[font=trebuchet ms]There was a guy named Stanley in the town I grew up in who was a bit of a nutter, but he loved Rock'n'Roll. He was the kind of guy who becomes famous for being widely known, see?. It was an important kind of seal of approval if Stanley dug your band. And his ultimate accolade was to say he had jammed tambourine with you.

Our first big gig was the first dance of the year at the high school I had graduated from. I was nervous enough about that on it's own, but as we were setting up, I heard that Stanley was coming. But I was prepared.

He appeared out of the crowd at the front of the stage, just as we finished the first song of our second set. Our bass player was also our leader, and he wasn't cool about having Stanley get up on stage with us. He was under some pressure because our lead singer had crapped out on us, leaving him to handle the vocals. I kind of slid in between him and Stanley, and waved him on up. While Stanley was bouncing up the steps at the side of the stage, I went back to my rig and pulled a package out of my kit.

I meet Stanley at centre stage and gave him the package. It was a tambourine that I had painted and put sparkles on. He was gassed! We played a stretched version of Savoy Brown's "Louisiana Blues", while Stanley went nuts with his new tambourine.

He was raving about our band all over town for weeks![/font] :D