Is she really going out with him?

Busy, busy time for everyone, I guess, but definitely for teachers – carol concerts, plays, assessments and the feverish dash to knock up … stuff … from card, tinsel and glittery bits. Predictably, this has meant the already meagre trickle of posts on here has recently dried up almost completely. I can only apologise.

What’s actually quite unlikely about the whole period is that somehow I’ve managed to squeeze two gigs into the last fortnight or so – I’m not quite sure how this has happened. This week I went to see punk legends, the Damned, at the Guild Hall. I quite like these old punk gigs – always bump into a few people I’ve not seen for a while, and it’s always kinda fun to see what shape these bands are in.

And it’s heart-warming to report that, despite being a little thicker around the waist and fuller around the face, Vanian and Sensible (regrettably no Scabies) aren’t doing too badly really. I was a little apprehensive to be honest, not just by the prospect of a new Damned album being out (not often a good sign) but also having suffered the humiliation of a perforated ear drum at the wretched Buzzcocks gig last year. To be fair, though, the sound this time was great, and the set not half bad. They galloped through a routine that included a few too many new songs, but was also dotted with a lot of rousing old favourites, including Love Song, Neat, Neat, Neat, Smash It Up and this….




(OK, not quite like that…)

Ear drum happily in tact, the only indignity suffered was courtesy of a friend’s pint, when an aging punk careened wildly out of the mosh pit and into our group. A modest sort of battle scar to be sure…