Comin' in out of the rain to hear the jazz go down.

It was a cold, grey damp Thursday afternoon in South Gosforth when having gotten all my timings wrong for wandering around Majestic wines and meeting up with a friend I found myself with a couple of hours to kill. No problem I thought, just go to the Brandling ( a pub last visited when I was in the 6th form at St Mary's) and have a couple of quiet pints. Well quiet was out the question as the place had a couple of large raucous groups in and there's nothing that makes you feel more like 'johnny no mates' than standing at the bar on your own when everyone else is laughing and the air is filled with loud chatter!

Still all was not lost, there was always the Millstone to try, so I braved the rain and wind and headed there, pushed open the door to be met with the unmistakeable aroma of Christmas dinner and the gentle hubbub of conversation, this will do I thought so a pint of Tyneside Blonde was duly ordered.

Pint in hand I took in the bar, which turned out to be full, all the tables and chairs taken, across in the corner a banner proclaimed 'Vieux Carré Jazzmen'. Aah great I thought some Jazz for the afternoon, maybe some mellow Miles or John Coltrane maybe even a bit Sonny Stitt. An announcement from the band area "will the gentlemen of the orchestra please come and attend to their instruments" Sure enough half a dozen guys made their way forward and the unmistakeable sound of instrument being prepared filled the air. One of them wanders to the microphone, welcomes everyone for coming and duly announces that todays session would start with a song from 1925! Oh god no... not trad jazz a music form I've never liked or appreciated, time to drink up and head for Newcastle and with three quarters of a pint to finish it wasn't going to be a quick escape.

So the band started up, now here was something new, this wasn't the Trad Jazz I'd heard in the past. This was something more melancholic, slower paced and definitely more pleasant on the ear! These guys were/are consummate musicians, playing with some style and a clear love and feeling for this music. The audience were clearly enjoying it too, applauding every solo  and generally getting in to the swing of things. Before I knew it I'd ordered a second pint and was applauding the end of the session. Next to me at the bar was a guy who’d been ‘foot tappin’ along to the tunes, so I turned to him and asked a little about the band, discovering they've been around in one form or another since the fifties and the trumpet player, Fred Rowe was in his mid eighties and the average age was comfortably in the 70's, new found admiration for these guys!

Third pint ordered and time for the second session to start. My old fears returned as the first couple of songs sounded, at least to my ears, that each of them were playing a different tune. But then Minnie The Moocher was introduced as the next song, the only song played that I recognised the title of, being familiar with the Cab Calloway version. Now this one was different and actually had an air of authenticity about it that said "I was here first" and contained enough ho di ho's in it to keep everyone happy as the audience joined in!

Pint no. 4 was duly ordered, this Tyneside Blonde is a lovely pint and goes down easily! The band were coming to the end of their set and finished with a song called Goin' or maybe Comin' home, for me this was the best tune played it had a distinct feel of the Blues to it and so ended the session to appreciative applause from everyone in the audience.

With the 21st century speeding past outside it was time to leave the warmth and comfort of the 1920's behind and get some Christmas shopping done and meet up with my friend. Now if you've ever got a bit time to kill and happen to see the Vieux Carré Jazzmen are playing, do yourself a favour and "come in out of the rain to hear the jazz go down."

1978 an eclectic mix!

No  Reading festival this year, heading off to Knebworth instead. I still managed to cover a pretty wide range of musical styles from The Ramones to Tangerine Dream.

The year started off with a tremendous gig from Ultravox on January 20th at Newcastle Mayfair a couple of days after my birthday, starting the set with one of my favourite tracks 'Hiroshima mon Amour'. Such a pity that John Foxx would leave, although I did get to see the Midge Ure version of Ultravox a couple of times through the 80's and Vienna is a great album, for me those first two Ultravox albums were the best!

March brought Eddie and the Hot Rods, who had Squeeze and a band called Radio Stars on the line up. Radio Stars must have impressed as I do own one of their albums, but I really cannot recall anything about the gig.

By way of a contrast at the end of March I went to see Tangerine Dream, well I say I, by this time I was 'going steady' (lol such a dated thing to say!) with a girl I'd met at Art College the previous year, Sheelagh Connelly, so gig costs had now doubled!! Tangerine Dream were awesome, probably the first gig where I'd seen a full laser light show and Tangerine Dream are comfortably in my top 10 for albums owned!

