I was there when.......

[Bassassin]

5 hours ago, fleabag said:

Just remembered another from the hazy days of the mid 70's  ( damn those jazz  ciggies )

Saw Jakko Jakszyk  (  Michael Curran  ) in his band 64 spoons  downstairs in the dungeon that was the Corn Dolly in   Oxford town center.   He of course went on to Level 42, King Crimson and others.  Fabulous musician

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jakko_Jakszyk

64 Spoons was the second gig I ever went to, playing a pub (might've been the White Horse) on Chatham Hill in 1978. Me & some schoolmates had gone along to see a local punky/pub rock band who'd cancelled, & 64 Spoons filled in. Don't remember much other than being confused by their rambling proggy/jazzy/trumpety material, and how nice they were, putting up with loads of stupid questions from a bunch of half-cut underage kids who'd decided (the week before!) to start a band! I saw quite a lot of bands at the same venue, including The Pop Rivets, featuring Medway music scene demigod Billy Childish - who I'd actually known a little from school.

Saw loads from the NWOBHM era in the late 70s/early 80s - Samson featuring Bruce (Bruce) Dickinson and a demented blood-drooling masked drummer called Thunderstick, an unknown Saxon supporting Motorhead (classic Fast Eddie, Philthy & Lem lineup), and many of the bands from that scene that Sounds used to write about - Tank, Girlschool, Vardis, Chrome Molly, Dedringer, Witchfynde, Magnum, Tygers Of Pan Tang... Many of them were bloody awful, even to a drunk 17-year old. Never saw DiAnno-era Maiden, unfortunately.

I was (unfashionably) a massive fan of Angel Witch, and saw them more times than I can count, from when they were an unsigned 4-piece. It's tragic they achieved so little at the time, considering the massive influence they're credited with on the thrash & doom/stoner scenes. A consequence of being broadly ridiculed by the music press, and some disastrously bad management decisions by guitarist Kev Heybourne's dad, who effectively blew out a deal with EMI.

My best "I was there" story sadly isn't mine - and I wish it was! A guitarist pal from Glasgow, who I played in a couple of bands with in the 90s, got dragged along to see a schoolmate's cousin's band on their first UK tour in 1977. Free tickets, front row at the old Glasgow Apollo, and got to hang out with the band afterwards.

The band was Rush, the cousin was Neil Peart.

[4000]

Angelwitch, along with a Girlschool et al, were one of the many bands I saw at the aforementioned Norbreck Nightspot. And apparently one of the bassists that I beat out when I joined my London-based metal band, back in the day, was Kevin Riddles, or so I was told. No idea whether it was true.
One other surreal moment from that venue and era was a friend and myself chatting briefly with a very drunk, very much less famous but understandably pretty made-up Neil Finn, at the time I Got You hit big. I had to ask my friend last year whether this actually happened, but he has an incredible memory and he assured me it did. 😂 

[fleabag]

28 minutes ago, Bassassin said:

64 Spoons was the second gig I ever went to, playing a pub (might've been the White Horse) on Chatham Hill in 1978. Me & some schoolmates had gone along to see a local punky/pub rock band who'd cancelled, & 64 Spoons filled in. Don't remember much other than being confused by their rambling proggy/jazzy/trumpety material, and how nice they were, putting up with loads of stupid questions from a bunch of half-cut underage kids who'd decided (the week before!) to start a band!

That rings bells. 

64 spoons were quite entertaining , as they were a hilarious bunch.  Jakko was a bit of a comedian,  but the music was a bit odd 

[4000]

4 hours ago, Stub Mandrel said:

I was at Reading '83 too, you can get a DVD of the Twelfh Night perfromance and because the BBC recorded the whole festival it spawned an amazing collection of live LPs.

