I was
lucky enough to get tickets to the 1st night of the sex pistols 7
date uk tour and i'm happy to say it was well worth the
£70 I had
to
pay to be there.
I did not see the
support band because the queue of people reached right down
the side of the building and as u entered the venue we were
separated into male and female lines to be searched for weapons.
Once inside the place was packed with people of all ages from 18
to 60 dressed in all kinds of clothing many wearing 30th
anniversary never mind the bollocks tour t shirts that cost £20
inside but could be bought much cheaper later as you left to go
home.
the dj's were playing loud techno dance music but after about 1/2
hour they were booed off stage.
ok here's the good bit...... the lights changed stage lights hit
the stage then the sound of vera lyns old war time song "there
will always be a england" started to play. A few minuets later the
pistols entered the stage by big black doors at the back of the
stage. A barrage of plastic glasses beer fag ends and spit and
anything the crowd could find were thrown at the stage then a huge
cheer and clapping started. Rotten was dressed as a english lord
in a shooting suit that made him look like the game keeper,
matlock had a really nice electric blue waist coat, jones wore a
t-shirt.
Rotten was great fun he paraded around the stage like a mad
english earl saying "50 years young" are there any people under 40
here? good you got to get them while they are young".
The set started with pretty vacant the sound was great they did it
very well i thought they must have done more than the 3 hours
practice they claimed they did. The band were tight they however
spent quite a lot of the gig with there backs to the audience
looking at the drummer paul cook who was spot on. Rotten however i
think only managed to do about 4 songs as they should be he would
forget verses sometimes leave them out, the band would sing the
choruses to keep him on track but non of this mattered he was and
is a fantastic showman he adlibed the whole concert that made it
so special because to be honnest if it had been a perfect copy of
never mind the bollocks and the b sides to the singles it would
have lacked those special anarchic moments of chaos only rotten
can really do. You want a copy of never mind the bollocks get the
record you want pure entertainment see the pistols live!
At the point in the show where the god save the queen track was
played they had a projection of eight £1 stamps. Rotten said "look
thats nearly a tenner we spent on our queen if you don't know this
song your in the wrong fucking building".
He Did GSTQ very well the crowd loved it.
Bodies was done very well and its fair to say that even though
Anarchy he did totally wrong jones saved the day with some clever
guitar work, this band are masters of being able to pull tricks
out of hats and should not be under estimated in any way.
They did 2 encores ending with a new version of belsen but with
different words.
All in all if you get the chance to see the pistols dont miss it
the band is still one of the most inventive charismatic original
acts out there and unlike most other old time bands you still get
the original line up after all it could never work with out all
four members.
There are a few tribute acts out there including us
www.nofuture4u.com and i was left with the feeling that we can all
still learn from the master mr lydon himself he is a true
showman!!! we can copy him but none of us will ever be better than
him he's the original.
Thank you John, Paul, Steve & Glen for a marvellous night.
regards
gym
www.nofuture4u.com
