Go Ahead, Lick The Toad - Three Legged Dog Review

Feeling suitably inspired I put down the book and finally began this review I had promised many half moons ago. I find a hangover and a blurred Sunday morning a highly creative time. Tired and loose, the mind can wander in a perfectly natural state. One of the beneficial factors of a comedown. Every cloud has a scabby and warted underbelly – it’s just how you lick the toad that matters.
I was told that Three Legged Dog were a Celtic Folk-Rock band, so I braced myself for a cold trip to the blowing battlefields of the Highlands and a swim in the icy waters of a mythical Irish lake, set to the sounds of some kind of Paganesque, ritualistic, sacrificial ceremony. Better to be ready for the worst than to naively go skinny dipping with a gang of friendly Piranha.
Step It Out Mary did nothing to quash my preconceived ideas of folk music. Or at least its lyrical content anyway. Tales of debauchery, and sexual urge and trade abound. A hard shuffling drum beat sets the song off at an aggressive pace, with a classic folk acoustic guitar riff fluttering away like a hepped up butterfly. Then SLAM, the rhythm section batters me in the back. The charging, war painted cavalry come charging down the hill. Right at me. Stand and take it. Just as I thought “this is it, time to get trampled by great huge crazed Scots in skirts”, The Ogre grabs me on the gallop and whisks me away on horseback. As enemy or friend is still unclear. My hairy chauffeur is telling me of a local girl he is to marry. A fine looking maiden by the sounds of it, “Eyes like diamonds and golden hair”. She’ll do, but I have a feeling she’s not to share. I dread to think of The Ogres reaction if I offered to take this girl to the local tavern for a mead. An ancient descendant of the Hells Angels he maybe, but in the mood to share his future bride he is not.
Dangling across his saddle like a deer strapped to the bonnet of a mountain poacher’s station wagon, I do well to keep my flailing arms and loose necked head out of the charging legs of this huge beast. I still manage to maintain a respectful and polite conversation with my saddle man.
We charged into town at around 8 o’clock and were greeted by the beautiful Mary and her father. From my unusual view, it appears he is selling his fine young daughter to The Ogre, demanding she show some leg and marry the wealthy outlaw. “Jesus”, I thought, “this is the clan to be in”.
The rhythm stayed close behind at all times. Tight and on cue to join in on the drunken jeering and leering. A constant huge heavy hand on my back, slamming every breath from my lungs, as all I could do was smile along and wish it was me taking this girl forevermore on Sunday. I don’t think the old man was too impressed by me though. Not exactly the big hero from out of town. More like supper.
The ceremony was short and to the point.
“Do you, Ogreman, take Mary to be your lawful wedded wife?”
“Eey, that I do.”
“I pronounce you man and wife” and without so much as a kiss for the camera’s The Ogre stomped off down the aisle like some Neanderthal, dragging the heat of my groin behind him.
Stood with the many locals in the joyous churchyard, I thought I heard Al Wilson’s Northern Soul classic, The Snake. I must have spooked the giant worm, and The Snake slid off and left me standing with young Matty Groves and The Fiddle.
The whorish cuckold that is Lord Donald’s wife approached us both. “A fine way to get over the loss of young Mary” I thought. But of course the whore wasn’t interested in the big haired, loose limbed stranger, brought into town strapped across the saddle of the big, strong, rich, primitive Mr Ogreman. Oh no. Matty Groves was her prey.
Bald as brass she came out with it, “come home with me and sleep till nine.” That little ratbag. How did he do it? Was this an ambush or something of a regular? I urged him, with my new friend The Fiddle, “Go on you fool. Take her for all she’s worth! Your master’s woman! Jesus boy! Take her and give her the lashing she’s after! Prod the kipper!”
There was a commotion in the crowd. I couldn’t be sure what it was, but there was a definite trail. Like the way a mole lifts the turf as the little bastard goes blindly racing around under the perfect Miracle Grown lawn, inches from the surface. It was the servant! That little snitch shit swine!
The affair rolled on with flashes of 60’s stabbing jangle, and a powerful bass line, keeping the party going with a constant forceful push of its huge barrel chest.
Last I heard from the great peaking female vocal, was that old crazy Lord Donald had done them both in, and that was it. All change. The Fiddle took the lead and hailed the murder. Gathering purpose and energy, a fuzzing guitar soon followed. At a canter the fuzz took centre stage, with a filthy solo worthy of any garage psyche blues freakout. Somebody ripped the door from its hinges and the band came in and stomped me.
I came around 2 hours and fourteen days later; who knows how many years. The soft dewy grass had soaked my back through and the early morning air froze me to the bone. A thick layer of mist hovered inches above the loch. If I had a leaf blower big enough, a big, huge, petrol powered, industrial strength DeWalt bugger, I could have blown the ghostly covering right off in a few sharp blasts, off into the trees.
“I’ll start the goddamn day at my pace if that’s ok?!”
