I was reading earlier about the Siouxsie show which advertised “+ special guests”, of which there were none, in the interim, there was a DJ set, and then the show didn’t start until half nine. A couple of weeks ago I saw Southside Johnny at the Shepherd’s Bush Empire and similarly there was a man playing records and announcing that Johnny would be onstage in an hour’s time.
On the BBC currently there is a man playing an hour’s worth of hits before The Pet Shop Boys (who presumably don’t need the most extensive of monitor checks before they go on, judging by the Glastonbury set where Chris Lowe didn’t even need to be on stage before they kicked off)
I’m not one to downplay the skill of the DJ, or the need to put some money behind the bar, or to necessarily proselytize the Hepworthian, method, but really – couldn’t we just get on with it?
I’d have missed the Iron Maiden traffic on the last train back to Ipswich if we had.
DJ Support Sets
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Agree completely. A band whose audience is largely 50+ would very much appreciate a 8pm start and for it to be over by 10pm.
And how abut nice warm milky drinks at the bar?
@h-p-saucecraft. Actually, Earl Grey tea would be nice.
Other non-dairy products are available.
I went to see Billy Bragg at Union Chapel about 10 years ago and had a cup of tea and a Kit Kat. It was bloody great.
But what was Siouxsie like? Or couldn’t you stay up that late?
Did you mean to ask Skirky that?
Indeed, but I was filtered into this orderly queue.
It’s my fault. I posted a YouTube clip and everything’s fucked. I’m sorry.
*Afterword T-Shirt klaxon*
@retropath2 I didn’t see the Siouxsie show, I read about it.
I guess what I don’t get is that oif the audience are there and the band are there, why we need someone to show us their MP3 collection for an hour before we get started?
Because the venue need to sell you copious amounts of alcohol so the staff can get paid and the owners can have their 3 Carribbean holidays a year.
I don’t know much how the business runs in the UK (if it’s overblown ticket prices or DJ sets – it’s all so that »the staff can get paid«…) but here in Europe there are a couple of (quite successful) bands who never have support acts on their tours, including some of my favourites like Element Of Crime, Phillip Boa and The Nits. Never heard complaints about the evening’s entertainment not being complete. And they all have the regular ticket price.
When the Nits played one of their rare London gigs at Bush Hall, the promoter offered to put on »a local singer-songwriter« as support act – which was met with howls of laughter from the band.
Could be that a lot of bands just don’t have long enough sets for a proper evening’s entertainment.
Or the promoters/venue just don’t want them on before about 9pm. I suspect the latter. With some kinds of acts the bar takings will decrease while they are playing so a long spell beforehand makes business sense.
Because audiences here are used to acts not getting on stage until about 9pm, a large proportion of the audience don’t arrive until 8:30 or 9pm. They meet their friends in a pub, where the drinks are cheaper, and then go on to the gig aiming to arrive just before the performance starts.
Venue license conditions here often mean the music has to stop at either 10:30 or 11pm.
I once (30+ years ago – Screamadelica wasn’t out yet) saw Primal Scream at the Cambridge Corn Exchange. Support was Andrew Weatherall playing some records and The Orb playing some records. I was driving, so I couldn’t even get ratarsed next door in the Red Cow. They came on stage at nearly midnight and finished at 1am. I have no idea how they got it past the college elders.
A year or two later I saw them at Brixton Academy and they didn’t even go onstage until 1am, followed by a nightmare journey home of nightbuses, early breakfast in a pub near Spitalfields market, first trains, etc.
Nowadays I’d have either just got the last train home and missed them entirely, or be asleep on the floor for the duration.
I think I might have been at that Academy gig. It was tedious waiting for the DJ to piss off and I think I actually did fall asleep.
Gigs just aren’t allowed to run that late here, these days. License conditions are strict and noise complaints can get you shut down if gigs overrun.
Good. The years of bands coming on at 11 or even later we’re grim. I couldn’t afford heavy drinking at club prices, and getting home in the small hours is often a pain. This idea of cool as it’s really late is such a load of toss.
