

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There wasn't any Stereophonics activity at this particular show, but we had such fun, and saw a new band we liked, so I'm going to do a review anyway.

One of the guests on this show was hypnotist Paul McKenna, so we put our names forward as volunteers to be hypnotised by him, just for a laugh, to see if we could get on the show.  So "we" were Michelle, Tom and I, pictured here:

The hypnotism thing is not quite what I imagined it to be, there's no magical subliminal messages that Paul feeds you, there's no sleep, it's all a matter of being prepared to go along with the silly things that Paul gets you to do.  If you're impressionable or not frightened of acting the fool for the camera, then you're in.  None of us fitted into this category, and we were not 'hypnotised'.  We did have a good giggle at each other in the room backstage where Paul was getting us to do daft things though.  I will never forget opening my eyes because Paul had realised I wasn't going along with it, and looking over to Tom, who was doing what he was told, but was peeking through one eye at me, and grinning cheekily.  I had to bite my tongue hard to stop myself from laughing out loud and 'waking' everyone!

Anyway, Tom and I were the first group to be asked to leave (Shell followed shortly after) and before we were led back to the bar, we were chatting backstage, and realised we were outside Stu Cable's dressing room, and there was a window in the door.  On a table was a mobile phone, and Tom was dying to go and get Kelly's number off it!  On the floor in there was a Platinum Disk for Performance and Cocktails.  I have just started watching the series, and it turns out that on another show, Stuart brought this on the show for David Dickinson to "value".

We were very tempted to poke about in there, but didn't, as we'd have got kicked out!

Because we had been part of the volunteer crew, however, we did get chance to get good seats in the studio during filming, rather than being on the platform at the back, Tom and his friends were on blocks in the centre of the crowd, and we were to the right, underneath where Steve Davis and his house band were playing.  That was fun because Steve's the master of cheesy jokes!

Onto the show, and the first interviewee was Tony Blackburn.  He talks just like he does on the radio, sounds so put on.  At the end of his interview, he cracked a 'joke' and it went straight onto a section where Stuart had to introduce the next act to the camera.  Stuart fluffed his lines, so they had to go back to the last few words of the interview with Tony.  He actually had the cheek to ask us to laugh more at his 'joke' this time!  How pretentious??

The first musical act of the evening was Damien Rice, but unfortunately we didn't get the chance to really hear them properly to get an idea of if we liked them.  It had been pre-recorded earlier that evening and we were right amid all the commotion with the cameras and hustle and bustle of the studio, so it was kinda lost on us.

Next up was Paul McKenna.  He did the usual stuff, getting one guy to pretend that a broom was Catherine Zeta Jones, etc.  If you look back at the photo of the three of us above, there's a guy looking at the camera behind us.  He was sat next to us in the audience, and was told that he wouldn't be able to remember his girlfriend's name.  After the show, the stage manager was curious and came up to him, asking if he really couldn't remember her name.  He said that he could, but he wasn't about to tell Paul McKenna that on television!  That's the only power Paul has, just that power of persuasion.

The band that ended the show were called The Revs.  They were from Ireland, and had been through a nightmare that day.  Their ferry over to Wales had been cancelled - probably due to the rubbish weather we'd had that day - and they only turned up to the venue minutes before the recording started.  Therefore, they just sat in the audience, with their guitars all ready next to them, and had literally about 5 minutes to plug their instruments in and play - no sound check or anything.  They brought the roof off the place - probably not entirely unrelated to the song they were playing, which was called "Death To The DJ".  Believe me when I say that Tony Blackburn was NOT impressed - we could see the black cloud floating!  I'm dying to see if they air it on tv!! Hehe.

The Revs had their photo taken with a very impressed Stuart Cable after the show, and I was able to capture the moment.

Shell had her photo taken with Stuart and at the time he said he couldn't stop long as he was about to drive to London, as the following day he would be joining the other band members to shoot the video for their first single off their fourth album, You Gotta Go There To Come Back.  The single and the video are both out now - check out Madam Helga, if you haven't already.  We felt kinda honoured being able to hear about that first off.

Tom and his friends were also able to get photos taken with Stuart.  Left to right, we have Tom, Matt, Stu, Craig and Charlotte.