'80s Rock

The Cambridgeshire Rock Scene in the 1980s

by Brenda Barber

(originally published as "A Guide To The Local Rock Scene" in Catchment magazine, December 1989)


coverpage

introduction

The Blue Mist

Darkness At Noon

The Pleasureheads

Nutmeg

Flowershop

The Charlottes

The Nightjars

'80s Cambs rock

 		Brenda Barber was a student through most of the 1980s. She reviewed local music for various media, and had just started a career in the record industry when she wrote this article. It is reprinted here to give context to the Molesworth story and, I suppose, for nostalgia's sake...

Peterborough Huntingdon Cambridge Ely

 It is a frequently heard complaint from social commentators that people no longer play music, they only listen to it on their radios or hi-fis. Yet anybody prepared to look can find musicians playing somewhere in the vicinity any night of the week, whether it be in a pub, club, village hall or concert hall.

The imminent collapse of Peterborough String Orchestra might suggest that classical music cannot survive without sponsorship, but just about any other kind of music you are prepared to mention is alive and kicking somewhere in the county. I have danced the day and night away at packed bhangra and reggae gigs in Peterborough, enjoyed many an evening drinking rum-and-coke to the sounds of trad or modern jazz in Cambridge or folkies in St Neots, and even made some attempt to sing along with the good ol' boys of Manea; country'n'western is massively popular out on the Fens (and, it cannot be denied, the Peterborough townships too).

But rock's what I like best. For most of the '80s Cambridgeshire has been without a major venue so we have been starved of big names, but there has been a relatively thriving local scene. Numerous pubs and clubs in Peterborough have had music licences, although there has been a decline since the mid-'80s heydays.

It is landlord lore that what drinkers want to hear is either chart covers or heavy metal. First impressions would suggest to any bunch of teenagers setting up their own band that this would make matters easy. It doesn't!

Every town in the country contains rock musicians who didn't quite make it professionally, or who preferred to keep their day jobs, and have continued performing semi-professionally to supplement their incomes or as a hobby. Many of them were in the '60s beat groups or '70s heavy metal bands, and are now so experienced that they can do passable imitations of Jason Donovan or Guns N'Roses after only a couple of hearings. Unfortunately they look like their dads! But whereas that matters on the cover of Smash Hits or Metal Hammer, it means nothing down at the Gladstone Arms or Shamrock Club.

Normally a young heavy metal band would have to have an hour-long set which they could play fluently and update regularly, plus a studio-recorded demo tape to play to the booker, before they could join the local circuit. Sadly there is an endless conveyor belt of teenaged heavy metal bands who - because this style of music is so relatively easy to play - reach just about this level, play a few sporadic pub gigs and find themselves consistently compared unfavourably with musicians who have enjoyed playing heavy rock three nights a week ever since it was invented. They are kept out in just the same way , I suppose, as The Rolling Stones and Aerosmith are keeping others off the top of the US charts even as I write.

Doing chart cover versions actually requires more musical ability, and much more technology, to sound convincing. Since the advent of the disco it seems a rather pointless exercise to me, but does draw the kind of admiration and respect from the audience that they might have for a top impressionist, and there is no doubt that chart and golden oldies covers bands are the best paid of local musicians, especially at social clubs. Five Card Trick and Unohoo spring to mind.

Some extremely promising and original young bands, in their desire to make it big quickly, have fallen to the temptation if not to do covers to at least change their sound and image to what is currently popular. Peterborough bands His Wife Refused and Heroes suffered as a result of this as they missed the vital point that - even if you do get selected from the mass of similar bands - by the time you have gone through the whole process of recording, manufacturing and promoting a record, tastes will have changed.

It's best to stick to your guns and to play what you really want. If you genuinely do like a conservative genre such as traditional heavy rock, then plug away at it and you could earn a tidy living over the years. If you have your own style or sound, develop it. If you're persistent it might become popular one day. Even cult recognition years after you've packed it in might be preferable to endlessly pursuing the next pop trend.

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