Rats! Sometimes it’s the gigs you don’t go to that you remember as much as the ones you do. This evening, I could so easily have been toddling down to the German Church in the Old Town of Stockholm to attend the opening concert of the Stockholm Early Music Festival. It looked very promising but the 600 SEK price put me off.
Silly me! If I’d gone for it, I could have found myself sitting in the same pew as the King and Queen of Sweden who also had tickets. The Queen is the patron of the festival so it must have been very enjoyable for them to go out gigging together.
And what a perfect opportunity it would have been for me to have a chat with His Maj about his favourite music. He’s a shy chap but I’m sure a mention of Jerry Garcia or Augustus Pablo would have loosened his tongue. His missus loves Purcell, Buxtehude and Bach. But which is his favourite Dick’s Picks Grateful Dead bootleg? And what about dub reggae? How often does Drottningholm Palace sway to the sound of King Tubbys Meets the Rockers Uptown?
What a very lively discussion It would have been!
Actually, the Swedish royal couple have had a busy time recently. Last week, on one day, they met not only all four members of ABBA (who each received a Swedish Knighthood) bur also the Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskyy who was on a flying visit to meet the Swedish PM and other leaders at a Nordic-Ukranian Summit.
My question to you all is simple. How often have you found yourself at the same gig as a celebrity, large or small?
Ratassed in the Rammstein moshpit with Dame Barbera Cartland?
Toking up with Ken Dodd and the Diddymen before a show?
Foraging on the beach with Nigel Farage before a surprise appearance on Clacton Pier?’
LoW never tires of me telling my Bruce Springsteen At The Hammersmith Odeon story! So here it is again, specially for him! I’d been “into” “the Boss” since the release of his second album [date pse. dai] and bought Born To Run on import [ie before its UK release – date pse. dai] and was bought a ticket ie 1 one ticket [price pse. dai] for his second Hammersmith gig [date pse. dai] as a wedding present. Anyway! Long story short! I was sat right behind Lamb Lies Down hitmaker PETER GABRIEL! He said it was the best gig he’d ever been to – well, it was for everybody. I started to go off Bruce after that because he got popular with civilians.
Great story, H.P. I’m a little surprised that Gabriel was a Springsteen fan. Then again, Pete has always listened to a wide range of music.
Bruce’s first album, Greetings from Ashbury Park, sounded very different to my ears to that big. epic sound he developed on Born to Run.
I can imagine that gig must have been stupendous.
What did the Swedish royalty listen to last night?
Buxtehude’s Membra Jesu Nostri
It was performed by this Danish combo: Concerto Copenhagen.
Some splendid recorder playing there by Pernille Petersen! An unfairly maligned instrument.
@h-p-saucecraft
Only way that story could be more AWesome is if you only realized the identity of the fan in front after you tapped him on the shoulder and asked him to remove the top of his LLDOB Slipperman costume so you could see the stage
Can you tell me the first Springsteen album you bought, and the first concert you went to? Nothing personal, but I can’t be seen conversing with someone who thinks Born In The USA is a “great album” – I’m sure you understand!
Interestingly (ie, not interestingly at all) the first and only Springsteen album that I own is Nebraska. Is this an indication of my “almost painful authenticity”©?
Respect! This qualifies you as an “edgy outsider” fan – quite the accolade!
Also his best album.
No, it’s just the one that a certain kind of depressive admires for its “raw authenticity” and general grimness. You know – “real” music.
Yeah, no drippy love songs or happy pappy singalongs.
Hence: “almost painful authenticity”© – phrase wasn’t placed there by accident, maaan!
Yebbut just because it’s dreary doesn’t make it any more “authentic” than Sherry Darlin’ (e.g.) Some people – no names, no pack drill – just don’t like rock n’ roll – are embarrassed by it! Doesn’t make them bad people, though. Oh wait – yes it does, actually.
I agree! I’m agreeing with you! Retune your “irony meter”, HP!
