This is a terrific seven minute summation of the Shamsters, from a punk TV Top 10 in, I’m guessing, the early 2000s. I’ve often wondered why there hasn’t been a definitive retrospective Sham docco, but perhaps this is all one really needs?
A 7-minute Sham-69-umentary
In these days of long form documentaries and re-appraisal, the Sham doc is probably already on the drawing board of Julien Temple (or A N Other director).
If The Cockney Rejects have had the DVD treatment, then why not Sham?
I’m guessing it may get held up for a while as no sod seems to know who owns the name anymore (although JP has registered the name as a trademark), but that hasn’t stopped Tim V’s Sham doing the rounds
I remember this – C4’s Top Ten Punk Bands, one of the many, many list shows they did around this time before the “Reality TV” boom ate up the schedules (Come Dine with My Big Brother’s Embarrassing Body and the like). Early 2000, I think. Presented by Malcolm McLaren and voiceover by Ian Dury – both since departed, alas alack and woe.
This was the show where Howard Devoto talked about attending his first Pistols gig in “a pair of gentle cord flares”
6 minutes too long
8 minutes too long I’d say.
Its a sham 6 – 9 minutes too long
There have been docs (TV or film, and sometimes more than one) on the Adverts, Rejects, Undertones, Pistols, Clash, Damned, Outcasts, Johnny Moped and no doubt several others… The Shamsters are becoming conspicuous by their absence.
If Johnny Moped can get a documentary made about himself then anyone who was around at that time can. I don’t actually think there is anything that needs to be added to the seven minutes other than the full performance of his dance act on Riverside which was truly hilarious.
The Sham Army debacle makes their history awkward, IMHO. They were almost going to be massive (they were playing big venues and had an indulgent record company) but the bonehead element of their fans rather sabotaged gigging, where a band like that is never going to be about album sales. I reckon that this means that the story does not have as much to say as other bands. Their fighting and football hard nut gimmick also backfired on them, big-time.
Yes, but what about the solo albums Jimmy talks about rhetorically in the clip? Did he make any? Were they any good!?
i gather one of their albums was a “day in the life” style, gulp…concept albums!!
I never got past the singles….but FOREMANS in Nottingham always played hersham boys just before kicking out Saturday night…..during the “hoedown” the place went crazy…..happy days indeed.
FISH.
YouTube is your friend. Personally, i don’t think this is great art, but what do i know? At the time I was more a fan of “National Health”.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LiLIzuA_Pj0
I remember there was an appalling dramatisation of that concept album broadcast on BBC2. No band’s legacy is strong enough to survive that and that Riverside broadcast. And, the first few singles perhaps, apart, they were bloody awful anyway.
A quick google reveals that it was an Arena special that I was thinking of, broadcast at 10.20pm on 4 April 1979: http://genome.ch.bbc.co.uk/schedules/bbctwo/england/1979-04-02
Thanks, Alan Yentob.
(And isn’t that site amazing? I had no idea it even existed.)
Jimmy Pursey was interviewed on Radio Luxemburg when he was promoting the concept album. They played a few tracks and he would explain the story to the interviewer. Did you know that Hurry Up Harry was a song about waiting impatiently at his friend Harry’s house for him to get ready to go to the pub? Maybe the Sham army didn’t and discovered its depths during the programme.
And lo and behold, here it is…