Category: Venues

London based band The Boys returned to The Nag’s Head on Thursday 21^st July 1977 for what is believed to be their first headline performance at the famous High Wycombe venue.  The origins of the band date back to late 1975 and they emerged out of the London punk scene a year later – signing a record deal with Liverpool based NEMS records in January 1977.

The line-up consisted of Matt Dangerfield (guitar/vocals), ‘Honest’ John Plain (guitar/vocals), Casino Steel (keyboards/vocals), ‘Kid’ Reid (bass/vocals) and Jack Black (drums).

An earlier appearance at The Nag’s Head in February 1977 had seen them support The Jam.  The rise of the latter had been dramatic and two days after The Boys’ July 1977 appearance at The Nag’s Head, The Jam would take to the stage at High Wycombe Town Hall for the highest profile gig in the Town for many years.

Meanwhile, The Boys were still awaiting the release of their debut album – recorded in May 1977 and eventually released in September 1977 as the self titled The Boys.  Two singles were also released in 1977 – ‘I Don’t Care’ and then ‘First Time’.

You can hear the full album audio via YouTube

Pure 1977 power pop punk

References:

Official band website http://www.theboys.co.uk/

Local duo, John Otway and Wild Willy Barrett returned to The Nag’s Head on Thursday 14th July 1977.

The Aylesbury boys had played the London Road venue in April 1977 and their increasing popularity amongst old and new music fans made them a decent crowd puller – and subsequently a favourite with promoter Ron Watts.

Trying to remember where you were on the evening of this gig? Top of the Pops on 14th July 1977 played the video for Pretty Vacant and punk was well and truly entering the main stream of popular culture.

A three band line-up played The Nag’s Head on Friday 8^th July 1977 in what is believed to be first publicised all-local ‘punk’ event in High Wycombe.

The Pink Parts appear to be a band with both High Wycombe and London connections and origins out of the Art School scene. Known band members include Martin Stone (guitar), Stone’s girlfriend Ruth (bass) and Paul Ferguson (drums).  29 year old Stone lived locally in Fingest and was a good friend of promoter Ron Watts.  He originally played with Savoy Brown and in the early 1970’s played with The Pink Fairies.  The latter had performed at High Wycombe Town Hall, including a support slot to The Pretty Things in Many 1971.  In the mid 1970’s Stone teamed up with Watts to form the shortlived Jive Bombers.  Stone also played briefly with Joe Stummer in the 101ers – a band that had played The Nag’s Head in March 1976.

Also connected with the Pink Parts was Stephen Jones.  He is seen dressed in PVC on the left of the picture below (posted by Stephen on his Twitter account).

Promoter Ron Watts described Jones as his ‘left-hand man’ in his autobiography, saying “He kept the local bands from the Wycombe area in order and drove them to gigs that they couldn’t get to otherwise.”

Jones went on to become a leading hat designer for the likes of Madonna, Kylie Minogue and Mick Jagger.

Watts also recalls The Pink Parts but doesn’t associate Jones with the band, although he does recall bassist Ruth being the ex-girlfriend of guitarist Martin Jones, with a later line-up possibly being all-female.  Watts recalled in his autobiography: “Pink Parts weren’t particularly good, but the main attraction wasn’t the music. They were new waveish and did alright for a while before the novelty wore off. The world wasn’t ready for a Thames Valley version of The Runaways.”

The Xtraverts were a band with less pedigree but with their roots firmly in High Wycombe and the escalating punk scene in the town.  Lead singer Nigel Martin, just turned 20 at the time of the July 1977 gig, had sowed the seeds for forming a band when he jumped on stage towards the end of a Deathwish gig at Desborough Hall on 4^th December 1976.  Perhaps significantly this was just four days after the infamous Bill Grundy/Sex Pistols incident on national TV? A few weeks later in The Coach and Horses pub in High Wycombe High Street, Martin was approached by fellow local punk and guitarist Mark Reilly and drummer Tim Brick, with an idea to form a band of their own.  Between them they came up with the name Xtraverts and eventually drafted in Deathwish guitarist Kris Jozajtis on bass for their initial chaotic live outings.  By the time of the July 1977 ‘Wycombe Night’ at The Nag’s Head, Jozajtis had stepped down as bassist – fellow Deathwisher Carlton Mounsher being drafted in following Deathwish’s last live outing (a support slot to Generation X in March 1977).

The Pretty had been formed by Kris Jozajtis following the demise of Deathwish.  They initially included Adrian ‘Belya’ Campbell on vocals, with the ‘in demand’ Mounsher on bass and Mark White on drums.  Mounsher left briefly to be replaced by former Reerumho and Roohas bassist Mike Edwards but he was later described as ‘never really fitting in’ and by the time of ‘Wycombe Night’, it was Mounsher back on the four strings.  The success of the gig can perhaps be gauged by the fact that it was The Pretty’s first and only live appearance.  The bulk of the band – minus singer Edwards -would go on to form The Party for gigs later in 1977.

Meanwhile, The Pink Parts would return to The Nag’ Head as support for Generation X in August 1977 and would also perform at The Roxy, London the same month.  A performance at Wycombe’s Newlands Club in November 1977 appears to coincide with their demise.  Martin Stone died in November 2016 – aged 69.