But I didn’t have a blower. Or much else. All I had was my thin leather jacket, Funkadelic T-shirt (soaked), Levi’s, and my trusted desert boots. I was freezing. I thought I was going to shatter my teeth I was shivering so bad. My jaw completely malfunctioning. Better keep my tongue well back from the calcium bladed guillotine. I don’t know if you’ve ever been conscious of the positioning of your tongue within your mouth, but once you are, and you try and control it, you’re in for a strenuous ride. Impossible to swallow.
I sat up and sank my hands down into the soft grass behind me and tried get my bearings. Nothing but mist and huge pine trees, prickling the low early morning cloud. Still no sun to burn off this eerie loneliness. I expected Hemmingway himself to enter stage left from the forest of pine, fishing rod in hand. Or maybe David Lynch dressed as Agent Dale Cooper in a dreamlike twist.
But I was greeted by something a lot less expected.
Across the inlet I could barely make out the figure of a woman. She was alone and singing some kind of folk tune. Black Is The Colour. Her voice carried across the loch like a swan on floating timber. She sang of her love. Another woman. Great news! Maybe a woman/woman thing? Or maybe just artistic license. The acoustic guitars began sweeping away the cloud and the sun made its warm presence known to all. I hope she finds her woman as I hoped to find my way out of this clearing and back to civilisation. I sent my best back across to her and got up to get lost in the forest.
Toes now soaking and pruned. That’s what you get for wearing canvas shoes in deep wet grass. SWINE BASTARD!!
It must have been late afternoon when I finally found the road. From my left a car came gunning up the road toward me. Lights dipped in the low sun, he came straight for me. “Holy Jesus! Not the Ogre?” The bastard boomed right by me. Missing me by inches. It could never have been the Ogre. Though the speeding Volvo was as trusty as his battle scarred horse, I don’t imagine he would’ve made it through the Theory Test. Hazard Perception? The Ogre? The hairy bastard would run down any hazard on the road like a slack jawed Hick chasing down a trespassing city slicker for some back door barn dancing. YEEEHAAAAA! YES SIRREE WE GOT A FINE ONE HEEERE!
The Volvo - the dense Pine - the giant blue and yellow IKEA billboard standing bright and bold behind me? Surely not? But sure enough I was. I was In Scandinavia. I was in SCANDINAVIA! How? How did this happen? What did the Ogre man and his keen rhythm section do to me when I passed out? Did they send me off with the Vikings as some sort of tartan scalp trophy? Treacherous behaviour. To be expected.
“Here we stand in Scandinavia.”
You are not wrong my friend. Just you, me, and the acoustic guitar keeping up hope. He plays a fine tune. Somewhere between Stairway to Heaven and the soft acoustic side of Pink Floyd.
The speeding Volvo was long gone. My only chance was to follow him on foot and hope to find civilisation before I fall into the depths of an energy sapping panic attack.
So off I set.
“See you later my friend.” I shook the vocal by the hand and left him there in the middle of the road. The crazy bastard just stood there, singing to the sky. How could he keep such hope in this remote place of ‘natural beauty’?
He’ll get his comeuppance.
I didn’t get far before he chased me down. But he wasn’t alone. A whole gang of the crazies chased me. But they chased me with open arms and smiles of great joy. But good clean joy. They don’t seem the type to be popping the little ones or chasing the little white line.
But you never know....
The drums and bass ran like the fat kids in the three legged race on sports day. Full of joyful purpose and huge persuasion. The Fiddle was doing its best to be a calming influence on us all, but I could tell it was bursting to join the surge. The overdriven guitar waited back like the star of the show biding his time. Waiting for the right time to bust out to the front and give it to us. Total respect for his band. Totally tasteful. They were right up on my back. I broke into a run so not to be battered by the wave. Hopefully they would pick me up and wash me away with them. Rush me away to safety and an ice cold, locally brewed beer. She jumped on my back wailing a mantra of good times and self belief. “Oh my soul let it carry me” and off we ran. A bunch of kids running from the scene of a village crime.
As we tired and the moon filled, we stopped in at the first bar we came to. It was very much a wooden shack type of tavern. Full of life and hectic drunken, knees up partying. I could hear the music as we’d been approaching. They all seemed up for a good old jig, but I was no mover. We burst through the door and I expected to be greeted by a sharp and sudden silence. And by shit did we get one.
Oh no. Here we go. Strung up by our ankles and dried for four years, heavily salted and finally sliced thin and served with good bread like fine Danish salami....
But no. One huge toothy smile from our front lady set off a huge roar of laughter, and we were drafted in. I had no time or desire for the dancing. A cold beer was top of any list. So I sat alone at the bar as the rest of my new, strangely easily excited friends, danced and jigged and twisted and twirled away to the live music. A traditional folk type of instrumental. All high energy and fiddly deeing. Music you can’t help but get red cheeked to. Lannigans Ball.
“Ah fuck it, out of my way! Let me spill beer with my new friends!!” And down I jumped from my bar side stool and into the mass of grinning faces and intertwining arms.
“Mazbeth my fat perverse friend! What are you doing here?!”
“Ah ha ha ha ha!” he gravelled back at me as he threw a big old arm round me, nearly pulling me to the floor.

My experience of Three Legged Dog.
Songs – Step It Out Mary
Matty Groves
Black Is The Colour
In Scandinavia
Lannigans Ball