Adam Ant Roadmender Northampton 25th April 2015

 

A few posts back and in connection with the '51' I was beoaning the fact that The Stranglers have been slow and inconsistent on the uptake when it comes to retro album themed tours whilst many of their contemporaries have fully embraced the concept. One former punk to do so has been Adam Ant. For him I would say the approach makes particular sense. A look at the back catalogue of Adam & The Ants and its easy to see that his/their albums were so different. I can think of no other artist/band that underwent such a huge transformation in their short existance.

1978 saw the Antz as a band with a hardcore cult following within the punk scene, a band with a penchant for fetishism and a willingness to flirt with fascist themes.When a mentoring scheme with Malcolm McLaren went awry and resulted in the departure of his band to form Bow Wow Wow, the direction of the band changed radically. In came Native American and pirate themes backed by driving Burundi rhythms. At some point in 1980, 'Kings Of The Wild Frontier' entered the mainstream and 'Ant Music ' was everywhere. 

In just four years, Adam and the Ants had 'graduated' from the pages of New Musical Express to the front page of 'Look-In'. You could even get Adam and the Ants school stationary sets in Superdrug! For this reason I would go and see Adam do the 'Dirk' album (and I did) but would side step a tour that focus on 'Prince Charming'.... actually I saw that back in 1981!

Here then is a recording from one of those Dirk Wears White Sox dates, which couples the album with other very early Ants material, one of which has only ever surfaced on bootleg albums of unreleased demos (Madame Stan, Decca Demos etc) and others as rerecorded B-sides of the big hits.

I appreciate that Adam and the Ants (the punk or the panto versions) are not everyones cup of tea, but me the '78/'79 version was highly original and completely out there.

FLAC: https://we.tl/t-bcOHc0KlxO

Artwork: https://we.tl/t-HlDV1mUYK9