GIG 0015: The Damned 10th Anniversary at Finsbury Park, London

 

Me looking pretty fucked after travelling to London

There was no live music scene to write home about in Colwyn Bay during those times unless you liked boring bland blues bands and that awful new wave of spandex metal rubbish. So entertainment was garnered from further afield. We went to Finsbury Park in London to see The Damned celebrate their tenth anniversary. Our quest to get there started around midnight on the day of July 26th 1986 when the National Coach driver refused to let us on because we were punks; even though we’d booked tickets. This is how the story unfolded…

My sister Emma, Ade Brunskill, Helen The Hair, Wayne The Bastard, Edi Filmstar and myself stood there, open beer cans in our hands, in our punk attire as the coach pulled up, the doors swung open and the driver took one look at us and flatly refused to let us on the coach!

’But we’ve got tickets!’ – he wouldn’t be budged, we weren’t getting on his coach and that was final. They call it judging a book by its cover, and we were the pages he didn’t want to read. There wasn’t much we could do, violence would’ve proved this bigot’s presumption right and landed us in the cells and not in London, so we sloped back to the flat and regrouped.

Thankfully, Helen had a credit card and she forked out for train tickets; we would successfully fight National Express for our money back later, but first we had a gig to get to. I think it was only Helen who managed to get any sleep on the journey down, the rest of us were pretty much cream crackered by the time we emerged into the London sunshine. Today was all about The Damned, a band I loved so much, enough to have their name tattooed onto my wrist next to a flaming love heart! [I’ve since had it lasered off, but my love has not diminished; although it has been tested with the latest album!]. The Damned were all things to me through my teenage years, my mates were not into them in school, preferring Sham 69, or Crass, or the Oi! Scene – I too went along with all that, but it was Vanian/Sensible/Scabies/Ward who always topped my charts. Dave Vanian’s guile, Captain Sensible’s exquisite guitar playing, Rat Scabies is still the best drummer I’ve ever seen, and Algy Ward is the best of a long succession of bassists the band has been through since.

This Finsbury Park gig was over two days and rumours were rife that the two years departed Captain Sensible would be making a guest appearance. He did, but we got the wrong day, and despite the hopes of 20,000 people chanting the old chestnut, ‘Sensible’s a wanker’ he didn’t show up on our day. We were however treated to a superb opening, Plan 9 Channel 7 was orchestrated before blasting into the full song and we all went bananas! Lot’s of ‘newer’ stuff was played, Eloise, Street Of Dreams, Is It A Dream, plus new tracks off the forthcoming disappointing ‘Anything’ album. I remember Limit Club (love that song), Stranger On The Town, then the finale of LA Woman, Smash It Up (the whole tent erupted) and Love Song. The encore, I think, was Dr Jekyll & Mr Hyde, followed by New Rose and ending with Lust For Life.

The opening band were Electric Bluebirds, I don’t recall much of these, although The Proclaimers seem to spring to mind, followed by the rockabilly Restless. Wayne’s interest in psychobilly bands would drag us to many gigs and to many albums, with the likes of King Kurt and Guana Batz being favourites, but Restless were pretty mediocre.

Dr And The Medics however, were far from mediocre. The drummer got up on stage and started with a great beat, soon followed by the guitarist and bassist as they formed an ace riff, then The Anadin Brothers (two girls) alighted the stage with their unique dance moves, before The Doctor himself (or Clive Jackson as he was called in school) appeared and had everyone in the audience in the palm of his hand. The attention he commanded was immense, the perfect MC, the ultimate band leader, the conductor, The Doctor!

We had their Happy But Twisted EP in our collection and would soon be buying their Laughing At The Pieces debut album, from which most of their set was made up. I do recall a rubbish version of Paranoid, and then an apology for making it to No.1 with Spirit in The Sky – The Doctor then announced that

‘This is the way it should’ve been played’ and they launched into a much better sped up version that kept the majority of punks happy in pogoville. Hard to imagine at the time that forty years from now The Damned would still be in existence and celebrating their 50th anniversary.

GIG 0014 - The Cramps / Stingrays at Royal Court, Liverpool

 

I was going out with a girl from Colwyn Bay. Helen’s leaning was very much toward the Goth end of the punk spectrum, and we shared a deep love of all things Bauhaus (her love of the band probably extended into the sexual aspect of their lead singer too!). I will also be eternally grateful to her for dragging me kicking and screaming to the Royal Court in Liverpool.

‘There’s no way I’m going to see the fucking Cramps.’ I protested. It was 20th March 1986, and at nineteen years old I was still a bit set in my pure punk rock ways; or at least had a reputation to uphold. We sat on the balcony, that very steep balcony at the Royal Court. The Cramps were incredible. You don’t realise at the time of seeing these bands that they will someday be iconic. They had just been on The Tube on TV and released the album ‘A Date With Elvis’ and played just about all of it before heading into crowd favourites like Goo Goo Muck, Human Fly and Surfin’ Bird, during which Lux Interior scaled the PA speakers with the microphone in his mouth, grunting throughout. A great spectacle. He was pretty oiled, necking red wine straight from the bottle and launching one at the over-zealous bouncers who kept beating up crowd surfers.

