Costa Del Folk was Blackbeard’s Tea Party’s first overseas gig, and this presented a whole new set of entertaining travel difficulties, including Tim nearly losing his train tickets and the band being completely unable to locate the taxi rank at Manchester Airport. Moreover, guitarist Martin had never been abroad before (it was only recently that he ventured outside Cornwall and learned to speak English) and so he had to apply for his first passport. Due to his Cornish DNA we had no idea whether he would be able to breathe the air in Europe, eat something that wasn’t a pasty, or cope with actual sunlight…
Imagine our relief then, when, without incident, we landed at Malaga airport late in the morning of Friday 14th March, after which we were ferried to the Alay Hotel in Benalmadena, about 40 minutes from Malaga. All the artists and ticket holders were sharing the same hotel, meaning you were likely to bump into Steve Knightley propping up the bar sipping a sangria, or Mike Harding oiling himself up on a sun lounger.

Our first day was gig-free, giving us time to aclimatise and explore the surroundings. The hotel had 4 main performance areas, plus two bars, a swimming pool, and a games area which doubled as a music-session room. Plus, the hotel was just a short stroll from a glorious sandy beach. Having settled with a few beers and a mojito, we went about challenging our friends Steamchicken to a pool tournament – and absolutely thrashed them.

The next day, drunk on victory and San Miguel, we began squaring up to The Demon Barbers and soon found that we’d unknowingly entered into an inter-band volley-ball grudge-match. Stuart had played a bit of volley-ball at school, but the rest of us had no clue what we were doing. The Demons are formidable opponents. There were more of them for a start, and they’re all in fairly good shape. Plus, Damien is fiercely competitive. In comparison, we looked like a shambling bunch of pasty miscreants. The match went to 3 sets, and the final set came right down to the wire. It was match point to us and Stuart tapped it over the net. It looked as though it was going out and then – all of a sudden – a huge gust of wind blew it back in. It was a close contest, but a glorious victory for BTP nonetheless.

On Saturday morning Tim jumped, fully clothed, into the pool in a bid to relieve his hangover. Soon, we were all joining him, bombing and throwing each other in. It wasn’t heated, and despite being sunny and warm in Spain, the pool was like an ice plunge. The temperature didn’t deter us though, and soon we were splashing about with some novelty inflatables. That night, punters and artists alike descended to the basement bar to bop to the wonderful Steamchicken who were on great form as ever. Somehow, the roots jazz of Steamchicken soon gave way to an all out pop disco, with some very drunk folkies pulling shapes to Beyoncé until the early hours of the morning.

In between all this high-jinx we played 3 gigs – an afternoon and evening concert on the garden stage, and a raucous ceilidh in the basement bar. They were our first public gigs of the year and went down well. We also had chance to watch some great sets from old friends The Demon Barbers, The Tom McConville Band and Flossie Malavialle, as well as new friends Miranda Sykes & Rex Preston, The Hillbilly Troop and local band Stolen Gnomes. Dave and Yom also found time to run a very well attended (and very noisy!) percussion workshop with Gary Hammond of The Hut People.

We finished off the festival on Sunday night, dancing like lunatics to Steamchicken before returning to Manchester airport on Monday morning with some very heavy heads.

The first Costa Del Folk was a roaring success and the good people at Enjoy Travel are already making plans for another next year. Y Viva España!

 

 

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