Still got the Barrowlands N.Y.E concert on VHS and yes it still plays, trackings a little off here and there. One gig I would have given my eye teeth to have been at, mind you if you believe everyone who says they were there, then about 500,000 people attended.
Decade 77-87 - a grown up disco: new wave, punk, postpunk, goth & indie.
Happy 60th Birthday to CLARE GROGAN (born 17 March 1962).
Clare was working as a waitress at the Spaghetti Factory in Glasgow, Scotland when she was discovered by director Bill Forsyth.
Only 17 years old at the time, Grogan was asked by Forsyth to star in his film Gregory's Girl. Both the movie and her band were suddenly tossed into the media spotlight.
Clare is as well known for her acting jobs -- her performance in Gregory's Girl acquired countless raves -- as her innocuous, bubbly personality with Altered Images.
She formed Altered Images in 1979 with Tony McDaid (guitar), Johnny McElhone (bass), and Tich Anderson (drums). After recording a demo, the group mailed it to Siouxsie & the Banshees, who then asked the band to be their opening act on a number of gigs.
In late 1980, with Grogan's acting in Gregory's Girl receiving international attention, Altered Images was signed to Portrait. In 1981, the group released their debut LP, Happy Birthday. The title track landed at number two on the U.K. charts.
Decade 77-87 - a grown up disco: new wave, punk, postpunk, goth & indie.
On this date in 1980, MADNESS supported by THE GO-GO’s played St George's Hall in Bradford, (April 27th 1980).
This show would become Madness’s contribution to the movie ‘Dance Craze’, 84 minutes of classic performances from the best of the 2-Tone label released in February 1981.
Directed by Joe Massot, the film featured performances from Madness, The Specials, The Beat, The Selecter, Bad Manners and The Bodysnatchers. A soundtrack album featuring 15 of the songs was released the week before the movie premiere.
Decade 77-87 - a grown up disco: new wave, punk, postpunk, goth & indie.
On this date in 1981, THE GO-GO's released the single OUR LIPS ARE SEALED (Jun 12, 1981) Go-Go's guitarist Jane Wiedlin wrote this with Terry Hall of The Specials.
"In 1980 we were playing at The Whisky on Sunset Strip, and The Specials were in town from England," said Jane.
"They came to see us, and they really liked us and asked us if we would be their opening act on their tour. I met Terry Hall, the singer of The Specials, and ended up having kind of a romance. He sent me the lyrics to 'Our Lips Are Sealed' later in the mail, and it was kind of about our relationship, because he had a girlfriend at home and all this other stuff. So it was all very dramatic. I really liked the lyrics, so I finished the lyrics and wrote the music to it, and the rest is history. And then his band, The Fun Boy Three, ended up recording it, too - they did a really great version of it, also. It was like a lot gloomier than the Go-Go's' version."
"[Terry] was talking about getting married and all this stuff. So I don't know how I got in the picture. And, you know, that's something that I did as a teenager, maybe I was 20.
That's something I would never do now, knowingly enter into a relationship with someone who was with someone else. I mean, it was completely screwed on my part.
Although I think when people do that, you really have to look at the person who's in the relationship, and they have to take the burden of the responsibility as well. Anyways, it was one of those things with the tragic letters, 'I just can't do this.' You know, 'I'm betrothed to another.' All that kind of stuff."
This was the first hit for the Go-Go's, who started as a punk band in the late '70s, but became pop superstars with the release of their first album, Beauty And The Beat.
Terry Hall's version with Fun Boy Three hit #7 in the UK. Jane Wiedlin told Uncut magazine: "I was so shocked when I heard the Fun Boy 3 version, because it's so moody. I don't think Terry kept a copy of the lyrics, because he got some of the words wrong." Producer Richard Gottehrer added: "The recordings are vastly different. They're both really good records. Fun Boy Three comes from a more serious place. I wouldn't say sinister, but it isn't as light as the Go-Go's version."
