Wreckless Eric Ashington Regal 16th April 1978
Support from The Showbiz Kids
Back in the 1970s there were still some lovely old cinemas around, and many of them were being used as venues for concerts. In the North East, I attended gigs in Newcastle Odeon, Jesmond Cinema, Gosforth Royalty and this concert which was in Ashington Regal. These were all beautiful theatres, very ornate, with plush comfortable seats, and sculptures of cherubs looking down at the audience. They brought back memories of going to the pictures in the ’60s and the Saturday morning picture clubs that we would all troop off to, such as the ABC Minors. The whole street would meet at the bus stop and get the bus down to the down to watch old Laurel and Hardy, Flash Gordon and Perils of Pauline films. Sadly all of the cinemas I have mentioned here are now no more.
The Ashington Regal Theatre was built on the site of the Miners’ Theatre. It opened in 1939, and had a 39 feet wide proscenium, an orchestra pit that could hold 15 musicians, and a cinema organ. It was taken over by the Noble Organisation in 1972, and closed in November 1979, just over a year after this concert. The building then lay derelict for several years until it was eventually demolished, and a nursing home was built on the site.
In 1978, in what I would imagine was a last chance saloon move to keep the cinema open, a series of Sunday concerts were put on at the Regal. I think this Wreckless Eric gig was the only one I attended, although I may also have seen Slade there, but can’t be sure. I know Whitesnake also played the Regal as part of the series, and I think Squeeze may also have featured at one of the shows.
We knew Wreckless Eric from seeing him on the Stiff tour and for his classic Stiff single “(I’d Go The) Whole Wide World”. Eric had just released his first album, and gave a typical shambolic, yet enjoyable performance. I saw him once more a couple of years later supporting Squeeze at the Mayfair. The Regal concert was quite poorly attended; Wreckless Eric was not such a big name at the time, and headlining a cinema of this size was probably quite an optimistic move. Support came from local band The Showbiz Kids, who were managed by local promoter Geof Docherty (who I think also promoted this gig) and featured Olga (later of the Toy Dolls) and Rob Kane (now of Dr Feelgood).
“We are the boys and girls well known as Minors of the ABC. And every Saturday we all line up, to see the films we like and shout aloud with glee. We like to laugh and have a singsong, such a happy crowd are we. We’re all pals together, we’re minors of the ABC.” Happy days 🙂
Posts Tagged ‘concert’
19 Jan
Wreckless Eric Ashington Regal 16th April 1978
18 Jan
Jimmy Webb Lyric Theatre Hammersmith London 21st May 2005
Jimmy Webb Lyric Theatre Hammersmith London 21st May 2005
I’d fancied seeing Jimmy Webb for many years. “MacArthur Park” is one of my favourite songs. There is something about it that sets it apart from all of the other songs of the late ’60s; it has an epic, timeless nature. The twists and turns of the enigmatic storyline, the dramatic melody changes, the lush orchestration, the hints of psychedelia, the pathos of Harris’ vocal, all add up to a masterpiece. I still play my old scratched vinyl 45. In fact, I subscribe to the view that Webb is a genius, and that as a young man he created some of the best pop songs ever written. For example, “By the Time I Get to Phoenix” is the third most performed song in the past 50 years. Until recently his visits to the UK were few and far between, so when we saw concert advertised at the Lyric Theatre, Hammersmith, Marie and I decided to go. The Lyric is a tiny theatre and was full of Webb fans from all over Europe. Jimmy sat alone with a grand piano, telling great stories and playing highlights from his back catalogue and tracks from his (then) latest album “Twilight of the Renegades”.
“Webb’s music has never fitted into a single category: it somehow spans pop, country, musical theatre and vaudeville. Here, he linked his pieces together with some well-polished yarn-spinning, like the one about driving around Ireland [on a big drinking spree] with the actor Richard Harris (who recorded Webb’s “MacArthur Park” and “Didn’t We”), or [in introducing “Highwayman”] the time he ended up on stage at Farm Aid, impersonating Johnny Cash alongside Willie Nelson, Waylon Jennings and Kris Kristofferson. “I wish they hadn’t invented computers,” said Webb “They’re puttin’ us out of business.” “By the Time I Get to Phoenix” was an odyssey of heartache, with Webb’s repeated right-hand trill mimicking the ringing of an unanswered phone. “Wichita Lineman” evoked the endless horizons of the American midwest. For an encore, Webb attempted the epic folly that is MacArthur Park – “Believe me, it’s an adventure” – and made an astonishingly good job of it. He could have played for twice as long and nobody would have left.” (extract taken form The Guardian review of the time, 2005).
