The Kinks Newcastle City Hall 1972 and Sunderland Locarno 1973
The first time I saw the Kinks was at a gig at Newcastle City Hall in the early 70s. I think it must have been in 1972, as it was around the time that the single “Supersonic Rocket Ship” was in the charts. I seem to recall that the support act was local band The John Miles Set. The Kinks live at that time were a glorious ramshackle affair. They often arrived a little worse for wear, but it was obvious that they were having great fun on stage. I saw them again shortly after this, at a gig at Sunderland Locarno, where the place was absolutely packed and Ray and Dave were very drunk. The Kinks were playing a selection of their old hits, and some rock n roll classics, at the time. I found a setlist from a BBC in concert show in 1973 . The songs played were: Victoria; Acute Schizophrenia Paranoia Blues; Dedicated Follower Of Fashion; Lola; Holiday; Good Golly Miss Molly; You Really Got Me; All Day And All Of The Night; Waterloo Sunset; Village Green Preservation Society. I would guess that the sets that I witnessed at the City Hall and in Sunderland will have been similar to this. My favourite song was always Waterloo Sunset, and it remains one of my favourites to this day. Sadly I don’t have a ticket stub for either of these gigs as they were both “pay on the door” affairs. I remember that Ray was wearing a silver lame jacket at the City Hall gig, and that he threw it into the crowd at the end of the show. I was sitting upstairs and was so jealous of the people down the front who were fighting over the jacket, which was torn to shreds. Happy days. I didn’t realise at the time just how important and influential a band the KInks were. But then I guess thats often the way. They were certainly a fun band to see; in many ways I would see similarities in their performances to those of the Stones and the Faces during the same time period. I’ll spend the next few days reminiscing about some later Kinks gigs that I attended in the remainder of the 70s and the early 80s, starting with the concept tours “Soap Opera” and “Schoolboys in Disgrace”.
15 Aug
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Posted by Neil Thompson on August 18, 2013 at 8:14 pm
Nice to see that you like The Kinks, Pete. Me and our Mitch (a frequent contributor to your website) went to see them at Sunderland Empire on Saturday 15th March 1969 with Mam and Dad (I was only 9 years old at the time!) I can still remember a few things. It was billed as ‘the North East folk song and dance festival!’ I’ve read since that the support act was a traditional Northumbrian dance act – but I can remember more of a Russian Cossack dancing troupe with sticks! Then the moment we’d all been waiting for – The Kinks – I can still picture Dave Davies’ flying V guitar. I remember Ray telling the lightman to turn the stage lights to blue and then singing ‘I love yooooooooooou’ and all the girls screaming. Ray mentioned that they’d released a new album a few months earlier and played ‘Last of the steam powered trains’ from ‘Village green’
I’ve read since that this gig was the last one with Peter Quaife on bass. Sadly this was the start of a dodgy 7 months for the band – ‘Plastic man’ was released a few days after this show and was only a minor hit – they then released two singles that missed the charts completely (and they were two of their finest) ‘Drivin’ and ‘Shangrila’ – they then released ‘Victoria’ which again was only a minor hit. 1970 and Lola would change all this but I preferred them in 69.
Posted by vintagerock on August 18, 2013 at 8:18 pm
Great Memories Neil Many thanks I would have loved to have seen them at that time. The support sounds bizarre! Peter
Posted by Doug Handyside on May 27, 2017 at 1:23 pm
Hi I was at the city hall gig 1972 the support band was Brass Alley the great Dave Ditchburn fronted local rock band. The Kinks were superb never stopped playing even when Ray was talking to the crowd great crafters.