In April it was the turn of Manfred Manns Earthband once again, this time on the Watch tour, another gig now forgotten .

So along comes Summer and what would turn out to be the last time I would see Genesis for almost 30 years at Knebworth Midsummer Nights Dream Concert. The real treat was getting to see Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers and opening the gig... Devo dressed in white boiler suits and orange propeller hats they were the perfect start to a great day. We also got Jefferson Starship,who due to domestic differences between Grace Slick and her long time partner, guitarist Paul Kantner, performed without her, she returned to America before the gig. It was the first time the Starship had ever played without her. However, they pulled out all the stops and received a standing ovation at the end of their set. Although I do recall an incredibly boring bass guitar solo, wonder if Spinal Tap saw it too!
Oh and Roy Harper played a short set at the last minute while we waited for Genesis to get themselves sorted!
I've got a bootleg of the Genesis set and apart from the awful Follow You Follow Me, they were actually pretty good even without Steve Hackett. However the ...And Then There were Three album was the end for me and I'd not be buying any more Genesis releases for a long long time!

Two special gigs towards the end of the year, both for very different reasons. The first was The Ramones, now I know there's alot of people out there who regard The Ramones as incredibly influential and although I'm prepared to concede that point I have to say that on that September night in Newcastle they were awful, eclipsed only by Wayne County and the Electric Chairs a year earlier at Reading '77

Luckily the year would end on one of the best gigs in a while. AC/DC at The Mayfair on the Powerage Tour, Bon Scott on vocals belting out Whole Lotta Rosie, Hell ain't a Bad Place to be and of course Problem Child and Let there be Rock all the time knocking back Snakebites in the horrible Mayfair plastic glasses - great stuff and proper Rock 'n' Roll not this Mumford and Sons crap that gets peddled for rock these days!

1977 from Prog to Punk and back again...

You'd be excused for thinking I was a massive, yes massive Genesis fan as in 1977 I managed to see them 4 times, including 3 times in 4 days... what was I thinking! In my defence this was the period when they were still playing a lot of the older material and hadn't yet went all 'poppy'.

I must have been keen because in order to ensure I got a decent ticket I ended up queuing through the night on a late autumn evening in the autumn of 1976 and very civilised it was too I clearly remember some older grandmother type coming round with hot cuppas for us young whippersnappers and no hassle from the Police either, it was indeed a different time.

Were the gigs any good I hear you ask, well yes they were featuring music from Trick of the Tail and Wind and Wuthering as well as Suppers Ready and a host of other older tracks. Steve Hackett, still on guitar as well. Add in Peter Gabriel on what I think was probably his first solo tour and you definitely get the strong Genesis vibe! Peter's support came from Nona Hendryx ex of Labelle.

Just as well I was taking in Reading Festival this year as some kind of antidote to all the proginess (is that a word? if not it should be!).

Reading was my introduction to Punk, John Peel played most of it from The Sex Pistols to Tom Robinson over the three days of the August Bank Holiday weekend. The Festival started on the Friday with : Staa Marx, Salt, U-Boat, Kingfish, 5 Hand Reel, Lone Star, Uriah Heep, Eddie and the Hot Rods and headliners Golden Earring. Sadly I can't remember anything at all about the first day apart from the weather which was dreadful!

Saturday brought, Gloria Mundi, Krazy Kats, No Dice, George Hatcher Band, Ultravox!, Little River Band, John Miles, Aerosmith, Graham Parker and the Rumour and headliners Thin Lizzy. Highlights were Ultravox! in the days when they were fronted by John Foxx, they made a big impression and I would go on to see them a few more times including a memorable night in Newcastles Mayfair, but more of that later! Thin Lizzy were superb and although by now I was caked in mud I wouldn't have missed it for the world!

