4Q / PMT – Attendance: 2 (who fucked off)

Monday night in Sheffield, Take 2

Two days before the gig I phoned Spike to confirm Blitzkrieg were on the bill. “Nah mate, we’re not doing it.” AAAAAARGH. After all the fucking hassle I’d gone through with posters, I felt like puking. Tried Metal Duck – no answer. Luckily PMT stepped in at short notice. Nice lads.

I hitched to Wrexham to grab the van, and our four intrepid heroes rattled over the Snake Pass to Sheffield. That road is less a carriageway and more a rally stage – I swear one day I’m getting a rally licence just for the hell of it. We met PMT at the venue, Take 2, and soundchecked to… two people. They both left before either band played, leaving only the bar staff as our audience.

PMT went on first (not that it mattered!) and as ever, were truly excellent.

So we did what 4Q always did – turned the void into noise. PMT’s Martin wandered around with two balloons under his shirt, Cumi shouting:

“Hey, where’s your nipples?”

Me: “Shut up and let me feel your tits, come on…”

Straight into Nein Werk, Video Party. No crowd, no problem. Every song an in-joke. Cumi announced:

“This is called Not Now Not Never – it’s about his dick.”

Me: “There’s nowt wrong with my dick.”

Cumi: “It does the bizz, does it?”

PMT’s bassist joined us to mime during 1984. Their guitarist jumped up for Dope Fiend. By the time we hit PMT, the whole of PMT were onstage singing the chorus with us. May as well – nobody else was.

We rattled through Jerks, then there was a row about whether it was the last song.

Cumi: “This is our last one – it’s called Systemisation.”

Me: “No it’s not, fuck off. There’s three left yet, he just wants to go home.”

Cumi: “You’re joking… oh sorry, I forgot about them.”

So we thrashed out God Save The Queen, then Twisted Tabloids, then finally Systemisation – but not before I told everyone (all five of us on stage) to ballroom dance. And we did. Ballroom dancing to Systemisation in an empty Sheffield cellar.

Cumi: “Thank you.”

Me: “You’ve been a wonderful audience.”

Cumi: “Kill him.”

Me: “Kill him, but love me.”

We packed up, skint, and had to scrounge petrol money off PMT for the drive home. That’s it – Sheffield, you’ve seen the last of us for a long time.

Hitching Hell

Ann The Beermonster, self, Jill the Ripper

If I ever have another day like this one, I’ll happily place a noose around my neck and play on the swings. It was supposed to be one of those simple “hitch it to Sheffield” days. No drama: up, out, posters plastered, job done. Getting there was easy enough. Finding the venue — Take 2 — took a bit more public transport detective work, but I got there in the end (it's in Attercliffe). Getting home, though, turned into the kind of nightmare that makes you wonder what the fuck you’re doing with your life.

By 6:30pm I’d managed two lifts as far as the Snake Pass moors, then another that dumped me in the East End of Manchester. From there it was a bus across to the other side of the city, then a long, cold wait that produced only two pissy little lifts in the next three and a half hours. That left me stranded outside Knutsford on some A-road pointing vaguely towards Chester. It was dark, wet, freezing, and looking like I’d be stuck there all night.

The rain pissed down, but I had my Sony Walkman, and Nick Cave for company. John Peel had introduced me to Kicking Against The Pricks, Cave’s LP of not-so-standard cover versions, and Wayne had taped it for me from his vinyl copy. I played that cassette to death, and out there in the wet night I found myself duetting with Nick Cave to By The Time I Get To Phoenix — only I swapped Phoenix for Colwyn. A sodden lunatic with his thumb out, singing his heart out to the hedgerows. Every song on that tape was a high point. Years later I finally bought the CD, but back then, that battered cassette was my lifeline.

Eventually, mercifully, I got a lift to Chester and bolted for the station, racing through the rain with two random blokes to catch the last train home. £5.10 for a single, rolled into Colwyn late but still alive.

The day wasn’t a total loss. On the way over I’d stopped in Glossop and knocked on Jill The Ripper’s door. She was in, looking gorgeous with her hair plaited orange, purple and black. She was warm, welcoming even, but very cordial. She showed me photos of The Damned on tour, and her very boring-looking boyfriend — “I’ve been with him a year now,” she quipped. Whatever spark had once lit up between us the year before had gone out, and I knew it was me who’d snuffed it. Just another reminder of how fleeting things can be when you’re living half your life on the hard shoulder of the motorway.