Webb’s singing was interesting to say the least. He put his own interpretation on the songs, periodically throwing his head back as if to somehow squeeze out the high notes. His piano playing was exquisite and added a further dimension to “MacArthur Park”. We had seats in the front row of the balcony, looking down on the stage. The guy next to us had travelled from Ireland for the show, and was shouting requests to Jimmy, talking to him as if he knew him. It was that sort of concert, a gathering of fans and friends who had come to savour the delights of a clutch of songs that a young guy wrote in the ’60s and ’70s, and that told us stories and painted pictures the like of which we had never seen before.
Jimmy Webb has toured the UK more regularly in recent years, playing concerts locally. I greatly enjoyed the concert at the Lyric, yet for some reason, I haven’t thus far felt the need to go and see him again. Rather, I have wished to keep my memories of that night in London, and of watching and hearing him sing “MacArthur Park” in particular.
Setlist: Crying in My Sleep; Highwayman; Galveston; Spanish Radio; No Signs of Age; Belmont Avenue; P.F. Sloan; How Quickly; By the Time I Get to Phoenix; Didn’t We; Wichita Lineman; Golden Girl
Encore: MacArthur Park; Adios
17 Jan
Wah! Newcastle University Students Union 28th Nov 1981
Wah! Newcastle University Students Union 28th Nov 1981
Support from The Set
Pete Wylie was born in Liverpool and began his career in 1977 forming a band “Crucial Three” with future Bunnyman Ian McCulloch and future Teardrop Exloder and druid poet Julian Cope. Wylie then went on to be in a stream of short-lived bands, sometimes with Cope, including the Mystery Girls (also featuring future Dead or Aliver Pete Burns), the Spitfire Boys (pretty sure I saw them as a support act), the Nova Mob, the Opium Eaters (also featuring future Banshee Budgie, future Frankie Goes to Hollywooder Paul Rutherford and future Lightning Seeder Ian Broudie), and Crash Course. So, as you can see, he was very much part of the Loverpool and Manchester Rock new wave scene.
In 1980 he then formed Wah! Heat, who received critical acclaim, became a John Peel favourite, and released two singles “Better Scream” and “7 Minutes to Midnight” Their biggest hit single was of course the great “The Story of the Blues”, which was released in late 1982, and reached number 3 in the UK Singles Chart.
I saw Wah! once, at a Saturday night gig at Newcastle University students union. In was in late 1981, before Wah! had released The Story of the Blues. I’d read of Wylie and the band in the music papers, and heard Peel championing then and went along to see what Wah! were like. I’d heard the Wah! Heat singles, and remembering enjoying the gig. The music was a mix of new wave and electronica as I recall.
Based on a published set list of the time it is likely that they played the following songs: The Wind Up; Better Scream; Some Say; Forget the Down; Don’t Step on the Cracks; 7 Minutes To Midnight; Hey Joe.
“Here in my pocket I’ve got the story of the blues,
Try to believe me cos’ it could be front page news,
I said I live it like it hasn’t happened yet
I keep thinking of everyone how I’m the one, the one they’re trying to get.
To tell…The Story of the Blues…..
First they take your pride, then turn it all inside,
And then you realise, you got nothing left to lose.
So you try to stop,try to get back up,
And then you realise you’re telling The Story of the Blues.”
(Pete Wylie / The Mighty Wah!, The Story of the Blues, 1982)
16 Jan
Wham! The Final Wembley Stadium 28th June 1986
Wham! The Final Wembley Stadium 28th June 1986
Support from Gary Glitter and Nick Heyward.
