TRUST THE WIZARDS

I’ve written before on this website about my first job working at The HMV Shop when I was 17 and being surrounded by older, cooler, more knowledgeable people who helped widen my musical horizons. One of the most important of those was the shop manager, a wiry bloke from Blackpool called Andy, still to this day one of the best bosses I’ve ever had and a much beloved figure amongst HMV alumni. Knowing that I was into The Damned, Buzzcocks and especially The Clash, he asked me one day if I’d heard of The Only Ones. My blank look in response was all the encouragement needed for him to arrive the next morning holding a carrier bag containing his records from home for me to borrow and make tape copies of. Gawd bless the TDK AR90 blank tape, I’m sure I spent most of my HMV wages on them!

In Andy’s carrier bag were all 3 of their albums, “The Only Ones” (1978), “Even Serpents Shine” (1979) and “Baby’s Got A Gun” (1980)

On those records, a world-weary voice sounds very sorry for itself and seems resigned to being one of life’s losers.

“Why do I go through these deep emotional traumas? Why can’t I be happy like everybody else?” 

A teenage Smiths fan like me was always going to fall in love with a band that start a song like that, even if the closest the 17 year old me had ever got to “deep emotional trauma” was having a faceful of acne and being unable to get a girlfriend.

Musically, there was a lot more going on here than the “wun-doo-free-for” surge of straightforward Ramones-style songs. Punk was generally anti-guitar solo and Mick Jones had even perfected the anti-guitar solo guitar solo (e.g. “Cheat” “Remote Control” “White Riot”) Proper tricky-to-play lead guitar lines and solos were all over these Only Ones records, perhaps a clue to why they didn’t fit in at the time and why commercial success never came anywhere near them. Their third album made it to number 37 in the album charts and the previous two didn’t even make it that high. None of their singles got anywhere near the Top 40, not even “Another Girl Another Planet” which is by many light years their best-known song. But they have definitely acquired “cult band” status because over the years I’ve met lots of people who love these records just as much as Andy and I do.

Back then the possibility of seeing The Only Ones live seemed less than zero. They’d not been heard of since they split in 1982 and frontman Peter Perrett was reportedly lost to junkiedom. I don’t know if many people remember Volume magazine which ran from 1991 to 1996 and may well have been the first music magazine to include a free CD in every issue. I bought every one on release and I was very excited to hear a new song called “Daughter” by “Peter Perrett’s The One” when it appeared on “Volume Ten” in 1994. The accompanying magazine article talked of a forthcoming solo album which took a while to actually appear and was a bit of a disappointment when it did. To my ears, 1996’s “Woke Up Sticky” sounded a bit insubstantial, like a watered down pint. Not sure why because it was produced by Marc Waterman who had previously done some astoundingly good work producing early singles by two of my favourite bands of the early 90s, Five Thirty and Ash. Maybe I should dig out the CD and re-listen?

A quarter of a century after the initial split and prompted by the use of “Another Girl, Another Planet” in a Vodafone advert, The Only Ones reformed for a handful of gigs in 2007. On holiday in Scotland with Mrs Garbanzo, we heard about the Connect Festival going on nearby in the grounds of Inveraray Castle, easily the most spectacular festival location I’ve ever been to. We had a great time seeing Bjork, Tilly & The Wall, and Orbital, but we weren’t able to go for the whole weekend which meant we weren’t there when The Only Ones played on the Saturday! That was my big chance to see them gone. Bollocks. “Why can’t I be happy like everybody else?”

So I was delighted to hear radio legend Marc Riley mention this new reunion a few months ago and an opportunity for me to finally see the band live. This mini-tour comprised of 2 sold-out nights at Hebden Bridge before a weekend appearance at the Rebellion Festival in Blackpool. The line-up included 3 of the 4 original bandmembers, Peter Perrett (vocals, guitar) Alan Mair (bass) and John Perry (guitar). Very sadly, drummer Mike Kellie passed away in 2017.

This was my second gig at Hebden Bridge Trades Club. It’s a great venue that books loads of bands I like, but I live nearly 2 hours drive away so it’s nearly really that viable most of the time. My previous time here was a flying visit 10 and a bit years ago to see the always brilliant Chuck Prophet & The Mission Express. This time around I had time to look around a bit before the gig and to take a scenic route on the drive up here, exploring the Calder Valley. Wow, what a beautiful part of the world this is! Not only that but the town centre seems to be full of enticing community-owned craft ale pubs that I would’ve loved to have gone into had I not been driving. You can see why it’s been nicknamed Happy Valley.

