Carol Bayer Sager - You’re Moving Out Today

The Beatles - Good Day Sunshine

What I loved about this is that Eddie Cochran himself would have loved Sid's version. Ian Dury and the Blockheads - Sex and Drugs and Rock and Roll

Cheers Mark.

I stood next to Paul Weller in the bar in the Ribblesdale that night. I was only in my early teens and came straight from a school cricket match! Weller would barely have been out of his teens himself at that point. John Weller was a fantastic bloke who would always make sure the kids were looked after for autographs/getting into soundchecks etc. One of the highlights of my gig-going life was seeing The Jam play Start in the 1980 KGH soundcheck. PW actually told us we were among the first 50 or so people to ever hear it as he had only just written it. Of course, it went on to be a number 1 hit later that year. I'll maybe post a review of the two gigs I went to in 1980 (KGH and Deeside Leisure Centre) at some point.

In November, a gig from 1979 is being recreated at King Georges Hall to celebrate 40 years since The Jam's Setting Sons tour reached East Lancs. Although not featuring Paul Weller, 'From the Jam' even have the same support band, The Vapors. So when I read this article in the telegraph I decided to dig out my review of the 1979 gig and send it to the author of the book that is mentioned in the article.. https://www.lancashiretelegraph.co.uk/news/17906337.jam-played-blackburn-three-times--/ Here is an abridged version of it: Wednesday 12th December 1979 John Lennon still had about a year to live. Margaret Thatcher was just starting to get into her wicked stride as Prime Minister, and my football team, Blackburn Rovers, was a Third Division football club, in every respect. Also on this day in history, three young men from Woking, Surrey were in the latter stages of a nationwide tour to promote their fourth album, the sublime Setting Sons. King Georges Hall in Blackburn, east Lancashire, was their latest port of call. I always imagined Blackburn to be the arse-end of England and not an obvious stopping-off point for major bands on UK tours. I was also very young - about to turn 15. Despite my tender years, this was not the first time I had seen The Jam in action. They had played King Georges Hall some 18 months previously, just before All Mod Cons was recorded. That night Weller had introduced Billy Hunt as “Our next single” and had also enjoyed a couple of pints in the adjacent Ribblesdale Hotel with Gill Price, his girlfriend. I would have been 13 at that time. Last time out, the 4000 capacity hall had been about two-thirds full, mainly consisting of punks. Generally speaking, when it happened in London, it took about 2 years to reach Blackburn. At least it had always seemed that way. However, what happened on 12th December 1979 was part of a national phenomenon that captured a generation of British kids, from all four corners of the land. This time around, The Jam had started to attract attention and some decent chart placings, and the gig was a sell-out, despite the fact that the tour also took in Lancaster, Manchester (x2), Deeside Leisure Centre and Leeds; all just about within the reach of the northwest youth. We decided to get to the gig in plenty of time to watch the support band, The Vapors. We arrived soon after the doors opened, and quickly spent a small fortune on tour tee shirts and badges. The two that seemed to shift the most were a Setting Sons Tour shirt emblazoned with a bulldog and rising sun graphic, and an Eton Rifles shirt with marching army cadets on the front. They were truly iconic and as cool as fuck. They still are. We had no money left for either a beer or our bus home, so made our way straight into the hall and got down the front. The Vapors were excellent, and they played just about the whole of the then-unreleased New Clear Days album. I particularly remember their soon-to-be-monster hit Turning Japanese and also Spring Collection. The hall was beginning to fill up at this point and you could feel the atmosphere getting increasingly tense. It was a heady mixture of genuine fear at what could kick off at any moment, given some of the chants that were being sung, and real excitement at who was about to enter stage right. Who needed booze on a night like this? These were tough, violent times. While I don’t recall there being much of a gang culture as such, there were certainly parochial battles aplenty, with many small towns making up the east Lancashire conurbation, and a gig such as this was a tinderbox, to say the least. Speaking of which, you could still smoke everywhere in those days - most of us did - and once the house lights went down (always the signal that emptied the bars and caused a crush in the hall) all you could see were the red ends of hundreds of fags and the wispy smoke billowing out of them. No mobile phones in those days. Then the spotlight shone onto the right hand corner of the stage, and a stocky man with white hair sauntered on stage. In his unmistakeable gruff voice, he bellowed “Alright, put your ‘ands together for the best band in the fuckin’ world, The Jam!!”. I actually thought the roof was going to come off the place! Apparently the ringing phone effect was played, but I doubt anybody heard it, as the band launched straight into Girl on the Phone. The bit where the word ‘cock’ is used in the song’s lyric signalled a mass punch in the air (later to be repeated during Pretty Green on the following tour!). Bearing in mind I saw The Jam a few times and my memory isn't what it was, but my recollection is that Weller – whose hair was longer than when I’d seen them 18 months earlier, had a navy blue and grey polka dot shirt and either grey or slate blue sta-prests. I have no idea what he had on his feet, but I seem to recall they weren’t the black-and-white ‘Jam’ shoes that had previously been a trademark. Foxton was wearing a grey tonic suit - he did have Jam shoes on - and he lost the jacket after just a couple of numbers. Rick had a striped blue button down shirt on – could have been pale blue, but it soon became dark blue! As for the crowd, the whole place was a sea of fishtails, Fred Perrys and boating blazers. You could normally tell after a song or two whether Paul was ‘up for it’ – he generally was – and I have to say that I have rarely seen him strut quite so aggressively around a stage as he did that night. I wonder whether he’d lost at cards on the coach on the way in?! “’Ow are ya, alright?” He looked at me when he said that! Okay, I’m sure every kid in the hall thought the same thing, but we were as one. They rattled through the set at breakneck speed as usual. I can’t remember the exact order of songs but it would have followed a similar set list as the rest of that tour. I do remember they played Strange Town, When You’re Young and The Eton Rifles, one after another, in that order. I only remember that because they had been the last three singles, in that order, and I reflected afterwards that it showed how good they were that they didn’t feel a need to hold any of them back for the encore. They made such an incredible noise, especially given that there were only three of them! The feedback Paul got during Rifles was ear-splitting. Another song that sticks in my mind from that show was Little Boy Soldiers. My late brother was in the army at the time and it sent shivers down my spine hearing that song played live. It still does! “And if I get the chance I’ll FUCK UP YOUR LIFE, Mister Cleeeeean, Mister Cleeeeean”. I cannot properly put into words just how loudly the crowd sang the bit in capital letters. Weller didn’t even bother singing “Is that seen?” - we did that for him! The last song of the main set was (Love is Like a) Heatwave. Many Jam fans, including this one, are of the view that this song had no place on Setting Sons. Paul now agrees, and reflects that they had no choice but to use it to close the album as he had no more songs written. Personally I think they would have been better served by including The Butterfly Collector. However, (Love is Like a) Heatwave DEFINITELY had a place on the Setting Sons tour. It was the most rousing way to close the set, and the crowd went ballistic, to say the least. It was probably the closest I have come to imagining what Beatlemania must have sounded like. Again, I think it was a brave song to leave the stage on, given the hits they already had under their belt at the time. Another thing gigs get measured on – well they certainly did in those days – was how many encores were performed. The Jam did two that night. The first one was David Watts, followed by The Modern World. Off they went again. “Thank you, goodnight!” A few people thought that was that and started streaming towards the exits, entirely satisfied that they had just seen the biggest band in Britain - and the best band in the fucking world - performing at the peak of their powers in a smallish venue. I have no idea why I remembered this, but I realised they hadn’t yet played Tube Station. Also, the house lights hadn’t come back on. I said to my mate that they were probably going to do a second encore. Sure enough, a roar greeted Paul, Bruce and Rick as they jogged back on stage, the former and the latter puffing on rather suspicious looking cigarettes! They ended proceedings with an incredibly intense version of A Bomb in Wardour Street - How many of us would actually be able to spell apocalypse if it hadn’t been for this song, be honest!?- followed by, of course, Tube Station, complete with sound effects (note the ‘e’). This time “Thank you goodnight” echoed around the hall as the band left the stage, and this time the house lights did go up and it was time to step out into the cold December Lancashire air. The last thing that struck me as I was leaving King Georges Hall that night was the steam and sweat literally rolling down the walls of the venue. It was quite literally like a sauna. Normally, after a gig or a football match in that neck of the woods, there would be sporadic outbreaks of battling between different parochial factions, but I can honestly say that all I saw was a sea of smiling faces, made so by three lads not much older than us.