Im May 1986 Wham! announced that they were to split and that they would play one final concert at Wembley Stadium. My mate Dave and I decided to go and see Wham! for one last time. I remember the journey to London well, as we decided that, instead of using the train as we often did when going to concerts in the capital, this time we would try out the North East’s new(ish) Non-stop Clipper bus service. The service was advertised quite heavily on TV at the time with a cheesy tune: “From Newcastle to London, from London back home….Non-stop Clipper, here it comes!” The Non-stop Clipper was a double decker bus, converted for longer journeys with a toilet and somewhere to sell stotties 🙂 but it was basically still a standard double decker bus. We decided to sit right up front on the top deck, to get the most out of our Non-stop Clipper experience. Now, I can tell you, it’s quite a strange, disconcerting experience, sitting up there on the top deck, overlooking the motorway, cruising for a few hours. Nonetheless it got us to London safe and on time and also at a fraction of the price of the train. I think we took a bus very early in the morning, which got us down to London early afternoon. Then we made our way across London to join 72,000 eager Wham! fans.
The show was a big celebration of Wham! and featured a career-spanning set of hits, and special guest appearances from Elton John who sang Candle in the Wind with George, and Simon le Bon who joined the duo for the encore. There was also a screening of the new Wham! film, Foreign Skies, which was shot during their tour of China. Support came from now disgraced star Gary Glitter and ex Haircut 100 front man Nick Heyward. There were big video screens and two giant walkways for George and Andrew to get close to the adoring crowd who screamed and screamed. There were also many tears, particularly during the last songs, as the reality hit home that this was the last time we would all see Wham! And then it was over. And this was one final that really was final. No reunion tour (not yet anyway). We made our way out of the packed stadium, wandered down Wembley Way with the crowds, and across to Victoria where we boarded our trusty midnight Non-stop Clipper which took us back up North and home. We arrived back early Sunday morning.
Setlist: Everything She Wants; Club Tropicana; Heartbeat; Battlestations; Bad Boys; If You Were There; The Edge of Heaven; Candle in the Wind (with Elton John); Credit Card Baby; Like a Baby; Love Machine; Where Did Your Heart Go?; Why (Carly Simon cover); Last Christmas; Wham! Rap; A Different Corner; Freedom; Careless Whisper; Young Guns (Go for It!); Wake Me Up Before You Go Go
Encore: I’m Your Man (with Simon Le Bon)
That concludes my coverage of Wham! Back to some rock tomorrow 🙂
15 Jan
Wham! Whitley Bay Ice Rink 11th Dec 1984 The Big Tour
Wham! Whitley Bay Ice Rink 11th Dec 1984 The Big Tour
Support act: Pepsi and Shirley; DJ Gary Crowley.
A year later and Wham! were back. This time, for their visit to the North East, they played three sold out shows at the massive cold, and cavernous, Whitley Bay Ice Rink. I attended the second show. The tour was entitled “The Big Tour” in support of their second album “Make it Big”. By now Wham! weren’t just big; they were a massively successful chart act and a hot concert attraction. They had reached the No. 1 spot in the UK singles charts on three occasions (three No. 1s in a row, in fact) with “Wake Me Up Before You Go-Go”, “Careless Whisper” (George Michael solo) and “Freedom”, and they had just released the Christmas single “Last Christmas” which reached No. 2.
Whitley Bay Ice Rink is situated near Newcastle and is the home of the Whitley Warriors ice hockey team. In the 1980s it was the North East’s main rock concert venue, and remained so until Newcastle Arena opened in 1995. By the 1980s each city wanted its own arena, so venues which were not ideal were used for large concerts as acts outgrew theatres and civic halls. Whitley Bay Ice Rink started hosting concerts with a show by the Jam in 1982 followed by AC/DC, The Cure, Kylie Minogue, Oasis, Take That and others. Standing on top of an ice rink covered in wooden boards was not the best setting for a gig, and it was always very cold, and the sound wasn’t great.
However the kids who poured into the Ice Rink to see Wham! didn’t care how cold it was; they were getting to see their heroes. The gig was a wild affair with lots of screaming girls, and George and Andrew performing all their hits. By now it was very much about George, and the loudest screams were reserved for him, particularly when he sang “Careless Whisper”. The concert was an all standing affair; and I spent the evening wandering around the hall, surrounded by 8,000 screaming girls. The show was great fun, and it was an experience to witness Wham! at the peak of their sucess.
