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So - we're leaving The European Union. Or are we? Forced to choose between the conceited opinions of podgy right-wing toff David Cameron and podgy right-wing toff Boris Johnson the Great British public chose the latter rather than the former, presumably because for some unfathomable reason they think that he's a 'character'. They even feel as though they can call refer to him by his first name. Why do people do that? It makes it sound as though he's their mate or something, and the last thing he is is their mate. Funny that. But there's nothing funny about what's happened since the referendum result was announced. It seems that all those promises made by the Vote Leave camp were not actually promises at all. Politicians lying? Who'd have thought it? All the people that voted for them and so presumably wanted to curb immigration, free up money for The National Health Service and whatever the hell else that they thought they were voting for weren't actually voting for those things at all. Anyone would think that it was all a load of - let's be polite here shall we? - nonsense wouldn't they? Why that 'nice' Mr. Farage (I assume the people that supported him thought that he was nice?) isn't even an MP is he? He like Johnson is often portrayed as a 'character' or even a figure of fun when in reality he's a part time politician and full time millionaire who somehow managed to galvanise the fears of millions of people into inadvertently voting for his cause and, since Cameron has taken the coward's way out and resigned, also voting for a new, presumably anti-EU Prime Minister. There's talk of another referendum, which would be unprecedented not least because the main reason given is that this one didn't go the way that some people think that it should have - but surely that makes a complete mockery of 'democracy'? As it happens I can think of quite a few General Elections that didn't go the way that I thought that they should have, but there was no talk of rerunning them… and if that wasn't bad enough the England football team has been knocked out of the European Championships by lowly Iceland. A bunch of multi millionaire prima donnas are beaten by a gang of unfancied part timers for the second time in a week. Oh dear.
Let's cheer up a bit shall we? GLM - the band formed by ex - Lurkers Pete Stride, Nigel Moore And Pete 'Manic Esso' Haynes and now renamed The Lurkers GLM - have released their second album 'The Future's Calling' and it's a cracker. It's popper than their debut 'Chemical Landslide' but no less powerful, with everyone on top form throughout. Full details of how to obtain a copy are on the band's website along with videos, downloads and more. Great stuff!
The Upper Cut played two private parties - cue 'none for ages and then two come along at once' gags - on Friday and Saturday. The first was at Terry the singer's workplace in London - literally, we played in one of the offices - and the second was a birthday party at The Dolphin in Uxbridge. The first show included a very pleasant but rather drunk young lady asking to have a go on the drums with the words 'I don't know how to work them but I like dancing' - she was correct, she didn't, and she did - while Geoff Nicholls depped for Roger on drums at the second show where repeated requests for 'Simply The Best' saw us managing to stagger through one verse and multiple choruses to scenes of audience hysteria and mayhem that wouldn't have been out of place at an actual Tina Turner gig and which took even the hardiest members of the band by surprise.
Two ex - Sex Pistols were on the same stage (although sadly not at the same time) on Thursday night when The Rich Kids and The Professionals co-headlined The O2 Academy in Islington. Both band released underrated singles and albums back in the day, and as all of said records are big favourites of mine the evening was pretty much unmissable from my point of view. With Tom Spencer taking the place of the sadly absent Steve Jones The Professionals were on first - opening with 'Just Another Dream' they sounded strong from the word go, and by the time they finished with 'Silly Thing' it was clear that we'd just seen a great band play a fine show. The Rich Kids were excellent too although I thought that they took a couple of songs to get going - that said it was definitely a case of 'all's well that ends well' with the encore of 'Rich Kids' all but taking the roof off. Paul Cook was always a great drummer and Glen Matlock's a brilliant bass player - who were those fools who said that they couldn't play? - and it really was something to see both of their post - Pistols bands together. A cracking evening, although it did take me over four hours to get home. Well, it had been raining, so all the trains were off and the roads were jammed. That didn't used to happen when we were in The EU did it?
Oh, hang on...
I have just - just! - returned from playing with Ruts D.C. at The Fat Tuesday Festival in Hastings. And what a great night it was - we played three sets in three venues (The Dragon Bar, The Lord Nelson and The Carlisle - this timetable shows how well-planned the schedule was) and played a different set each time - it really was a terrific event to be part of. I must say it was quite an intense evening - as our first set finished the next band were queueing up to get on stage and we were being told that we had to get a move on to get to our next venue, which might not sound particularly 'intense' here but certainly felt it at the time. And in the midst of the madness Girlschool bass player Enid came over and introduced herself - I saw them play with Motorhead all those years ago. Mind you, so did lots of people!