Nebraska is the dreariest album I own – and that’s saying something! I was given it by an ex who knew how much I disliked “RAWK Broooce” and was trying to get me on board. She failed – but there it sits in my collection – unloved, unplayed…but not actually moved on to the chazza.
Ah – irony. The least valuable commodity not only on the internet but in the universe. (I’m being ironic.)
Prove it! (All night…)
Give Western Stars a go, his career is actually much more diverse than one might think from the caricature Brooooce
@h-p-saucecraft
First album, BTR in 1975
First gig. Manchester Apollo Thursday night May 1981.
Actually passed on the chance to go and see the FA Cup Final replay (the one in which Ricky Villa scored the amazing goal) and am very glad I did as is one of the five best gigs I have ever seen
This qualifies you as “Third Generation”* fan – nothing to be ashamed of but you can’t sit at my table, I’m afraid *simper*.
*Going by the first three albums – anyone arriving later is a civilian.
Sat behind Robyn Hitchcock in the RAH for the Watersons Mighty River of Song.
Richard Hawley was in the audience at Sheffield City Hall for a Waterson Carthy gig.
Arthur Smith at a performance of Shockheaded Peter at a London venue.
And it appears that Simon Nicol was at the Richard Thompson concert on Friday in Manchester.
This gets this year’s Most Afterword-Friendly Comment Award already!
Just for you @H-P-Saucecraft if I get permission to attend the Thompson concert at the RAH on Saturday I’ll see if I can add some more.
I did travel on the tube once with Don Warrington, well he was in the same carriage and the lo and behold he appeared playing god in the Mysteries at the National.
I shared a flat with Don Warrington, for the few weeks he was seeing one of my flatmates, anyway. This was pre-Rising Damp, so he wasn’t famous – was just getting going in rep at the time. Nice bloke.
Did he speak like that then? I think he’s great. Anyone remember an odd series with him, Nigel Havers and a couple of other middle aged players. It was fun.
I’m a member of a forum/blog type thing on the internet where two other people have interacted with Don “Rising Damp” Warrington.
I don’t remember tbh. In my memory I’ve probably copy/pasted his Philip Smith voice onto the 20-something he was at the time. I’m sure I’d remember a Trinidad/Newcastle combo though.
Oh and I sat with Norma Waterson in the pub at Beck Hole as we waited for her husband to come in from accompanying the Goathland Plough Stots on their Plough Monday tour.
Kudos @mikethep
Neil Young saw me in the audience one time and lifted me up on stage – quite against my wishes! – and handed me Old Black for an epic jam on Like A Hurricane. At one point he dropped to his knees in front of me while I took that guitar to places it had never been in his hands. There were tears in his eyes when I finished the song (and the concert!) with an epic scream of feedback that stunned the audience into silence before the applause erupted in a roar! Refusing Neil’s offered gift of Old Black, I modestly made my way backstage while the auditorium shook with demands for an encore. Backstage, Susanna Hoffs pressed her body against mine, gazing up at me lustfully as she ran her tongue over her moist, parted lips … “play me like you played Old Black, Saucy!” she breathed, ripping her flimsy top off to reveal REDACTED and REDACTED my REDACTED until I REDACTED all over her REDACTED and then I woke up.
‘Which was nice’.
I sat next to the late swimmer David Wilkie once. He wasn’t the late Mr Wilkie then. He did have a personalised number plate on his Porsche, though.
Am I the only one here whose heart is lifted as if by the gay song of the linnet at Mr. Area’s unexpected appearance?
Apparently so. Sad.
Probably…
Little Johnny England fiddle man, Guy Fletcher was at the Richard Thompson gig in Brum, and asked if I was excited. (Does that count?)
A friend of mine was sitting next to Robert Forster at a Roberta Flack concert in Brisbane in 2009. No – it’s true!
Most of our gigs are in London so plenty, but the record was probably John Cooper Clarke at the London Palladium. We went to stretch our legs during the interval and my other half pointed into a bar and said, ‘Look – there’s Mickie Flannagan [the comedian]’ But I didn’t hear at first because at the same moment I was looking the other way and saying, ‘That’s Mick Jones from The Clash’, and just as we were both speaking someone who looked very like Brett Anderson from Suede scurried past.
