What an absolutely brilliant night at the Barrowlands. The band and the audience created such an amazing atmosphere. The best night I’ve had out in a long time. My first time at the Barrowlands too.
I headed down to Andrews house the night before to catch up and do a little bit of filming in the house to form part of a documentary that Andrew is making about his build up to the Barrowlands. The music and several albums produced by Beluga Lagoon is often Andrew playing several different instruments and singing (occasionally with a female voice joining for a song) and then his mate Gregor putting it together in his music editing suite and adding some bit of playing from himself sometimes too. So when it comes to playing a live gig Andrew needs to pull together a bunch of friends to play on stage. Even though Andrew plays several instruments during an evening he cannot play several at the same time lol.
So the band comes together of Jim (his Dad) on guitar, Willy on Bass, Matt on Drums, Gregor on Guitar, Ian (fingers) on piano and Betty adding in some female vocals on some songs.
The band which has played a few smaller village halls of 200 to maybe 300 people. But Andrew a wildlife filmmaker has a break this year from filming for others and decided to give a few bigger gigs a go. I believe there was a little bit of pushing to do this from mates and family but possibly from the fans to who can struggle to get a ticket. So he booked Aviemore for 1100 people. Bigger than all previous concerts put together and to Andrews surprise I think, it sold out in 3 minutes lol. So then Stirling was booked for 800 people again sold out in a few minutes, then he thought maybe I could sell out the Barrowlands. Which sold out in 3 minutes for 2000 tickets and I believe from the website traffic within the first hour it could have sold out 3 nights in the first hours.
So on arriving at Andrews we had a good chat with Lyndsay and the kids then went and met Matt drummer in the put and Mark (from roaming in the wild) and Shona for a few beers. Mainly to help the nerves and sleep for the next day.
The next day we left the house at 9am to go set up in the Barrowlands. The sound crew and lighting crew were there on arrival setting up the stage and Andrew started getting his home made lighthouse (made by Jamie) and fire pit setup on the stage. Andrew being a filmmaker is quite into visuals too so likes to add to it.
Later my pal Rupert arrived, another filmmaker from Aviemore who would be the other half of our filmmaking team that night. We chatted through what we would do and got a song list from Andrew and what he wanted covered. The song list changes for every concert as Andrew know several fans come to each gig. This will keep changing as the year goes on and there are some pretty interesting changes too. This night he would also be trying out Isla and Margo & Barry tunes from the new album which came out only 6 days before this night.
Rupert and myself then started filming Barrowland stuff for setup shots. I did a few drone shots inside and outside too. Then the line outside formed and we did interviews and were amazed at how much Beluga Lagoon music had influenced people. We then headed inside to film the band getting ready. Andrew was remarkably calm and had plenty to say (usually he goes quiet towards the concert start). There were a few nerves in the team but most pretty happy to be at the Barrowlands backstage where many famous folk have been before them. Managed a bit of chat with the band. Gregor and Willy mainly just putting their faces to close to the camera and Willy often saying something inappropriate lol. But also some nice bits in-between. I then headed on stage and set 4 cameras going as things were about to start.
The band then hit the stage with Willy pushing Andrew up the ramp in a shopping trolley we found at the back stage door lol. Crowd erupts and the music starts. Have to say when oil;ming with the steady cam right at the front with the speakers right next to you it pretty emotional and just awesome. I couldn’t stop smiling.
The evening from here was just bouncing and rather than an audience build up like our past venues it just went full tilt straight away and stayed there. The following night in the pub with Andrew one lady said she’d seen loads of bands there over the past 30 years and can’t remember ever seeing the whole 2000 people jumping. Usually just folk st front going wild. few dancing in middle and folk at back sipping on a pint. So it was truly bouncing. What was brilliant was when they played Isla (Evan joined with his fiddle) and Margo and Barry from the new album the whole place was singing the songs back to Andrew and they had only been out for 6 days lol. Anyway what an awesome night and will be great to see what Andrew does with the footage as he pops together a wee short documentary for his youtube channel. https://www.youtube.com/@belugalagoonfilms8620
