The music we love is the soundtrack to our lives. For me, there are some moments that are indelibly burned into my memory as mindblowing moments of bliss. As my band, The False Dots face the biggest moment of our career, with our album launch at The Dublin Castle tomorrow, I thought today would be a great day to share my best musical moments.
1. The Ramones at the Roundhouse in June 1977, when Joey Ramone came out with the GABBA GABBA HEY placard during pinhead. The gig was mindblowingly good, but this was the moment that stuck in my brain forever. It was the moment I knew what I wanted to do with my life. I was fourteen years old and at that moment I realised Id spent my life waiting for this one moment.
2. Wire. 1978. The Marquee club. Wire are a bit of a difficult band to enjoy. I absolutely love them, but they only play new songs at shows. They had made a seminal punk album called Pink Flag. I went expecting to hear all of these masterpieces. They only played one song from the album. What I didn't know was that they had recorded a new album called Chairs Missing, that was evern better. It was not punk, it was arty new wave. The songs were unlike anything I'd ever heard. One of the songs, Practice makes perfect, descends into manic, hysterical laughter. It was one of the most intense moments in any gig ever. It literally blew my mind. Of course the next time I saw Wire, they didn't play it.
3. Hot tramp, I love you so. The last line of the chorus on Rebel Rebel by David Bowie. I was on a date with a girl I had the real hots for. We were having a drink and flirting like mad, when this came on the juke box. When it got to that line, we both looked into each others eyes, sang the line and kissed. It was my best jukebox moment ever. It also cemented Bowie as one of my favourite artists ever.
4. 54-46 was my number. May 2017. My daughter was at Uni in Leeds. In a moment of drunken foolishness, she fell 30 foot out of a tree she was climbing in the town centre. We got a call from A&E to say she was in a bad way. We dropped everything. They wouldn't tell us her condition until we arrived. How we didnt' get a speeding ticket I will never know. We got there and to my immense relief she was sort of ok, but had multiple fractures including a badly broken arm, which required a large metal plate in her arm. We brought her home. She was really down. The Specials were playing at Hatfield House. We got her a ticket to try and cheer her up. Toots and The Maytells, a band I love, were supporting. To be honest, I was so stressed that I wasn't really looking forward to the gig. But as soon as Toots kicked off, my blues disippated. When they played 54-46 was my number, the whole place went bonkers. I looked and saw my daughter smiling. I knew everything would be Ok.
5. I am not sure of the year, I think around 1990 but I may be wildly out. I went to see The Dickies at The Powerhaus venue in Islington. I'd not seen the band for a decade, since The Marquee in 1978, when The Banana Splits song was in the chart, which was one of the best gigs I've seen. I didn't have high hopes, as it seemed to me that most of the punk bands had run out of energy and lost their way. How wrong could I be? The Dickies were blindingly good. They had a relatively new song called "If Stuart Could Talk", off Stukas over Disneyland. It was an OK song, not a stand out. However when they performed it live, they added a bit at the end. The theme of the song is that the singer is having a conversation is having a conversation with his penis, which is called Stuart (who is not overly happy with the attention Leonard Graves-Phillips has been paying him). I was quite enjoying it, when the band unexpectedly (for me), segued into Listening to You by The Who. Graves-Phillips produced a giant Penis glove puppet to perform the "See me, feel me, touch me, heal me" line. It was the most mindblowingly hilarious moment in any show, ever. It completely pricked the pomposity of The Who song.
6. The Gangster of Love. My brother used to ask me to babysit for his kids when they were little. He'd buy a bottle of cider and give me a fiver. I'd get one of my mates to nip over and we'd listen to his record collection. He had such artists as The Velvet Underground, The Electric Prunes, Country Joe and The Fish in his collection. Being punks, it was a sort of guilty pleasure to sit there and listen to them. We put on Sailor by The Steve Miller Band. A record my brother told us was the best album ever. We quite enjoyed side one, span it over and played side 2. Track 3 is a cover of the Johnny Guitar Watson song "The Gangster of Love". We were listening to it, enjoying the vibe. About halfway through, the at around 1.20 into the song. The band all crack up and stop playing and it seguey's into a Jimmy Reeds song "You're so fine". We looked at each other and cracked up. We sort of realised that the band had a sense of humour. Much 1970's prog rock was rather po faced. This was a great antidote.
