Tuesday 22 July 2014

It's A Small Place, Blogland Really.



It really is a small world.  That may be a cliche but that doesn't make it any the less true.

A couple of years ago I wrote a post about my first CND demo in Barrow In Furness way back in 1984 and received comments from both Nolan Micron of the much lamented Castles In Space blog and The Vinyl Villain saying that they were also there. Coincidence, yes but in a comment for another post it turns out that both JC and I were at Custom House Quay in Glasgow at the same time watching Natalie Merchant, Billy Bragg and Michael Stipe twenty four years ago last month, sure there were 250, 000 people from all over Scotland milling about Glasgow that day but there weren't actually that many who had waited through Aly Bain and his fiddle on the Broomielaw to listen to Big Nosed Bard from Barking at that time  most of the crowd were either in George Square or at Glasgow Green.

A couple of years ago when talking to my eldest nephew I found out that one of his lecturers at Uni  was none other than Comrade Colin of another lamented blog,  And Before The First Kiss. Another coincidence.

Well it's gone and happened again. A few days ago Scott over at Spools Paradise when posting a track from an Artists For Animals compilation mentioned the fact that he used to man the anti-vivisection stall in Argyle Street in Glasgow as a teen. I passed that stall every other Saturday when alighting from the Lanark train at Argyle street on my frequent visits to Flip and if Stiff was with me we would stop and Stiff would have a look through the stuff as he was right into that kind of thing. Me being a leather wearing, steak eater, I sort of hovered in the background but must have crossed paths with Scott. Anyway, when I mentioned some anarchist punk bands that we used to listen to in the comments, Scott replied saying that he had played Tube Disasters by Flux Of Pink Indians recently. I have this single and quite a few other anarcho-punk records from the early 80s not half as many as Stiff who has some right weird ones like the Italian thrash punks who we couldn't acertain whether they were anarchists or not as the lyrics and sleeve notes were all in Italian and all I can remember now is that it it was quite furious stuff!

Six years ago the RVNG record label in America put out a five track 10" single called 10 Inches Of Fear which included a track each by four groups/artists who were involved in the anarcho-punk scene all re-edited by JD Twitch from Optimo, it also included a mix cd of punk and bands influenced by punk called 60 Minutes Of Fear which is well worth a listen. One of the tracks that is re-edited is the afore mentioned Tube Disasters.

Small world, isn't it?

Flux Of Pink Indians - Tube Disasters (JD Twitch re-edit

3 comments:

Scott said...

Never heard this version before Drew. Be good to hear some of the other tracks in future. Our paths may have also crossed at the Big Day at The Broomielaw.

drew said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
drew said...

I was the one sitting on lovely black and chrome Vespa GS with the King and Queen seat.