A good read as usual. Thanks Ian.

Well said. Its a pet hate of mine as well.

Sandie Shaw - There’s Always Something There To Remind Me

Bit of a stretch this one so I apologise, but surely worth it for this gem? The Zombies - Care of Cell 44 From one of the greatest albums of all time.

The Ruts - Babylon’s Burning

The Housemartins - Happy Hour

Ray Charles - Hit the Road, Jack!

The bit that particularly irritated me was plonking his heavily pregnant daughter in court to try and garner some sympathy and mitigation. Arrogant prick. And just for the record he in fact didn't "play under Brian Kidd at Blackburn" as the article states, he played under Tony Parkes and Graeme Souness at Blackburn.

Paul Weller - Wings of Speed Featuring Carleen Anderson, who has the voice of an angel!

Geno Washington and the Ram Jam Band - Michael, The Lover

The English Beat - All Out To Get You

T Rex - Get it On

Man and the Echo - I Don't Give a Fuck What You Reckon

Prince Buster - Madness

Try again mate, this song preceded the one I posted above

The Supernaturals - Motorcycle Parts

The Who - Out In The Street

Eddie Bo and Inez Cheatham - Lover and a Friend Mr Weller nicked a bit of this for That Dangerous Age

Scott Walker - The Old Man's Back Again