Sunday was an awesome festival day, weather was still crap but the bands playing on the Sunday included a few favourites. The full line up on Sunday was Widowmaker, The Motors, Tiger, The Enid, Blue, Racing Cars, Electric Chairs, Hawkwind, The Doobies Brothers, Frankie Miller and to end The Sensational Alex Harvey Band. So the weather was continuing to be suitably wet and cold but as they say... The bands played on, well they did until Wayne County and The Electric Chairs took to the stage, maybe they did this gig to fund Waynes sex change! What I do know is that they were truly dreadful and quite possibly the worst band I've ever seen. The crowd certainly let them know how they felt! I doubt they had finished the first assault on our combined ears with a song entitled 'If you don't want to F**k me F**k off', before the first clod of mud landed on the stage, pretty soon the air was filled with flying mud as the crowd vented their combined displeasure, bravely they played on but to no avail, as watching from the sides were The Doobie Brothers roadies who pretty quickly decided they'd had enough of this mud landing on their equipment and Wayne and the Chairs were unceremoniously frogmarched offstage to loud cheers from the crowd. Hawkwind were up next and I do seem to remember their set was in sunshine as the weather finally broke. But the overall festival highlight was definitely Alex Harvey and the boys, belting through the classics, Vambo, Faith Healer and of course Delilah, I'll not forget the sight of Alex coming on to stage a huge polysyrene cross across his shoulder, dressed in a flowing white robe as he sang 'Framed' excellent stuff! It would be a few years before I went back (1980) as the line ups became more punk orientated and didn't really interest me.

After Reading it was off down to London, Earl's Court to see Genesis, once again, this time supported by Richie Havens who almost certainly played a 3 day version of Long Train Coming, of course he would later work with Steve Hackett once he'd left Genesis, so Mr havens must have impressed him!

Camel at Newcastle City Hall in the September confirmed a return to Prog!

To end the year there were couple of gigs at Newcastles Guildhall building where The Enid and Slaughter and the Dogs were seen as well as catching The Jam at the Mayfair, I do remember coming away from the Jam gig wondering what all the fuss surrounding them was about as they were dreadful that night. Oh and it was around this time I met the future Mrs Peace and these last three gigs we took in together, I don't think she was too impressed with being taken to a Slaughter and the Dogs gig, The Enid on the other hand were on top form, finishing with a rousing version of The Dambusters march!

More from 1976

1976 was certainly a busy year, gig wise as well as being my A-level year where obviously I worked long and hard on revision!

Not only did I go to my first festival (Reading) but also took in gigs at Newcastle City Hall and a trip down to Hammersmith Odeon in London.

The year started off with those good old boogie boys Status Quo who I'd seen a few years earlier in 1973.

One of the highlights was seeing SAHB again, things had certainly developed for the bands stage show. It had moved on from the polystyrene 'brick' wall of earlier years to a multi level 'tenement block'. Delilah and Boston Tea Party and a terrific OGWT appearence had brought a newer audience to SAHB who were a bit shocked to see Alex dressed as Adolph Hitler during the track Framed - political correctness was never part of SAHB! Great show tho'.

A-Levels drew to a close and it was time to look for a place at Uni or for me, art college. Not exactly met with much enthusiasm from parents and friends, I mean what would you do as a 'job' if you went to art college, art colleges were full of long haired drug takers, well they were if you believed the Daily Mirror! Any ways my first choice was Canterbury Art College so portfolio was prepared and train ticket purchased and off I went along with a school friend, John Simpson who also was heading to Canterbury.

Now John was a big Genesis fan and up to this point I'd not paid them much attention. However on the way back he mentioned they were playing Hammersmith Odeon and did I fancy heading there before we went back, so we both lugged our portfolios across London and bought 2 tickets on the day, for the princely sum of £2.00! Portfolios were kindly left in the Box Office (it was a very different time back then). The gig was one of the first with Phil Collins fronting, the yellow jump suit was probably a mistake Phil, but the gig was a memorable one as both old and new Genesis were played and I now own a bootleg of that very gig!

Come August, I was off to Reading Festival and taking in a whole host of new sounds.

One of the highlights of Reading was Manfred Manns Earthbands set, where they played through a unexpected torrential downpour, 1976 being the hottest summer for absolutely ages and only just eclipsed by this July in 2013!

I'd now decided to do a Foundation year in Art at Newcastle College on Bath Lane in the city, another building now long gone where I met some good friends who I still see and meet up. We took in Barclay James Harvest, Octoberon tour. One of the dullest gigs I've been to, not helped by the support band, Racing Cars,  having a 'hit' single titled 'They Shoot Horses Don't They'. The year ended with heading off to see Wishbone Ash, with Gordon Smith and Gary Wright who were both on Foundation year with me.