I walked up to the train station to meet my mate The Lancashire Toreador who’d travelled up from Manchester. Then we got into the venue just in time for the support act Crimewave. They’re a one man outfit and that one man is Jake Wilkinson. In his militaristic khaki t-shirt and maroon beret, he looks like a Holy Bible-era Manic Street Preacher, but sounds more like the Manics a few years later when they started deliberately alienating their newly acquired mainstream fanbase by commissioning the likes of Mogwai, Cornelius, Fuck Buttons and Four Tet to create noisenik remixes of their singles.

Armed with just a guitar, a Midi pad and a laptop, Crimewave were all frantic breakbeats and blasts of Spacemen 3-style guitar accompanied by a big screen backdrop showing blurry CCTV footage of various violent incidents, like watching an episode of Crimewatch through a frosted window. The music was mostly instrumental and any lyrics were impossible to make out. But the songtitles on his Bandcamp page (Ultraviolent Crime, Metropolitan Police, Dispersal Order) certainly suggest that they fit in with the backdrop images and the bandname.

Crimewave’s performance was reminiscent of a bloke called Joe from Wigan whose performs as TV-AM. We played his single “No Explanations” on our podcast in 2014 and I’ve caught him live a couple of times, supporting Moon Duo in Liverpool and Dengue Fever in Manchester. Two full-length albums later, I’m hoping to catch him again at Manchester Psych Fest next month.

After a while, The Lancashire Toreador was finding the visuals a bit much and starting to feel like Malcolm McDowell in A Clockwork Orange having his eyelids held open by wires. He decided to listen to the rest of the gig standing with his back to the stage. I did a similar thing the second time I saw Tricky back in 90s. Having seen him support PJ Harvey and play in almost complete darkness save for a couple of dim blue lights, when I saw him again at a festival soon after I decided to sit down with my back to a massive speaker by the mixing desk. It was a waste of effort trying to watch the “show” because it was 100% about the sound, not the vision. It meant that I only needed to use one of my senses to absorb the performance but I think I actually enjoyed that gig far more than the one that I’d actually watched!

The Toreador’s verdict was that it didn’t lose anything from just listening, not watching. But I thought the visuals were powerful and added to the ominous feeling of hostility and menace in the music.

Overall it was quite an onslaught and a great choice for the support slot.

Don’t have nightmares, sleep well.

Soon after, The Only Ones walked onstage with all Perrett, Mair and Perry all wearing sunglasses indoors and getting away with it as only the supercool can. They were joined by Perrett’s son Jamie (ex-Babyshambles) on additional guitar and drummer Steve Hands, who also played on Peter Perrett’s aforementioned “Woke Up Sticky” album, and did an absolutely magnificent job filling in here.

They opened with “Peter & The Pets,” originally released on the the B-side of their debut single “Lovers Of Today.” It was clear from the very first lines that Perrett’s tired drawl sounded just the same as it did on that record and still hit me with the same emotional punch. Standing to his left, John Perry knocked out the song’s nimble lead guitar lines perfectly, gazing out into the crowd and seemingly not even needing to pay any attention to what he was playing.

Other early highlights of the gig included “Why Don’t You Kill Yourself?” a song I remember being met with incredulous looks from my kids when I’d played it in the car a while ago. They couldn’t believe that anyone had been allowed to get away with singing that! Different times, children, different times. What a great song it is though. It’s always been one of my favourites and it was played brilliantly here by the whole band but especially Alan Mair who filled in the spaces with some fantastic Entwistle-style runs.

That song is from the third and final album “Baby’s Got A Gun” and should the incredibly unlikely scenario ever occur whereby somehow a baby got a gun and held it to my head demanding that I tell them my favourite Only Ones album, I’d probably say that the second album “Even Serpents Shine” just shades it ahead of that one.  

The 2 opening songs from that album were played soon after and both were amazing.

“Flaming Torch” has our hero resigned to failure again singing “I think our life together has been cursed, I don’t know which one of us is worse” and the irresistibly singalong chorus “I’m always in the wrong place at the wrong time.” More dazzling guitar playing from John Perry on “From Here To Eternity” and more lyrics of doomed romance. Perrett should be lifting up his top to reveal a “Why always me?” slogan like a post-punk Mario Balotelli.

Along the way, Perrett gave a shoutout to the much-missed drummer Mike Kellie, greeted with a big cheer from the crowd. In an interview with John Robb at Rebellion a couple of days later, Perrett said that Kellie was such a key part of the band, he now felt quite uncomfortable using the bandname without him.

