63 Monroe, Embassy

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This morning, May 28, 2024, we're in Fremantle, WA and awake in to gale force weather. A world away ...

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. We arrive in Brisbane, Australia this morning to discover that Dave has been busy. He's identified a large collection of photos of 63 Monroe from a late 80's event. Dave writes in 1980's Punk Rockers in London, Ontario:

"Here's some more Reg Quinton photos, this time 63 Monroe at the Embassy circa 1984.  Classic lineup of the band with; Pete Dekoker, Jeff Rooth, Markii Burnaway and Steven R Stunning."

This was a particularly memorable gig with the band dressed in outlandish costumes. Everyone who was there remembers it vividly.

The photos are particularly bad — overexposed, bad color balance. When we return home I'll see if I can dig out the slides and scan them again.

I'm not sure if these photos have been shared before, I suspect they have not. But, in any case, many thanks to Dave for his work organizing these old photos and figuring out the location and time for many of them.

— 2024/12/21 I have moved this post to the approximate date of the event ... sometime in 1984.

The Clash

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Kate and I saw the Clash (the only band that really matters) on Friday May 4, 1984 at the University of Waterloo. We were punk fans and really liked the band. We drove over from London after work and returned that night. 

The sold out concert was held in the school gymnasium and we had seats high up and far from the stage. I took a few photos but they're pretty crappy -- too far away, too over exposed. But they're a record of where we were. You can, if you squint hard, make out Joe and Paul playing.

This tour was sort of the last hurrah of a great band that was disintegrating. Topper Headon (drums) was replaced years earlier and Mick Jones (guitar) had just left the band to form Big Audio Dynamite. Joe Strummer (guitar) and Paul Simonon (bass) remained. Mick was replaced with a couple of young punks on guitars -- Nick Sheppard and Vince White. The show was pretty frantic with lots of running around the stage. At one point, one of the new guys (I can't recall which), was running around stage right and ran right off the stage into the crowd. I'm pretty sure he didn't mean to do that. He couldn't have been hurt too badly as the show continued without any break or let up.

There's a web site which gives a set list for the concert. I can't speak to the accuracy.

This version of the Clash went on to record the often overlooked album "Cut the Crap". I have the LP and had ripped a version into my digital collection. For the longest time that album wasn't available and often denied in the Clash history (but see YouTube Playlist for the album). There are several tunes from that session that I really like -- "We Are The Clash" and "This is England" really stand out while "Three Card Trick" has a nice bass line and a great reggae beat. It's an album with some definite high spots.

I was sad when the Clash broke up shortly after. There's never been a band quite like them.

Ps. Photos in the album are scans of push processed B&W negatives taken at the time. I had never printed them. This note and the scans were prepared during the COVID-19 lockdown of February 2021.