Fun Boy 3 VS Go-Go's Our Lips Are Sealed on The Tube '83.
There's a great documentary currently being shown on Sky Documentaries about the band,it surprised me with some of the things that went on and is worth a watch.
On this date in 1980, SPLODGENESSABOUNDS' debut single SIMON TEMPLER / TWO PINTS OF LAGER peaked at #7 on the UK Singles Chart (Jun 30, 1980).
"We're planning the greatest rock extravaganza this world has ever seen on film," said Max Splodge in 1980, comparing the fire power of his band with ‘The Great Rock 'n' Roll Swindle’.
Formerly The Faber Brothers at Butlins Holiday Camp in Bognor, Max and guitarist Pat Thetic were sacked and decide to travel to London in the hope of pilfering a few musicians to make up a new outfit.
"I can't remember why our old bassist left," said Max. "We must have done something to him, I suppose. Our guitarist left recently because we superglued his hand to his guitar, and when he complained I beat him up."
"I mean, there are eight of us, I mean nine, seven — oh, I can't remember. More than enough, anyway. Our guitarist came back the other day actually, but we gave him a bag of crisps with a mousetrap in and it broke his finger. We thought it improved his playing 100%."
Based in Peckham, pi55-artist pranksters Splodgenessabounds began playing London venues in early ’79 and built a reputation for audacious story-telling, publicity gimmicks - firing cannons, throwing flour, waving bums, even dragging a pantomime donkey on stage - and making sure their audience had a laugh.
When Max told a story he reverted to a cheeky schoolboy and everyone roared with laughter. Humour that started as soon as the tour titles were announced, "Not So Much Time To Wallow In The Pardon Me Boy Is That The Toffee Crisp You Chew Chew Tour" being just one of them.
During 1980, Splodgenessabounds scored three top thirty singles and their debut single, Simon Templer /Two Pints of Lager & A Packet of Crisps made it into the Top Ten.
"One night I rushed into the Crown in Chislehurst waving a pound note, trying to buy 2 pints of lager and a packet of crisps.” said Max.
“The bell rang and the bloke wouldn't serve me. The next day I put down a drum track and bass line and just shouted, 'Two pints of lager and a packet of crisps please.' Mike Reid played it on Radio 1 and it started selling 17,000 copies a day.”
Along with bands like Peter & The Test-Tube Babies and The Toy Dolls, the media gave Splodge et al the epiphet ‘punk pathetique’.
"The pathetique bands are the other side of Oi!” said Max. “We're working class too only whereas some bands sing about prison and the dole, we sing about pilchards and bunts. The audience is the same."
On this date in 1978, SHAM 69 released the single IF THE KIDS ARE UNITED, (July 14th, 1978).
The anthemic 'If The Kids Are United’, chanted in playgrounds, youth discos and football terraces across the country, was Jimmy Pursey appealing to the hearts of disenfranchised kids with his angry but thoughtful lyrics.
Loosely based on a Socialist Worker Party / Highbury 'North Bank' chant, ‘Kids are united’ was a great success for the band and reached #9 in the UK charts. Back in ’78, Jimmy Pursey would introduce the song, carefully enunciating its title and the ‘kids’ would chant the words over and over. Jimmy, never embarrassed by the hippy sentiment, would just smile. The stage would be awash with bodies. The bouncers would gape. Encores? Three.
When Jimmy yelled "We're not a New Wave band, we're not a Power Pop band – we're a PUNK band" they roared back their approval. They were not interested in polite, safe versions of the punk genre. They wanted stark high tension and adrenaline to saturate the atmosphere at gigs and, long before Sham 69 hit the stage, they felt their hearts beating double-time. "The great thing about Sham was that they appealed to the kids,” said the Pistols’ Steve Jones. “The kids come along for a great time, they don't care what some trendies in the music press say."
On this date in 1978, SHAM 69 released the single IF THE KIDS ARE UNITED, (July 14th, 1978).