Perrett introduced “Trouble In The World” with the words “we haven’t done this one in a long time” before correcting himself and saying “we haven’t done anything in a long time!”

As the end of the main set approached, they played a cover of The Kinks song “I’m Not Like Everybody Else,” performed with a lot more vim and passion than the version on “Woke Up Sticky” and all the better for it.

Inevitably “Another Girl Another Planet” was the loudest audience singalong of the night. I was transfixed watching John Perry play that opening lead guitar line and even more so when he played the guitar solo in the middle. I know how hard it is to play that solo because I’ve been trying to master it for 30 something years (still a work in progress!) John Perry makes it look absolutely effortless, that’s how fucking good he is! I particularly loved the moment when he nonchalantly pushed his sunglasses up his nose with his right hand while his left hand just carried on bending the note.

Name me a cooler guitarist. I’ll wait.

See for yourself 2 minutes into this video.

The little sunglasses flourish prompted a memory of seeing The Stranglers in Liverpool many years ago when the late, great Dave Greenfield downed a pint during the trickiest part of the “No More Heroes” keyboard solo.  

Even better was to follow with “The Beast,” a standout song from the debut album and a song that both The Lancashire Toreador and I had mentioned as being a favourite on our pre-gig walk from the train station. There’s also a brilliant version on their Peel Sessions compilation album.

Both the original and the Peel version clock in at just under 6 minutes, making them the longest song the band ever recorded. But the 2023 live version is extended even further and was breathtakingly great, possibly my favourite song of the whole gig.

As they came back out for the encore, Perrett said they were going to try something else they’d never done before, a medley. The song had the chorus and chords from Neil Young’s “Helpless” but with different words in the verses. I’ve since learned that it is called “Don’t Feel Too Good” and it was released on a round-up of non-album songs called “Remains,” as was “Prisoners” which was also played in the encore.

After a fairly standard bar-band run-through of “Baby Let Me Follow You Down,” Perrett thanked the crowd for allowing him to indulge his fantasy of being Bob Dylan in 1966. A quick-witted crowdmember responded with a “Judas” shout.

Then the final song of the encore and another absolute golden moment when they played “Someone Who Cares,” another of my favourite songs from “Even Serpents Shine”

Another song that features plenty of that nihilistic romanticism I’ve already mentioned: “I’m scared of losing the most precious thing I own, wake up one day to find the bird has flown.”

But there’s also another thread that runs through lots of Only Ones lyrics. It’s the faint chance of redemption, the possibility of some beams of light at the end of the tunnel. I can take the despair, it’s the hope I can’t stand. “I hope you find someone who cares.”

Regular readers of my gig reviews (hello to you both) will know that I can occasionally get nitpicky about setlists, so here comes that bit.

Only 12 of the 19 songs (63%) they played were what I would describe as well-established Only Ones songs from their golden era. As well as the B-sides of their first 2 singles (“Peter & The Pets”, “As My Wife Says”) they  played 3 songs each from “The Only Ones” and “Baby’s Got A Gun” and 4 from “Even Serpents Shine.”

I would’ve loved to hear the A-side of that debut single “Lovers Of Today” as well as later singles “You’ve Got To Pay” and especially “Out There In The Night,” another song about lost love that I can really imagine going down a storm here.

Lots of other favourites from the albums were absent too… The Lancashire Toreador’s favourite “No Solution”…  “The Whole Of The Law”… “Language Problem” … “No Peach For The Wicked” … “Miles From Nowhere” … “In Betweens” (although let’s be fair, those last 2 were played at the following night’s gig.)

Instead we got 2 as yet unreleased songs “Black Operations” and “Louder Than Words” and 3 songs from the “Remains” round-up album. No doubt there were a few hardcore Only Ones fans at the gig who were as delighted to hear some relative obscurities being played as I am when the same thing happens at a Wedding Present gig.

But The Wedding Present are pretty much constantly on tour and nearly all of their audience are, like me, repeat customers. So much so in fact, that they end every gig by jokingly asking if there’s anyone there who’s never seen them before.

In contrast, The Only Ones have played about a dozen UK gigs in the last 30 years! So in the circumstances, I’d be happy to sacrifice hearing those little-known songs and the 2 covers and have them replaced with some of the more familiar favourites mentioned above instead. I suspect most of the other audience members might have felt the same judging by the slightly underwhelmed reaction to most of the encore songs.

OK, griping over. Apologies for sounding like an entitled little princess.

Here are some photos from from the gig that are far better than the ones I took.