Trent Poly, Nottingham, 1984 - I think it was November - at Clifton Campus (south of the city across the River Trent). I seem to remember it was a bitterly cold winter (so not much has changed there then!). My girlfriend at the time used to play Smalltown England over and over, and both of us came from small/remote places. Having spent much of my time at school wishing I had been in London watching the Clash under the Westway, it was good to hear someone singing about the highs and lows of living in places more like the ones we knew. Several years later at Rock City (1989?) they dedicated the Green and the Grey to the people who had travelled in from the small towns and villages in rural Notts which seemed a typically touching thing to do.
I have to confess that although it was a great gig in 1984 I wasn't an immediate all-out convert. They were different from the bands I usually used to see in those days (Conflict, Subhumans etc) and I was into a particular sound then. It was only later that I really began to fully appreciate their breadth, dynamism, and soul, and that, yes, you could have great songs played with intensity, power, and emotion on acoustic guitars! So for me it was a slow-burning passion that developed over the following years. But while I have forgotten many gigs from way back then, I still remember the way their presence and spikiness filled that hall in 1984.
