Our 1st Gig with Flip Side

It was March 2016 and Flip Side was fresh on the scene! 

We were asked to perform alongside another local band for a 40th birthday party.

At this time there really wasn't any other act around the same location doing what we had set out to do, which was an 1980s style duo. We wanted to be different, we loved the 80s and knew others would. 

We hadn't had much time to prepare for this night, so we arrived a little freaked out! 

Although I had quite a few years of entertaining under my belt previous to this, being the 1st performance together, there was a level of stress happening. 

Lofty was a little greener to the entertainment world, so a naturally talented, but nervous guy got thrown into this all rather quickly! (We will tell you all about how that happened another day)

At this early stage in our journey, we were 2 singers, singing our hearts out! Later on, we added the keyboards. 

Neither of us drink alcohol, but this night we took a bottle of French Brandy with us (we still have that bottle!) and had one shot before we started for the nerves. (a very good friend, who was a big inspiration to me, gave me this advice back in 1990)

As the clock ticked over, it was our time to start, & we looked out to that big dance floor and put on our best "Were not nervous" smiles hoping they would like us.

I think we must have looked like a rabbit in headlights for a second or 2!

Our 1st song was Time after time by Cyndi Lauper. 

We went on to sing a big range of 80s tunes for the rest of our stint including the now famous for our Pom Poms cover of "Hey Mickey"

The Pom Poms were an idea we had, and we got told "that will never work!" Well, 10 years later people ask us "Can you bring the Pom Poms"

Quite quickly they started to dance! We were relieved. They liked us! We were told throughout the night they loved hearing songs they hadn't heard in ages, and it was refreshing! Remember this was 10 years ago and the 80s comeback hadn't really started fully

That night went on to go incredibly well, and we landed our next gig out of it booked straight away on the night and the rest is history.

We will be forever grateful to Mark for asking us to do his 40th birthday (he had heard my sister and i sing at the local AMP show) This was the start of a 10 year very busy run! 

Below: our 1st ever promo pic taken this night

Keep dancing everyone, 

Sharon x

PCENZ