A couple of years later I bought a bootleg tape of this gig from Aladdin's Cave in Rhyl. I have no recollection of The Stingrays.

GIG 0013 - The Damned / Third Light at Manchester International

 

There’s something special about seeing a band at the height of their powers in a venue that feels like it’s barely holding them in. Following the polished grandeur of the Apollo back in June, The Damned’s return to Manchester at the International 1 felt less like a tour stop and more like a victory lap with old friends. Although tbh, they were probably fulfilling contractual obligations having booked this gig in advance of their new found stardom!

The night was a masterclass in the band’s mid-80s evolution. As the opening chords of "Street of Dreams" filled the room, it was clear that the transition into a more atmospheric, gothic rock sound hadn't cost them any of their edge. Dave Vanian was every bit the spectral frontman, commanding the stage with a theatricality that felt perfectly suited to the intimate, smoky confines of the club.

But the true magic of the International has always been the lack of a barrier between the stage and the street. Once the feedback faded, the band didn't vanish into a dressing room. Instead, they did something few bands of their status would dream of: they walked right back out into the crowd. Well, all but the elusively shy Mr Vanian.

The scene at the bar reminded me of when I first saw them some four years ago in Colwyn Bay; Rat Scabies, was stood next to me with a "Come on, will someone get me a fucking pint!"

Nearby, the late, great Bryn Merrick was showing exactly why he was the heart of that lineup. Amidst a sea of fans asking for signatures, I decided to turn the tables, leaning in to autograph Bryn’s own arm instead of the other way around. It was a moment that could have gone sideways, but Bryn took it with a massive grin and a laugh—a testament to the genuine, ego-free person he was.

Third Light were from Chester I think and were just starting out - they played kind of post-punk melodic indie stuff. Didn't hear much of them since; or remember anymore from the gig.

Love & Rockets: Seventh Dream of Teenage Heaven

 

My introduction to Love & Rockets was completely unexpected, arriving via a budget-friendly Cherry Red Records sampler LP—a purchase necessitated by bedsit living and cheap price. On it was the track "Haunted When The Minutes Drag," which instantly grabbed hold of me. Even now, the song remains utterly captivating, and I still yearn for the track's sprawling, eight-minute duration to stretch out even longer.

Of course, I was aware that three-fourths of Love & Rockets were the remnants of the legendary Bauhaus (Daniel Ash, David J, and Kevin Haskins). While I had the requisite copy of "Bela Lugosi's Dead" and had seen their iconic Top of the Pops performance of "Ziggy Stardust," I consciously viewed this new group as a distinct entity—and they truly were.

Seventh Dream of Teenage Heaven is the definitive statement that this band was not just "Bauhaus minus Peter Murphy." It established their new direction, moving away from gothic rock and embracing a sound rooted in neo-psychedelia and expansive alternative rock.

The album, however, is not without its transitional quirks. It showcases the trio's interest in the electronic textures that Daniel Ash and Kevin Haskins had explored in Tones on Tail. This is evident in the liberal use of what sounds like Haskins' new electronic drum kit, giving the record a distinct mid-80s flavor and a slightly raw, experimental quality.

While this electronic-heavy production is a defining characteristic of the album, "Haunted When The Minutes Drag" still rises above the rest. It is the undeniable highlight, utilizing those electronic and psychedelic elements to create a genuinely hypnotic and timeless piece of music that continues to haunt and reward repeat listens.

GIG 0012 - The Damned / Fuzztones @ Northgate Arena, Chester

 

I saw that The Damned were playing at the Northgate Arena in Chester, I didn’t have any money so I took my beloved ghetto blaster to a pawn shop. The owner could see I really didn’t want to part with it so he gave me £35 and said he’d hold it back for a fortnight and I could buy it back at the same price. It’s July 6th 1985. I got on a train to Chester and met up with other punks who were milling around outside the venue on this sunny afternoon. I hooked up with a girl called Seraphina who I knew from Denbigh. She was like the rebel at the all-girl private school in the town, all dressed in black and fishnets and back-combed hair. We and others drank cider and discussed Rudimentary Peni lyrics on account of my ‘Stone the crows and fuck the pigs’ t-shirt. Seraphina then squirted hairspray down my ear ‘for a laugh’ - I didn’t see the funny side and lost her in the crowd.

The Fuzztones opened the show, they reminded me of The Cramps and I had heard their single Bad News Travels Fast on Peel’s show. My sister Jane tapped me on the shoulder, she was there with her mate Ali Craig, I’d not seen her for a while. The Damned were making a real go of the charts with their new gothic image and Shadow Of Love was in the Top 30 and the album Phantasmagoria was imminent, so it was surprising this venue was only about three quarters full. They opened with the epic Curtain Call and I made sure I was right down the front. It was a good gig, lots of new stuff and they encored with Lust For Life and did a second encore with Rat Scabies on guitar playing Pretty Vacant.

