Gigs I missed #3207
I've got a mate who cherishes dearly a ticket he got for Nirvana at the SECC in Glasgow for a date that ended up getting cancelled when Kurt bought it. Pretty sure they go for a fortune on ebay. Anyone have tickets for the Joy Division tour of the states that never happened? Or a Pistols gig that was cancelled?
What's yer sob story about missing a gig?
Back in the '80's some-time I got talked into going to a weekend festival in Germany. Rock-AmRing, I think it's called. It's still going and it's based at the Nurburg Ring race circuit. The main attraction, for my traveling companions anyway, was Bowie playing there as part of his "Glass Spider" tour, but there was a couple of other decent bands that were an the bill too; The Smiths and Echo & The Bunnymen were on, and sandwiched between The Eurythmics one night and Bowie the next there was also about 80 German Heavy Metal bands. Oh, and I think UB40 and The Pretenders played too. Anyway Echo & The Bunnymen were a highlight, I think they just thought, "Fuck it, we're in the middle of Nein-Ver, Germany- who's gonna see us?" and played mostly classic Doors and Velvet's songs with lots of improvisation / jamming / pissing about.
But the point of the story is that just before we left on the midnight coach to kick off the journey it was announced that The Smiths had just split up. I'll never forget the look on the faces of the passengers on that 2nd bus from London to the gig, as it drew up beside ours at the gates to the festival. Every gloomy lad; his face pressed hard up against the glass mournfully, was, to a be-quiffed, speccy (but Charming, I'm no doubt sure) man, decked out in a Smiths tshirt. It's print already mysteriously fading; a Turin Shroud in reverse.
So not only had their favourite band just vanished forever from their miserable lives, but they were about to be stuck in a muddy race track in deepest, darkest Germany getting pissed-on for the weekend. And with about 40 thousand pissed up German bikers for company.
Thats how it looked, anyway.
I had to laugh.
What's yer sob story about missing a gig?
Back in the '80's some-time I got talked into going to a weekend festival in Germany. Rock-AmRing, I think it's called. It's still going and it's based at the Nurburg Ring race circuit. The main attraction, for my traveling companions anyway, was Bowie playing there as part of his "Glass Spider" tour, but there was a couple of other decent bands that were an the bill too; The Smiths and Echo & The Bunnymen were on, and sandwiched between The Eurythmics one night and Bowie the next there was also about 80 German Heavy Metal bands. Oh, and I think UB40 and The Pretenders played too. Anyway Echo & The Bunnymen were a highlight, I think they just thought, "Fuck it, we're in the middle of Nein-Ver, Germany- who's gonna see us?" and played mostly classic Doors and Velvet's songs with lots of improvisation / jamming / pissing about.
But the point of the story is that just before we left on the midnight coach to kick off the journey it was announced that The Smiths had just split up. I'll never forget the look on the faces of the passengers on that 2nd bus from London to the gig, as it drew up beside ours at the gates to the festival. Every gloomy lad; his face pressed hard up against the glass mournfully, was, to a be-quiffed, speccy (but Charming, I'm no doubt sure) man, decked out in a Smiths tshirt. It's print already mysteriously fading; a Turin Shroud in reverse.
So not only had their favourite band just vanished forever from their miserable lives, but they were about to be stuck in a muddy race track in deepest, darkest Germany getting pissed-on for the weekend. And with about 40 thousand pissed up German bikers for company.
Thats how it looked, anyway.
I had to laugh.
posted by Alias at 3:41 PM
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