But The Light’s favourite would be the time we were in Edinburgh and went to see Kathryn Williams. She was the support act (I forget the headliner’s name, and we left early) and Kathryn walked into the venue with Ian Rankin. The Light is a huge Ian Rankin fan, and on that holiday we had already been on the official Rebus guided tour, walked around Marchmont to see where Rebus ‘lives’, and seen the creepy dolls in the National Museum which inspired Rankin’s book The Falls.
He came out with Kathryn after her set and as I bought some CDs from her he kindly agreed to sign The Light’s gig ticket. I asked if he would mind having a photo taken with her. ‘I promise, she’s not stalking you.’ ‘But she did stalk me!’ He has no idea how true that was.
I’m not sure what’s got to hurt the most, the “from The Clash” after Mick Jones or “from Suede” after Brett Anderson. I hope neither of them are on the blog.
It could have been the Mick Jones from Foreigner, though I grant you he’s a less likely John Cooper Clarke enthusiast.
Isn’t “out of” the canonical form? Like “Fish out of Marillion”?
I once sat beside Paul Brady at a Van Morrison gig in the National Stadium in Dublin. I was a fan and wanted to ask him something about Crazy Dreams but he looked in very bad form so I didn’t…
Two great stories there, Gatz.
Ian Rankin is thoughtful about giving autographs. When he did an appearance at Kulturhuset here quite a few years back, he not only signed a book I’d bought for Mrs KFD, he even did a squiggly, rebus-like drawing.
He could at least have signed it in Swedish. Rank(in) amateur.
Ayshea Brough signed my UFO box set at an “event”…
Hope you didn’t ask after Ollie Beak. He apparently took their break up very hard
Ayshea Brough? I’d never heard of this heartless lass who broke poor Ollie’s heart.
Here’s a whole episode of Lift Off which she presented.
Spot Ayshea, about 20 seconds from the start…
One of the cast of UFO was Gabrielle Drake. who played Lt Gay Ellis.
She is the sister of Nick Drake.
Oddly enough this came up on a posting only yesterday.
Note arms “akimbo”. Is akimbo still a thing? A word, even?
I used the word ‘akimbo’ only yesterday sending a message. We are hieing ourselves away on holiday next month but the place we are staying is on the airport flight path and near the airport. I suggested earplugs akimbo ( I’m aware it’s incorrect) but it’s good to annoy him now and then.
This sounds like they’re making it up, because they have no fucking idea where the word comes from:
https://www.etymonline.com/word/akimbo
Have you noted my avatar, KFD?
I encountered Lee Child at a London do and immediately went into hysterical fanboy mode, burbling away like an idiot. He gave me a pitying sideways glance and looked over my head (he’s a good 6″ taller) in search of someone more interesting. The creator of Reacher said nothing.
I stood behind Miles Hunt from the Wonder Stuff at a Public Enemy gig. He bought me a pint.
Not a gig, but a festival – Perry Farrell of Jane’s Addiction bought me a pint at the backstage bar at the 1993 Reading Festival. I joined him in wetting the baby’s head (his daughter had just been born in California).
There was a rumour Noel Gallagher was to do an acoustic gig at a pub in Soho called something and The Chinaman. I forget the exact name. I was working in Oxford Street at the time. This was Oasismania era before the rot set in. As the evening wore on in came Martin Fry then Kevin Rowland. As it turned out it was Beth Orton who was to perform. As we left I spotted Bobby Gillespie hanging around outside the ladies, his preferred domain. Some girls were enjoying his company. He uttered a sullen ‘alright mate’. I do recall that Kevin Rowland has a notably big face.
Another time I got into a record launch for a Britpop era band whose name I forget. They had Jim Rose circus whose act included a man pulling volunteers around on a wheeled chair attached to his penis. There was also a woman who applied an angle grinder to her crotch that gave off sparks. Anyway, who else but Noel Gallagher turned up before promptly disappearing again when too many people wanted to say hi. There were free vodka drinks. It was a fun night.
