THE BEAT?, "i'll let you know".

What a palava i had yesterday over THE BEAT supposedly playing in a park in leyton, things started looking bad when i spoke to a friend and was told the day was starting at 11.30am at the tube station so that the drinking could start early, i looked at the clock with my bleary 'just woken' eyes and saw it was 11.15. Even if i had been ready i still needed to get a bus to the tube station, "drinkers!".
So i made arrangements to meet 'there' and to keep in touch, i waited till everyone was together and phoned someone up and told them that THE BEAT'S website said they were in the middle of an American tour, "oh, its not that band", " BEAT but they are still a good band" i was told, "right" i was beginning to think, "its not the actual real BEAT but it is supposed to be a (and i quote) ska-ish" i thought again "hmmm" i thought quickly, "just let me know when you move" was my masterly idea, "o.k, we are in a pub next to the train station but the band are on at 2pm so we will go over to the park sometime before then" i was told, so i put my phone down and thought about how i was going to waste half an hour.
The next thing i know its 1.30pm and i have fallen asleep in front of a DVD and was cursing my friends to the sky for not phoning me even though i also cursed myself because Ive slept through the phone ringing lots of times before, but it still suited me to blame them when i checked my phone and i had no missed calls (phoning them was too much of a sensible idea), so i half dozed through the rest of the DVD and forgot about the time.
At 2,15pm i received a call from my friends telling me "we are just leaving the pub and are about to have a wonder over to watch the band" so i checked the time and due to a lack of a TARDIS of my own laying around my home i knew i wouldn't make it, but i hopefully said "let me know what the band are like and who they actually are, this BEAT name has me all confused", friend-"OK".
So, i didn't end up going because i weighed up the options, was i going to an unknown park at a station that i forgot to ask what line it was on, was it the BT overground or THE TUBE? and all to see a band just because i was interested to see why they called themselves the beat, in the cold and i would of been at least an hour too late, providence was not on my side it seemed, so instead i went back to THE BEAT'S website and watched some of their videos.
Today i spoke to one of the friends who went yesterday and asked them for some information about the band and who they were, all i got was a "they were really good" and a "don't know" as to the bands identity. dontcha just love word of mouth, i have been to so many events that were not even happening over the years that i wonder where they come from, quite often they have even included the address of distant suburbs that must of taken some work to find in the first place!
I do know that some years back during the 1980's (and before and after, i don't know) some underhanded promoters were advertising bands as playing at venue's when it wasn't true, it was a common ruse to raise the profile of club's and promoters pretending to put on big name bands (even if they didn't play in which case the band was usually blamed), or it was to look good when trying to book bands saying "oh, we've had so and so booked before", but this was nothing to do with that, the reason i have nothing to tell you about the day even though i was expecting to go was due to me not wanting to pound the pub doors open on a Sunday morning to drink myself sick and not wishing to see a band simply because i heard the name of a band said wrongly that sounded like a famous band, and worst of all i listened to half spoken rumours yet again. egg on face time for me again I'm afraid.
Or maybe THE BEAT did really play, but i have my doubts, sorry about advertising them below, usually my friend isn't wrong, but then again i do remember an article below that ran broadly along the same lines!
Oh, and the WALTHAMSTOW FESTIVAL finished about three weeks ago, i really know some clued up people don't i!?!