Blue Peter, Victoria Park

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Our friend Dave O'Halloran (aka What Wave Dave on CHRW) has been sharing on Facebook, with our grateful permission, photos that we had taken of various bands back in the 1980's. Today, April 7, 2024, Dave writes in The Cedar Lounge - Blue Boot group: 

"RIP to Paul Humphrey, lead singer of the band Blue Peter who made their London debut at the Cedar Lounge. Later they played Fryfogles, Bullwinkles, the Spoke and probably other venues in London before ending up in Victoria Park as pictured below. They made 2 appearances at Victoria Park, August 1 1983 and May 21 1984. Thanx to Reg Quinton for the great pics!"

I recall that my brother Paul was visiting that weekend. I see him dancing in one of the photos. I had recorded a C90 of a CHRW Blue Peter broadcast from the Broken Spoke (UWO campus pub) dated 82/01/16, since digitized, that I have shared with Dave. CHRW used to broadcast shows back then. Back then tapes got recycled and shows were lost.

— 2024/12/21 I have moved this post in my blog to the approximate date of the event. I'm assuming it was August 1, 1983.

Hippies & Generics

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Our friend Dave O'Halloran (aka What Wave Dave on CHRW) has been sharing on Facebook, with our grateful permission, photos that we had taken of various bands back in the 1980's. Today, July 17, 2024, Dave writes in 1980's Punk Rockers in London, Ontario group:

"Here's some more Reg Quinton photos. This time it's The Hippies playing at the Forest City Gallery circa 1983. This was when FCG was at 231 Dundas St, south side near Clarence St, second floor.

The Hippies consisted of: Lindsay Young, Brian Young, Kelly Mulvey and Henry Kox and released one 7" record in their tenure. They did a name change to Tenement 13 and the band ended shortly afterwards. Lindsay, Brian and Henry regrouped in late 1984 as The Bloodbrothers with Al Cole (who was The Hippies manager) on vocals, and only lasted a couple gigs. A short while later, Jon Traut came in as singer and they became The Boy From Nowhere and they still play occasionally to this day."

Marty Spacil comments that "Lindsay Young, Brian Young, were also saddlesores" (I'll assume Saddlesores was another band from that era).

Kelly Mulvey, the Hippies singer in these photos, comments "Wow memory lane thanks". Recently, back in October of 2023, there was a 60th birthday bash for Kelly at an east end London pub. A couple of the photos from this session were used in Peter Tangredi's promotion of the event on Facebook (the Wabi Sabis played at the bash). I've clipped his posts and added both to the album.

There is a final interesting picture I've added in the album. Later that day Dave writes: 

Generics

"Another Reg Quinton photo, this time the Generics at Forest City Gallery circa 1983. This is probably the same show The Hippies played at FCG, which was just posted.

Only found this one pic of Marc Sahrmann and Mary Lou Ambrogio."

Chris Richards comments, "I always forget about this one, and I don't remember much about it, so it's cool seeing a photo to prove it happened. Yes, we broke up in February 82, and reformed in June 83. The FCG gig was a spur of the moment one-off which I don't think we even practiced for. Presumably we were awesome and received a standing ovation from a packed house of adoring Generics fans who demanded three encores before presenting us with flowers."

Again, many thanks to Dave for his work to research and organize these old photos and to share them with an interested audience. Kate and I both appreciate his work. And we are happy to see these photos put to good use.

— 2024/12/20 I have moved this post to the approximate date of the event.

63 Monroe, Victoria Park

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Our friend Dave O'Halloran (aka What Wave Dave on CHRW) has been sharing on Facebook, with our grateful permission, photos that we had taken of various bands back in the 1980's. Today, May 18, 2024, Dave writes in 1980's Punk Rockers in London, Ontario:

  

More Reg Quinton pics. This time it's 63 Monroe playing the bandshell at Victoria Park, London ON circa 1983. It's my fave lineup of the band; Markii Burnaway, Pete Dekoker, Jeff Rooth and Steven R Stunning.

Peter Lambert comments: "Love Rooster and his Staccato drum kit!" Pete was an original drummer with NFG.

Markii liked the picture of him on his guitar (which it turns out he still has) and has used it as his Facebook profile picture.

