The infamous Blackbeard not-best-men’s speech
On Saturday 10th May 2014 Blackbeard’s Tea Party members Dave Boston and Laura Barber became man and wife. The wedding and reception taking place at Wold Top Brewery in the East Riding of Yorkshire.
It was a beautiful ceremony full of music and laughter, followed by a most excellent buffet with plenty of Wold Top beer flowing. Then came three very poignant speeches, from the father of the bride, the father of the groom, and the newly married couples themselves.
And then the day took a turn for the worse, when the four remaining members of Blackbeard’s Tea Party took to the stage to give a speech. We present that speech here for public consumption. Enjoy.
The Speech
Stu: Good evening. We’ve heard all the soppy and emotional speeches, so I think the time has come for the character assassinations… Dave. We’ve known Dave for about five years. We see Dave virtually every day, and Laura and Dave have been planning this wedding for two years now. So when Dave asked us to make this speech two weeks ago we felt a whole range of emotions. Pride,
Martin: joy,
Tim: anxiety,
Yom: anger,
Stu: despair.
Martin: Standing up and making speeches doesn’t come naturally to everyone. Being in front of a crowd you don’t know, not knowing how they’ll react, being completely under-rehearsed, and fearing you may offend and be booed off stage. However being professional musicians we’re completely accustomed to this. So with that in mind… let’s begin.
Tim: For those of you who don’t know, we are…
Stu: Stuart,
Martin: Martin,
Yom: Yom
Tim: & Tim, members of Laura and Dave’s band Blackbeard’s Tea Party, part-time musicians and full-time carers for David here. However, we are not the best men. Dave and Laura made it very clear that they did not want a best man for the wedding. So although we made the wedding playlist,
Stuart: organised the stag do,
Martin: set up the PA,
Yom: and are giving the speech,
Tim: we are emphatically NOT best men.
Yom: Seeing as we are definitely not the best men, we definitely didn’t look up how to make best men speeches on the internet, and we definitely didn’t do this last night….
Stuart: If we were the best men and had looked it up on the internet, we would have seen that we should pay a compliment to the bride. So, I think everyone in the room can be in total agreement when we say that Laura looks absolutely beautiful today! A solid 10 out of 10! (Pause for applause and wolf whistles). Dave on the other hand – nil points – but maybe you’ll improve as the evening progresses and you drink more rum!
Martin: Most of us met Dave when we first formed Blackbeard’s Tea Party. Guitar, drums, bass and vocals were already sorted. All we were missing was a feisty fiddle player. Enter Laura.
Yom: We really wanted Laura to join our band but she would only play if she could bring her drummer boyfriend along. This was one more drummer than we needed or wanted, but in what would be the first of many instances, Laura ended up getting her own way! Dave, now that you have finally tied the knot, expect this to happen more and more often.
Martin: It was during our first rehearsal that we became aware of Dave’s incredible optimism and knack for succinctly summarising the events around him. He remarked: “Well, I thought this was going to be rubbish, but it might actually be quite good.”
Tim: Being a sometime function band we see a lot of weddings - a lot of great buffets, a lot of beautiful dresses, a lot of great speeches by bestmen who had more than 2weeks to prepare…
Yom (interrupting): We’re not the best men!
Tim: …so, Dave and Laura, believe us when we say, with great authority, ‘We thought this wedding was going to be rubbish, but it might actually be quite good.’
Stuart: Dave is the most forgetful and absent minded man we have ever met. It’s easier to talk about the days when Dave hasn’t left something essential behind. You name it and he has lost it: his clothes, his wallet, his keys, his phone, his Djembe. How do you lose a Djembe?!
Martin: Recently, on a flight to Spain, Dave lost his passport. He had his passport when he got onto the plane, he had his passport when he sat down in his seat, he didn’t move from his seat and he was in an enclosed space 30,000 feet up in the air. When we touched down, Dave had lost his passport. It turned out that Dave had put it my pocket.
Stuart: However, our absolute favourite thing that Dave has ever forgotten, in all the time we have known him, was the time he forgot to ask us to do a best men speech until two weeks before his wedding!
Yom (interrupting): It’s not a best man’s speech!
Tim: So, I bet you’re all wondering how Dave possibly managed to win a woman like Laura. Let us explain… How to woo your bride, in five easy steps, by David Sidney Boston:
Martin: Step One: Attract the female’s attention. Taking his cue more from the behind of a baboon than the tail of a peacock,
Dave decided the best way to attract Laura’s attention was to paint himself green and sweat profusely in her general direction whilst banging loudly on a drum. It was love a first sight.
Yom: Step Two: Demonstrate your superiority over every other male. Laura, a lifelong vegetarian, could hardly restrain herself while watching Dave’s ability to devour three mixed grills in one sitting.
Tim: Step Three: Show a common interest. To show a common bond with his paramour, Dave took a liking to the song “Laura” by the “Scissor Sisters”, because - you know - they are both called Laura. He liked the song so much he decided to make a recording of it accompanied by his own Djembe playing. He then arranged for his friend to deliver this recording to Laura on her birthday, while Dave was holidaying in Guinea. We are pleased to say we that very recording with us tonight. Hit it, DJ!
[Excrutiating record is played. Everyone looks around a bit awkwardly. Stu, Matin, Yom and Tim pull some shapes.]
Stuart: Step Four: Treat her to a romantic evening. For their first night together, Dave wanted to give Laura a taste of the romantic
delights that he would provide in their future marriage. He paid for a meal of rum, with a side order of rum at the Gallery – a nightclub in York. Having persuaded Laura to come back to his place Dave dimmed the lights, lay on his bed and whispered those three magical little words: “Wanna watch Anchorman?”
Martin: Step Five: (The Final Step) Mark your territory. As any man knows, once you have trapped your mate, you must mark your territory,
so that she is not stolen in the night by another band member. Dave chose to do this in a tent, in Bromsgrove, but that story is not really suitable for public broadcast. If you do want to know what happened on that fateful night you’ll have to ask us the next time you see us!
Stuart: Despite it all, we’ve come to see the qualities in Dave that we know Laura sees in Dave…
Martin: his charm,
Yom: his friendliness,
Tim: his appetite,
Martin: his caring nature
Stuart: and his massive co…
Yom (interrupting): …ollection of drums!
Stuart: We are all incredibly fond of him, and we think of him as a brother. So please join us, in a toast to Our Friends, Dave and Laura, on their wedding day.
To Dave And Laura!