Gordon and I have recently met up again in the last couple of years and we've taken in a few gigs, one of them being the 2012 Stanley Music Festival where strangely enough Martin Turners Wishbone Ash headlined... Blowin' Free once more!

1976 Reading Festival

My first festival, an experience I'll never forget. It was the glorious summer of 1976 and the UK was in the middle of a drought. So rucksack packed, myself and Eric Craig, a good school friend, headed out to hitch-hike our way from Newcastle to Reading, aiming to arrive on the Thursday before the Festival kicked off over the August Bank Holiday weekend. It took us a couple of days to travel to Reading on a pretty uneventful journey apart from a guy throwing a load of porn mags our way while we were stuck on a roundabout outside Leeds somewhere which were duly burnt that evening for a bit warmth!

We arrived at the Festival site in mid afternoon on the Thursday pitched the tent and took it all in, no kids around in those days, festival weren't the family friendly events they've now become and going to the loo was to risk dysentery! It was pretty much a sea of denim, leather jackets and long hair! Pretty soon we'd met up with a few more friends who had traveled down as well as discovering a white van parked nearby selling scrumpy in dodgy plastic containers. Thursday evening was spent drinking scrumpy and burning sausages by way of eats!

Fridays headliners were Gong and according to the list I have Friday also featured Mallard, The Mighty Diamonds, Roy St. John, Stallion, Supercharge and U-Ray. I don't remember anything about the bands that played through out the day, but Gong were a very relaxed pleasant end on a warm summers evening to the first day. This would be Pierre Moerlens Gong who were firmly in the Jazz-rock genre by this time, Steve Hillage and Daevid Allen along with the teapot pixies had long gone.

Saturday brought Festival headliner Rory Gallagher along with Camel, Eddie and the Hot Rods, John Hiseman's Colliseum, Manfred Manns Earthband, Moon, Mick Pickett, Pat Travers Band, Phil Manzanera's 801, The Sadista Sisters and Van der Graaf Generator. Although the festival wasn't a competition to give winners and losers, I remember Manfred Manns Earthband went down an absolute storm as they played through a torrential downpour that pretty much flooded out the Saturday night. I remember plunging 2 large cans of Watneys Red Barrel in to the mud and standing on them late on the Saturday night. It was no great loss losing the two cans as Watneys Red Barrel was pretty much the same as drinking coloured water!

Sundays finale gave us AC/DC on what must have been one of their very first UK appearances. AFT, Back Door, Black Oak Arkansas, Brand X (with Phil Collins on drums), The Enid who were excellent, The Dambusters March never sounded so good, Howard Bragen, Sassafras, Sutherland Brothers and Quiver, Ted Nugent who played with so much distortion he was almost unlistenable. Special guests to finish off the night were Osibisa, but after a couple of songs in we decided it was time for more scrumpy and end the evening around a communal camp fire.

All in all a great 3 days, one nights sleep then the hitch hike home starts!  Roll on Reading '77.

1974 and 1975

My first Friday night at The Mayfair came in 1974 a few days after my 16th birthday. Sadly The Mayfair is now long gone but a great great place to see a gig, well I think it was, I cannot be 100% sure as Fridays at The Mayfair involved imbibing lots of Snakebites in plastic glasses! I'm not clear on who played on those Friday evenings but I'm pretty sure I saw The Sensational Alex Harvey Band there for the first time, Edgar Broughton played there and Beckett, who's lead singer went on to front Back Street Crawler. There's no doubt a few others who are now just a distant memory. In 1975 the only band I can definitely recall seeing there was Alvin Lee. Around that time I would arrive at The Mayfair in a long grey RAF overcoat, no wonder I was so thin back then, I must have spent most of Saturday totally dehydrated and nursing a hangover!

The RAF coat almost got me beat up one night, back in those days Newcastle was split between the 'Skins' and the 'Hairies'. Coming out the Mayfair a friend and I were just about to start the long walk up the West Road when we heard a shout behind us, coming towards us were 7 or 8 skinheads intent on giving the 2 'Hairies' a good seeing too. Not fancying the odds it was time to run, we must have been alcohol fueled, or they were drunker than us, as we outpaced them reaching the Big Lamp where they gave up and headed off down Elswick Road while we continued back home to Fenham. Pity I can't remember who we'd seen that night!

