Aural Sculptors - The Stranglers Live 1976 to the Present
Welcome to Aural Sculptors, a blog aimed at bringing the music of The Stranglers to as wide an audience as possible. Whilst all of the various members of the band that have passed through the ranks since 1974 are accomplished studio musicians, it is on stage where the band have for me had their biggest impact.
As a collector of their live recordings for many years I want to share some of the better quality material with other fans. By selecting the higher quality recordings I hope to present The Stranglers in the best possible light for the benefit of those less familiar with their material than the hardcore fan.
Needless to say, this site will steer well clear of any officially released material. As well as live gigs, I will post demos, radio interviews and anything else that I feel may be of interest.
In addition, occasionally I will post material by other bands, related or otherwise, that mean a lot to me.
Your comments and/or contributions are most welcome. Please email me at adrianandrews@myyahoo.com.
Sunday, 16 August 2026
Ruts DC Button Factory Dublin 2nd March 2019
Top 30 Punk Albums #11 The Crack - The Ruts
Not sure even where to start with his one. This is probably the case for most music lovers, but of all of the albums that I have amassed over the last 46 years there are perhaps half a dozen or so with which I feel a deeply personal connection. One of those is the 'The Crack', the debut album by The Ruts. It was released in the UK in September 1979, so I was only 10 and the reality was that I did not get to know who The Ruts were until many years later... after an awful lot of other music has passed under the bridge. The reason for the connection is all down to the fact that I spent four years from the late 1980's at Brunel University in Uxbridge. Now student life was not really my cup of tea, so much so that whilst my course mates were wearing their Inspiral Carpets 'Cool As Fuck' T-shirts, I was parading around in 10 hole DMs, red braces and a hand painted Ruts T-shirt (this was 23 years before Ruts DC reformed so there was no merch available... hence the DIY job). The shaved head was a necessity rather than a political statement, but the general look used to earn me some filthy looks from young Asians on Southall Broadway, how were they to know the connection that The Ruts had with RAR and Southall in particular.
Oddly enough an effort to clear our loft (abandoned for now due to heatwaves) brought down two laundry bags that are now sitting in the 'spare' room. These bags are stuffed with old T-shirts including that hand painted Ruts one circa. 1988 rather than 1978!
As mentioned I was never a studenty-type student, so I spent a lot of time outside of the university environment seeing punk gigs in the local area and in London. I was also seeing Gunta, who at that time was living in Ealing Common so I was also a regular 207 bus commuter. Seeing bands locally brought me in to the social sphere of a group of people from Uxbridge and Hayes. These people were intensely proud of the connection that the place where they grew up had such close associations with a band such as The Ruts, even though they had been out of existance in any form for many years at that point. 38 years on from my first arrival at the end of the Metropolitan Line, I am still in contact with those people and as such I retain a strong affection with this extreme of West London. It just so happens that The Ruts/Ruts DC are all rolled into that sentiment. One of those local bands was The Price with Leigh Heggarty on guitar.... I wonder what he's up to these days?
So what of the album then?
Well, like lots of bands popular in '78/'79, The Ruts played punk rock and a kind of punk/reggae fusion. The difference was that, with the possible exception of The Clash, The Ruts did it better than everyone else! Of the other bands following this path, the most notable (and successful) were The Police, a trio comprising a jazz bassist, a prog drummer and psychedelia influenced guitarist, who knowingly created their own style of reggae fusion... a 'Reggata De Blanc' for which they were frequently taken to task by reviewers (criticism that never harmed their bank balances). And The Members, well they came from Surrey!
Conversely, The Ruts were rather more in the thick of the action. Notable songs on the album are 'Babylon's Burning' and Jah War' songs influenced by the pervading race fuelled political tensions. These tensions boiled over on 23rd April (St George's Day of course) 1979 when the National Front staged a rally at Southall Town Hall. In the course of the day's troubles, teacher Blair Peach died at the hands of the notorious SPG (the 'Special Patrol Group' of the Metropolitan Police) and Misty In Roots's manager, Clarence Baker, was hospitalised with a fractured skull and brain injury after the police stormed the People Unite Community Centre in Southall (The Ruts' first single 'In A Rut' was released on the 'People Unite' label).
'The spark of fear is smoldering
Saturday, 15 August 2026
The Icicle Works Aston University 4th December 1987
Victoria Theatre Halifax 11th November 1997
Elastica Liberty Lunch SXSW Festival Austin Texas 17th March 1995
Thursday, 13 August 2026
Hugh Cornwell Interview (Record Mirror 7th September 1985)
Apologies if this is a hard read, it is manageable if you click on the image to enlarge, but the font is still small and the contrast (white on light blue) is not the easiest. See how you get on.
The 'Aural Sculpture' tour is done and dusted as Hugh turns his attention to the promotion of his new single 'One In A Million'. With talk of his appearances on stage and screen along with talk of his extracurricular ventures into making music for film, it is clear that it this stage Cornwell was seeking something beyond the realms of his current quartet and more importantly something vastly different to what he was able to do within the confines of The Stranglers structure.
With some understanding of tensions that existed within the band at this time coupled with Hugh's efforts to branch out and experience other aspects of the creative industries, I have always been a little surprised that the split did not come in 1985 rather than in 1990... discuss.
Tuesday, 11 August 2026
Alexandra Palace London 11th August 1990
A mere 36 years ago The Stranglers played Alexandra Palace in North London. A gig that I missed as on the night I was in Whitehaven in Cumbria at my brother-in-laws wedding. I have said it on these pages before that having heard the gig I don't have any real regrets about missing this one (despite its significance). It was a lack lustre gig... perhaps due to the cavernous and soleless nature of the venue (an iconic building but a crap one for gigs) or it could have been the knowledge of what Hugh was to do within a couple of hours that perhaps unconsciously affected the band on the night. Whatever, it wasn't the swan song that Hugh deserved.
Here's a link to the full gig posted back in 2016.




















