First Gig, Best Gig, Worst Gig.

[Saxondale]

Right this time I'm starting a thread and I've actually done a search to see if its been done before.  I cant find it if it has.

So I've been reminiscing with the manager of Manchester Apollo tonight about gigs of our youth.  Very similar tastes at the age of 15 it would seem.

So my first gig was supposed to be The Waterboys at Diggers.  Bought a ticket for £4 and then got on to an outward bound course In Pencelli (or something like that.  In Wales so probably a few more LLLLLL's and a lot more phlegm) so missed out.  So instead we got our business studies teacher, Mr Lowery to get a school minibus and take us to Milton Keynes bowl and see Simple Minds.  We promptly fucked off as soon as we got in the car park.  Didn't want to be seen with a teacher.  So uncool.  We genuinely thought that, little be-mulleted twats that we were.

The bill on the day was Doctor and the Medics, Big Audio Dynamite, Lloyd Cole and the commotions and the Waterboys before the pounding beat of 'waterfront' hailed the arrival of the scotch messiah.  Loved every minute except the minute where Kerr announced the score of England Argentina saying 'England Won' I screamed with delight before he said Argentina two.

Not my best gig.  Best gig was probably some dead obscure malarkey.  American Music club at the Fleece in Bristol springs to mind or maybe all the great ones I saw at the Bierkeller in brizzole (nirvana, smashing pumpkins, NIN, Stone Roses) All probably bettered by the cure in '89 on the prayer tour.  To my tiny mind dry ice, flashing par cans and 12 minute long doomy goth rock songs was heaven.  They knew my pain and anguish.  They knew no one understood me.  I probably went home and wrote some poems, pretentious little twat (I've not changed)

Worst gig - Fuck knows.  Primal scream are occasionally dreadful or have been in the past.  Bobby Gillespie fucked makes Ian Brown sound like Pavarotti.  But there is some shite I've seen.  Napalm Death.  Now they were pointless shite.  The cocteau twins.  That's probably it.  Music was fucking lovely.  But music you should listen to in your bedroom not in the Bristol studio.  2 hours standing up tedium of the first degree surrounded by chin stroking aren't we clever listening to a woman making whale noises twats.

So.  Any memories if we haven't done this before? 

 

[Bedford Red]

I was at that Simple Minds Gig in 86

First gig was Status Quo's fairwell concert at the Bowl in 84. My Dad worked at a paper nearby at the time and i used to get into all the gigs at the Bowl in the 80's, sold some papers in the day to get some money and then saw a free gig at night....

Best Gig, hard to pick one out of the 100's i've been to (probably one of my many Foo Fighters concerts i've seen), so i'm going to choose one which suprised me by being much better than i thought it would be. OMD at Birmingham NEC in 91, Radio One sponsored the gig, The Railway Children and River City People were the two support acts; when OMD came on everyone was up from the first song, the sound was excellent and i really enjoyed it....


Worst Gig, has to be Whitney Houston at Wembley Arena in 86. Went with my girlfriend at the time, she sang the fast songs slow and the slow ones even slower, everyone was sat down the whole gig and it was awful.

[TungstenCarbide]

Following on from one of your points Saxondale, the track Disintegration off the Wembley live album Entreat.... that is the high water mark of live performance for me.

[Christy]

First two: Depeche Mode and Echo & the Bunnymen in the same week in October 1984, a lifetime ago but both still hanging around.

Best is almost impossible: My Bloody Valentine in Sheffield, the Pixies in Kilburn - the day Lou Macari left us and a million other unforgettable things, Christy Moore anywhere and everywhere...sometimes it's the big set piece gigs - Pulp in Sheffield, a Pogues reunion in Brixton, seeing Frank Turner sell out Wembley Arena a year after the back room of the Bully in Oxford or the Manics playing 37 singles at the o2.  But really, it's the surprises that endure, Catatonia (yes) in their pomp or a host of unplanned, unheralded local pub nights that become magical. Thank you most recently to 1000 Mile Highway and Cooper Black.

Worst, by a distance, Miles Hunt, on his own giving it the big one and getting what he deserved from the nice people of Cowley Road.

[sonicyouth]

First was Therapy? at the Oxford Zodiac in 2001.
Best was Kings of Convenience at Warwick Arts Centre in 2009 or Billy Bragg at The Assembly in Leamington Spa in 2010. Met him after the gig, he was wearing a lovely jumper.
Worst was Morrissey at the Oasis in 2009.