We rehearsed for said Hastings gig(s) in the familiar surroundings of The Music Complex in Deptford on Friday. A jovial first hour or so some very unexpected oldies both from the band's back catalogue and elsewhere (did we really play 'Roxette'? Yes, incredibly, we did!) as well as attempting to put three sets together for the shows. After a coffee break progress was swift, although I'm still not sure how so many Spandau Ballet lyrics managed to find their way into quite a few of the songs...
Rehearsal finished at 4 o'clock - 2 hours later I was back at home readying myself for a Big Al Reed and The Blistering Buicks gig at The Paddington Packet Boat in Cowley. Due to other commitments it had been quite a while since I'd last played with the band (my good friend Pete Kerr has been dong a splendid job in my absence) and with this in mind I ran through a few songs on Thursday afternoon before leaving for The Brewery in Moorgate to see a Q&A session with Roger Daltrey and Wilko Johnson. This was an interesting evening (you knew I'd say that now didn't you?) with Daltrey bemoaning the amount of time people spend with their mobile phones held in front of their faces and Wilko telling a hilarious story about Lew Lewis attempting to syringe his own ears with a bicycle pump (!) among the many highlights. It goes without saying that I'm really - make that really - looking forward to getting their 'Going Back Home' album later this month but, well, I'll say it anyway - I'm really looking forward to getting their 'Going Back Home' album later this month!
Anyway back to the Cowley gig, which was, erm, ok... the band played well but I made a few too many mistakes for my liking. I always find this annoying although it didn't seem to bother anyone else (or if it did then they didn't say anything to me!) However the next night's show at The Three Wishes in Harrow was much more like it; indeed I'd even go so far as to say that it was one of the best shows that the band has ever played. That's more like it!
Back in 2010 The Band Of Sceptics and The Flying Squad played together at Tropic At Ruislip; on Sunday evening the two bands reconvened at the same venue to play a tribute show to the late and undeniably great Gypie Mayo who had played with The Band Of Sceptics at the afore-mentioned gig and who also of course played for Dr. Feelgood, The Yardbirds and many more. Joining myself and singing stalwart Andy in The Squad were Johnny Squirrel on bass and Andy Moore on drums, and with regrettably no chance for the band to rehearse before the show we all resolved to get to the venue early to run through as many songs as time would allow. When we got there John had already set up the (excellent) P.A. system, so all that remained was for us to set up and get going - we managed to play quite a few songs and work out some endings before time caught up with us and we made way for The Band Of Sceptics to soundcheck. By the time the doors opened it was raining heavily and there were fears that this would put people off from coming, but in the event there were more than enough people in the audience to make the evening work. The Band Of Sceptics were up first - led by the irrepressible Pete Sargeant their engaging West Coast-powered set found favour with the Tropic crowd. They very kindly invited your humble narrator to join them on stage for Captain Beefheart's 'Gimme Dat Harp Boy' - I ended up staying with them for the rest of their set, which was great fun to say the least. Our set started strongly with 'I Can Tell', and despite the odd mad moment here and there it all went well with a great reaction from those present. We finished with the Dr. Feelgood classic 'Down At the Doctors' before Pete joined us to jam on Howlin' Wolf's 'Killing Floor' which bought a highly enjoyable evening to a close. We raised several hundred pounds for The Dorothy House Hospice who cared for Gypie towards the end of his life, and we're doing it all again on Friday at Surrey Blues Club. Excellent!
This week's Reggae Punk Monday at The 12 Bar Club featured Bug on the stage and GLM at the bar - both fine sights to see. I'd not seen the three ex-Lurkers together for a while - when 'Shadow' came on over the P.A. I attempted to get them all on stage to mime to it, but sadly to no avail... Bug roared through a breathless half hour set before an increasingly appreciative audience. Frontman Phil described the band as 'Northern monkeys' on more than one occasion - maybe he was trying to get the put downs in before anyone else did, but if he was then there was no need as the band sounded great. And Monday nights at The 12 Bar Club really are getting better and better, which is a good thing to see in these troubled times.
Right, time for some food. Or some sleep. Or something. Hmmm... I think last night is catching up with me... I told you it was intense...
This month begins with the news that GLM - the band formed by ex-Lurkers Pete Stride, Nigel Moore and Pete 'Manic Esso' Haynes - have released a new single (well you can download it for free from their website, I think that's how things work these days?) For what my opinion is worth 'The Future Is Calling' is probably their best work to date, sounding more like The Lurkers of old rather than their recent 'Chemical Landslide' album. And if that wasn't enough the band has a new Facebook page which you can find here - it looks as though things are going well for Ickenham's finest...