Have to say those bands not deigning to perform in a timely fashion were disrespecting their paying punters. Taking the piss, basically.
In a perfect world, the punters would storm the dressing room and drag the lazy fuckers out.
It’s the Bobby Gillespie method…”I can’t go on before midnight, I’m a jailbird, a snorting, rock and roll animal, not a skinny runt who files his records! C86? Nah, not me guv…”
I recall having to sit through a long Gary Davies set before seeing the Pet Shop Boys
Honestly, the support DJ set is just a wanky option, I’m going to see live music, put a bloody support act on instead
And the keeping people hanging around… even Guns n Roses have realised how boring that is
Ooh, etc.
Are the Pet Shop boys live music?
These days I like the fact that headliners generally start punctually-& you can establish when they’ll come on, eliminating much irritation. This means you can have a decent idea of when it’ll be done & dusted.
This is in stark contrast to innumerable outings in the days gone by that either entailed leaving before the end in order to leg it for the last train – I can’t count the times I had to sprint down The Strand from The Lyceum to Charing X- (not always successfully), or ended up stranded with nightmare journeys home having stayed for the encore.
More than once this felt like being in an outtake from ‘The Warriors’ , crossing unfamiliar (& genuinely hostile) territory with next to no money or definite idea of where you were going. The late 70s/early 80s was a pretty hairy time to be loose in a big city as I’m sure many AWers will recall.
Fast forward to now, I love that most venues run a tight ship & you can be sure when the place will close up & the security blokes will be off home.
There is no way that artists will be indulged to get *even more* stoned or be generally disorganised, thus keeping the audience & everyone else waiting. They’re probably likely to get sued for breach of contract by the venue if they do, so we all get a better deal. For me, that is a 100% improvement.
A lot of venues are wary of noise after a certain time, maybe it’s a license condition? Shepherds Bush Empire now has a luxury hotel next door, instead of a derelict cinema and they finish bang on 11pm, Concorde 2 in Brighton generally finishes at 10.30 as it becomes a night club after gigs. It makes the get out a bit of a scramble!
That’s a factor that hadn’t occurred to me, but it makes perfect sense.
With the number of venues (especially smaller ones) that have fallen essentially to noise complaints in recent times, this is probably more important than ever.
I wouldn’t be surprised if there was a version of ‘3 strikes & you lose your license’ at play.
Local to me venue, The Duke of Wellington in Shoreham, have taken legal action ahead of a new building going up next to them to ensure they aren’t closed down by new residents, who bought a flat next to a long established music pub, complaining.
https://www.morningadvertiser.co.uk/Article/2023/06/02/The-Duke-of-Wellington-Shoreham-granted-noise-abatement-notice
I recall at one venue (Trades Club Hebden Bridge) where the running time was so long (start 19:30) that Iain Matthews played his encore on the following day.
Exactly my point and memory. I suspect it was cool to be a music journalist in London back when you could afford to live reasonably centrally, and walk or get a cab home. Getting from Hammersmith to New Cross was a pain if it was ok late. And London at least had night buses.
I’ve always driven to gigs in London. I always felt sorry for the ‘locals’ who had to leave before the end because they needed to catch the last tube. It was always very noticable at the Electric Ballroom.
These days, as traffic is heavier and parking is harder, I really appreciate the fact that I can generally find out the stage time of the main act so can wait until the evening traffic has died down before setting out. I can usually aim for about 8:30 which usually means that I’ll miss the support band.
Of course, I’m not 25 anymore so it’s not beauty sleep I need these days, it’s just sleep!
I am on the mailing list for the Rescue Rooms in Nottingham. I don’t live in Nottingham, or even Nottinghamshire. But the venue does Saturday night gigs which end before 10:30pm, when it turns into a nightclub. There’s a multi-storey car park next door. I can be in my Cambridgeshire bed by midnight. Fantastic.