The next time I saw the duo was at Live Aid at Wembley Stadium on 13th July 1985. George Michael sang “Dont let the sun go down on me” with Elton John while Andrew Ridgeley joined Kiki Dee in the row of backing singers. I saw them one further time, at their Final concert, again at Wembley, a year later in 1986. I’ll write about that concert tomorrow to conclude my Wham! series.
14 Jan
Wham! Newcastle City Hall 15th Oct 1983 The Club Fantastic Tour
Wham! Newcastle City Hall 15th Oct 1983
Real guilty pleasure time; this is. I have to admit to secretly liking Wham! in the ’80s, and going to see them not once, not twice, but three times. So, for my sins, over the next three days I am going to reflect on those three experiences, at least two of which were actually pretty great fun. I’ll start today with my Wham! live initiation, which was the “Club Fantastic Tour” when it called at Newcastle City Hall in 1983.
I’d seen George Michael and Andrew Ridgeley on Top of the Pops performing “Young Guns (Go for It!)” and thought they were good fun. They seemed to burst onto the scene as a pure pop alternative to some of the more serious bands of the time. By the end of 1983, Wham! were competing against the Durannies and Boy George and Culture Club as Britain’s biggest new pop act, and their début LP “Fantastic” spent two weeks at No. 1 in the UK album charts in 1983. I’d been to see most of the other top pop acts of the period, so when Wham! announced a tour I decided to go along to the City Hall concert, which quickly sold out. The tour was sponsored by Fila Sportswear, and George and Andrew modelled Fila clothes on stage. They were both dressed all in white, their t-shirts emblazoned with “Wham!” and wearing white shorts, down which they famously placed shuttlecocks (or at least the press claimed so).
They were augmented by a full band (with a rhythm and brass section), and backing vocalists including the two legendary dancers/singers Pepsi and Shirlie (one of their earlier backing singers, Dee (D C Lee) had defected to the Style Council by the time of the tour, and later married Paul Weller). The keyboard player in the band was Tommy Eyre from Joe Cocker’s Grease Band who provided the swirling Hammond sound on the UK chart-topper “With A Little Help From My Friends”.
The concert started with an hour or so of dance records played by the tour resident DJ and compere, Gary Crowley. Wham! played two sets (featuring several costume changes), and between the two spots they showed us home videos of our two heroes. George had a solo spot to sing “Careless Whisper” over a taped backing track, and the show featured all the hits. It was actually great fun (honest 🙂 ) and there was lots of dancing going on, while I stood quietly observing, and yet secretly enjoying the whole thing. Don’t they both look so young on the cover of the programme. And remember at this time, Wham! were truly a duo, with George and Andrew sharing equal billing. The programme presents the band as fun, but serious, white soul / dance act; which to give them credit, I guess they were. I found a flyer in the programme for a concert by K C and the Sunshine band which took place at the City Hall the following week. Now I bet that was a fun night too.
Setlist: Young Guns (Go for It!); Club Tropicana; Blue; Wham! Rap; A Ray of Sunshine; Careless Whisper; Bad Boys; Love Machine; Nothing Looks the Same in the Light; Come On!; Wham! Rap; Good Times.
More guilty pleasures tomorrow, I’m afraid.
13 Jan
Steve Winwood York Barbican Centre 3rd March 2004
Steve Winwood York Barbican Centre 3rd March 2004
The next time I saw Steve Winwood was more than 20 years later at a concert at York Barbican Centre. David was a student at Leeds at the time, and I drove down to York and met him at York station. This was my second visit to the Barbican, having been there once before to see Jethro Tull. The concert was all standing with a modest crowd gathered to see Winwood. Although the ticket lists “Special Guests”, I am pretty sure that this wasn’t the case and that there was no support act, with Steve playing two sets. The concert was very much a run through his career from the ’60s onward, with selections from his time in The Spencer Davis Group, Blind Faith, Traffic and his solo work. The concert came at the time of his eight solo album “About Time” and he was accompanied by an excellent band with heavy use of percussion, which reminded me of the Rebop era Traffic. A great show and a chance to get very close to a legend.
