The Stranglers - A Review by Chas de Whalley (Sounds 8th January 1977)

I chanced upon another early review of the band at The Nashville Rooms in Kensington. Appearing in the 8th January issue of Sounds, Chas de Whalley, a champion of the band right from the beginning, once again waxes lyrically about the appeal of their dark and dirty psychedelia.

Now, the Nashville was almost a second home to The Stranglers throughout 1976. Most notably they played the Kensington venue on 19th December 1976, a gig that was recorded with a view to release as the band's debut LP. In the event, as we all know, the album, 'Dead On Arrival', was effectively 'Dead Prior to Departure', its release being vetoed by the band on the grounds that they did not consider it to be sufficiently representative of the band live at that time. The gig was advertised without reference to the support on the night.

The Burning Up Time Forum indicates that support on the night of the live recording was TRB. 

In de Whalley's review the support is very evidently Chelsea. So when precisely did this gig take place? Appearing on 8th January, one can assume the gig occurred some time between 10th December 1976 and the first week of January 1977.

Another Nashville review published in Music Weekly on 18th December (here), assumed to be related to the gig on 10th (although the article refers to a Saturday, assumed to be an error as the gig occurred on a Friday) makes no reference to the support band.

The close of 1976 into 1977 saw the following Stranglers gigs (according to NME listings):

Saturday 11th December support to Deaf School (Friars Aylesbury)
Monday 13th December with Nobodaddy (Tiffany's Edinburgh)
Thursday 16th December headline Mags Head High Wycombe
Friday 17th December headline Peterborough Technical College
Sunday 2nd January 1977 Pink Faries/The Stranglers/Little Bob Story (Roundhouse)

The Burning Up Time Forum states  that the band appeared once more at the Nashville in a pre-Christmas gig (23rd December) supported by Racing Cars.

The ad as it appears in NME makes reference to Racing Cars only.

So my question is who supported The Stranglers at The Nashville on 10th December 1976? If it was TRB then when did this gig with support from Chelsea happen? 

There was another gig at the Nashville on 21st November 1976 (again with no reference to the support in the gig listing), but it seems unlikely that this would only get written up in a January 1977 issue.

Any ideas?

One thing seems certain... when Chas refers to JJ in eyeliner and ripped shirt... this would be his view of the stage!

Preston Guild Hall 14th February 1985

 

I mentioned in my last post that on occasion Aural Sculptors is host to an exclusive and here is one courtesy of the master of the remaster, DomP. Many thanks my friend. This is a lively gig, probably on account of it being just the fourth gig of a sizable UK tour. By the time I got to see them in Brighton on the last night, they would have been knackered!

Here's Dom with his own words on the recording:

'An extraordinary Valentine’s Day audience tape of The Stranglers on day four of the Sculpture tour in the north of England.

A bad night for Dave’s synths, Hugh chunters away between songs and there is a kerfuffle in one of the tracks where JJ puts down his bass and sorts something, or someone, out. Some of the most violent versions of the "older" tracks you'll hear from this era. An angry wonky classic.

This took a while to master as I couldn't quite tune in, then it clicked that it was recorded from distance, so once I figured out the hall acoustics all was good. Imagine you're listening from up on high, looking down....'

FLAC: https://we.tl/t-pObJi7sJTFhahz3C

Artwork: https://we.tl/t-FWB1JPXfdBOebAU6

Subscription Time Again

 

Well perhaps not 'Penny for the Guy' but as sure as 5th November comes around once a year, so too does an email from WeTransfer to inform me that the annual subscription is due on 18th July. Just to recap, to support the site uploads I use the WeTransfer platform's 'Ultimate Plan'. The Ultimate Plan gives me an upload capacity of 5TB (of which the current total content of the site, as of today, takes up 859.9GB - so there is no risk of running out of upload capacity). In the past I, like many other blog owners with music content, used file storage platforms that were shut down. A great number of owners of such sites ceased to operate after this, leaving the internet littered with what initially look to be promising sites, but in fact all the links are broken and there is nothing to be shared. Aural Sculptors has weathered that particular storm. The available data for my WeTransfer account indicates that I have used the platform since 2019. In that time I have found it to be stable and very reliable. There was a brief period at the beginning of 2025 when they decided to place an expiry upon all uploads, but thankfully this policy was short lived, so that provided the subscription is up to date, the uploaded material will be available until such time that I either stop paying or remove it.

The good news is that the 2026 annual subscription (12 months from 18th July) cost is unchanged from 2025 at €228 (£198). Should you be so inclined, contributions towards this critical element of the Aural Sculptors site you can do so via the PayPal button located on the right hand side bar of the site, below the Aural Sculptors logo (see below). I don't think that I necessarily need to repeat this but I will. I make no money whatsoever in running this site. The subscription contributions, whilst very gratefully received, have never completely covered the total cost each year and I have made up the shortfall. The site is not monetised in any way - there are no ads. A shared joy of obtaining live recordings that filled in the gaps between official releases is the only reason wht this site exists. People who headed over to Camden market days after a gig to see whether the men with the cassette laden trestle tables had it on offer will understand this. How we loved those tapes, with their pastel coloured sleeves and badly typed track listings!