The anthemic 'If The Kids Are United’, chanted in playgrounds, youth discos and football terraces across the country, was Jimmy Pursey appealing to the hearts of disenfranchised kids with his angry but thoughtful lyrics.
Loosely based on a Socialist Worker Party / Highbury 'North Bank' chant, ‘Kids are united’ was a great success for the band and reached #9 in the UK charts. Back in ’78, Jimmy Pursey would introduce the song, carefully enunciating its title and the ‘kids’ would chant the words over and over. Jimmy, never embarrassed by the hippy sentiment, would just smile. The stage would be awash with bodies. The bouncers would gape. Encores? Three.
When Jimmy yelled "We're not a New Wave band, we're not a Power Pop band – we're a PUNK band" they roared back their approval. They were not interested in polite, safe versions of the punk genre. They wanted stark high tension and adrenaline to saturate the atmosphere at gigs and, long before Sham 69 hit the stage, they felt their hearts beating double-time. "The great thing about Sham was that they appealed to the kids,” said the Pistols’ Steve Jones. “The kids come along for a great time, they don't care what some trendies in the music press say."
On this date in 1981, UB40 released the single ONE IN TEN, (July 31st 1981) Taken from the band’s second album ‘Present Arms’, ONE IN TEN was a biting commentary on the rise in unemployment that struck at the heart of an inert government:
“I am the one in ten A number on a list I am the one in ten Even though I don't exist Nobody Knows me Even though I'm always there A statistic, a reminder Of a world that doesn't care.”
Few tracks - before or since - have had such political relevance and eloquence. The lyrics tell the different effects of unemployment in the first person: a beggar on a street corner, a neglected child who cannot read, a homeless person in a slum, a middle-aged man dying of a heart attack, a mother hooked on drugs and a teenage suicide in a soulless street. The chorus is poetry of tempered steel: "I am the one in ten A number on a list I am the one in ten Even though I don't exist Nobody Knows me Even though I'm always there A statistic, a reminder Of a world that doesn't care".
The single was released in late July and peaked inside the Top Ten during September. When it slipped out of the chart the following month, the national unemployment rate also hit one in ten. The song became the soundtrack to the jobs famine, which peaked in April 1984, when the dole queue was the longest ever recorded. The shadows of despair cast by high unemployment did not fall evenly: they were especially long in the industrial cities of the north and the midlands, where the group witnessed its effects first-hand.
Decade 77-87 - a grown up disco: new wave, punk, postpunk, goth & indie·
This week in 1980, IAN DURY & THE BLOCKHEADS released the single I WANT TO BE STRAIGHT (Aug 1980).
In 1980, Chaz Jankel said goodbye to the Blockheads and headed off for a solo career.
His replacement was Wilko Jonson.
The question as to what Dury would do without Jankel was answered in the single 'I Want To Be Straight', one that initially came in a sleeve sporting a school prefect’s badge and later with a sleeve aptly sporting snaps of the whole band as every one of them now took a composing credit.
Written by Ian and Mick Gallagher, the song had a bluesy tempo and was firmly tongue-in-cheek.
It begins with spoken introductions from each band member over keyboards and bass. A clever touch which helped to the single rise to the top of the pile when it came to battling for airplay. Not to mention Davey Payne’s gritty sax solo played over terrace-style chants of ‘straight’ from the rest of the band.
“I'm Charley, you know I'm Norman pleased to meet you I'm Mickey, hello Wilko I'm Johnny, how are you doing, alreet, champion? My name is David And I'm Ian' and ' guess what? Oi! I want to be straight, I want to be straight I'm sick and tired of taking drugs and staying up late. I wanna confirm, I wanna conform I wanna be safe and I wanna be snug and I wanna be warm”
Decade 77-87 - a grown up disco: new wave, punk, postpunk, goth & indie.
This date in 1976 saw the Notting Hill Carnival end in riots (Aug 30 1976).