Link2wales gig review

GIG 11: Bad Manners / Meteors @ Scooter Rally, Castle Donington

There was a Scooter Rally being held in Castle Donington and Jon invited me, it was 8th June, 1985. Old school mate Andy was driving and I was hanging out with Psycho Sandra at the time and I asked her if she wanted to come along. She was called Psycho Sandra for very good reasons! This was a person who was high on life with a punk rock attitude and she lived up to her name. The four of us (including the driver) thought it would be a great idea to drop acid before heading on the three hour journey, and by the time we got there I began to be a bit edgy to say the least. Here I was, the only punk rocker in a huge field full of mods, and being off my box only added to my paranoia as people would mutter ‘Punk’s dead mate’ at me. So imagine my nerve endings, when we entered the main arena and the support band (some mod shite) The Gents were stopped mid-set and a panicky voice is announcing over the PA; he’s pleading with the crowd at the front of the stage to clear the way for an ambulance to get through as someone had just been glassed in the throat and was losing a lot of blood. Shiiit…

It was getting from bad to worse, I kind of fancied Sandra, even though she scared the shit out of me, and she kind of fancied me, but she disappeared for what seemed like hours only to return with a psychobilly lad she had copped off with. While she was away, we watched The Meteors, who were pretty good and I had last year been introduced to their fantastic debut album ‘In Heaven’ (still such a good record), so at least I had something positive to focus on while being surrounded by thousands of fishtail jackets and the smell of shit scooter engines.

By dark Bad Manners were on stage and it was raining. We were still in the throes of the Pink Panther or the Microdot tabs we had taken, so it felt like we were protected from the damp. Sleep wasn’t going to happen, the come-down was fucking awful, five of us crammed into this Vauxhall Cavalier; Andy, Jon and myself trying to sleep, dying to sleep but unable to, twitching uncontrollably in a lysergic loop as Sandra and her psychobilly boyfriend had noisy and violent sex next to us, well, virtually on top of us.

GIG 0010 - Edwin Starr at Poppies, Bodelwyddan

Out of town in Bodelwyddan was Poppies nightclub, which had two dance floors. On a Thursday it was happy hour and we would all descend there to bop to watered down alternative music like Baby I Love You (Ramones), Too Much Too Young (Specials), What Difference Does It Make (The Smiths), Love Cats (Cure) - that kind of stuff. It was quite a good night, Edwin Starr used to appear there on the other dancefloor and I remember watching one of his performances and feeling zero emotion. Normally we seldom strayed from our darkened area. I do remember there being this complete twat dressed like Michael Jackson (Thriller era), kitted out in a suit, trilby hat, hair-beads and one white glove. He had all the moves down to a tee and the DJ would play loads of Jacko-shit as this idiot danced on his own. I ended up some fifteen years later inadvertently employing him… Although not as a Michael Jackson impersonator!

My Thursday nights at Poppies became very regular, often with both my sisters in tow, and with the beer being so cheap (£1 a pint) and Thursday being payday, I soon began skipping work on Fridays due to a horrendous hangover. My boss quickly became wise to this and when I went to collect my wages she’d open my pay packet and take out a tenner and say, 

‘This for you to go out tonight, have a great time. You can have the rest when you come in tomorrow.’ Alcohol is ace though, you wake up the next day all fuzzed out with a banging head. Despite waking up with a face like a badly drawn cunt, a hangover was something I loved having as it was the result of a great night out. My Poppies days were numbered however after I began helping myself to the Guinness. The pump was right at the end of the busy bar and there’d only be one girl working, who was really stressed and stretched. I used to quickly reach over, stick my empty glass under the tap, leave it there until three quarters full and make off with my free drink. My nights became very cheap for a few weeks until I was caught and literally kicked and punched down the road by the bouncers.

Bath Street, Rhyl - The Corridor of Doors

 

He opened the book on his bare lap, fingers tracing the flavescent page, bent and creased from some forgotten moment of distraction. The story itself was about patricide — grim, unsettling, and yet he couldn’t look away. The words reached into him like an infection, twisting something already restless inside. It was a kind of perverted perversion, a fascination that felt alien and yet entirely his. Power radiated from those sentences: the power of imagination, of annihilation, of mutilation, amputation, and ultimately… of contemplation.

Closing the book, he rose and found himself walking down a corridor. At first it seemed ordinary — long, sterile, clinically clean, the sort of place where echoes linger long after footsteps fade. But something was wrong. Something shifted. At the far end loomed a door, heavy and waiting.

He paused, listening. Nothing. The air hummed faintly, as though alive. With a breath that caught in his throat, he turned the handle.

The world on the other side wasn’t right. The corridor continued, yes, but now its walls pulsed with a fuzzy purple light, static and liquid at once. The surfaces moved yet remained still, a contradiction that defied reason. He reached out, hand trembling, and the material resisted like gel, then rippled away into silence.

