battersea 85?

[mary kenehan]

i was always going to the free days out in the 80"s in london put on by the g.l.c and the trade union council the music was always a good mix.. punk reggae blues anyhow i was walking thru battersea park and on a tiny stage under some trees a band were playing irish music in a way i had never heard before and that was my first sighting of the pogues needless to say i was blown away chills up the spine ! now years later i have heard theres a video somewhere of that gig does anyone know this to be true?and was it 85 or 86? i just am not sure! the old brain playing tricks!! and to come full circle in 2001my 4 brothers myself my 70 year old mum and3 of my kids 2 of one of my brothers kids all went over to brixton for the sunday gig no other band unites us like the pogues !god love them.

[Christine]

Loved your story, Mary. The mix of people at Pogues shows is very impressive, must be unique among Brixton gigs; hopefully Shane's Shepherd's Bush appearance in March will attract the same kind of crowd. How did your mum like it? Were the kids not trampled to death?

Don't know about Battersea Park videos but have a look at the thread about live shows 85-86. A bootleg of that show is listed by Alex: http://home.pages.at/pogues/boot85.htm.

[mary kenehan]

hiya christine,my ma loved the gig,the kids i say kids the youngest was 19 at the time! were all down the frount ,it was one of those nights that seem to glow in your memory,and the crowds on the tube at rush hour are roughter than a pogues crowd any day of the week!!

[Fyllo]

Tell us more about the Battersea 85 gig

[JamesFearnley]

So, I think Battersea was the first time we met - well, I met anyway - or indeed we met, as a band, that is, Kirsty and Steve Lillywhite. Frank the manager, who had worked with Kirsty, brought them backstage. She was lovely, of course, and spirited and everything and wearing green, if I remember properly. So, a bit of a milestone, the Battersea gig. And Steve, sort of - I don't know - something priestly about him I suppose. Nice guy.

Plus also, I was standing on the stage playing the accordion, aware more than I wanted to be of a guy I used to go to college with in Ealing who had gone on to work for the council (who'd put on the gig as I remember) and who had landed a bouncing job at the barrier, if there was one, not that he had the physique at all for bouncing, but that's beside the point, so there I was, playing my accordion, when I spotted, up in the sky over the heads of the audience, suddenly appearing from nowhere, a sort of twirling black dot that rose up and then levelled off and I thought to myself, what the fuck is that? and sort of puzzled over it for a bit to see what it was going to do next and then, with a certain amount of curiosity watched the twirling black dot started to come down again, and it was at that time that I realized that it was not just descending but actually headed my way, and the next thing I knew there was a fucking great smack of a full beer can against the front of my accordion and then a crack as it fell onto the stage and sort of fizzed round and round with foam like a firework. I stopped playing for a bit, to reconsider my life, sort of, as you do, in a circumstance like that.

That's my Battersea story. It could so easily have gone very differently.

[DzM]

That's my Battersea story. It could so easily have gone very differently.

This story actually made giggle outright. First time in a good while. Thanks! I've needed a good giggle over the last few days.

[Fyllo]

it seems to be dangerous playing the accordion.

[Big Sim]

... and it was the first time I'd seen the Pogues. They'd recently been featured on the Tube so I was very keen to see if the bite matched up to the bark. It was a glorious summer's day and after a few tins of Red Stripe courtesy of the the Worker's Beer company I could not but fail to enjoy the gig. Top quality fun watching something that at the time seemed to be completely original.

I do recall one of the band "going down" on the side of the stage. I thought he was being sick.

Afterwards, we made the fatal mistake of sticking around too long (too see OMD of all bands!!!) and missed the last train home to Luton so me and my mate Dave spent the night in a cafe across the road from King's X trying to chat up a couple of German girls who were also at the gig.

So there we are, sitting with the German girls amongst all the human flotsam and jetsom that collects at stupid-o-clock in the morning in a cafe in Kings X when who should stumble through the front door but Shane himself.

"Uurrrrgh. Alright lads. Got any fags?"

Well, we didn't.

"Urrrrgh. Where'd ya think I might get some?"

Sorry, Shane, we're marooned here.

So Shane's minder grabs him. "Come on Shane. Let's go home".

And that was it. Life imitates art. And we never got anywhere with the girls either.

GLC free festivals: Surely time for a revival.