Based on a setlist from the London show on the same tour it is likely that the set was something like this:
Set 1. Pearly Queen (Traffic); Different Light; Cigano (for the Gypsies); Empty Pages (Traffic); Can’t Find My Way Home (Blind Faith); Crossroads; I’m a Man (Spencer Davis); Glad (Traffic); Freedom Rider (Traffic).
Set 2: Talking Back to the Night; Bully; Higher Love; Who Knows What Tomorrow May Bring (Traffic); Keep On Running (Spencer Davis Group); Back in the High Life Again; Dear Mr. Fantasy (Traffic); Low Spark of High Heeled Boys (Traffic).
Encore: Why Can’t We Live Together?; Gimme Some Lovin’ (Spencer Davis Group)
Band: Steve Winwood (vocals, Hammond), José Piresde de Almeida Neto (guitar), Walfredo Reyes, Jr. (drums, percussion), Karl Vanden Bossche (congas), Richard Bailey (timbales), Karl Denson (sax, flute).
I’ve seen Steve Winwood a couple of times since then, once at the Sage and once at Wembley Arena when he toured with Eric Clapton, and I’ve already blogged about those concerts.
12 Jan
Steve Winwood Newcastle City Hall 6th July 1983
Steve Winwood Newcastle City Hall 6th July 1983
This was Steve Winwood’s first full solo tour, and was in support of his third solo album “Talking Back to the Night”. Winwood was on a high at the time; having had considerable success with his first two albums “Winwood” and “Arc of a Diver’ and chart hits with “While You See a Chance” and “Valerie”. He had recorded the albums at his home in Gloucestershire playing all instruments himself, and this was the first time that he had gone out and played the songs live in concert with a band. I went along with my mate Ian and we were secretly hoping that he might play a clutch of Traffic and Spencer Davis Group songs. We had seats close to the stage and a great view of Winwood, and his excellent band and he did indeed play some of those songs we were hoping for later in the concert. I wasn’t familiar with a lot of Steve’s solo material apart from the singles, but was pleasantly surprised by how quickly I got into the new songs. Winwood is one of our top artists from the 60s, with an incredibly soulful voice, a very under-rated guitar and Hammond organ player and he always looks incredibly fit and so young, to this day. 
My favourite has always been “No Face, No Name, No Number” but I don’t think he played that particular song at this concert. However we were treated to a clutch of classics from the ’60s which included “Somebody Help Me”, “I’m a Man”, “Keep On Running” and “Gimme Some Lovin'”, along with Traffic’s “Dear Mr Fantasy”. Great stuff.
Setlist will probably have been something like this: Roadrunner; Help Me Angel; Arc of a Diver; Valerie; It Was Happiness; Second-Hand Woman; Vacant Chair; Talking Back to the Night; Slowdown Sundown; Dust; Night Train; Somebody Help Me (Spencer Davis Group); Low Spark of High Heeled Boys (Traffic); Dear Mr. Fantasy (Traffic); I’m a Man (Spencer Davis Group); Big Girls Walk Away; And I Go; Your Silence Is Your Song; While You See a Chance.
Encore: Keep On Running (Spencer Davis Group); Still in the Game; Gimme Some Lovin’ (Spencer Davis Group).
Steve Winwood band: James Hooker (piano), Bobby Messano (guitar), Eric Parker (drums), Carole Steele (percussion), Fernando Sanders (bass/vocals), Godfrey Wang (keyboards).
11 Jan
W.A.S.P. Newcastle Mayfair Rock Night 21st Sep 1984
W.A.S.P. Newcastle Mayfair Rock Night 21st Sep 1984
It was Friday Rock night at Newcastle Mayfair and the headline band was a new act, called W.A.S.P. Now W.A.S.P. are an American heavy metal band, whi formed in 1982, and emerged from the same L.A. scene as Van Halen, Mötley Crüe, and Ratt (and later Guns N’ Roses). There has been a lot of speculation about what the band’s name means, and whether it actually stands for anything. One interpretation is “White Anglo-Saxon Protestants”, particularly as the early W.A.S.P. song “Show No Mercy” contains the repeated line “White Anglo-Saxon / A violent reaction”. However, the original U.S. release of their debut album had the words “We Are Sexual Perverts” inscribed on both sides around the label in the center. When asked about the band’s name leader Blackie Lawless avoided giving a straight answer: “We Ain’t Sure, Pal.” In a later interview, Lawless stated the main reason for the name was the full stops (periods), and that they created a “question mark of uncertainty” to make W.A.S.P. stand out more.