The police had been expecting hostility due to what they deemed as trouble the year before. Consequently, after discovering pickpockets in the crowd, police took a heavy-handed approach against the large congregation of black people and it became "no-man's land".
The 1600-strong police force violently broke up the carnival, with the arrest of 60 people. In the aftermath of the event, the carnival was portrayed in a very pointed way, with those aiding the riots lumped together as the "trouble-makers" responsible.
Clash members Joe Strummer, Paul Simonon, and their manager Bernie Rhodes were at the event and got caught up in the riots, which inspired Joe and Mick Jones to write WHITE RIOT.
'White Riot' (with the rallying cry of '1977' on the 'B' side) was written by Joe and Mick after first-hand experience of the Notting Hill Carnival riots the previous year and produced under the guidance of their live gig sound man, Micky Foote.
Comments
Happy 60th Birthday to CLARE GROGAN (born 17 March 1962).
Clare was working as a waitress at the Spaghetti Factory in Glasgow, Scotland when she was discovered by director Bill Forsyth.
Only 17 years old at the time, Grogan was asked by Forsyth to star in his film Gregory's Girl. Both the movie and her band were suddenly tossed into the media spotlight.
Clare is as well known for her acting jobs -- her performance in Gregory's Girl acquired countless raves -- as her innocuous, bubbly personality with Altered Images.
She formed Altered Images in 1979 with Tony McDaid (guitar), Johnny McElhone (bass), and Tich Anderson (drums). After recording a demo, the group mailed it to Siouxsie & the Banshees, who then asked the band to be their opening act on a number of gigs.
In late 1980, with Grogan's acting in Gregory's Girl receiving international attention, Altered Images was signed to Portrait. In 1981, the group released their debut LP, Happy Birthday. The title track landed at number two on the U.K. charts.
On this date in 1980, MADNESS supported by THE GO-GO’s played St George's Hall in Bradford, (April 27th 1980).
This show would become Madness’s contribution to the movie ‘Dance Craze’, 84 minutes of classic performances from the best of the 2-Tone label released in February 1981.
Directed by Joe Massot, the film featured performances from Madness, The Specials, The Beat, The Selecter, Bad Manners and The Bodysnatchers. A soundtrack album featuring 15 of the songs was released the week before the movie premiere.
Here's a trailer for the film Dance Craze.
On this date in 1981, THE GO-GO's released the single OUR LIPS ARE SEALED (Jun 12, 1981)
Go-Go's guitarist Jane Wiedlin wrote this with Terry Hall of The Specials.
"In 1980 we were playing at The Whisky on Sunset Strip, and The Specials were in town from England," said Jane.
"They came to see us, and they really liked us and asked us if we would be their opening act on their tour. I met Terry Hall, the singer of The Specials, and ended up having kind of a romance. He sent me the lyrics to 'Our Lips Are Sealed' later in the mail, and it was kind of about our relationship, because he had a girlfriend at home and all this other stuff. So it was all very dramatic. I really liked the lyrics, so I finished the lyrics and wrote the music to it, and the rest is history. And then his band, The Fun Boy Three, ended up recording it, too - they did a really great version of it, also. It was like a lot gloomier than the Go-Go's' version."
"[Terry] was talking about getting married and all this stuff. So I don't know how I got in the picture. And, you know, that's something that I did as a teenager, maybe I was 20.
That's something I would never do now, knowingly enter into a relationship with someone who was with someone else. I mean, it was completely screwed on my part.
Although I think when people do that, you really have to look at the person who's in the relationship, and they have to take the burden of the responsibility as well. Anyways, it was one of those things with the tragic letters, 'I just can't do this.' You know, 'I'm betrothed to another.' All that kind of stuff."
This was the first hit for the Go-Go's, who started as a punk band in the late '70s, but became pop superstars with the release of their first album, Beauty And The Beat.