And then he saw it: the void. Where one wall should have been, there was only blackness — infinite, hungry, bottomless. The purple corridor clung to existence on the edge of that abyss, as though straining against being swallowed.

Along the single remaining wall stretched countless doors. Closed, identical, each one humming with unseen possibility.

A chill ran through him. Each door, he knew without being told, contained a future. Not a metaphorical choice, but a literal one. Only by opening a door and stepping through would he discover which life awaited him.

He hesitated. His hand hovered at the nearest knob, sweat beading at his temple. What if he chose wrong? What if the wrong door led only to deeper voids, to darker corridors? What if none of them led back?

The silence pressed in, thick and suffocating. His heart raced. For a moment he almost turned back — but when he glanced over his shoulder, the clean corridor was gone. There was only purple static and the infinite dark.

No retreat. Only doors. Only futures.

His hand touched cold metal. He drew a breath, braced himself, and—

—suddenly, awareness hit him like a crash of light.

The corridor dissolved. The void melted. The doors vanished. He was back on the threadbare carpet of his first flat in Bath Street, Rhyl. The book was still in his lap. The walls were still nicotine-stained. The buzzing wasn’t cosmic energy — it was the fluorescent strip light.

It had been an acid trip. One of many in those days, when his experiments with LSD carved out strange journeys through his own mind. That night, 1984, he had wandered corridors of choice and stared into black voids of possibility. And though the drug had rattled him with visions of futures unknown, somewhere in that trip — and in the years that followed — he’d like to think he chose the right door.

GIG 0009 - Ocean Rane at Rhyl Bandstand

 

Summer 1984: I had relocated to Rhyl and upgraded my life to a truly luxurious bedsit at the ripe old age of 17. It had all the charm you’d expect — questionable smells, mysterious stains, and a décor best described as “landlord chipwood.” Still, I’d acquired a new gang of friends and a girlfriend, so obviously life was going brilliantly. We were a united front of punks and psychobillies, heroically keeping hairspray and cheap lager manufacturers in business.

Rhyl, culturally speaking, was not exactly bursting at the seams with gigs. Entertainment options were mostly limited to the arcades, the wind, and bad drugs. So when we stumbled across a band called Ocean Rane playing on the bandstand on the Prom, it felt like we’d discovered the local Glastonbury.

They looked impossibly young and painfully nervous — the kind of nervous that makes you want to clap before they’ve even started, just to be kind. Naturally, it later turned out they were actually older than me, which was both insulting and confusing. Their sound struck me as slightly moddish, which in our leather-clad, hairsprayed worldview was practically experimental jazz.

Still, for one glorious windswept afternoon, the Rhyl seafront had a soundtrack — and we had something to do that didn’t involve loitering with intent. A cultural high point, by local standards.

GIG 0008 - Desmond Decker at Colwyn Bay Pier

This was my third visit to a gig in Colwyn Bay, and a few years since that fatefu Black Flag riot! This time it was to attend a Scooter Rally on the Pier. Spike and Tony came with me and we joined up with some of the Colwyn crew. We were most certainly the punks in the corner speeding like a jet as the soul boys did their 360s on the dancefloor to the wall to wall Motown being pumped out. Desmond Decker was on the bill (oooh ohh my Israelites), and he kept referring to Tony and Jon (bloth black dudes) as his brothers.

There was a smattering of skinheads who showed their true colours when the DJ (naively) put on a Skrewdriver record and six or seven of these boneheaded boots ‘n’ braces had the dancefloor to themselves. I thought ‘fuck this’ and got up and danced like a chicken amongst them. I expected a good kicking from the National Front, but not one of them challenged me.

GIG 0007 - Terminal at The Crown Hotel, Denbigh

 

We’d gone to see the local-ish heroes Terminal play their jagged new-wave set at The Crown in Denbigh — a triumphant hometown moment for their very polished guitarist Nige Peters, while the rest of the band had apparently travelled the gruelling Wrexham-to-Denbigh tour circuit.

We’d only just escaped school after being politely encouraged not to darken the door of sixth form again — a decision we graciously accepted and travelled daily in the opposite direction of the band to college in Wrexham. Being spectacularly underage, we fortified ourselves with Thunderbird Wine that older, more morally flexible friends bought from the off-licence. By the time we staggered into the tiny upstairs room at The Crown, we were already operating at what could generously be described as “festival levels”.

I distinctly remember dancing to This Charming Man, which The Smiths had put out the week before. This proves two things: one, I was very drunk; and two, my musical judgement had become deeply questionable.

By the time Terminal actually hit the stage, I’d progressed from “enthusiastic audience member” to “collapsed furniture accessory,” lying on the floor under a cluster of chairs near the front. My final memory of the evening is of vomiting dangerously close to the bassist’s mic stand — a moment that, I like to think, really added to the ambience.

A legendary gig, by any standard. Just possibly not for the band.

