In the restaurant last Friday night, we had the misfortune to stumble across a live act. A couple of old blokes were on a small stage at the far end, engaged in a karaoke session - so a bit like the Pet Shop Boys, then. I jest, of course; the music was a selection of oldies, such as "Sweet Caroline", "I Just Called To Say I Love You", and "Bye Bye Love". All were being completely murdered.
A guy who was sitting alone, just a couple of tables away, was tapping the table in time with the noise, and getting rather enthusiastic. The OTT clapping at the end of each song was becoming more nauseating than the singing. The keyboard player then took the lead while the supposed singer of the pair took a short break from "performing". Seconds later I exclaimed that the Clapper had left, but no, he'd stood up and joined the singer a few feet away. Obviously the old git was glad of the attention from the fan, who was no doubt demented and putting in a request for some diabolical tune.
Two nights earlier I'd described as a "Habitat curtain" an ice cream dessert which was layers of various shades of brown and cream, in a glass. The singer was not wearing a Habitat curtain, I announced, but was in fact wearing a Wilko shower curtain. His shirt was black, grey and white, in a weird block-type pattern.
Our guess regarding Clapper's request was proved correct, because Wilko proceeded to sing a peculiar song with great passion, reading from his karaoke screen. Clapper was going like them (the Clappers) and tapping profusely while getting quite animated. He then stood and was moved by a waiter to a table very much closer to the performers, where he started to clap in the style of "Manuel" (from Fawlty Towers) with a flourish which suggested he might suddenly turn a shade of Flamenco!!!
A couple of minutes later, four blokes joined Clapper at his new table. Then, he got up and sauntered over to another table, where he asked a woman of indeterminate age to dance. She accepted the invitation, and they were at it for a while, until the instrumental of "Tulips From Amsterdam" seemed to kill the mood, and they split. The barrel organ music rumbled on, to produce the direst dirge imaginable.
Hilarious!!! Five minutes later I was looking across the restaurant towards the stage, where the keyboard player was doing nothing and achieving even less. To the right and set back a bit, was a curtain which suddenly moved, opened with a wild flourish and a swishing noise that travelled easily to my ears, bypassing the other musical noise. Out stepped Wilko, from a cubicle (or it should really have been a shower, bearing in mind the shower-curtain shirt!). His flamboyance was met with no reaction from anyone, and who knows what he was up to.
"And I said to myself, what a wonderful world" was slurred by the keyboard player, who was having another go at singing. The outcome was similar to when I used to play my mum's 45rpm vinyl singles at 33rpm. "Red roses too" was more like an elongated "Tiramisu".
As they finished up, I wondered if the last track was from Simon & Garfunkel - The Sound of Silence. But it wasn't that; no, it was the clearest, purest dose of peace and quiet, and provided true enlightenment.
It was the sound of one hand clapping.
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