I found myself standing next to Paul Weller at a Midlake gig back in the mid 2000s. He had on the full mod gear and I did the classic double take. Spent the next few minutes trying to think of something to say to him but decided that he would just tell me to fuck off so stayed shtum.
Praise be @geacher isn’t around these days……
I’m still here……
The most surprising was a pre-major fame Matt Lucas at a RAH Ben Fold Five concert. I told him I liked the character Sir Bernard Chomondeley, he thanked me, then we went our ways. Both, awkwardly, towards the Gents. How we laughed.
At a Guy Pratt spoken word gig I was not entirely surprised to squeeze past (and I do mean squeeze) past David Gilmour in a corridor. We’ve both lost a bit of weight since then.
The first Brian Wilson Pet Sounds gig at the Festival Hall – Nick Lowe being low key and cool, Bobby Gillespie being the opposite are the ones that stand out.
Alexander Armstrong at Richard Thompson’s 1000 Years of Popular Music at Sadler’s Wells.
Nigel Planer seeing Christopher Ryan (Mike in the Young Ones) at Leeds Playhouse but I can’t remember the play.
At a big number anniversary of Ronnie Scott’s Jazz Club held at the Barbican, John Prescott, then a cabinet minister sat in the row in front of me. I remember he left at an odd time, which I assumed was for security reasons.
Met Stuart Pearce standing next to the sound desk at Sub89 (Reading) at a Stiff Little Fingers gig. A handshake and a few brief words were passed. This was when he was with England Under 21s and had a night off from Bisham Abbey (where the squad were staying) so he drove 20 miles up the road to
speak to mesee SLF in a sweaty clubMark Ellen (and Anton Corbyn) at a Stones gig at Shepherd Bush Empire. They came on very late (tube had stopped running by the end) as they were apparently waiting for Ronnie to sober up (1999)
David Hasselhof at a Brian Wilson show Royal Festival Hall, talking loudly into mobile phone during show, my friend almost hit him, unaware he was in the presence of “The Hoff” (2004)
Met Richard E Grant at a Who gig inside Royal Albert Hall, totally messed up what I should have said to him as we stood at the bar together. Jerry Hall was also there (2004)
Also RAH, Chris Difford at a Nick Lowe/Ron Sex-smith show, met Nick and almost Chris at after show party in the bowels of the venue. Martin Freeman, Rat Scabies and Mark Lamarr were amongst other “celebs” I spotted at the party. Bought Ron a glass of red wine which he proceeded to spill all over Martin Freeman (2008)
Saw Noel Gallagher at a Macca gig in Milan (2011)
Saw Steve Cram and Steve Diggle at Kate Bush concert Hammy Odeon (2014)
A cousin of mine once told me he and his wife had ended up sitting behind
Gerry Adams during Leonard Cohen’s legendary Sloane Castle gig in the
late Noughties.
I doubt very much he and his wife rustled too many sweet wrappers that
particular evening
If I had a bottle of wine for every top Swedish politician that my pal @DuCo01 has rubbed shoulders with in the Systembolaget (State Liquor Store) on Friday afternoons, I’d have a rather well-stocked wine cellar.
Sat next to John Peel and Andy Kershaw at an Ivor Cutler gig at the Bloomsbury Theatre (I think).
Stood behind David Gilmour in the queue and fawned for Leonard Cohen at the O2, 20/6/13.
Had lunch with Paul Young at a Thai restaurant.
He’s got form , that Paul Young. Goes out for a meal and does a runner.
“Oi, come back and pay.”
Sunday 17th July 1994, Phoenix Festival, Long Marston. I had been reporting on the event for BBC local radio, and John Peel had been the on stage MC for all four days.
Instead of sampling the delights of Iggy Pop (in his see-through trousers period), I joined a few of the tech crew who had decided to watch the Brazil v Italy World Cup Final in the catering tent behind the main stage.
I ended up sat next to Peel in “companionable” (read: for me, utterly starstruck terrified) “silence”, for the whole 120 minutes plus penalties. Iggy accompanied the latter stages of the game with a set of pounding Stooges material from fifty yards away.
