Blame The Distractions

Dave Hammond, the chap responsible for the original Distractions Facebook group, recently wrote a blog about how he came to have his own radio show, the Smelly Flowerpot Show on Cambridge 105, and involvement with a record label, Oh Mercy! Records.  Here's part one:

I wouldn’t be writing this if it wasn’t for that fateful decision made by Island Records in the early eighties.

Really.

OK, an awful lot of other things have happened to put me in this place, right now, with laptop on knee, but I can honestly say if that decision had gone the other way then most of those other things just wouldn’t have lined up.

Let me explain…

A few months apart in late ‘79/early ’80 I saw two bands. I probably saw many more, but it’s these two bands that are important. The first band was at The Taboo Club on Huntriss Row in Scarborough. Don’t ask me how I still remember the name of the street - I just seem to have a knack for retaining trivial information, while the important things get forgotten. Birthdays just don’t go well in my family. Anyway, my mate, and resident club DJ, Paul Russell had a flat above the club which doubled as a changing room for bands playing at the venue. So, there I was one Saturday afternoon with fish and chips on knee, watching the wrestling on World of Sport, commentated on by Kent Walton (more trivia…), when four skinny, spotty youths walked in with bags in hand. They milled around a bit, talking quickly in hushed tones and generally getting in the way of my tv viewing. So I bogged off downstairs to catch up with Paul and have a beer.

The band hit the stage later that evening and played a fairly enjoyable and energetic set, the lead singer being the focus of attention as he clambered on a fairly unsteady stack of amps, nearly losing his balance at several points and generally making a prat of himself. I asked Paul who the band were at the end of the night, as he was ejecting the recording he had just made of the gig- something he did for all the bands who played there. "Irish band," he said, "call themselves U2 I think." I’d never see them play live again.

 

Fast forward a few months and I was at the Welly Club [Wellington Club] in Hull to see The Members and, more importantly, a band called The Distractions. I’d bought an EP of theirs called ‘You’re Not Going Out Dressed Like That’ and the follow up single, the classic ‘Time Goes By So Slow’. They’d just been signed by Island Records on the back of much critical praise and were about to release their debut LP. The future looked bright. To say this was one of my favourite gigs of all time is not overstating things. The band were terrific, brilliant 3 minute post punk pop songs played superbly by a band including a guitarist with a Wilko Johnson haircut and a charismatic but unlikely looking frontman in a spangly suit. Me and the girl I took along spent the evening swinging along and grinning stupidly. We both swore to buy the debut LP and catch the band live again. I would do so, but little did I realise it wouldn’t be for another 32 years...

[to be continued]