Inevitably this year will see many events marking punk rock's half century. Not an inconsequential place in this spittle flecked history is the 100 Club in London's Oxford Street (still one of the greatest rock 'n' roll venues anywhere!). Hosts to the famous/infamous Punk Rock Festival over what would have been two quiet weekday nights on 20th and 21st September 1976, the event brought together the main protagonists in what was to become the greatest youth culture to emerge in the UK (my opinion of course). Later, egos and controversies (real or manufactured) would drive wedges between many of the bands that appeared at the festival.
I was not there in 1976 as I was just 7 at the time! The best that I could do was to make an appearance at the 2nd 100 Club Punk Festival and Buzzcocks on the second night.
Over the years I have seen Sex Pistols, The Damned, Buzzcocks, Chris Spedding, The Vibrators and Siouxsie & The Banshees. I never got to see The Clash (Joe Strummer, Big Audio Dynamite and if memory serves Havana 3am was the closest I got). And I missed the opportunity to see Subway Sect who played on the 1st night of the 2nd festival (along with ATV).
To mark the the 50th anniversary of the original festival, the 100 Club are hosting a number of punk luminaries on 18th and 19th September. I opted for TV Smith and the Bored Teenagers and John McKay's Reactor over X Generation X and Stinky Toys. Whilst seeing Stinky Toys would be interesting given the fact that they played the original event, not having played in the UK since 1977 may be against them (maybe they have been more active in France). Actually I don't think that I have heard anything by them.
This seems to present a good excuse to post some TV Smith and John McKay material.
It was back in 2007 that TV Smith at long last reconciled with his Adverts past and backed by The Bored Teenagers started playing that band's material again for the first time since they dissolved in 1979. Since that time he has continued to thrill audiences with high energy Adverts sets such as this one from Rebellion in 2022 when he and the band played a set of exclusively Adverts songs.
The Adverts didn't play at the first 100 Club Festival, their live debut occurred some months later on 15th January 1977 when they supported Generation X at The Roxy, but Tim and Gaye were in attendance at the 100 Club for the fun.
The Banshees line up that played the 100 Club Festival was intentionally a one-off, Sioux doing vocal duties, Severin on bass, Marco Pirroni on guitar with Sid Vicious doing something with the drums. Later the line up settled with Sioux and Severin joined by Kenny Morris on drums and John McKay on guitar. Before John McGeogh, McKay's guitar work is widely recognised as defining the sound of the early Banshees. This line up went on to record the debut album 'The Scream' and the follow up 'Join Hands'. However, the relationships within the band were fractious and McKay and Morris famously departed from the band on the day of release of 'Join Hands', just hours before the band were due on stage at Aberdeen's Capitol Theatre.
In the last year or so John McKay has re-emerged with his Reactor band performing a mix of early Banshees songs with original material. Thanks to Malcolm for this one!