Only one gig at The City Hall that year, the rather wonderful Sensational Alex Harvey Band, a great live band who's staging was getting more and more elaborate. Alex Harvey was one of the best front men I've seen.

1973 and all that!

1973, the year I spent every bit of pocket money on gigs and good old vinyl, I was still to young to get in to The Mayfair (that would come next year!), so all these are City Hall gigs.

Starting with....
The classic Deep Purple line up on the Machine Head tour, Nazareth were support who later went on to greater things! It was an awesome gig and quite possibly the loudest one I've ever been to.

In March I managed  two gigs, Groundhogs and Status Quo. I can still remember the drone of the mellotron during the opening of Earth Shanty from Hogwash. Don't remember an awful lot from the Status Quo gig. It's Piledriver era so I probably went because I'd heard 'Paper Plane'

Next up 2 gigs in two nights, there were probably only about 50 people in the City Hall for The Edgar Broughton Band, 'Out Demons Out'. As for Fanny, well I don't remember anything at all about their performance! 

After this came Faust, now this one I do remember, for two reasons. First the insane Gong were support and the Faust set was cut short because the drummer had an attack of food poisoning! Still it was my first taste of Krautrock, Faust took to the stage in darkness only lit by the orange 'on' lights of their amps. Faust Tapes was duly purchased along with Tago Mago by Can and Zeit by Tangerine Dream, the Kraftwerk albums came a couple of years later. I'm still listening to Tangerine Dream to this day!

Argent, Rory Gallagher,  Uriah Heep and a return for Nazareth ended the year. The Rory Gallagher gig started a life long love of his guitar playing.

1972 and a couple of typo's!

After my first gig in the summer of 1972, I was definitely hooked so what better way than to take in T Rex arch rivals Slade. From what I remember it was a pretty good gig, opening with Suzi Quatro then on to Thin Lizzy with Eric Bell on guitar before Slade stomped on to do an 'all the hits' gig.

The final gig of 1972 was a real classic. Hawkwind the Space Ritual Tour (note the typo's on both tickets) Lemmy was still with them and we were witness to Stacia's naked dancing, what more could a 14 year old want!

The first few rows of the City Hall had scented joss sticks placed on them and as the night progressed the place filled up with the heady aroma of patchouli and err... something not quite legal!

The set list would be the same as the live album released in 1973, The Space Ritual Live, one of the best live albums ever!

I find it a bit odd to hear Master of the Universe used in a car advert these days!

First ever gig!

It was a long time ago, this was the second set after a matinee performance, support were Quiver, it was probably the same set list as the Born to Boogie film.

Some background info.

T. Rex were a British rock band, formed in 1967 by singer/songwriter and guitarist Marc Bolan. The band formed as Tyrannosaurus Rex, releasing four underground folk albums under the name. Tony Visconti (their producer for several albums) claimed in a documentary on the band that he had taken to using the abbreviated term "T. Rex" as a shorthand, something that initially irritated Bolan, who gradually came around to the idea and officially shortened the band's name to "T. Rex" at roughly the same time they started having big hits (shortly after going electric).
In the 1970s, the band had reached success with glam rock hits like "Jeepster", "Get It On", "Ride a White Swan", "20th Century Boy", "Children of the Revolution", "Hot Love", "Telegram Sam", and "Metal Guru". Check out Electric Warrior and The Slider, definitely th ehighlights of the Glam years.

Quiver
A melodic UK progressive rock band, Quiver occasionally followed a country rock path but achieved more success following their merger with the Sutherland Brothers. The line-up comprised Tim Renwick and Cal Batchelor. Renwick had formerly been with Junior’s Eyes, and he and Batchelor recruited Cochise drummer John ‘Willie’ Wilson. Subsequently, the line-up of Wilson, Renwick, Batchelor, and ex-Village bass player Bruce Thomas , recorded the self-produced Quiver. For the recording, they were augmented by Dick Parry (saxophone). The same line-up recorded Gone In The Morning, but due to lack of commercial success the band was subsequently dropped by Warner Brothers Records. The members were not coming up with new songs, and so they decided to join the Sutherland Brothers, the two line-ups merging in late 1972 with the addition of Pete Wood. Tim Renwick is now an in-demand session guitar player, touring with bands such as Pink Floyd and Mike And The Mechanics.  Quiver’s greatest claim, however, is being the first ever band to play the legendary Rainbow Theatre in London.