[Levi lapper]

First, queen,  royal Albert hall jubilee day 1977, but taken by parents so doesn't really count, so sham 69, oasis 1979 ( I think)

Best, Mudhoney, nirvana, tad london Astoria 1989

Worst, Julian cope in Portsmouth 1990ish, had a whiteout and spend most of gig chundering in the gents.

[Amir]

First - The Roots at Lakota, probably '97.
Best - Hard to say, so I'd probably go for the above being as I'd never been to anything like it before, and seeing Rahzel beatbox live was incredible.
Worst - Klashnekoff.  The little mincer.

[Nemo]

Before I answer, do festivals count for individual acts, the full weekend or disallowed?

[TungstenCarbide]

SY, I was at that gig at the Zodiac (airless smokey little room with low ceilings). Therapy? were fucking awesome though.

[cheltred69]

First - Thin Lizzy, Bristol Colston Hall, 1977 - was brought up in a city with no live music venue whatsoever so needed to wait to have my own transport to get there!
Best - tough to chose, but must include The Clash, Coventry Tiffany's 1980 and The Pogues on Paddy's Day in Town & Country, Kilburn, sometime around 1987 ish.
Worst - probably The Fall at Cheltenham Town Hall, Mark E Smith clearly didn't want to be there.

[STFC_Chris]

Worst? Tonight. Pete Doherty in Riffs bar. 12.15am, no sign of him. Apparently he was buying a second-hand Jag in Hammersmith.

[Honkytonk]

First - Lindisfarne, Octagon Yeovil. My dad took me. I can't have been more than 9, remember sitting down and meeting the band afterwards (they signed a cap that I still own with pride).

Best - Difficult, but right now I would say the Zebrahead/Less Than Jake double header I saw in Hammersmith about 2 years ago. I've been lucky in that I've seen some amazing bands in the few years I've been old enough to properly enjoy live music, but that night sticks in ky mind for the friends I was with, the fun we had before and after the gig, the quantities of booze that were enjoyed, and the fact I went home with an absolute stunner.

Worst - oh boy, there are so fucking many. I used to write freelance for a music magazine at Uni and fuck me did I get asked to go to some awful shite. The most well-recognised one would probably be the Black Eyed Peas in Cardiff though. That was the biggest pisstake of a gig I've ever been to. They turned up an hour late and I thought they were an appalling tribute band. Truly dire. For the amount of youngsters in the audience too, there was some really quite gratuitous soft porn/dancing going on, the set dressing/costumes looked cheap as owt, and for what was a nearly £40 ticket I was appalled at how short the sets were. I liked the BEP's until that moment (their first album is still a favourite).

[horlock07]

First - Went to quite a few at the Jericho Tavern in Oxford from about 1991 onwards, but first 'proper' one was Blur at Kilburn Ballroom.

Best - Few, Neds and PWEI in various locations (1991-1994), Carter and Sultans of Ping FC at Brixton Academy, Hermans Hermits (only went as the bassist drank in the pub my mate worked in) in Newcastle during Euro 96, dancing on tables.

Worst - Been some stinkers but the one that sticks in my mind is a band called 'On a Friday' which we went to see at the Jericho Tavern, they were truly dreadful. It was announced in the Oxford Music paper (cannot remember what it was called) the next week that they had changed their name... to Radiohead!

[Costanza]

First: Reel Big Fish - a long time ago.

Worst: LostProphets at the Plymouth Pavillions, tagged/dragged along. Arctic Monkeys at the Pavillions were shite too and Reel Big Fish at Plymouth University was embarrassingly bad.

Best: I went a Halloween Punk show in Boston which was amazing fun. Brain Failure-The Phenomenauts-River City Rebels-Street Dogs-Big D & The Kids Table. Everything about that show was brilliant.

Seeing Robert Plant perform at the Fiddlers in Bristol was ridiculously good and Rancid are never bad.

[Batch]

First - struggling to remember. Carter at Gloucester Leisure carter in 1991ish I think.

Best - New Order at Reading 98? (waited ages to see them), James 'last' gig at Wembley Arena (Brian Eno on backing vocals for a bit!).

Worst - struggling, I mean there are a number of support bands I thought were shit, but that's expected and you should be in the bar anyway.
There was Collaberation Festival in Lechlade: Expected 5000 people, got about 200 and the music was good but at times there were 10 or 20 people watching an act (Sorry for mentioning Wiggy)
I think the 'winner' was the time I drove a mate to Dudley to see his friend (signed) metal band, and he'd got the day wrong.