December 9th 1985 - Leicester University I'd seen a few bands by now a couple of times, Ultravox and OMD....The Alarm would become the first band I'd see for a fourth time, although were were to be far from finished with the other two bands mentioned. I remember 1984 and 1985 and a very special... Continue Reading →
November 5th 1985 - Birmingham Odeon Birmingham!! New venue for me, new town for me, starting to grow up and travel, but the musical direction still involves Midge. Ultravox were on a break for a while in 1985, which gave all the guys a chance to focus on their own projects. In truth, there would... Continue Reading →
November 4th 1985 - Thomas Cook Public House This is a shout out to the local Leicester music scene and at the time, some guys we knew, not well, through musician friends, but it was the first time we would get close to a band trying to make it in the business. Ultimately, they wouldn't... Continue Reading →
October 11th 1985 - Leicester Polytechnic The first Waterboys album I bought was A Pagan Place in 1984 on a recommendation. "The Big Music" and "The Thrill is Gone" were the two feature tracks, but the stand out track for me was "Rags". It was such a mix of sounds, rock, pop, orchestra and piano.... Continue Reading →
October 5th 1985 - Leicester University I'd say the Pogues were at their peak in 1985, for a number of reasons. They had just released their second album, Rum Sodomy and the Lash, which for me is still their greatest album (quite possibly because it was the first one I bought!). Secondly, in the years... Continue Reading →
October 3rd 1985 - De Montfort Hall It was great to see Spear of Destiny tour not long after being part of U2's Longest Day concert and to actually come to Leicester as well. As a town of kids growing up, we were starting to realise bands often missed us out and went to Nottingham... Continue Reading →
June 22nd 1985 - Milton Keynes Bowl This..........was exciting!!! In the mid eighties there were quite a few bands making the headlines as BIG bands, after all, we didn't have many TV channels to watch, Leicester City weren't all that good hovering around the lower end of Division 1. I'd waited a long time to... Continue Reading →
May 11th 1985 - Hammersmith Odeon We'd been to see Ultravox at Hammersmith Odeon and had such a great time, that when we saw The Alarm were going there too and on a Saturday, we jumped at the chance to have a full day out in London. Getting to London from Leicester was pretty easy,... Continue Reading →
March 22nd 1985 - Leicester University This gig was postponed from February 1985 and rescheduled for 22 March 1985, 7 days after Frankie Goes To Hollywood. Which meant they were going to struggle to follow that hype....and they couldn't (but still a great sounding gig). The guys were one of the bands signed to Paul... Continue Reading →
March 15th 1985 - De Montfort Hall In the eighties, Wham were big, Culture Club were huge, both had created an enormous amount of hype and excitement about their tours. Well, Frankie Goes To Hollywood were just MASSIVE. The hype was MASSIVE......your parents were not impressed with the "Relax" single, I can tell you!!! Mind... Continue Reading →
February 2nd 1985 - Leicester University In December 1984, Bob Geldof and Midge Ure did something truly amazing, something that has changed charity giving since. There was a human catastrophe in Ethiopia, a famine which was killing hundreds of thousands of people and had been going on since 1983. The guys felt things weren't being... Continue Reading →
January 21st 1985 – Leicester University 1984 and 1985 had some fantastic learning concerts in them!! Killing Joke had hit my radar through my bestie, Geoff (most of my punky/industrial stuff started here!). I really loved this album, with Love Like Blood and Eighties on it, really hard for me at the time and warrior... Continue Reading →
The Fan Club Years 