After last weekend's gig frenzy things have backed off a bit this week, with 'three-gigs-in-three-days-with-three-different-bands'; actually they haven't really backed off that much have they? Good!
Big Al Reed And The Blistering Buicks played at The Dolphin in Uxbridge on Friday evening; the show got off to a late start due to the Chelsea match being on the television but the band certainly got straight into the swing of things and gave an energetic performance in front of a small but enthusiastic audience. I'm going to miss some gigs with the band over the next few weeks as I'm off gigging with Ruts D.C. (more about that in a minute) so my good friend Pete Kerr will be depping for me - he joined us for a few songs at this show and it sounded to me as though he'll make a very good job of things. A good gig all round.
Saturday saw Balcony Shirts designer and t-shirt printer Dave get married to Kate in The Four Seasons Room at Uxbridge Register Office. I was trying to remember when I last went to a wedding at this venue - I'm pretty sure that I haven't been to one there this century (!) and I'm absolutely sure that I hadn't been to one like this before, with Dave in his punk rock finery, both bride and groom sporting splendid haircuts courtesy of Horsepower Hairdressing and Dave's brother Mick wearing what might best be described as a 'tuxedo onesie' (it looked something like this and had to be seen to be believed!) among the many highlights. Their reception was held the same evening at The Old Vinyl Factory in Hayes, an extraordinary venue on the site of the EMI record factory. Musical entertainment came from myself and my old mate Matt - between us we came up with a varied selection of material performed on two acoustic guitars and with Matt in fine voice throughout. The unusual nature of proceedings was underlined by the fact that there was coffee, curry and cupcakes but no alcoholic drinks - I'm sure I haven't been to a reception like that before either!
It was back to Colnbrook on Sunday afternoon for an Upper Cut gig at Ye Olde George Inn. We've played some good shows here over the last few months but this was probably the best so far, with our three sets seeing much dancing and jollity from the assembled throng (no shortage of of alcoholic drinks here!) and a chap in the audience offering us money to play another set. When our drummer Roger declined saying that he had to be elsewhere I couldn't resist asking him if he really had to get away or if he just didn't fancy playing any more - he replied that he did have to leave but that he'd also put so much into the show that he felt that he physically couldn't play any more. I knew how he felt - and believe me, that's a great way to feel at the end of a show.
And to finish the weekend off I went to the jam night at The Three Wishes in Edgware last night. Myself and the afore-mentioned Pete and Big Al played 'My Babe' and 'Born To Run' to the general approval of all concerned, and I was very pleased to be invited to play 'It Hurts Me Too' and 'Natural Born Bugie' with Danny the bass player and some very young and talented chaps and chapesses. All good stuff, and indeed good fun.
This coming weekend sees Ruts D.C. play shows in Preston and Newcastle - there are gigs for the band over the next four weekends, and full details are on the band's website. And if that wasn't enough I'm making an appearance on Music Scene Investigation this Sunday evening - provided of course that I get back from Newcastle in time...
Commercial time - here are a few things that have caught my eyes and ears over the past couple of weeks :-
GLM - the band formed by original Lurkers members Pete Stride (guitar), Nigel Moore (bass) and Pete 'Manic Esso' Haynes (drums) - have put a new track 'A Perfect Storm' up for free download on their website. There is also an interview with Mr. Stride on the always-worth-visiting Louder Than War website in which among other things he talks of the band playing some live shows later this year. To fans of The Lurkers (and indeed GLM) like myself this is splendid news! In addition Esso has made an extraordinary appearance with Garry Bushell on the Radio Litopia podcast. Have a listen here - it's very funny, but it's not for the faint-hearted...
It's been a good time for drummers on the (Internet) radio, as Dave Ruffy from Ruts D.C. appeared on Shoreditch Radio last Friday, telling some great stories and playing some of his favourite music. You can hear it here, and it's well worth a listen. And while we're on the subject of Ruts D.C. our new album 'Rhythm Collision Volume 2' is now available on vinyl as well as CD - you can get it now from Amazon or from the band at forthcoming gigs. A record - a proper record! Great stuff!
