Thelwall, Grappenhall & Latchford April 2015 | Page 52

Essential Feature

Diary of a Rock Band
Helen, Chester born and bred and lives
with her Magician Husband Paul.
Although she has sung her entire life,
Helen began her ‘official’ singing career
when landlord best friends Joe and
Helen, forced her into covering a slot that
had been cancelled the week before. She
had no gear and more importantly no
songs with only a few personal backing
tracks for fun. However with a week’s
notice and some serious determination
and folder full of words, she set out with
2 x 45 minute slots to fill and some old
borrowed, battered gear. She ran out of
songs and was harangued into repeating
her entire repertoire again but thankfully
it worked!!
She joined her first band back in 2009,
Rewind UK, and it was a brilliant time
in her life and still stays in contact
with many of the members but when it
disbanded (excuse the pun) she decided
to concentrate on solo performances
closer to home but soon got bored. She
started to look for other bands to join and
on the first t’interweb search, found Black
Thursday advertising for a new female
vocalist. They were a ROCK BAND!!!
Helen had no experience of singing rock
other than the odd ‘AC/DC’ track with
her previous function band, but she
knew she could pull it off so decided to
contact them.
She was offered a late night audition as
they had already lined up a load of other
girls so without much hope she went
and did her thing and left! Thankfully
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though, so the story goes, Garry, John and
Lee decided that Mike needed to make
sure she didn’t disappear and never come
back and so Mike ran after her (almost
getting run over as she was reversing….
literally!!) They offered her the gig then
and there and she’s never looked back.
Helen, although loving all types of
music, has a very odd penchant for
alternative covers specifically and can
regularly be found searching the web for
new and excited covers to listen to. She
loves to play around with songs to bring
a new style or genre to the mix and Black
Thursday proves this with their fantastic
Blues versions of Happy by Pharel
Williams and Voodoo Woman by Koko
Taylor.
‘I am so, so lucky to have the voice that
I do and to have found a band like Black
Thursday that allows me to experiment
personally with my range and styles of
singing. We have such a great relationship
and more importantly we have such a
great time together when we’re gigging,’
Helen says. ‘But there is nothing in this
world that makes me happier than seeing
people smiling when they’re listening
to us, if they dance that’s even better!
Sometimes they’re having so much fun
they want to join the band and as long as
they don’t touch my mic or tambourine,
we’re all good!’
Black Thursday are available for parties,
weddings or any event. For more
information call John on 077881 521150.
You can see a list of all our forthcoming
dates at www.nwb.co/blackthursday
You can also find us ion Facebook (blackThursday-uk) or on our website www.
blackthursdayuk.wix.com

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Thewlwall, Grappenhall & Latchford • Birchwood • Lowton & Golborne • Newton-le-Willows • Warrington Town