Futurama 2 Festival Queens Hall Leeds 14th September 1980
This was the second Futurama festival and it took place at Queens Hall, which was in the centre of Leeds. The Saturday line-up featured U2 (low down on the bill), Echo & The Bunnymen, Soft Cell and Siouxsie & The Banshees (who headlined). I attended the Sunday with my mate Dave and it featured The Psychedelic Furs, Gary Glitter, The Durutti Colum, Classix Nouveaux, Young Marble Giants, Hazel O’Connor, The Soft Boys, Flowers, Naked Lunch, Blurt, Artery, Notsensibles, Vice Versa, Desperate Bicycles, Frantic Elevators, Athletico Spizz 80, Brian Brain, Tribesmen, Boots for Dancing and Household Name. We arrived during the afternoon and missed some of the bands. Queens Hall was a cavernous building, which was originally a tram and bus depot. It was used as a concert venue during the 1980s. It has since been demolished and is now a car park.
When we arrived it looked like a war zone. Punk fans from all over the north, and further afield, had decamped there for the weekend, and had been in the venue all night, sleeping on the floors; there was trash everywhere. We saw faces that we recognised from Middlesbrough Rock Garden, which had closed for the weekend as everyone was going to the festival. We chatted to a few people; everyone was talking about how great Siouxsie (who had headlined the Saturday night) had been. There were stalls around the place and pop-up art performances in dark corners of the hall. I recall one performance which involved a guy having a crap in a bucket; we moved on. The bands were playing on a stage at the end of the massive hall. 
This was an opportunity to see bands who went on to stardom: The Frantic Elevators became Simply Red, and Vice Versa became ABC. There was a great mix of bands at the event and the atmosphere was wonderful, really friendly. Although on the surface this festival appeared messy and shambolic, it is actually one of the best I have every attended for the musical range and the feeling in the crowd. Highlights of the day were Hazel O-Connor, who was in the charts with “Eighth Day” and became the robot from “Breaking Glass”, Durutti Column featuring Vini Reilly’s meadering guitar, and the 4″ by 2″s who were a proto-Oi! band featuring Jimmy Lydon (John Lydon’s brother) and also at one point featured Youth of Killing Joke. But the highlight was an incredible performance by Notsensibles, a punk band from Burnley who had some success with their single “I’m in Love with Margaret Thatcher”. Their set included a lot of tongue-in-cheek songs, all performed in their strong Northern accent. They’d brought a large contingent of fans, who all sang along with every daft song. Notsensibles motto was “all we want to do is make silly records and play silly gigs”. There is a video on YouTube of them performing “Death To Disco” at the event: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zIGrhea75qU
The festival ran very late into the night (inevitable given the incredible number of bands who were performing) and we left around midnight during Psychedelic Furs set to drive back up North and home, thus missing the headliner who was (also incredibly) the now shamed star Gary Glitter. The Futurama festival had a history of choosing off-the-wall headliners; on another occasion the closing acts was a reformed Bay City Rollers (now that must have been something to experience). A crazy, mad, fun event with some great bands. Happy happy days 🙂
Archive for the ‘Psychedelic Furs’ Category
15 Mar
Futurama 2 Festival Queens Hall Leeds 14th September 1980
11 May
Iggy Pop Newcastle City Hall 1980 and 1987
Iggy Pop Newcastle City Hall 1980 and 1987
Iggy continued to have success in the 80s; everywhere I went I would hear “Lust for Life” being played. He also visited the UK a few times; I saw him twice at the City Hall during this period, in 1980 and 1987. The 1987 gig was around the time Iggy hit the charts with “Real Wild Child”, his cover of the old Johnny O’Keefe song. I remember these gigs as crazy nights with Iggy taking his stage performance to the limit, as he usually did. Support at the 1980 gig was the Psychedelic Furs, who had just released their first album. 
Iggy’s set contributed to draw from Stooges’ days and his solo releases. Although the ticket from the 1980 gig refers to Iggy as “Iggy Pop and the Stooges” his band didn’t contain member of the original Stooges. The next time I saw Iggy was around 20 years later, by which time he had reunited with the Stooges. I’ll write on that gig tomorrow. Setlist from 1987: I Got a Right; Real Cool Time; 1970; Gimme Danger; Some Weird Sin; Winners & Losers; Shades; Five Foot One; Real Wild Child (Wild One); Dirt; Down on the Street; The Passenger; Blah-Blah-Blah; Search and Destroy; Sister Midnight; Raw Power; Sixteen; I Wanna Be Your Dog; No Fun; I’m Sick of You; T.V. Eye;
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