The originals, which Dave posted, were slide scans and badly in need if work. In the album above I've cropped and adjusted exposure so these pictures are a bit better than what was shared on Facebook.

An odd coincidence that, on Victoria Day Weekend (the first summer holiday of the season), Dave posts these pictures from Victoria Park.  Many thanks to Dave for organizing the photos, figuring out the location, date and time. It's work that is very much appreciated — by those who were, and remain, fans and, of course, by Kate and me.

— 2024/12/21 I have moved this post in my blog to the approximate date of the event. ... sometime in the summer of 1983.

Gang of Four

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Gang of Four were an English post-punk band, formed in 1976 in Leeds. The original members were singer Jon King, guitarist Andy Gill, bass guitarist Dave Allen and drummer Hugo Burnham. We got to see them early at Wonderland Gardens, London on Saturday March 5, 1983. It was late in my Ph.D. program (I dropped out a year later) and we attended with a gang of my classmates. At that time Dave Allen had been replaced by Sara Lee on bass. Shortly thereafter Hugo Burnham quit the band. I recall they struggled to continue with drum machines and then Ginger Baker (of the Cream) for a while but they seemed to just peter out by the mid 1980's. They did, however, continue under Andy Gill with various line ups.

I was introduced to the Gang of Four in 1980 by a friend Curtis (he was a high school chum of Gord's and was attending Althouse Teachers College) who followed the NME magazine. He was really into English punk, we both loved the Clash. The Gang of Four debut album, "Entertainment!", was impressive for being radically different from anything before or since. Through out their career the signature sound has been a driving bass and drums dance beat with jarring/slashing guitar over the top. Dissonance is a description, not adequate but good enough. You either loved them or you didn't — I did.

At the time we saw them they would have been touring to support their latest "Songs of the Free" (1982) with their back catalogue of "Solid Gold" (1981) and "Entertainment!" (1979). The album "Hard" came out later that year and has Sara Lee on the cover. I had all their albums and have continued to follow the band through the years. Sadly Andy Gill passed away in 2020 and the band truly is no more.

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The band had a couple of backing singers with them on this tour and Sara Lee also sang. Between the three of them, with Jon King carrying the lead voice, they put on quite a show with really great dance music. Andy Gill, as seen in the photo at left was ultra cool while Hugo's drums with Sara's bass laid down the dance beat. The place was hopping; not as much as Jon King who really threw himself into the show. It was quite a memorable performance. Wonderland Gardens was a smallish performance hall that would have held only a couple of hundred or so. I much prefer seeing bands in small venues where you can get up close to the stage.

There is a set list of tunes played at this show, I can't vouch for the accuracy but I can say: "I was there".

I had taken some pictures of the show but they were filed away and forgotten until recently (I'm writing this in April, 2021). I have a friend Brian Busby who was also a fan of the band. We talked about these photos several times and I had hoped to find them, if only to share with Brian. He had done an interview with the band a year before we saw them and has been in contact with surviving band members. During the COVID-19 pandemic I found some color negatives in the fall of 2020, then the BW negatives in the spring of 2021. Both have been scanned and shared on Facebook. I've also shared them with Andy's widow Catherine Mayer.

We had a chance to see them a second time much later when we were in Perth Australia. At the time they were touring for the "Content" album. I'm sorry to have missed that show.

At this writing a tribute album, "The Problem with Leisure", with a reinterpretation of 20 classic Gang of Four tunes is available for preorder.

Our friend Scott from 63 Monroe tells us he was hired as security that night, which would have been a little like having the fox guard the hen house. Brian Busby recalls that one of the backing singer was Michelle Cobbs who he saw just two months later singing with Roxy Music at the Forum. I recall seeing Sara Lee playing bass with the Waitresses at a show we saw in Washington D.C. The Gang of Four Wonderland show had the "Hoi Polloi" as the front act. They were a very Canadian good band, but they were fronting for one of the best bands there ever was.

Many thanks to Brent Wootton who was also at this concert and helped to jog some of my memories.

See also Episode 21 of "My Life In Concert" by Various Artists, he too was there.

This blog posting and photo albums were composed during the COVID-19 pandemic in April, 2021. The blog entry has been filed for the date of the concert.