7. Falsedub. In February 1982, The False Dots were in a studio owned by Ray Randall, bassplayer of The Tornados in Hendon. We were recording a new demo tape. One of the songs we'd written was a rather bad cod reggae/ska track called Falsedub. We simply weren't good enough musicians to get the right feel. We had a rock drummer who wasn't adaptable enough. I really wanted the track to work, so I booked some more studio time with Ray to remix it. Bassplayer Paul Hircombe came with me. We had a cunning plan (the sort you make when you are young and stupid). We decided that if we got some really strong ganga and mixed it whilst being stoned, we'd get a proper reggae vibe. Ray merrily joined in. We went in and spent six hours smoking and putting heavy delay and all manner of strange noises on. By 2am in the morning, we had completed the masterpiece. Ray gave us a master tape and a cassette. It genuinely was the most amazing music we'd ever heard. The next day, I went around to Paul's to excitedely listen to it. He put on the cassette. It was absolutely awful, what were we thinking. It was an expensive lesson. As an aside, the song was called Falsedub because we'd played it at a party at a squat in Maida Vale. We asked a wise old Jamaican Dread brother what he thought of our reggae song. He said "man, that ain't reggae, that's false dub". He preferred a number that sounded a bit country and western.
9. Aland, January 1982. The False Dots were on tour in Scandinavia in January 1982. We had to play a gig in Aland, which is a Baltic Island that is Finnish. We played a venue called Pub Bastun. They paid very good money, but we had to play three sets of 45 minutes in length. We didn't have enough songs, so we frantically learned two sets worth of covers and dusted off every song we'd ever played. One of the songs we learned was the Steve Miller band song "Space Cowboy" (not The Joker, which references it). It has the same riff as Lady Madonna by The Beatles. It ends with a stop and a short drum break. To pad it out, we decided that our drummer would play a drum solo at the end. Paul Hircombe suggested that we'd do the solo with a strobe light on. Paul 'obtained' a strobe light and we rehearsed it. It was hilarious as it appeared Mark was playing in slow motion, whilst frantically bashing everything in sight. We decided that we'd end the first set with it. Until that moment, the Fins were midly enjoying the tracks, but not getting too involved. When we played Space Cowboy, their ears pricked up. I think they expected Lady Madonna. At then end when the lights were cut and Mark did his solo, they went mental. After that they really got going. When we finished the final set, they bayed for an encore. We said "We've got no more songs". They all bayed "Play Space Cowboy again". So we did, three times. There was a moment when Mark was doing his solo in the final set, with the strobe on. There were massive great Viking hulks dancing on tables, seemingly in slow motion. I will never forget looking at the scene and wondering if we'd ever get a response like this again. I wondered if anyone would? The next morning a few of the punters turned up. We were the first English band to play Pub Bastun. One guy said to me that he'd never seen an English band before, only Swedish and Finnish ones. I asked if he liked us. He said "Your playing is rubbish, but your attitude is amazing and I've never seen a gig like it. All of our bands are very regimental". I hope our playing has improved a bit.
10. The Family Stone at The Jazz Cafe. I can't believe this was 2012, over 12 years ago. Sadly, Sly was not playing with them. But I cannot tellyou how good they were. Rather like the Dickies at The Powerhaus, I really went out of curiosity. From start to finish the gig was amazing, but when they played Higher, I was transported to a better place. When the brass really kicks in, it just is so uplifting. That was the moment I decided I wanted a band with brass in it and it's why Tom Hammond plays guitar with The False Dots.
As I compiled this list, it reminded me of just how much I love live music. I could have made this a top 25 or even a top 100, possibly even a top 1,000. An important thought occurred to me. These days so many people at gigs are obsessed with taking videos that they miss such moments. One thing I guarantee with gigs is that the videos never capture the moment. Professional crews rarely do, so what hope have you. Put the phone away and groove on down and feel the moment. My biggest bugbear of all are people who talk at gigs and don't enjoy the music. If I ever become world dictator, I'll employ people with electric cattle prods to shut them up. A mate recently told me that he'd "given up on gigs as they are too expensive". I pointed out that venues like the Dublin Castle, where we play tomorrow charge a tenner for entrance. You will notice that none of my moments occurred in Stadiums with mega artists. I passionately believe that if you want to see the best music, go to a small club. If you can get down tomorrow to the Dublin Castle, please do.
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