When Robert Baggio hammered his spot kick over the bar, Peel became a bit moist in the eyes, and declared out loud to no one in particular that he hated it when any team lost in such circumstances (he had “had a few” by that time, in his defence). He then wandered off into the Warwickshire gloaming.
Aha, which explains the sour expression given to my affectionate greeting, “o look it’s John Peel”, after a dire Bob Dylan set had sent me to the bar.
@robert
He probably heard “Schools Out” playing over the festival PA
Pissed next to Nigel Planer at the Gents in Ronnie Scott’s once. At a Joe Zawinul gig.
Also shook hands with Joe (I did wash my hands after pissing) later and congratulated him regarding he and his band’s performance, which was amazing.
I have a bootleg of the performance, which was being recorded for Radio 3’s “Jazz On 3”.
Literally bumped into Peter Cook one Friday lunchtime on Hampstead High Street. He was weaving a little and I was walking uphill and preoccupied, having just deposited my paltry wages cheque. Didn’t notice him at first and when I did and moved to one side to let him pass, he unfortunately weaved in the same direction and we clashed. We both laughed and carried on towards our destinations.
On another occasion I was on a train to work near Clapham Junction and Celia Imrie boarded at Olympia and sat opposite me. I was in awe and far too shy to say hello.
To my shame @Mike_H, I had to google Celia.
I was excepting her to be a sultry, sensuous jazz singer from Ronnie Scott’s. I got that wrong!
It must be odd to be a very successful actor like Celia. Or indeed a musician or TV personality. People see you on the Tube and think they “know” you. and automatically say hello.
Then again, Celia has probably met hundreds of people in her work. So she does know a lot of people.
But how many names can she (or indeed any of us) remember??
@kaisfatdad
Apparently CI’s brief encounter with Mike_H was enough to age her terribly
Not likening myself to a successful actor but having worked in schools and colleges I sometimes bump into ex students. This year some 200 miles away from the last school I worked at I was in Ally Pally walking round I saw a young chap staring at me. ” it’s Mr Rawlinson isn’t it” I recognised him but had to apologise as no name was forthcoming and I was a tad nonplussed meeting someone from the school.
Last week getting into the car at home someone said “I know you, you taught me bricklaying at the college forty something years ago” Alas again no name was forthcoming but I did recognise his name when he told me.
I travelled in a lift with Jon Culshaw and remembered his name., but only when I got out of the lift.
Okay, I’ll do it:
JON CULSHAW??? WHO THE FUCK IS JON CULSHAW???
His paradox is that he is is many people and yet somehow none.
Surprised you’ve not heard of him. He’s apparently inimitable
Stood next to Ian Chappell, former Australian cricketing great and his partner at a Jimmy Vaughan gig at the Metro in Sydney. Respect for his choice in music and that he was just standing there like the rest of us in a general admission gig.
While I’ve never seen him at gigs, Cillian Murphy apparently happily stands in the crowd at quite a few shows in Dublin
I literally bumped into Michael Hutchence in the crowd at a gig. He was carrying a drink in front of him and had a very serene look on his face. Apologies were exchanged and we went our seperate ways. I said to my friends, “Guess who I just bumped into…” and they didn’t believe me. Until… he came bopping out on stage during an encore.
The funny thing is I was clearly taller than him. A good couple of inches. I am 5ft10. He is listed as having been 5ft11. How is this so? I wasn’t wearing any heels and I doubt he was wearing any apparatus to make himself shorter. I have long pondered this.
I reckon I can solve it for you – his bio lied.
Lots of rock singers are shorter than they’d have you believe.
There is a theory that being a bit of a shortarse comes part and parcel with the showoff gene.
Tom Cruise. Not a rock singer, but still. Just don’t call him Lofty on set.
Why not?
The good-natured joshing would most likely go right over his head
Famously, the Small Faces were all a bit on the short side.
In the Beatles, John, Paul and George were all reported as being 5’11”, some witnesses claim that at least John was a bit below that