GIG 0006 - Terminal at Wedgewood Cinema, Denbigh

A year or so after my work as a teenage cleaner had ended at the cinema, I pitched a wild idea to the new owners. Picture this: bands playing live at the Wedgewood Cinema, decked out in white, with films projected over them during the set. Lewis, the owner—a decent bloke, easy to chat with—thought it was a cracking concept but reckoned it’d cost a bomb to build a stage up to the screen’s height. Not one to give up, I threw out another idea: what about a punk disco? Lewis gave it the nod, and for at least six months, the Wedgewood became Denbigh’s own punk rock mecca.

Every weekend, the town’s teenage punk crew—spiked hair, ripped jackets, and all—formed a gloriously chaotic queue outside, buzzing for the mayhem to kick off. We’d already be half-cut, our heads swimming in Bub’s lethal homebrew, toting bags stuffed with records for the DJ. This wasn’t some half-arsed Youth Club disco with a token punk track thrown in to shut us up. This was the real deal: wall-to-wall Discharge, Blitz, Peter and the Test Tube Babies, Dead Kennedys, Crass, The Ejected (belted out Have You Got 10p?—nah, not me!), UK Subs, Cockney Rejects, The Damned, Sex Pistols, Buzzcocks, Slaughter and the Dogs (You’re Ready Now was a banger), Plasmatics, and heaps more. 

Those nights were pure chaos, and I’ve got a scar on the back of my shaved head to prove it. During a particularly mental rendition of Dead Cities by The Exploited, I ended up at the bottom of a pile-on, face-down on the sticky floor, barely able to breathe under a heap of sweaty bodies. Some daft sod thought he’d leap over the lot, only to clip my head as he landed. Blood pissed out for the rest of the night, but I kept dancing, too caught up in the madness to care. Eventually, I dragged my blood-soaked self to the Infirmary for stitches. That scar’s still there, a jagged little memento of those great nights.

Denbigh wasn’t exactly a hotbed of musical talent back then, but we had one band that made some noise: Terminal, a new-wave-cum-pop outfit with a slick, radio-friendly sound. They were alright, I suppose, though a bit too polished for my raw punk tastes. Still, I couldn’t resist grabbing their single Am I Doing It Right—a cheeky tune about a lad losing his virginity that had just enough edge to make it worth a spin. They played a gig at the Wedgewood Cinema, and it was a proper spectacle. Picture this: a stage rigged up on scaffolding, level with the massive screen, with a film flickering over them as they performed. It was electric, a proper show that felt bigger than our little town.

Where did they get the idea to put it on there and have a film projected over them as they played?

 

GIG 0005 - Black Flag / Black Flag Roadcrew / Vicious Circle

My soon-to-be step-brother Chris Vandal (same age, same questionable life choices) and I travelled from Denbigh to the legendary Dixieland Showbar on Colwyn Bay Pier to see The Exploited. Punk pilgrimage complete. Or so we thought.

We arrived to be greeted by two bouncers and the crushing news that singer Wattie Buchan had sprained his ankle playing in the snow, so the band wouldn’t be appearing. But good news — we got a free poster. Because nothing heals teenage disappointment like a rectangle of paper.

Since Denbigh had approximately zero punk gigs, we decided we were staying anyway and would extract maximum value from the evening.

First up: Vicious Circle. My main memory is their singer wearing leather trousers and me throwing a full pint of water at them. In my defence, the Punk Rulebook clearly stated you had to throw liquids at bands. It was practically etiquette.

Next came a hastily assembled band made up of Black Flag’s road crew, including Minor Threat’s Ian MacKaye on bass. This was our accidental introduction to American hardcore, which was roughly 200% more aggressive than Colwyn Bay was emotionally prepared for.

Naturally, we responded with violence. Enter Black Flag and from the safety of the back of the pit, we began throwing coins and badges. Chris then removed his Sid Vicious padlock and chain necklace and launched it toward the stage like a medieval siege weapon. Had Henry Rollins not ducked mid-lyric, we might have accidentally assassinated him.

During the chaos, someone’s bullet belt exploded across the floor, gifting the crowd a handy pile of ammunition. An older punk with enormous blond spikes actively encouraged us to keep firing. One bullet eventually hit guitarist Greg Ginn on the head. He stopped mid-song, put down his guitar, picked up a folding chair and launched it into the crowd before storming off. The rest of the band followed. Honestly, fair enough.

Rollins returned to the stage looking even angrier than usual, holding the offending bullet and yelling:
“One of you fuckers threw this and spoiled it for everyone, good fucking night.”
Mic drop. Exit. End of Welsh debut.

After the gig, we mingled innocently with the band and crew and asked, “What happened?” A roadie shrugged and said some kids got over-excited. If only he knew.

Years later, Rollins immortalised the incident in his book Get in the Van and retold it on his spoken-word tours.

Some people get thanked in album liner notes. We nearly got thanked in a police report.

