Provence
Apart from three Covid years, the German rock cover band Five and the Red One (named, so they say, because one of them has a ‘fire mark’) have played a free concert on the Cours here in the village every summer since 2008. I first saw them in 2009 when my three daughters were teenagers. The four of us, along with our friends Monica and André, who were then in their mid-sixties, stood together near the front jumping up and down and singing along. Some of the wee ones who sat on their fathers’ shoulders behind us might have children of their own by now.
Last year a rowdy coterie let the well-built 6ft 3in guy who owns the expensive hat shop in the village crowd-surf and, discovering the burden was beyond them, let go. As he fell he narrowly missed crushing tiny Monica. Before Saturday’s concert she said she wouldn’t be joining me in the mosh pit this year. ‘I’ve got to stop sometime,’ she said. Understandable, but sad nonetheless. End of an era.
American Cathy stepped up as a late substitution. She’s going through a difficult time; her marriage ended in April and, as often happens when an individual is stressed, she’s become accident-prone. Her body can’t keep up with her brain. At the village’s recent Bastille Day celebrations, she fell and banged her head on the way back from buying the second round of drinks of the evening; the third minor head injury she’s sustained in a year. Onlookers told us she was out cold for a full minute. Medics are the worst patients. By the time her colleague Tina and I got to her she was sitting on the kerb beneath a plane tree telling everyone she was a doctor and to cancel the ambulance. Pointing to Tina, she said: ‘She’s a doctor too. I’m OK.’
I’d cleaned the slightly bleeding wound under the hair at her left temple by the time the ambulance arrived a few minutes later, lights flashing and sirens blaring. Despite her protestations, the pompiers insisted on checking her over. ‘You look fine, Madame, but come with us. Two minutes.’ The ambulance doors closed behind them. After what seemed like an age we heard laughing and the doors opened. ‘At least I got to sit in the ambulance with the young hot guys. I wanna dance to “September”.’ Ten minutes later, arms aloft, she led the entire dance floor in a conga line round the square. Unlike the French, I hate that sort of thing but in order to keep the patient under observation, I put my hands on her waist and followed. A row of outstretched arms formed a tunnel and the long line stooped to dance through.
Afterwards we bumped into my friends Charlotte and Ed. As I introduced Cathy, they stared. I turned. The dancing and bending had reopened her wound and blood was pouring thickly down her face and neck. Grateful as I was to have Cathy at my side in the mosh pit on Saturday, I knew I couldn’t let her out my sight.
I gave the lead singer a hug, which landed somewhere between maternal and teenage fan girl
The band kicked off with the Steve Miller Band’s ‘The Joker’. They looked, sounded and moved as a rock band ought – a mesmerising and nostalgic spectacle. The audience of about a thousand souls roared in appreciation. David, the lead singer, effortlessly held the performance together, much as the conductor and soloist would for an orchestra.
The mosh pit was, as usual, a heaving, beery, stomping, sweaty mess. People of all ages and nationalities forgot their worries for a few hours and joyfully sang and danced as one. I turned to watch the crowd during ‘Sweet Child of Mine’, and saw Monica and André coming to join us. For a while she and I held hands as we danced. Things got a little wilder during ‘I Can’t Get No Satisfaction’, and as the band began to play ‘Should I Stay or Should I Go’, a favourite of mine, Monica left. Wise move. A few bars in, the crowd went mental. I’m not very big in flip-flops and Cathy’s shorter than me. Soon we were swamped by huge guys, dripping in sweat, either barging into us or trying to engage. But, slight as I am, I spent 50 years in the environs of Glasgow and they soon backed off.
A glorious three-part, revved-up sing-along to ‘Twist and Shout’ brought things down from the febrile heights of posh-boy punk and to the finale, ‘Highway to Hell’.
Afterwards, when the DJ took over, I saw David, whom I know slightly, on the square and gave him a hug which landed somewhere between maternal and teenage fan girl. Apart from his sodden Robert Plant curls, he was transformed from rock singer back into an ordinary 40-year-old German father of three. I asked him how the village compared to other venues. ‘We don’t do
any other gigs,’ he said. ‘I’m forming another band and writing my own stuff, but this band stopped touring when we started having families and only gets together once a year for this. We do it for fun. Stay there. Don’t move. I want you to meet my uncle. He’s a really cool guy…’
Comments