“The Village, you must go to the Village”.  When I opened the Glasgow shop 10 years ago, I constantly heard this statement. So when the LIST magazine sent myself and the then food editor Barry Shelby ( currently being burnt alive inside a wicker man somewhere in the Hebrides), I was ecstatic and so as it turned out was the Village Curry House, that year they ran away with the LIST’S best budget Restaurant of the year.

Fast forward a few years to, probably the best night of my life so far. Me and big Jesmo finished our shift at Lupe Glasgow and headed to the Horseshoe bar in the centre, sank a few pints and meandered across the bridge to Tradestown an area famed for Fireplace salesrooms, warehousing and office supplies. When you get to the other side of the bridge at night and start wandering past pitch black industrial monstrosities, empty car parks, the constant rustle of witches knickers, plastic bags trapped for a lifetime on barbed wire, howling like werewolves or stray dogs. Panic sets in. This looks like a great place for gangland beating or worse still alien abduction. Persevere and turn a few corners and like a neon lit oasis in a world of no hope and darkness.

THE VILLAGE and it’s packed on a Sunday night, the Takeaway queue is 10 deep and luckily I phoned ahead for a table, the place is buzzing. We order a curry each and some nans a couple of mango lassis to put a lining on our stomachs for the astronomical amount of drink we will consume in approximately an hour. The curries are out of this world, perhaps were getting abducted after all , the nans are light as a feather, all our fellow diners are delighted, the place is oozing warmth, a difficult place to leave but leave we must, for we must rock.

How about this for a gig, a Rock and Roll Combo in the style of Surf guitar instrumentals warring all black, their faces disguised behind Mexican Wrestlers masks, are about to play The Grand Ole Opry

Country and Western club in Glasgow. Our pace quickens, we pass another office supply warehouse, just down the road from an Italian furniture shop where Elvis would furnish his Southside mansion if he were still alive and living in Glasgow.

The Grand Ole Opry is where all the country and western fans hang out, many dress in cowboy gear, hold fake shoot outs and you can say what you want about that, I think they have a damn fine taste in music, and we and a whole bunch of other strangers were welcomed warmly into their strange domain, and the beer is social club prices so yeeha and down the neck with a few lagers.

The lights dim and if my very poor Spanish serves me rightly a machine gun speed announcement along the lines of  Ladies and Gentlemen all the way from Los Angeles, California will you please put your hands together for that unique rock and roll combo. LOS STRAIGHTJACKETS. The lights come on revealing 4 masked musicians.The band burst into life, playing their amazing high speed surf style guitar instrumentals. It takes about four songs for the small dance floor to fill completely but by the time they start on their version of a Link Wray classic there are two lines of Cowboys sequence dancing and a bunch of lads and lassies twisting and jiving and that’s enough to get me up for a bit of leg trembling and quiff thrashing. The Spanish announcements continue throughout the set of amazing Rock and roll instrumentals and the masked men start doing some spectacular Shadow style moves that send the audience into fits of hysteria. All this is done in the front of the back drop of a cowboy prairie and all too soon a door opens next to the cactus and the band disappear, leaving the audience astounded.

 The chances of a band of masked rockers ever playing at Glasgow’s Grand Ole Opry again seems a bit unlikely. Still, there’s always The Village Curry House.