Squit aka ‘the blog’
1984 Autumn Tour by Baz and Mark
Colin sent us a copy of Griff (number 4 in fact). We’ll gradually be adding it to the blog
Although it was only a short tour we thought that we’d better do a couple of warm ups before it started, mainly to check any problems with the set and to make sure that Larry, the drummer, was a decent bloke. The first warm up date was at the Royal Holloway college in Egham – support band was the Triffids. I can’t really remember much about the night, but it seemed to go down pretty well, we did a couple of encores and made a note of which songs were the least popular then wandered home again.
The second date was at the Savoy Ballroom in Tufnell park. Sounds like a pretty smart place until you realise that it’s just a room above a pub and it’s pretty hard to find as there’s no mention of the word ‘Savoy’ anywhere inside or out. The band spirit was further dampened by the appearance of sundry record company types, the usual round of pre gig interviews, a meeting with a prospective manager, a minute dressing room with no lock on the toilet door, need I go on? The performance itself was generally OK but far from wonderful. The audience were very abusive (aren’t they always!) and we also realised that certain songs didn’t seem to be working. ‘Drinking and Dressing Up’ was greeted by total silence.
Between the Savoy and the rest of the tour we wrote a new song, “Art Gallery’ – actually I should say that the others had written but I was short of most of the words – Baz.