Finsbury Park, London – Saturday 26th and Sunday 27th July, 1986.
Seems a bit odd to write about a gig I went to 39 years ago. I can’t remember much about the performances—it’s all a bit of a blur, except Captain Sensible performing some of the set naked, but the events surrounding it are etched into my memory.
It was a day (well, two days) of peaks and troughs, and one of those strange pivotal moments in life where things shift, where new opportunities and friendships sneak up on you, and others get torched spectacularly, usually through your own idiocy. A customary course of events throughout life, we later always referred to as ‘the big D,’ the big debacle. The Big D would go onto become an almost bragging right of how spectacularly you’ve fucked up. A strange ritual where disaster would be recounted with the old Morrissey adage, ‘I can laugh about it now but at the time it was terrible,’
The Exuberance of Youth
It started well. A big group of us went up from Sussex, hitting Unwins for the beers at Haywards Heath Station, loud and boisterous from the off. By the time we reached Finsbury Park, we’d picked up more people and more beer. The day was set very very fair.
We parked ourselves a few hundred yards from the venue, somewhere in the middle of the park. There we were: a mass of silly cothes, sillier haircuts. Aged between 16 and 20—apart from “Old George” who might have been, what, 23?
Every Story Needs a Love Interest?
Meanwhile, the bid D was lurking.
As is customary with young people, our love lives were a chaotic mess. But I had a plan. Today was the day I was finally going to start something with Girl A, a beautiful, suave goth with whom I’d shared various moments and flirtations over the previous couple of years, always saying we should get together permanently one day. This, I had convinced myself, was day, the destiny.
I’d also made sure Girl B, my recent ex who was still very much emotionally invested, would be attending with a smaller, separate group. I’d called it off with her a few months previously but like a dog had gone sniffing around for scraps, which she had interpreted as a potential reunion. I’d maybe cruelly, repositioned her as “ex with benefits” without ever formally telling her that. I had, of course, used the time-honoured teenage excuse: “It’s not you, it’s me.” That classic line designed to soften the blow when you have no emotional maturity to work with.
And then Girl B appeared. As I had my heart invested in landing Girl A, so had Girl B invested in landing me.
For about an hour, I was drunk, surrounded by friends, and basking in the smug glow of two women competing for my attention. Life was perfect. Until I managed to spectacularly cock it all up.
In a moment of bullish drunken confidence, I fully kissed Girl A. Girl B, understandably, burst into tears and stormed off. Girl A was less than impressed with my explanation (something along the lines of “She doesn’t mean anything”) and decided I was, in fact, not boyfriend material.
In the space of a few minutes, I went from having two almost girlfriends to none. The Big D had struck.
Karma
To the surprise of no one (except me at the time), Karma decided to give me a little slap. Sitting high up on his moral high ground he was taking a very dim view of my behaviour.
As we all made our way towards the entrance, I reached into my pocket to get my ticket… gone. I’d checked it a dozen times that morning, but now, with thousands of people flooding into the venue, it had disappeared. I was gitted, I loved the Damned, they were my favourite band and I’d been looking forward to the gig for weeks.
Crushed, a few of us retraced our steps. I was convinced it was gone for good. Hundreds of people had walked over the place we were sitting, no chance. But there it was, lying in the grass amongst the rubbish, right where we’d been sat. Untouched. A small miracle.
The whole affair had left me a bit gloomy. Still, ticket recovered, we entered the huge big top and cracked open more beers and watched the support acts. The mood lifted again. Especially once word spread that Captain Sensible, then going through a hiatus from the band and riding high on his brief solo success, would be appearing.
Fate and Karma Pt 2
Karma had decided in his wisdom that as I had upset two girls a further dose of the big D was due.
Being 20, and energetic, I used to enjoy partaking in a little moshing in the mosh pits of various venues. I loved the wild energy, the sweaty crush of bodies at the front, the way everyone jumped and pushed and threw themselves around. It was glorious chaos.
Until it wasn’t.
I got caught in the surge and went down. Instinctively curled into a ball with my hands over my head, but not quick enough. Someone’s boot landed square in my eye socket. Karma has exacted sweet revenge, as he should, an eye for an eye, literally.
Sounds scarier than it was. Back then, if someone went down, everyone around them helped get them up in seconds. It was wild but weirdly safe, apart from, in this case, the head injury. In fairness the only one I ever received at a gig.
A few kind souls dragged me up and to the sidelines, where a friendly hand grabbed hold of me.
It was Slim.
Now, Slim was someone I vaguely knew. We’d gone to the same dreadful public school,Ardingly College. in the 70s. This was before schools were checked up on and many independent schools were a disgrace. Slim succinctly put it at a later date that all Ardingly did was ‘produce a better class of yob.’ He was in the year above. We didn’t exactly know each other very well except for an acknowledgement when we bumped into each other.
And yet, there he was, appearing out of nowhere and hauling me out of the moshpit carnage.
Cut to 39 years later: a few weeks ago, I travelled to Suffolk for Slim’s 60th birthday. He’s now my best friend.
The Band That Shouldn’t Have Been (But Was)
Back then, I’d just started learning bass and had joined a band called The Gutter Drunks, a sort of Cramps/Gun Club influenced noise outfit. Meanwhile, Slim was playing in The Unchristened.
There was a rumour floating around that our bands might merge, forming some sort of Haywards Heath punk supergroup. It was probably just drunk pub talk.
But that evening, chatting away, I brought the rumour up with Slim. Something like: “Are we doing this or what?”
And we did.
The band—Jack the Ripper (not a name you’d get away with now) lasted a decade. Slim wrote our own material, did the odd cover (including Smash It Up by The Damned, naturally), and became proper mates in the process.
Looking Back (With Only a Little Shame)
The Damned’s 10th Anniversary Tea Party was chaos. But in the middle of the booze, heartbreak, and boot to the head misadventure, something clicked.
Two romantic disasters, a lost ticket, a boot to the face… and a best mate and band formed in the wreckage.
Not bad for a weekend in 1986.
The Rights of Fans. 