Blasts From The Past pt 1

This last month has been a time for nostalgia…

Posted Friday, 15 August 2008 by Ronnie Kerswell in

Blog

This last month has been a time for nostalgia… No, it’s not that I’m not getting on (er, that much, anyway), and enjoying telling the nippers all the tales of my youth (for a start, we don’t have any nippers!), but what with loads of classic albums being re-issued, and the appearance of old muckers, it’s really been a trip back in time.

Let me tell you about Bomber (yes, another mate with a wild moniker!). I met her when I was 14 and we played in a band together (she on bass, me on drums). We were the ‘punk’ section of an all-girl group (the other two, we teasingly referred to as the hippies!) and tried our best to cause havoc. One time, Lush (an indie band in the late 80s/ early 90s) were playing at Exeter University and we invited ourselves onto the show (well, we decided we were the support and we were playing and nothing was going to stop us!). Obviously, when we arrived with all our gear (which typically consisted of some practice amps and guitars) the promoter wanted to know what the hell was going on, to which we casually replied, ‘we’re the support – some bloke told us we were playing’. I think we actually believed it ourselves! The promoter then mumbled something along the lines of, ‘I think someone’s been having you on’, but let us into the gig anyway, where we proceeded to drink Lush’s rider and generally make ourselves welcome. The best thing is that Charley (guitarist) managed to make Lush feel so sorry for us that they gave us passes to Glastonbury (we had to pretend to be the Pale Saints!), so we spent to weekend lording around the VIP area, and managed to get certain members of The Cure to get us food, slag off Marco Perroni, cheek off loads of bands and watch Bomber ask various music bods if they wanted a fight. Seeing Bomber again in July was great – I’d forgotten all the trouble we caused, like getting bands banned at a certain Exeter venue, playing Brixton Academy - and even playing with Rancid in Newport on one of their first tours when Bomber casually went up to Tim Armstrong and said, ‘You think you’re well-hard, don’t you?’. But nothing could beat the classy situation I found myself in when supporting the Cranberries (just before they had their one hit). I’d not bothered to put a rug under the kit (I saw that an unnecessary – but was forced to change my mind after this incident) so the drum stool was sliding further and further away from the kit until eventually one of the legs fell down the back of the stage - and I disappeared mid-song! Everyone falling about in hysterics is not what you need when you’re trying to look cool…

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