These guys were crazy, wild heavy rock theatre. From the fold-out poster programme that I bought at the gig”: “W.A.S.P. is extreme heavy metal. They don’t stop with leather and studs, chains and spikes – they wield circular sawblades onto metal codpieces and armbands. Bare-assed on stage, they throw raw meat at the audience and drink blood from a skull – and this is only the beginning. Blackie Lawless (leader, lead singer, bass, songwriter) hung out with Ace Frehley (Kiss) in a tough street gang until being seriously stabbed at the age of 13. He went on to a two-year sentence at a military school in Florida. After 18 months Blackie was expelled for beating up a sergeant major, but he broke his knuckles in the process….Blackie took up guitar and did a stretch with the notorious New York Dolls. Randy Piper (guitar) quit school at 15 and slowly worked his way to L.A. He worked 10 days in Disneyland sweeping up, before getting fired for drunkenness. Tony Richards (drums) got himself thrown out of a dozen different schools for various kinds of anti-social behavior by the time he was 15. Included with the more common fighting, drinking and drug charges were getting caught in the closet with a young female teacher and burning the school’s football team’s equipment. Chris Holmes (guitar), the madman whose mother was a Hells Angel (and still beats the shit out of people who argue too much). Chris was kicked out of school at the tender age of 7 – for savagery. These four guys were obviously meant for each other.”
Is this for real ? 🙂
The programme went on: “By May of 1983, W.A.S.P. could sell out the 3000 seat Santa Monica Civic and put on a show that was truly over the top and very controversial. Blackie arranged for a Red Cross Blood Drive during a three-day sod-out run at the Troubadour: fans who gave blood would get in free. But when the Red Cross found out that Blackie drinks animal blood on stage, they didn’t want the band’s blood, or most of the fan’s blood, either. A greater controversy exists over the ‘rack’ [W.A.S.P. would torture a girl on a rack on stage] and feminist groups condemn the onstage treatment of women by W.A.S.P. …YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED.”
W.A.S.P. had just released their latest single “Animal (**** Like a Beast)” and their eponymous debut album, and delighted the Geordie rock crowd with a typically OTT performance of slabs of heavy metal, and very un-PC rock theatre. Good unclean fun. Support came from UK NWOBHM glamsters Wrathchild. I saw W.A.S.P. again at Donington a few years later, and they were equally crazy. Now a Born Again Christian, Blackie Lawless continues to lead W.A.S.P to this day.
Setlist: On Your Knees; The Flame; Hellion; L.O.V.E. Machine; Sleeping (in the Fire); Tormentor; School Daze; The Torture Never Stops; I Wanna Be Somebody; Animal (*** Like a Beast)
10 Jan
Mari Wilson & The Wilsations! live 1982 and 1983
Mari Wilson & The Wilsations! live 1982 and 1983
13th May 1982 and my mate Dave and I are a student dance at New College Durham, in the old buildings up at Nevilles Cross. The headliner was none other than Mari Wilson (aka The Neasden Queen of Soul) and her group the sensational Wilsations!. We’d read a little about this lady and her band in the music press, but didn’t really know what to expect. There was a fun-packed programme for the evening which started with a screening of the movie “Animal House”, followed by a disco (of course) and support band the Sinatras. So by the time Mari took to the stage it was late and the young student crowd had partaken in more than a few drinks and were ready to dance, generally go crazy and be entertained. Nothing could have prepared us for the spectacular that we were about to witness. This was one of those gigs that I try to relive in my mind; to say Mari and the Wilsations! were sensational is an understatement. This was a totally full-on, expertly choreographed and colour co-ordinated rock’n’roll cum doo-wop 1950s review.
