The only live music I saw while growing up was school and church music: Bach on the organ, school orchestras mangling Haydn, school choirs murdering Britten, school troupes absolutely torturing Gilbert and Sullivan.
When I was 15, I saw The Sensational Alex Harvey Band live at Leeds University. Seventies rock vaudeville. It blew my mind:
We sat on the floor in a small hall with a low stage. Everyone seemed to be very much taller than me. At first I couldn’t see much of the stage but as the eveing progressed the audience seemed to shrink. It turned out everyone was sitting on cases of beer. As they drank, they got closer to the ground. By the end of the evening, half of them were horizontal. Not knowing how these things worked, I’d neglected to bring anything to drink–though I think others took pity on me and gave me a couple of tinnies. (For those of you who don’t speak Northern, a tinny is a tin–a can–of beer.)
One of things I admired, and still do, is SAHB’s fabulous sense of timing, their willingness to take a moment and let it…stretch. Oh, and the music was really, really loud. This evening in 1976 was where I saw, for the first time, someone try to curl up in the cone of a big bass speaker. No doubt that person now uses BSL (British Sign Language) because there wouldn’t have been much of his eardrums left.
Anyway, I hope this enlivens your Thursday.
Their version of Jacques Brel’s Next! is totally insane. Gonna have to find them on i-tunes now to get all nostalgic.
< HREF="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7vaLi9W6HRc" REL="nofollow">They have that on YouTube<>, too. Fabulous.
They are great. I enjoyed the beer as hair gel bit.>>Opposite end of the scale from my first concert; I was 13(?) when I saw John Denver. Back in those days in the US there was no alcohol allowed in concerts. We had to sneak it in.
I loved John Denver’s music, used to sing it to myself a lot while I moved about the house, but people teased me: hey, they said, you even <>look like John Denver!<>. I didn’t like that. For years I couldn’t listen to his stuff. Perhaps it’s time to try again.
Thanks for the youtube link :-)
<>terry<>, my pleasure. Though if you have a cure for the ‘Delilah’ < HREF="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ear_worm" REL="nofollow">ear worm<> I’d be very, very grateful.
Easy enough Nicola. Flamingo by The Nutty Squirrels. http://is.gd/ga9r
Ha!. Crazy tho – of course you are <>much<> easier on the eyes than John Denver.>>Had to follow your link to find out what ‘ear worm’ is. Did you see this for < HREF="http://prettypictures.com/maim/" REL="nofollow">the cure?<>
Thangyouthangyouthangyou. I too was going to comment about the pace but the guitarist with the clown face distracted me. Oh yeah, and graciasmucho!
<>terry, jennifer<>, I’m afraid to follow those links in case the cure is worse than the original affliction…>><>rhbee1<>, you are most welcome.