It’s fast approaching the end of 2009 and with it the end of Scotland’s Year of Homecoming and the celebration of the 250th anniversary of the national bard, Robert Burns.  We took part in a couple of big events to mark the end of this celebration year, beginning in Glasgow with Homecoming Live.  Some of the biggest names in the Scottish music scene came together for joint concerts in the Clyde Auditorium and the SECC but it was definitely the Chilli’s who were the hardest working as we played in both venues!  We opened the show at a packed Clyde Auditorium, whipping the crowd into a frenzy of Scottishness before Hue and Cry took to the stage, and while they were just getting settled into their first song, we were darting across the road to the SECC to do it all over again!

It’s a great pleasure for us to be able to help celebrate one of Scotland’s favourite sons and what better place to do that than in Dumfries, where he lived and worked for a large part of his life.  And so we headed down to the southwestern corner of Scotland for the ‘Dumfries Fling’ the day after our SECC and Clyde Auditorium double-whammy. The cold weather did nothing to keep the ‘Doonhamers’ away and a huge crowd filled the town centre to help us close this special commemorative year in real Scottish style.  There was an even more special surprise at the end of our performance as we were joined onstage by Santa Claus himself to turn on the Dumfries Christmas lights!

A couple of weeks later we were down in Catterick, at the Bourlon Army Barracks to perform for the annual christmas party of the Scots Guards.  It was a real honour for us to meet so many brave service men and women and we were extremely humbled by the fact that some of them referred to us as heroes! It was a great fun event and we were extremely well looked after and we had a fantastic support act in the Pipes and Drums of the Scots Guards.  In a great ‘Cribs’ style moment, this rather happy looking chappy was delighted to show off his ‘wheels’ to Chris and Mal!

A week after that and we were up in Dunfermline to play to a sold out Alhambra theatre.  This beautiful looking old theatre provided a great setting for our Chilli Christmas Special.  We had a few surprises for the audience this night, including and Elf handing out sweeties and another special appearance from Santa, although this time he had a very suspicious looking red mohican hairdo and a red guitar!

We were also joined onstage by a miniature version of our G-man, a young lad whose name was, strangely enough, Gregor! He even had a mini red guitar and a mini red Mohawk! When Stuart spoke to him on the stage, mini Gregor told us that he’d been playing guitar for 5 years, even though he’s only 4 years old – now that’s dedication for you!  Many people did think that this was a stunt organised by us but it was honestly just a chance encounter in a restaurant prior to the gig that introduced us to the mini G-man.

It was a great night altogether and a great opportunity to say:

MERRY CHRISTMAS FROM THE CHILLI’S!!

i think it is a funny picture but funny in a very cool way just like the band they are the coolest ever!!!

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