Imagine seeing a combination of Darts, The Ronettes, and ShaNaNa, fronted by Julie London. And imagine you are at the local hop in an episode of “Happy Days”, or you are a cast member of “Dreamboats and Petticoats”. Got it? Now make it even more colourful, funny, fast, and crazy than you imagined.
From the moment she stepped out on that school-hall style stage (it even “felt” like we were at the hop) we all knew that we were in the presence of a true “star”; 110%. Yes; Mari was centre-stage, wearing a Taffeta dress, and sporting her famous skyscraper beehive hairdo, but the show wasn’t just about her. The fully choreographed 12 piece band (or it may have been 18 piece, there were certainly lots and lots of them) The Wilsations! were a crucial part of the experience. 
This was an event – pure entertainment. Our compere for the evening was none other than Hank, a larger than life character straight from the high school hop: “Hi I’m Hank and this is the Hank Beehive show. Say “Hi Hank” [we all said “Hi Hank”] and say “Hi” to the band. Tonight we have the two Marines on backing vocals: Kurt L’Amour and Wilbur G Force [Kurt has a penchant for choc dips; throw those dips girls; if you want to win his heart, and Wilbur is a jujitsu expert of some renown and has just completed a karate ballet, drives a Marina and has mated his dogs with the Queen’s corgis]. And providing tonight’s musical accompaniment we have the Wilsations!; all handpicked because their names rhymed with Mari: Harry and Barry (sax and trumpet) [known as the brass monkeys; Harry drives a bottle-green Morris van and Barry has a reputation for anti-rust work on it, and on his trumpet], Larry (pianoforte) [Larry has a tough greaser look], Gary (big drums) [“I got where I am today because my name’s Gary and I know it”], Cary (guitar) [Cary is the resident health freak and has escorted a former Miss World], and Jim (big bass) [Jim always wanted to be in a band but nearly didn’t make it as his name didn’t rhyme with Mari]. And on backing vocals we have the two beautiful Marionettes: Barbarella and Candide [Barbie describes herself as a “professional debutante” and Candide was actually aka Michelle Collins aka Cindy Beale].” [Note: most of the elements in square brackets come from a later programme, by which the names of some of band members may have changed].
The interplay between Hank, the rest of the band, and Mari was hilarious, the dancing was sensational and the costumes perfectly co-ordinated. Mari was simple perfection. The set was a mix of 50s classics, and songs which would soon feature on Mari’s debut album “Showpeople”. This was before she hit the charts with ‘Just What I’ve Always Wanted’. I remember being totally captivated by her performance of ‘Cry Me A River’, the Julie London song which has been a big favourite of mine since I first saw Julie perform it in the film “The Girl Can’t Help It”. A crazy night, where it really felt like we were back in the 50s at the high school hop. I expected to turn around and see the Fonz and Potsie Weber standing next to me 🙂
A few months later and our hero appeared in our own front room, on TV, singing “Just What I’ve Always Wanted” on Top of the Pops. The girl with the big hairdo had done good and had “made it”, just like she always wanted, just like Hank told us she would, and just like we knew show would.
We saw Mari and her Wilsations! a couple of more times, once at Redcar Coatham Bowl on 10th October 1982, and then at Newcastle City Hall on 18th March 1983. The Redcar gig was an equally crazy, fun night. But things changed, somewhere along the way our hero Hank left the band and the membership of the Wilsations! changed (although some of the band members had the same names as their predecessors; isn’t that strange and rather convenient ? 🙂 ). Local north east guitarist, and old mate, Keith Airey joined as guitarist and Julia Fordham joined as one of the two girl vocalists. The City Hall show was good, but the authenticity of “the high school hop” was lost in a larger hall, and things were never the same without Hank. And soon it came to an end and Mari returned to Neasden to knit cardigans or raise a family (actually that’s not true, she continued to sing and does so to this day, moving towards a soul and jazz direction).
For me Mari Wilson and the Wilsations! were at their best that night in 1982 when, at a dance in the old New College hall, we were transported back to the 50s high school hop and Mari simply sang her heart out for us.
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