Stoli, Ushankas and Adidas Trackies

I loved the Age of Chance so much so that I saw them live through the fug of concussion once. I was in Aberdeen, my first year at Uni and my mate Stiff and Hazel came up for the weekend which started calmly enough, a few beers (Crucial Brews) on Friday night, dancing at the Union, trying to avoid the fucking goths sitting about the dance floor, well I tried to avoid them Stiff just danced and if a member of the undead was stepped on in the process so be it. Then a kebab and a frozen,  drunken walk home as there were five of us going back to my place, so  Hazel and the two Susan's got the taxi promising to send it back but after half an hour Stiff and I realised that we would be walking and so set out on foot. I was sure that I knew a shortcut but what should have been a half hour stagger at the most turned into a two hour trek but we did find the Beechgrove Garden, the location for an extremely popular gardening programme at the time in Scotland.

Things started to go wrong around lunch time on the Saturday when I remembered I had a bottle of Stolichnaya in the freezer that my mother had brought me back from her recent exchange in Moscow and Leningrad. So as Hazel went out with some of the others into the town Stiff and I sat around drinking shots of Vodka while taking turns wearing my bearskin Ushanka, another present from the USSR and saying "yavas lublu" and "nostrovia". When Hazel returned we couldn't bite our little fingers. We were supposed to be going out for dinner to Radar's, a cheap student eatery in the town, with some of my friends. Stiff sensibly bailed out, stayed in to watch Sportscene I on the other hand insisted that I was fine and ventured out.

A very stupid move, as when I stepped into the fresh air, I went down like a sack of potatoes cracking my head off the granite pavement. I got up staggered across to the bus stop and went down again. How I was allowed onto the bus will remain a mystery however by the time we reached Union Street I had been sick all over my mate John's suede jacket and was bundled into a taxi with a good Samaritan who took me back to the flat where I remember saying something incoherent to Stiff and then passed out on the floor where I remained until the next morning when I awoke with the mother of all sore heads.

The Sunday morning was a blur and when Stiff and Hazel left to go back down the road I decided to do my washing in the laundry. I was sitting there when a girl I knew asked me if I was alright. I said yes and then asked why? To which she informed me that I was sitting watching an empty machine going through a cycle with what she took to be my washing still in the laundry basket at my side!. I told her of the events of the previous evening after which she insisted on taking me to A&E to get checked out. I tried to protest as I didn't have time to wait around the hospital as I had a gig to go to but she would not take no for an answer.

After what seemed like hours, I was seen by a registrar, related the story once more was told that I probably had concussion and sent home to rest. I asked if it was alright for me to go to a concert and was told in no uncertain terms no. So an hour or two later I was in, I think,  The Venue watching a very loud Age of Chance promoting 1000 Years of Trouble.  My main memory of the evening is the band's DJ, Powercut resplendent in his Adidas trackie. I did not drink vodka after that until my very late thirties.

I think that Age of Chance would have played this track that night.

Age Of Chance Take It (Unlimited Credit mix)