And I've just heard the extraordinary news that Wilko Johnson is apparently planning some more shows despite being diagnosed with terminal cancer and indeed playing a series of farewell gigs earlier this year. What can I say? Well 'thank you God' springs to mind... in the meantime you can click here to hear the great man's recent appearance on the BBC Radio 4 show 'Mastertapes' - highlights are many and varied, not least when he's asked if he has ever used any effects on his guitar -
'Pedals? Listen man, I'm a guitarist, not a cyclist!'
Comments like that go a long way towards explaining why he's also a hero.
The Who have finally announced British and European dates for the 'Quadrophenia' show that they're currently touring America with, and unlike the Wilko Johnson farewell shows tickets seem to be reasonably easy to obtain - well they are as long as you join the fan club on the band's official website. And it's even easier to obtain a V.I.P. package although with standard ticket prices edging ever nearer to the £100 mark I dread to think how much these would be. Actually I could just brave looking them up couldn't I? Hang on... oo-er - the Emerald Package is £245, the Ultimate Fan Experience £375 and the Signature Fan Experience £495. Am I the only person that thinks that this has all gone too far? 'Quadrophenia' is one of my all-time favourite albums and I guess I'll be at one or more of the shows, but it's all getting far too corporate for me. Maybe that's just how things are going these days, but I for one don't like it. Then again perhaps I should cheer up and go along and enjoy the music? It is the mighty 'Quadrophenia' after all...
Friday's Good Old Boys gig at Hayes Working Men's Club turned out to be a highly enjoyable affair on several levels. It was a rather longer evening than I for one was expecting, with three 40 minute sets meaning more than a few 'we-haven't-done-this-one-for-a-while' songs appeared among the expected material. This of course made little difference to me as I didn't know any of them! I played a few numbers with the band back in 199-something at a birthday party for ex-Episode Six drummer John Kerrison and did a show around 2003 in a very big house out in the sticks but other than that I was, as I think the saying goes, 'flying by the seat of my pants'. Simon was very helpful, Hud made all the endings slightly more obvious than usual, Alan was as authoritative as ever out the front, and Nick - well, standing a few feet from him I was all too aware that this really was the bloke out of Johnny Kidd And The Pirates, Deep Purple and all those other bands. I'd not really met him before bar a quick hello here and there but he was a thoroughly nice chap with some amazing stories as you might well imagine. We played 'Shaking All Over' (shame we didn't play 'Hush'!) and as the solo approached Simon gestured over at me with a smile - at the end of the song Nick said something like 'Johnny Kidd would have been proud of that solo'. I have rarely stopped smiling since.
The Upper Cut returned to The Half Moon in Harrow on Saturday evening for a show that was definitely a game of two halves. Terry vocal microphone wasn't working properly from the word go - the P.A. amplifier had just come back from Roger the amplifier repair man so we knew that was (hopefully!) working properly so it had to be a mic problem. It's a radio mic so he changed the batteries but with no improvement he used my mic for the first set, which was a somewhat scrappy affair - maybe we were a bit unnerved but a couple of songs went wrong and the whole thing was a bit of an uphill struggle. During the interval Terry discovered that the output level in the transmitter was set lower than usual - thankfully turning it up cured the problem and we went on to play a second set that was the polar opposite of the first, with everything falling into place and an encore of 'Route 66' bringing the proverbial house down. We're back at The Dolphin in Uxbridge this Saturday for a birthday party - hopefully we'll carry on where the second set left off.
Sunday saw the first Back To Zero get-together, in which Sam, Andy and myself ran through arrangements for eight songs which should make it into the live set at our upcoming Mods Mayday show. Using the 'It's All Relative' album as a reference (it features Sam and original singer Brian in home studio mode with programmed drums and overdubs a-plenty) we split guitar parts between myself and Sam while Andy, who is actually the drummer in the band, played along on bass. It all sounded pretty good to me, and another meeting is planned to run through the rest of the proposed set before full rehearsals with a bassist and keyboard player in the not-too-distant future. There's lots to look forward too here, and there is already talk of more gigs and possible recording sessions. Excellent!
And last night it was up to The 12 Bar Club with Esso and Nigel from GLM (and previously The Lurkers of course; incidentally there's a great article on the Nuzz Prowling Wolf blog about GLM which you can read here) and their mate Scottish Stuart to catch a solo show from Tug Wilson. When I was a lad Tug was in a band local to us called The Injections, and these days he plays with Nigel in Pack Of Lies. His 35 minute set showed that he's not lost the knack of writing good songs (I saw The Injections a couple of times back in the day including a support slot to Wild Horses at Brunel University, the band's material was mostly written by him and very good it was too) and it all went well especially considering it was as far as I know his first solo gig. Also on the bill were Alpha Earth Light and Boss Caine - the former are a Austrian guitar and drums duo (now there's something that you don't find yourself writing every day!) which made a fearsome sound for a two piece while the latter (on this occasion a chap called Daniel Lucas, although I think there is a band line up too) had the chap next to me calling him a 'British Tom Waits' which isn't a bad thing if you think about it. In the meantime much drinking and jollity ensued - a good evening all round.