GIG 0004 - The Damned / Anti Nowhere League at Colwyn Bay Pier

Five years before I actually moved to Colwyn Bay, I arrived as a wide-eyed almost-15-year-old about to attend my first proper punk gig without parental supervision. This was serious business. I’d already seen and even met The Jam and The Clash, but those were balcony gigs — observational punk. This was going to be hands-on, down-the-front, getting-elbowed-in-the-kidneys punk. The Damned at Colwyn Bay Pier.

My mates Yosser, Shaun “Cret” Walton and I fought our way to the barrier, planting ourselves within gobbing distance of the support band: Anti-Nowhere League. I even had the tour flyer like some kind of sacred relic. The Damned had their Friday 13th EP coming out, and the League were causing national outrage with their version of Streets of London. It was 20 November 1981, and Colwyn Bay Pier was briefly pretending it was the centre of the musical universe. Motorhead, Siouxsie & The Banshees, Cockney Rejects, Desmond Dekker — all had somehow ended up playing this seaside pier that was held erect by rust and hope.

Being crushed against the barrier watching Anti-Nowhere League’s North Wales debut was, in my teenage brain, a spiritual awakening. Leather, chains, tattoos, biker boots and a very enthusiastic commitment to swearing — it was everything I thought adulthood would be. I decided right there that I would be in a punk band. Punk had been branded onto my heart like a slightly dodgy tattoo you get on holiday.

At the time, I believed every single outrageous story printed in Sounds and NME. Drug orgies. Farmyard animals. On-stage chaos. Backstage chaos. Chaos in the car park. In reality, they were probably perfectly polite blokes who mowed the lawn on Sundays. The fact they’re all still alive strongly suggests fewer livestock were involved than advertised.

I absolutely loved the scandal of them being banned from Top Of The Pops after allegedly fighting the stage manager, and the police seizing their single because of lyrical indecency. But so what! as a teenager, nothing says “great music” like mild moral panic. I remember belting out Streets Of London and a beautifully reworked version of Rock Around The Clock that had undergone what you might call “lyrical enhancement.”

The Damned — my favourite band — were almost overshadowed by all this. I do remember Captain Sensible introducing new bassist Paul Gray by proudly explaining he was better than the previous bassist at sticking carrots up his own arse. It’s strange what the brain chooses to preserve.

After the gig, because it was a pier and therefore an architectural cul-de-sac, we hung around to meet the bands. Dave Vanian cleverly escaped by combing his hair down and strolling past carrying a handbag before anyone clocked it was him. Captain Sensible and Rat Scabies, however, stayed to sign autographs and exchange insults.

The Captain was smoking. I asked for a drag.
“Piss off, have a wank,” he replied warmly.

As the tour bus pulled away, Captain and Rat leaned out of the window, gave the entire crowd the universal wanker gesture and shouted, “Thanks for your money!”

You’re very welcome. Thanks for the night.

John Lennon is Dead

 

It was a wet and miserable December morning, the time was about 6.55am. I was in Colomendy estate in Denbigh on my paper round. I had been doing it for about a year & Xmas was coming, normally for a paperboy the advent of Yuletide meant a big pay-day as the tips for your year long slog with scant reward would start flowing. This, sadly was not the case, my round cover the most affluent part of Denbigh, nice houses, nice cars, no tips. The other paperboys who did the council estates returned loaded with 50p's and pound notes, although there was little money within the households they served. There was plenty of cash flow, perhaps the phrase; 'the rich get richer while the poor get poorer' stemmed from the generosity extended to the paperboy at Xmas.

My BMX bike weaved its way along the dark pavements, door to door, delivering the Telegraph, the Guardian, and the Times. For company, tied to the handlebars I had an Action Man radio, a waterproof birthday present which could transmit Morse code should I ever get lost in the depths of Denbigh. Radio One, as ever, poured out drab pap music, but it kept my 14-year-old mind on the job in hand.

The 7 o'clock headlines rang out across the sleepy housing estate:

'John Lennon has been shot dead outside his home in New York.'

I pulled the brakes on my bike, took the heavy paper sack off my shoulder and dropped it onto the wet pavement. A state of complete shock came over me, but I didn't know why, John Lennon had never consciously meant anything to me, particularly during my musical awareness years where the likes of Sham 69, Sex Pistols, The Damned, Clash etc. were my idols.

Leaving the sack in a puddle where it fell, I solemnly made the long climb up Vale Street and home to my sleeping family. I awoke my mother:

'Mum, John Lennon's dead.'

We lived in Ruthin in the late sixties as did John & Cynthia Lennon, and my parents would attend the various parties held by the neighbours.

My mother didn't get out of bed that day.

Dad’s account of this day (written in 2009) goes like this…

It was my day off. I dragged myself out of bed mid morning, turned the kettle on and then the radio.

The kettle boiled dry.

Shocked by the news, I never got my morning cuppa. I sat all day, stunned, as a crackly medium wave Radio City struggled to reach over the Welsh mountains. They played Beatles tracks all day back-to-back.

John Lennon had been shot.