Terry Hall's version with Fun Boy Three hit #7 in the UK. Jane Wiedlin told Uncut magazine: "I was so shocked when I heard the Fun Boy 3 version, because it's so moody. I don't think Terry kept a copy of the lyrics, because he got some of the words wrong."
Producer Richard Gottehrer added: "The recordings are vastly different. They're both really good records. Fun Boy Three comes from a more serious place. I wouldn't say sinister, but it isn't as light as the Go-Go's version."
Fun Boy 3 VS Go-Go's Our Lips Are Sealed on The Tube '83.
There's a great documentary currently being shown on Sky Documentaries about the band,it surprised me with some of the things that went on and is worth a watch.
"We're planning the greatest rock extravaganza this world has ever seen on film," said Max Splodge in 1980, comparing the fire power of his band with ‘The Great Rock 'n' Roll Swindle’.
Formerly The Faber Brothers at Butlins Holiday Camp in Bognor, Max and guitarist Pat Thetic were sacked and decide to travel to London in the hope of pilfering a few musicians to make up a new outfit.
"I can't remember why our old bassist left," said Max. "We must have done something to him, I suppose. Our guitarist left recently because we superglued his hand to his guitar, and when he complained I beat him up."
"I mean, there are eight of us, I mean nine, seven — oh, I can't remember. More than enough, anyway. Our guitarist came back the other day actually, but we gave him a bag of crisps with a mousetrap in and it broke his finger. We thought it improved his playing 100%."
Based in Peckham, pi55-artist pranksters Splodgenessabounds began playing London venues in early ’79 and built a reputation for audacious story-telling, publicity gimmicks - firing cannons, throwing flour, waving bums, even dragging a pantomime donkey on stage - and making sure their audience had a laugh.
When Max told a story he reverted to a cheeky schoolboy and everyone roared with laughter. Humour that started as soon as the tour titles were announced, "Not So Much Time To Wallow In The Pardon Me Boy Is That The Toffee Crisp You Chew Chew Tour" being just one of them.
During 1980, Splodgenessabounds scored three top thirty singles and their debut single, Simon Templer /Two Pints of Lager & A Packet of Crisps made it into the Top Ten.
"One night I rushed into the Crown in Chislehurst waving a pound note, trying to buy 2 pints of lager and a packet of crisps.” said Max.
“The bell rang and the bloke wouldn't serve me. The next day I put down a drum track and bass line and just shouted, 'Two pints of lager and a packet of crisps please.' Mike Reid played it on Radio 1 and it started selling 17,000 copies a day.”
Along with bands like Peter & The Test-Tube Babies and The Toy Dolls, the media gave Splodge et al the epiphet ‘punk pathetique’.
"The pathetique bands are the other side of Oi!” said Max. “We're working class too only whereas some bands sing about prison and the dole, we sing about pilchards and bunts. The audience is the same."
Saw them back in the day.
Max pi55ed in a glass on stage and threw it over the crowd.....
Max pi55ed in a glass on stage and threw it over the crowd.....
Standard back in the day.
The anthemic 'If The Kids Are United’, chanted in playgrounds, youth discos and football terraces across the country, was Jimmy Pursey appealing to the hearts of disenfranchised kids with his angry but thoughtful lyrics.
Loosely based on a Socialist Worker Party / Highbury 'North Bank' chant, ‘Kids are united’ was a great success for the band and reached #9 in the UK charts.
Back in ’78, Jimmy Pursey would introduce the song, carefully enunciating its title and the ‘kids’ would chant the words over and over. Jimmy, never embarrassed by the hippy sentiment, would just smile. The stage would be awash with bodies. The bouncers would gape. Encores? Three.
When Jimmy yelled "We're not a New Wave band, we're not a Power Pop band – we're a PUNK band" they roared back their approval. They were not interested in polite, safe versions of the punk genre. They wanted stark high tension and adrenaline to saturate the atmosphere at gigs and, long before Sham 69 hit the stage, they felt their hearts beating double-time.