In terms of site usage, visits to the site have increased this year. I believe a typical daily tally of visitors runs to around 1,500-2,000. Site hits are becoming increasingly difficult to gauge though. For example, the total number of visits last month was in excess of 365,000! Clearly this is nonsense, a figure that I put down to bots harvesting data for AI purposes. For the first time I took a look at the downloads recorded for the WeTransfer account. I counted the download total for audio posts only (i.e. downloads of associated artwork were excluded) from today going back to the beginning of 2026 and I was surprised by the data. There have been 8,397 gigs (concerts not GB!) downloaded in that time. This means that in the last 12 month subscription period around 20,000 downloads of material from the site. I knew it was a lot, but didn't think that the figures were that large. 

So, my ask of visitors is to continue to enjoy the site. Interact in whichever way you can whether through comments or sharing recordings that may be of interest and/or make a contribution to the upkeep if you wish. I know that the way that blogger is set up does not make it easy for people to interact with the site through comments, but for those that do comment, I do read them. Overall, there is not a great deal of feedback or active engagement with visitors to be had so sometimes I feel a bit like a lonely lighthouse keeper posting stuff to a remote readership!

The site has some very good friends whose generosity both in terms of subscription contributions but more importantly in their willingness to share recordings, many of which appear on the Aural Sculptors site exclusively and I am sure that this will continue. 

I will use this opportunity once again to appeal for any Stranglers or Stranglers related material (preferably in lossless format - but beggars can't be choosers). It is still intended to be a site focused on the music and career of The Stranglers first and foremost. My thinking as punk marks its half century is let's get as much stuff our there as possible. Put it this way, my kids are not bowled over by the prospect of inheriting several thousand bootlegs of old punk bands... 'Listen Son, promise me that you'll take good care of this Johnny Moped bootleg when I'm gone'. We are the people who appreciate this stuff, so let's listen to it and enjoy it whilst we can.

Thanks for you attention. End of public service broadcast.

The Hexagon Reading 18th March 1990 - Major Upgrade

 

DomP has come up trumps again. This '10 Tour' gig from Reading's Hexagon Theatre is already posted on the site, but the difference in sound quality between that version and this one is like the difference between day and night. As such it is really the definitive full set record from the tour. I should have gone to this gig... it was two days before my 21st birthday. Instead I had tickets for the London dates, Poole, Crawley (awful!) and Leicester (the less said about that one the better!)... that is a far as my finances would stretch at that time. The gigs on this tour were great (although I still question why Hugh felt the need for a second guitarist to be on stage) and world's apart from the disappointment of Ally Pally a few months later.

Thanks Dom. Great work!

FLAC: https://we.tl/t-YhGDt7Jw9OagF6Eh

Artwork: https://we.tl/t-21dt03OVEUn9p6D0

Kid Kapichi Empress Ballroom Winter Gardens Blackpool 6th August 2023

 

This was a band I did watch at 2023's 'Rebellion' and damn fine they were too. I was expecting really big things from them but either they fell off the radar a bit or I was losing tough (the latter probably). Looking at their discography, they have released albums in 2024 and 2025 and they are on the festival circuit in the UK and Europe from next month with indoor dates from November. 

In this recording they perform as a four piece, but since that time it would appear that two members of the band departed leaving the current line up as a duo.

Good sounding angry punk from Sussex (Hastings). Thanks to Chatts for this one.

Empress Ballroom, Blackpool

6th August 2023

FLAC: https://we.tl/t-FuE9ABXfzg71geMG

Artwork: https://we.tl/t-FRu0EEgo6Sj4Okoy

Brixton Academy London 12th June 1989

 

The culmination of a great Strangling weekend with consecutive gigs in Livingston, Newport and London (didn't get across the Irish Sea for gigs in Belfast, Dublin and Cork). Set included a couple of '10' teasers in the form of 'Someone Like You' and 'Where I Live'.

Back in London Town (Finchley Road?)

12th June 1989

FLAC: https://we.tl/t-DGfFHBhsZ77mvWAo

Artwork: https://we.tl/t-cv3zsMxVGSheJVzy

The Ramonas Rebellion Blackpool 3rd August 2023

 

In response to my posting of The Meffs recently, Krisinblack requested that I continue to post more music by new bands. This I am happy to do and courtesy of good friends of Aural Sculptors I have a clutch of lesser known bands, if not necessarily new bands, from Rebellion 2023 and 2025.

Here's another set from the wonderful Ramonas (thanks Chatts), this time 'Almost Acoustically'. Their electric set from the following Day (4th August) in the Empress Ballroom is on here and can be located from the right hand side bar of the site.

Good to see original material in amongst the Ramones songs.

FLAC: https://we.tl/t-u7JPnqTncrykKE5N

Artwork: https://we.tl/t-wGEsbyp87dLZfjAu