The following day I was back at work for the Evening Leader newspaper. Myself and feature-writer Carol James were the only newspaper people John’s ex wife Cynthia would talk to at that sad time. We interviewed and photographed her at her home in Castle Street, Ruthin, whilst the photographers from the Nationals were dropping mind-blowingly huge cheques through her letterbox desperate for exclusive pictures and an interview. She tore them all up.

We got through the door because we were journos she could trust to be sensitive and not sensationalise how she felt about John’s death, having previously done a feature about her charity work a few months earlier and prior to that a promotional piece about her book A Twist of Lennon.

For me, the whole thing was made far more poignant since I’d been part of the 60s/70s music scene myself.

My band, The Executioners, had graduated from the local village hall dances, through the Chester and Deeside working-mens clubs, to earn our place on the Mersey Beat scene. We played the Cavern, The Iron Door, Tower Ballroom New Brighton and many other Merseyside Clubs, alongside the likes of the Searchers, The Big Three, Freddie Starr and the Midnighters, The Black Abbots, and the Undertakers.

Sadly, we were never on the same bill as The Beatles, so I never got to meet John Lennon.

It was spooky when some time later, I photographed Julian Lennon as a young man because at that time he was just like his father during the Cavern years.

Today, 29 years after his untimely death, John’s music is as fresh and meaningful as back then. It will live on forever. But I often wonder what he would be doing now had December 8th 1980 never happened.

GIG 0003 - Billy Joel at Deeside Leisure Centre

I was 13 and there purely by accident because I happened to be staying at my dad’s that night and he was the local press photographer. Not exactly the rebellious rock-and-roll origin story you’d brag about in the playground. In fact, I told absolutely nobody. My carefully curated Punk Cred™ would have evaporated overnight.

From what I remember, the show was… fine. Competent. Polished. A bit self-indulgent. The sort of performance that probably felt transcendent if you loved Billy Joel, and like a very long piano lesson if you didn’t.

The real highlight came afterwards. While my dad was busy photographing the star dramatically pretending to play a pinball machine, I was in the bar chatting to the band’s American guitarist. He confided that he loved punk and only played this “stuff” because it paid well and came with travel perks. Even at 13, I recognised the purity of that sentiment: sell out, see the world, complain about it in the bar afterwards.

That night marked my third and final visit to Deeside Leisure Centre as a venue. A fitting farewell, really, because I also proudly refused the chance to see Adam & The Ants and Blondie around the same time. I declared myself “too punk rock” to attend. My sisters went instead.

Naturally, they had a brilliant time. I have spent the intervening decades perfecting the fine art of regret.

GIG 0002 - The Clash / Mikey Dread / Jiving Daleks at Deeside Leisure Centre

Crass taught me more about life, idealism, and social awareness than my parents or any schoolteacher ever did. I didn’t agree with everything they said, but I knew every word of every song—and still do. What set them apart was that they rarely told you what to do; they just told you what it was about. They laid the world bare and left you to make up your own mind.

And they did it without fleecing the kids. “Pay no more than 45p” was printed on some singles. Stations of the Crass, a double album, cost just £3.25. They were against profiteering, and it worked. Records flew out by the truckload because kids could actually afford them. That principle stuck with me, and it’s a policy I carry on to this day with my own music. I sell at a price that covers the costs. Seldom do I break even, let alone make a profit. If I wanted to make money out of music, I’d have joined a fucking covers band.

The irony was that the ultra-low prices meant Crass records weren’t eligible for the official charts. But sales-wise, they were still beating the big boys. When ABBA sat at No.1 with Super Trouper, Crass’s single Bloody Revolutions actually shifted more copies. That blew my teenage mind.

I learned more about the world by sitting in my bedroom with a record spinning and the lyric sheet in my hands than I ever did from the pompous lectures of school. That was my education—raw, noisy, and a hell of a lot more useful.

“They said that we were trash, well the name is Crass not Clash, they can stuff their punk credentials ‘cos it’s them that take the cash.” (White Punks On Hope – Crass, from Stations Of The Crass, 1979).

See? I said I didn’t agree with everything Crass preached. Decades later, Steve Ignorant even expressed regret for writing that line. Crass certainly had their detractors—The Exploited, Special Duties, Garry Bushell—but I liked The Exploited, never really paid attention to Special Duties or their Bullshit Crass single, and once I realised what a cock Garry Bushell was (and still is), I was firmly on the Crass side of the divide.

But before I’d even heard of Crass, let’s rewind a couple of years…

I was back at Deeside Leisure Centre, watching The Clash. I had just turned thirteen, and Dad had scored me two press-pass tickets for their 16 Tons Tour—they always gave their tours names, which made them sound important. It was 26th January 1980. Punk rock was becoming a staple of my life, but I was also trying to impress my new girlfriend, Lynda. We perched on the balcony with the “dignitaries” while thousands of punks swayed on the covered ice rink below.