This week there's the afore-mentioned Upper Cut gig along with Big Al and co. at The Admiral Nelson in Twickenham on Friday - and then things start to get very interesting indeed. More about that next time.
'Never Mind The Bollocks, Here's The Sex Pistols' was released 35 years ago this week. It's hard to explain to people that were too young to understand (or indeed not even born) at the time just what an astonishing event the release of this album was to disenfranchised teenagers such as myself. For me it remains the ultimate 'you're-either-with-us-or-you're-against-us' moment in popular music, an event that polarised the classroom, the playground, the kids that you played football in the park and in the street with - everyone. Listened to now (and I've been listening to it rather a lot this week) it still sounds extraordinary, a 12-track blast of punk rock adrenalin that never fails to astound and amaze. Well, that's what it does for me anyway! Inevitably it's been re-issued in various formats, not least a 'Super Deluxe Box Set' which will set you back the best part of £100 and which includes previously unheard outtakes, a DVD of footage from the turbulent year that was 1977 and a book that looks so big and heavy that it'll probably fall through the average coffee table. I keep telling myself not to buy it, but we both know that I will in the end don't we? I must have the album in various formats, oh I don't know, 6 times at least - which reminds me, I wonder how much my '11-track-album-with-the-one-sided-single-of-Submission-and-a-poster' is worth? Maybe enough to buy the box set? Then again surely the fact that I'm even thinking of spending that much money on something that I've basically already got is keeping the great rock 'n' roll swindle going into the 21st Century? Malcolm McLaren, take a bow!
Meanwhile the first album by GLM is released this week. 'Chemical Landslide' features Pete Stride (guitar and vocals) Nigel Moore (bass) and Pete 'Manic Esso' Haynes (drums) and while it's 14 tracks sound quite a bit heavier and indeed darker than anything that they produced together in The Lurkers there's still plenty there to keep us old fans happy. Esso and Nigel thunder along in time-honoured tradition, and if the Stride guitar is more metal than punk these days his haunting vocals balance it all out well. The best track for me at the moment is probably 'Beyond The Pale' with it's amazing 'can you turn the lights down' refrain although the opener 'Every Night's A Story' and the title track are running it close, with 'Crash Landing' probably the nearest to the old Lurkers sound. It's always hard to be objective when it comes to music made by friends but I think they've really got something good here so let's hope the album gets heard by enough people to make an impact - it seems to me that with all the social media at our disposal these days it's relatively easy to have an Internet presence but it's harder than ever to stand out from the crowd. It's available now from their website for the very reasonable price of £8.99 - go on, you know you want to...
In other news Ruts D.C were due to play at The Islington Assembly Hall on Tuesday, but sadly the show was cancelled as The Mayor Of Islington is using the room. I will heroically restrain myself from saying anything at this point other than to observe that judging by the comments on the band's Facebook page (and indeed on The Ruts's page) I'm not the only person that's disappointed... still there have been some good reviews of last month's shows in Birmingham and York, and we're playing at The 100 Club on Saturday 22nd December (hopefully!) as part of a Joe Strummer tribute weekend (it'll be the 10th anniversary of his untimely death) as well as lining up some gigs for next year so it's not all bad news by any means.
And on the subject of everybody's favourite social network I've been musing on whether or not to keep the Facebook page that I started back in September. Yeah, I know, things must be quiet if that's all I've got to think about... anyway after talking to a few people (not least the legend that is Voltarol - once again the winner of last month's caption competition was the only entrant! Mind you, it was a very good caption!) I've decided to put my reservations to one side and to keep it for the moment at least. You can find me here if you want to - with yet more shameless self-publicity in mind I'm basically going to use it to publicise upcoming gigs, post reviews and YouTube clips of old gigs, plug my mates when they're doing something interesting and maybe even include the odd lefty rant. So - pretty much the same as on this here blog then... incidentally I put up a note about the GLM album this week and someone 'unliked' me! It's a good album, honest!
And things are quiet in more ways than one, as I'm still suffering from earwax in my right ear; indeed if anything it's got worse. Maybe it's just as well (for once) that I've had no gigs this week?
