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MANDY NUTTHALL             Vocals  &  Additional Instrumentation

PAUL BATTERTON:            Guitar

Gear



Guitars : Peavey EVH, Epiphone Les Paul standards, Line 6 Variax 600, Custom made Fender Strat.

Amp : Marshall MG250.

Pedals : Line 6 PodXT Live with additional Line 6 Expression pedal.





I started playing guitar at the tender age of 13 (23 years ago). I played in a number of bands at school and college but started taking things seriously in 1991 when I went to Reading Uni where I played in a rock covers band called “Veil Of Tears”. I played with this band for 5 years playing pubs and clubs all over the south of England as well as various functions on the university campus. I left this band in 1996 after I had moved to Leicester. I then took a few years off to take care of grown up stuff like marriage, kids and career etc. In 2004. I started to get the itch to play live music again and joined The Bootleg Rhythm Band which has now morphed into “The Contra Band”.



My early influences were the usual Clapton/Hendrix sort of stuff. Not surprisingly, I enjoy guitar driven music and have a number of heroes such as Gary Moore, Stevie Ray Vaughan, Nuno Bettencourt (Extreme), Paul Gilbert (Mr Big), Slash (G’n’R), Eddie Van Halen . . . the list goes on. I love to play classic rock tracks, which is something The Contra Band excels at. Since joining The Bootleg Rhythm Band, my musical tastes have become much more diverse. Playing in a band that can play rock one minute then soul the next followed by classic blues with some funk thrown in for good measure means that I pretty much listen to anything these days. Our bass player Nigel has even introduced me to music that is only available on something called Vinyl which looks like a big black CD. Apparently, these “records” were very popular in his day!!!!

KEVAN BARRETT:               Sax & Keys

Gear

Saxes:       Selmer Super 80 Alto,  Yanagisawa Elimona Tenor

Keys:         Yamaha Motif ES6; Yamaha S30

Amp:          Carlsboro Colt 120 Combo

I always wanted to take up the saxophone but I never got around to it until I was 20.
Fortunately I made rapid progress and soon started to play sax and clarinet in a local swing band at the start of the 1980’s.
I soon got the urge to play rock and played in a couple of original and covers bands, none of which achieved any significance.

In the mid 80’s, I took a short break to start a family but didn’t count on that lasting for 16 years!

During that time I kept my hand in by playing clarinet in a wind band and teaching myself the rudiments of keyboards.

In 2002 I was tempted back to live rock music again when I could not resist the opportunity to become my sax idol Andy Mackay in a proposed Roxy Music tribute band.

Despite many months of rehearsal the Roxy thing never quite made it to gig, however an offshoot of that, a covers band (Under The Covers) specialising in the ‘Interesting side of the sixties’ played several gigs including three gigs at the Robin 1 and 2. Despite some favourable reviews, this outfit never reached it’s full potential and slowly folded.

That brings me up to 2004, when I became the final founder member of The Bootlegs and from the beginning of 2008 my new venture The Contra Band.

NIGEL MINETT:                     Bass

MIKE STONE:                        Drums