Some listed here:

http://www.stubmandrel.co.uk/14-music/105-i-was-there

For me the highlight of the festival was a 'new' blues guitarist who was supposed to be a dab hand at playing Hendrix covers on his first tour of the UK... on Stevie Ray Vaughan. Mid you I even enjoyed Black Sabbath with Ian Gillan 🙂

I was at Reading in ‘82. Heard the first night from outside the fence as we didn’t have tickets. Hadn’t taken any sleeping bags, tents or anything and ended up drinking soup in the Salvation Army tent in the middle of the night. Never been so cold in my life. If only the drink hadn’t worn off. 😂

Had tickets for the Saturday so saw all that, some excellent performances. Thankfully bumped into a friend in the evening who was sleeping in his car but had a spare tent. Myself and my mate were woken early morning by someone reaching into the tent and pinching my mate’s bag. My mate gave chase but lost him. Unfortunately the only thing in the bag were my mate’s soiled undies from the previous day.😂 Went home on the Sunday so missed that. That was the year the mighty (although much ridiculed at the time) Manowar didn’t turn up, so I had to wait til ‘84 to get my head blown off by them. 
 

Oh, was at Monmore Festival in 1982(?) when Hawkwind welcomed Nik Turner back into the fold. My main memory is of Nik making synth noises into the mic. We’d expected actual synth!

 

[Stub Mandrel]

There was a tiny (probably free) festival, somewhere in Mid-Wales, near Tregaron in either 1984 or more likely 1985.

All I can remember (that I'm willing to out on the record) is that it was well attended by persons of an 'alternative lifestyle' nature and we all got searched by Mister and Mrs Plod on the way out.

Can anyone suggest what it might have been?

 

Google suggests it might have been the Cantlin Stone Free Festival.

http://www.ukrockfestivals.com/cantlin-stone-free-fest80.html

Edited March 13, 2020 by Stub Mandrel

[tony_m]

45 minutes ago, 4000 said:

Angelwitch, along with a Girlschool et al, were one of the many bands I saw at the aforementioned Norbreck Nightspot. And apparently one of the bassists that I beat out when I joined my London-based metal band, back in the day, was Kevin Riddles, or so I was told. No idea whether it was true.
One other surreal moment from that venue and era was a friend and myself chatting briefly with a very drunk, very much less famous but understandably pretty made-up Neil Finn, at the time I Got You hit big. I had to ask my friend last year whether this actually happened, but he has an incredible memory and he assured me it did. 😂 

Sounds like we were at all the same gigs!!! And even after seeing Motorhead umpteen times (at least once on every tour from 1979 to 1984, plus odd gigs since), I still reckon Magnum at the Norbreck was the loudest gig I've ever attended... 🤯

[Mykesbass]

43 minutes ago, 4000 said:

That was the year the mighty (although much ridiculed at the time) Manowar didn’t turn up, so I had to wait til ‘84 to get my head blown off by them. 

 

At the time? When did it change (and why?) 😏

[4000]

28 minutes ago, tony_m said:

Sounds like we were at all the same gigs!!! And even after seeing Motorhead umpteen times (at least once on every tour from 1979 to 1984, plus odd gigs since), I still reckon Magnum at the Norbreck was the loudest gig I've ever attended... 🤯

I missed Magnum. No idea why. My mates all said Tank were the loudest but I missed them too. 

[4000]

23 minutes ago, Mykesbass said:

At the time? When did it change (and why?) 😏

When I first went to see them, I went because I thought they’d be hilarious. 😉

I came out a believer....🤘🏻😂

[Mykesbass]

21 minutes ago, 4000 said:

When I first went to see them, I went because I thought they’d be hilarious. 😉

I came out a believer....🤘🏻😂

Had the pleasure/misfortune of releasing this compliation way back when!

 

[Owen]

I did not see Amy Winehouse once. I was playing Brecon Jazz and she was on before the band I was with. This was before she broke big. Yep, I did not go and watch her.

Regrets, I have a few........

[TheGreek]

We bunked off school to watch the making of the "Stand & Deliver" video at Hatfield Park. I had the mirror (at 52 seconds) which I gave away when Mr Ant fell out of favour (maybe he shouldn't have gone round breaking mirrors).