"The great thing about Sham was that they appealed to the kids,” said the Pistols’ Steve Jones. “The kids come along for a great time, they don't care what some trendies in the music press say."
When I was about 14, a Polydor Records employee lived opposite. He only came over enthusing about a song he'd just heard twice.
John Otway-"Beware of the Flowers (cos I'm Sure they're gonna get you yeah)"; and
Sham 69-"Borstal Breakout".
45 years later-still 2 of my favourite songs. And my youngest recently rang me from a John Otway concert
Taken from the band’s second album ‘Present Arms’, ONE IN TEN was a biting commentary on the rise in unemployment that struck at the heart of an inert government:
“I am the one in ten
A number on a list
I am the one in ten
Even though I don't exist
Nobody Knows me
Even though I'm always there
A statistic, a reminder
Of a world that doesn't care.”
Few tracks - before or since - have had such political relevance and eloquence. The lyrics tell the different effects of unemployment in the first person: a beggar on a street corner, a neglected child who cannot read, a homeless person in a slum, a middle-aged man dying of a heart attack, a mother hooked on drugs and a teenage suicide in a soulless street. The chorus is poetry of tempered steel: "I am the one in ten A number on a list I am the one in ten Even though I don't exist Nobody Knows me Even though I'm always there A statistic, a reminder Of a world that doesn't care".
The single was released in late July and peaked inside the Top Ten during September. When it slipped out of the chart the following month, the national unemployment rate also hit one in ten. The song became the soundtrack to the jobs famine, which peaked in April 1984, when the dole queue was the longest ever recorded. The shadows of despair cast by high unemployment did not fall evenly: they were especially long in the industrial cities of the north and the midlands, where the group witnessed its effects first-hand.
This week in 1980, IAN DURY & THE BLOCKHEADS released the single I WANT TO BE STRAIGHT (Aug 1980).
In 1980, Chaz Jankel said goodbye to the Blockheads and headed off for a solo career.
His replacement was Wilko Jonson.
The question as to what Dury would do without Jankel was answered in the single 'I Want To Be Straight', one that initially came in a sleeve sporting a school prefect’s badge and later with a sleeve aptly sporting snaps of the whole band as every one of them now took a composing credit.
Written by Ian and Mick Gallagher, the song had a bluesy tempo and was firmly tongue-in-cheek.
It begins with spoken introductions from each band member over keyboards and bass. A clever touch which helped to the single rise to the top of the pile when it came to battling for airplay. Not to mention Davey Payne’s gritty sax solo played over terrace-style chants of ‘straight’ from the rest of the band.
“I'm Charley, you know
I'm Norman pleased to meet you
I'm Mickey, hello
Wilko
I'm Johnny, how are you doing, alreet, champion?
My name is David
And I'm Ian' and ' guess what?
Oi!
I want to be straight, I want to be straight
I'm sick and tired of taking drugs and staying up late.
I wanna confirm, I wanna conform
I wanna be safe and I wanna be snug and I wanna be warm”
This date in 1976 saw the Notting Hill Carnival end in riots (Aug 30 1976).
The police had been expecting hostility due to what they deemed as trouble the year before. Consequently, after discovering pickpockets in the crowd, police took a heavy-handed approach against the large congregation of black people and it became "no-man's land".
The 1600-strong police force violently broke up the carnival, with the arrest of 60 people. In the aftermath of the event, the carnival was portrayed in a very pointed way, with those aiding the riots lumped together as the "trouble-makers" responsible.
Clash members Joe Strummer, Paul Simonon, and their manager Bernie Rhodes were at the event and got caught up in the riots, which inspired Joe and Mick Jones to write WHITE RIOT.
'White Riot' (with the rallying cry of '1977' on the 'B' side) was written by Joe and Mick after first-hand experience of the Notting Hill Carnival riots the previous year and produced under the guidance of their live gig sound man, Micky Foote.