The Clash were already huge by 1980, and just seeing the size of the crowd was breathtaking. The pre-gig PA droned on with endless reggae, which seemed to stretch on forever and bored a lot of the audience. Then Problems by the Pistols kicked in, and the energy shifted instantly. The crowd pogoed in unison, the tension snapping into raw, kinetic excitement.

Deeside Leisure Centre was, at the time, the sixth-largest indoor venue in the UK. That sounded impressive on paper, but in reality it was a freezing concrete cavern that felt more like an aircraft hangar than a concert hall. It was vast, echoing, and probably the grottiest place I’d ever been to see a gig. 

The local support were Chester’s own Jiving Daleks. They kicked things off with raw enthusiasm and the sort of scrappy confidence only small bands seem to have when suddenly faced with a huge crowd. Their singer, Mazz, looked out over the sea of pogoing punks and shouted into the microphone, “Stop spitting at me—I’ll catch hepatitis!” The place erupted. It was brilliant. Their song Two Faced Bitch still rattles around somewhere in my head decades later—rough, loud and gloriously unpolished, just like the band themselves.

Next on the bill was Mikey Dread, the reggae toaster who would later collaborate with The Clash and inspire their track Bankrobber. Unfortunately for him, the crowd that night had been raised on Anarchy in the U.K. and New Rose. Laid-back reggae rhythms weren’t what they’d come for. Within minutes the front rows turned into a spit-launching artillery line, gob after gob flying toward the stage and glinting under the lights.

To his credit, Mikey Dread carried on performing, but you could see the moment he realised he wasn’t winning this crowd over. Then members of The Clash wandered onto the stage wearing long coats and dark sunglasses, skanking beside him in solidarity. They started spitting back at the crowd, turning the whole unpleasant spectacle into something that felt more like a standoff than heckling.

When their own set finally began, the atmosphere changed instantly. They were electric. They tore through songs from London Calling, which I barely knew at the time. I was only thirteen and too green to catch every lyric, but the sheer force of the performance hit like a shockwave. The details of the setlist have faded over the years, but the energy of it all burned itself into my memory.

When the gig finished the crowd drifted off into the night, but Lynda and I stayed in our seats waiting for my dad to finish talking in the bar. While we were hanging around we spotted Mazz and Sven from the Jiving Daleks milling about nearby. We asked if they knew where we could get a concert programme. Mazz grinned and said, “I can do better than that—I can get you backstage to meet the Clash.”

We followed her through a maze of corridors and past a line of fans who looked at us with obvious envy. A few turns later we were suddenly standing in the band’s dressing room. My little notebook was out immediately, my hand shaking slightly as I held out a pen. Paul Simonon signed first, smiling warmly. Mick Jones followed. Topper Headon was busy chatting up a groupie but still managed to scribble his autograph without really looking up.

Across the room, Mikey Dread stood quietly wiping spit off his coat, looking like he’d rather be absolutely anywhere else. Then there was Joe Strummer. Unlike the others, he didn’t just sign and move on. He leaned forward and asked where we were from. “Denbigh? That’s just up the road, innit?” I was stunned. Joe Strummer knew Denbigh. Looking back it probably wasn’t exactly obscure geography, but to a thirteen-year-old kid from North Wales it felt incredible.

Lynda, bold as ever, ended up perched on his knee while he signed her notebook. With a grin he added a couple of kisses after his autograph. For a brief second I considered squaring up to him for flirting with my girlfriend, but reality quickly intervened. I was a skinny kid and he was Joe Strummer. Some battles you simply don’t start.

Looking back now, that night felt magical: a grimy venue, a spit-soaked crowd, a punk band at the height of their power, and two kids from Denbigh suddenly standing in the dressing room with their heroes. I can’t remember every song they played, but I remember exactly how it felt. That’s the strange thing about memory—the details fade, but the feeling never does.

There’s a small detail that still makes me smile. On the album Sandinista!, the lyric sheet for The Crooked Beat credits Paul Simonon with singing the line “Class, class, you wanna learn to dance.” But every time I hear it, it sounds suspiciously like “Crass, Crass, you wanna learn to dance.” Maybe it’s just my ears playing tricks on me, or maybe it was a sly nod to Crass after they’d questioned the Clash’s punk credentials. Either way, that’s always how I’ve heard it.

As for Lynda and me, I honestly can’t remember exactly how long we were together. Our little school gang worked like a revolving door of teenage relationships—boyfriends and girlfriends swapped around regularly, like mixtapes being passed from hand to hand. If someone got “chucked,” things rarely stayed awkward for long. We were just kids. “Going out” usually meant sweaty hand-holding, snogging behind the bike sheds, and the occasional hickey worn proudly like a badge of honour.

The delicate balance of our little social universe nearly collapsed, though, when I briefly started seeing Claire—the mod. She had sharp clothes and pure Vespa energy, while I looked like I’d fallen head-first into a box of safety pins. How that combination ever worked I’ll never know. It didn’t last long. Just another blurry moment in the strange, chaotic orbit of teenage punk life.