With Just A Hint Of Mayhem

I love bringing people together at gigs especially my friends that haven’t met before. At Fibbers tonight I was joined by my good mates John Williams and Simon Hernaman for an excellent night of great music and punk nostalgia. I also got to meet a fellow blogger, a lovely young lady named Louise who wants to be a music journalist. Well based on her blog I think she has a good chance. Click here to check ot the marvellous stylusblog. La Bête Blooms from Hull were the support band and what a darned good warm up act they proved to be. Obviously with their name they are clearly from the posh end of Hull, well if there is one. But hopefully La Bête Blooms are a great pointer for what’s in store for Hull in its tenure as city of culture next year. they showed the influence of many great bands; Eddie and the Hot Rods, Magazine, Joy Division and even the Who. Their sound is a bit new wave, post-punk with a twist of more modern pop punk. The band’s engine room of drum and bass was a complete powerhouse and overlaid on that was the excellent vocals and guitar work from the other two band members. They really looked up for this gig and they seemed to be really enjoying themselves too. This is definitely a band to watch and one that I will certainly pay to see again. Click here to check their SoundCloud page out.

Whilst the support were bloody good we were there for a punk band that has now been around for forty years. Does that make me feel old? Of course it bloody does, I was only seventeen when they formed. The band in question is of course one of Manchester’s finest, the magnificent Buzzcocks. I have only seen them once before and that was back in 1978 or 1979. For a band of this maturity you’d think that the energy levels might be a little low, but they were off the top of the scale. From when they hit the stage it was a relentless assault of many of their finest moments with no let up until they took a short pre-encore break after an hour of solid playing. The highlight in that first section for me was a truly dazzling rendition of “Autonomy”

One thing that became very clear to me early on is that old punks never die, they just get older, dress like they always did and turn up for gigs like this. It really is a heart warming sight to see so many old school forty/ fifty something punks pogoing as if their life depended on it. While Pete Shelley and Steve Diggle are the mainstays of the band given that they have been around for so long it would be mean not to mention the excellent rhythm section of Chris Remmington on bass and Danny Farrant on drums. The pair have been with the band for eight years and ten years respectively and they underpin the excellent songs incredibly well. Like all of us who have been on the planet for so long Shelley and Diggle are definitely part of my generation, both are 61. But age does nothing to diminish their power and stage presence. Whilst Steve Diggle has aged incredibly well he seems to have morphed into a Postman Pat lookalike. (Thank you to John Williams for putting that thought in my head, now it won’t leave!)

As for the Buzzcocks encore, it was simply stunning consisting of “What Do I Get”, a magnificently rousing (please note that I said rousing and not arousing ok) “Orgasm Addict” and obviously they were never going to get away with not playing “Ever Fallen In Love (With Someone You Shouldn’t’ve)”. That one came close to bringing the house down and many of us thought that perhaps it was all over for the night. But it wasn’t as the band laid waste to the audience with mightily stupendous version of “Harmony In My Head”. Fibbers is a great venue and the Buzzcocks remain a great band which makes a great combination for a great night!

Apologies about the evil, but thankfully dead, bastard who introduces the next video.

A brief(ish) public service announcement. All the photos apart from the first one were all taken on my shittly little Nokia Windows Phone. The first picture was helpfully supplied via a Goggle search and all the videos are courtesy of YouTube including the reasonably good quality adience recorded one from the actual gig!