Compare this to when I saw a Roddy Frame fan club show at the 12 Bar Club, London, about 20 years ago. Having used all my biz patter and bribery to get in, I watched the support band (a New York performance poet and a man ‘playing’ an ironing board) for an hour and a half, then waited for almost an hour, then Roddy came on. I saw one song then had to leave for the last train home, just as the opening chords of Oblivious started up.
They found room on the 12 bar stage for an ironing board?!
The Lyceum was the worst because they only seemed to have gigs on on Sunday evenings when the tube finished even earlier than usual. The last Hainault via Newbury Park was about half eleven, IIRC, which made for a few tense encores. It was at least easy enough to get a night bus from Holborn though if it all went wrong.
Two DJs chatting…
DJ 1 Fancy going to the cinema?
DJ 2 Who’s the projectionist?
👏👏👏
Only been to one gig where the opening act was a DJ as far as I recall. That was Julian Cope and the DJ was absolutely dreadful.
One slight caveat to all this…I saw Portishead a couple of times in the 90s and the support was the DJ Andy Smith. He was absolutely brilliant…loads of Northern Soul, loads of disco cut ups (I am fully aware I am on the outer limits of my DJ phraseology here!) and even I danced.
Actually thinking about it there was a DJ set before a Jools Holland gig I once attended.
I recall it being much better than the gig itself and introduced me to Ibrahim Abdullah.
Eyup! Back in my gig-going days … *watches hovering fly, loses train of thought* … we never ‘ad no fancy-pants DJ opening for the main act. That were always left for Stray, who were at least loud enough to be heard from the bar.
For years at the end of the 70’s, I saw the listings in NME for the Marquee in Wardour Street. I was amazed at the number of times, Jerry Floyd was listed alongside the support act. It wasn’t until I became a semi regular there at the start of the 80’s that I realised he was the resident DJ.
Back in 1980, I saw The Clash at Top Rank in Birmingham. Mikey Dread played a DJ set. The dance floor remained empty until four men dressed in great coats and Jack boots (it was winter) started skanking. It took a moment to realise these were The Clash and they were walking among us. Well, spanking among us.
Made my evening. It was a great gig.
Went to see Van Morrison in New York once, ticket stated it would start at 7.30 SHARP! There was no support and Van’s band actually started just before 7.30. There were people wandering in, drinks in hand looking for their seats at 830. Gig was over by 9.
We went to see jazz singer Ian Shaw perform the Joni Mitchell songbook at Cadogan Hall, near King’s Cross, London some years ago.
Cadogan Hall is a formal concert venue so when they say it’s a 7:30 start, that’s exactly what it means.
Shaw came on, on time, played a 50 minute set, then said he was taking a 20 minute break.
He started the second set on time.
Just after 9:00 there was a bit of noise from the back of the hall, and a group of four or five made their way down to the front row and took their seats. Probably expecting jazz club times, when 9:00 is an early start.
Shaw finished the second set at 9:20.
If a concert venue gives a start time then that’s what it’s going to be. Those latecomers were more likely expecting rock gig timing, where there’s at least an hour’s drinking time with recorded music playing (not a DJ, because DJs need paying) before the band/artist makes an appearance. Jazz clubs I’ve been to generally tell you the start time and that is it, or thereabouts.
I’ve been to some gigs with DJs doing really good sets before the bill-topping artist, but I’ve been to some where the DJ was awful as well. Generally, once you’re in the venue there’s no escape, sadly. Sound-isolating earbuds and a music-playing device are a remedy.
All of this reminds me why I’ve been to thousands of sporting events, and yet pop concerts comfortably (very, very comfortably) clock in under three figures. I think it’s the waiting. Even when concert tickets were cheap, I couldn’t stand the waiting, and I never thought it helped the show.
Went to football yesterday – 3 p.m. kick-off – kicked off at exactly 3 p.m. Why would it not?
Van Morrison, in one of the above posts, has the right idea.