2 minute read
The Damned Live review by Martin Hutchinson.
The Damned
Loud Loud Loud!
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Martin Hutchinson reports from the O2 Apollo in Manchester on the 3rd of November.
One of The Damned’s best-known songs is ‘Neat Neat Neat’ (‘Damned Damned Damned’, 1977) and this show was Loud Loud LOUD!
To warm us up, and to get our ears accustomed to the volume, there was a trio of supports. Firstly, an all-female trio from Italy, Smalltown Tigers. They were followed by TV Smith and The Bored Teenagers. Smith was in The Adverts back in the day and his set was exclusively tracks by his old band, including their 1977 hit ‘Gary Gilmore’s Eyes’ (UK#18). The third band to assault our ears was Penetration, another band that was founded in the seventies.
Finally, it was time for the main event: the reunion of the original members of The Damned, with Dave Vanian on vocals, Rat Scabies on drums and Captain Sensible back on bass guitar to make way for original guitarist and main songwriter Brian James, who departed the band after their first two albums, ‘Damned Damned Damned’ and ‘Music for Pleasure’, both released in 1977.
Today’s Damned is a different animal to the seventies’ version. For a start, there are now five of them, including a keyboard player and the music is more melodic and a bit ‘gothy’. The version we saw tonight was the Punk Rock Pioneers, the band who was the first UK Punk band to release a single and tour the US. The material played was mainly from the first two albums along with a couple of supplementary tracks. The songs came thick and fast with hardly a pause, although at one point, Vanian asked for the lights to be turned on the audience, with Sensible commenting that we were “better looking than that London lot”. The Damned had, of course, just played two dates in the capital.
It was high-energy and high volume throughout, even the snare drum gave up the ghost at one point and had to be replaced. And after a four-song encore, which included that first UK Punk single ‘New Rose’, released on the 22nd October 1976, and a cover of The Rolling Stones’ 1965 single ‘The Last Time’ (we had already had a Beatles’ cover with the band’s unique version of ‘Help!’, which was featured on the B-side of ‘New Rose’), Rat set his cymbals on fire whilst Sensible smashed his bass to smithereens. A fitting end, I thought!
I will admit that I have been to better gigs, but the historical value of this one made up for the four-day loss of hearing.
Set List:
‘I Feel Alright (1970)’; ‘You Take My Money’; ‘Help!’; ‘Born to Kill’; ‘Stretcher Case Baby’; ‘Feel the Pain’; ‘I Fall’; ‘Fan Club’; ‘Alone’; ‘Fish’; ‘1 of the 2’; ‘Problem Child’; ‘Neat Neat Neat’; ‘Stab Your Back’; ‘Sick of Being Sick’; ‘See Her Tonite’; ‘You Know’.
Encores: ‘New Rose’; ‘Pills’; ‘The Last Time’; ‘So Messed Up’.
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