Mine was proper embarrassing, went to see the smooth and sweaty sealion of love, Alexander O'Neal at Manchester GMEX in 1989. Remember wearing a prince of wales check suit, paisley tie and belcher chain over the knot of the tie...........how wrong is all that ? He's the guy that brings a bed on stage and picks a chick from the crowd to sing to on it ! I was only 17 !!

Please don't think I dress like that now, I actually dress rather well now

My first gig was Echo & The Bunnymen. Portsmouth Guildhall, in 1989 before their drug fueled break up. The force was not with them that day, and they were way too loud into the bargain. The reunion tour was vastly superior, so I consider Southampton Guildhall my real first gig-people were shouting out "brilliant,marvelous" towards the end. The best gig I have ever seen was during the EATB Flowers tour at the Brighton Concorde II-only one band has come close to it live since-Elbow at the Portsmouth Pyramids. The thing about Elbow is that they are reliable and totally professional, its not a game of chance hoping that they'll give a great show-you can take it for granted.

Green Day supported by New found Glory

To be fair, Green Day were great live, and they put on a really good show.


I'm still embarrased though

Uriah Heep supported by Girlschool, Newcastle City Hall 1980.
Pretty grim looking back on it, no idea why I went , wasn't a fan or anything. But I was a 13 year old rock fan and it was fantastic at the time.

I narrowly missed seeing Eric Clapton a few months before. My parents said I was too young to go and my older sister went instead and complained that Eric (aka God) had been supported by "some dirty old man who sang rude songs" - PAH! that was only the LEGENDARY Muddy Waters!