 

[TheGreek]

Another moment of flirting with fame - I have a friend on my shoulders while the camera is focused on another friend at the Mandela Concert at Wembley. See 3.24 (yes, TheGreek did have hair at one time)

 

 

Edited March 13, 2020 by TheGreek

[4000]

27 minutes ago, Mykesbass said:

Had the pleasure/misfortune of releasing this compliation way back when!

 

Don’t get me wrong, there is a very funny side to them, as that picture shows. I love them though, they’ve got some great tunes and are so entertaining. 😁

[lowdown]

1973 (I was 16). I watched a terrific, funky, soul band at the Black Prince in Bexley (Kent). They tore the place down and the next week they were support for Eric Clapton.

It was the Average White Band.

[peteb]

On 11/03/2020 at 17:28, Happy Jack said:

In 1979 I went with a friend to The Nashville Rooms in West Kensington to score some dope. William & I were hanging around the main bar, which was rapidly filling up with a bizarre assortments of mods, rockers, punks and new romantics ... these were people you never saw in one place unless something was kicking off between them.

Will had the self-preservation instincts of a lemming and flagged down a passing skinhead to ask what was going on.

"It's a great new band called Madness" he shouted. 

Will and I looked at each other, said "nope, me neither", and we went off to find our dealer.

 

Early eighties – I was living in a student hall of residence in Islington with Ezee Studios on one side and a big old-fashioned boozer on the other. We all became quite blasé with the number of superstars we would be propping the bar up with on any given night of the week.

One Saturday, me and a friend were looking for a mate before setting off for a big night out after a few early beers and a couple of other, ahem, liveners. I was leading the way and headed into the back room, bumping into a short haired bloke playing pool who had then fell into his fellow equally shorthaired, short-arsed pool players. The bloke I had bumped into looked up at me angrily, causing me to look down and laugh before heading off to try and find our missing drinking partner. I enquired as to what my mate found so amusing? He said ‘you’ve just played skittles with various members of Madness’ (Suggs wasn’t there, so I just didn’t recognise them) …!

[Stub Mandrel]

13 hours ago, TheGreek said:

I have a friend on my shoulders

You look on the verge of collapse! 😧

[Stub Mandrel]

13 hours ago, 4000 said:

Don’t get me wrong, there is a very funny side to them, as that picture shows. I love them though, they’ve got some great tunes and are so entertaining. 😁

They really should have thought twice about the nappies though...

[4000]

57 minutes ago, Stub Mandrel said:

They really should have thought twice about the nappies though...

Well, when you get to a certain age......😉😂

[pst62]

When Captain Sensible decided it would be great fun to urinate on the audience at the Rock Garden In Middlesbrough, in 1979. Luckily, I was far enough away to avoid the Golden stream.

 

[steantval]

23rd November 1971

Trapeze (Glenn Hughes) played at a local pub .

[uk_lefty]

The year was 2006. Or 2007. I was young IT worker sent to Leicester to work for a no longer in existence bank. One of our colleagues organised a night out to a luxurious nightspot. So luxurious the clientele were treated to questioning by the Police on the way in and then a queue to go through airport style security before a semi strip search, to which they looked at a young terrified bunch of professionals and scoffed "don't bother" to save us having to remove our coats to be searched for knives and guns. Needless to say once inside this club on a midweek night we stuck out like sore thumbs, and not just because we were the only people not wearing clothing emblazoned with G-STAR RAW. The only other white faces in there were the very people Ali G had been mocking for years earlier, obviously not up to speed on the joke, or girls grinding themselves into the wannabe, or very real, gangsters swarming the place. 

Then they took to the stage. N-Dubz. 

If I hadn't been in fear for my life with all the security procedures on the way in and the looks and shoves I had received all night so far I'd have whizzed myself laughing. I thought it was a joke. 

A year or so later and they're releasing singles, "dappy" makes TV appearances and "Tulisa" becomes an X Factor judge and Internet sex tape star. 

Yes. I was there. 

Edited March 15, 2020 by uk_lefty