The Xtraverts quickly became High Wycombe’s leading ‘punk’ band, although a support slot to 999 at The Nag’s Head in September 1977 ended in violence and led to a ban of ‘punk’ gigs at the London Road venue.  They would release a debut single, Blank Generation/A Lad Insane in early 1978. At the time of this post, they had just released their 4th single.

Here’s the audio from the 1978 release.

References:

Stephen Jones – https://twitter.com/SJMillinery
Martin Stone – https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Martin_Stone_(guitarist)
Xtraverts – http://www.thextraverts.co.uk/

Since this article was first published, local music fan Dave Tapping, dug out his scrapbook from 1977 and sent the cutting below from Sounds magazine.

Anybody else out there have memories of this gig, or the history of these early High Wycombe punk bands?

Punks in the process of turning skinheads, Skrewdriver, blasted out a set at The Nag’s Head on Thursday 7^th July 1977.  A then 19 year old Ian Stuart Donaldson formed the band in 1976 and they rode the crest of the punk revolution in early 1977 before cutting their hair to join the rebirth of skinhead fashion that was coming to light in the second-half of the year.

The line-up at the time of their Nag’s Head appearance was most likely:

Donaldson (vocals and guitar), Phil Warmsley (guitar), Kevin McKay (bass) and John Grinton (drums).  Ron Hartely (guitar) would replace Warmsley later in 1977.

They would release studio album ‘All Skrewed Up’ later in 1977 on the Chiswick label before disbanding in 1979.  Hartley appears on the album cover but it was Warmsley playing on the recordings.

Promoter Ron Watts’ memories of the band were perhaps tarnished by the highly controversial views of a reformed Skrewdriver in the mid 1980’s.  Their debut release contains none of the highly controversial views of their later releases.

Recalling Skrewdriver’s Nag’s Head appearance, Watts said in his autobiography:

“Punk wasn’t all about excitement and interesting music. Skrewdriver came to play the Nag’s in July 1977.  They hailed from Blackpool and were a rock band who’d got into punk because that was the future, or the way to earn a fast back. “They played an instantly forgettable set in front of an audience who had learned to sort the punks from the poseurs and a I didn’t bother asking them if they fancied a repeat engagement.”

Fair to say that numbers at the gig didn’t come on the expectations and Watts went on:

“That was the last I heard of Skrewdriver until a few years later when, riding another bandwagon, they re-emerged as a neo-Nazi skinhead band.  Luckily they were the only band of that ilk who I booked and an enjoyable gig a week later by those rapidly-emerging legends of Thames Valley, John Otway and Wild Willy Barrett, put me in a better mood.”

Here are a couple of pictures of the Skrewdriver taken during their 1977 fashion transition.

Lead singer Donaldson was asked about the reasons behind their change of image during an early 1980’s interview.

“Basically because we got fed up with punk turning a bit leftwing, whereas before everyone came along and had a laugh and danced about, but then it got to the stage where it became high fashion, and people would just stand there seeing who had the most drawing pins through their nose. When it got to that stage it got really silly. We had all been skinheads in the past so we all just reverted, and a lot of our mates coming to the gigs were skinheads.”

 Donaldson died in 1993 aged 36 as result of a car crash.

You can listen to the complete first album audio via YouTube.
Note: The final track at 24:10 is a cover of The Who’s, Won’t Get Fooled Again.

References:

http://www.skrewdriver.com/
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Skrewdriver

Clayson and The Argonauts made their second Nag’s Head appearance of the year on Thursday 23^rd June 1977.  It appears the band were making every effort to ride on the coat tails of the ‘punk’ and ‘new wave’ explosion happening in 1977 but it never quite happened.

However, Clayson went on to become a well respected music journalist and author.  One of his most famous books, being ‘Backbeat – The Story behind the Lost Beatle’.

The band had appeared at The Nag’s Head in January 1977 and their popularity may have prompted promoter Ron Watt’s to bring them back to the London Road venue.   A 2007 entry on Alan Clayson website recalls that Watts had once offered his ‘services and manager’ to Clayson and The Argonauts following this earlier Nag’s Head show plus an appearance few days before at The 100 Club.  Clayson recalls: “I can still see him now, at the rear of the mob, eyeing a biscuit tin of coins and then us on the boards, fingering his moustache with sly satisfaction.”  Clayson goes on to bemoan the fact that Watts didn’t feel it worthy of mentioning The Argonauts in his ‘Hundred Watts: Life In Music’ autobiography.

The band split up in 1986 but reformed in 2005 and at the time of this post (40 years after this 1977 Nag’s Head gig), Clayson and The Argonauts were still on the road in the UK.

This is Alan Clayson and The Argonauts performing ‘The Rakes Progress’ during one of their performances following their reunion in 2005.  He mentions High Wycombe in the introduction?

References and further reading:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alan_Clayson

http://www.alanclayson.com/

It’s a busy Thursday night at The Nag’s Head on 16^th June 1977 as Billy Idol’s Generation X return for their third appearance at the High Wycombe venue since forming in London at the tail end of 1976. They had previously performed at The Nag’s in January 1977 and March 1977.

By the time of their June 1977 appearance they had replaced drummer John Towe with 18 year old Mark Laff.  He had been recruited after the remaining members of the band had auditioned more than 20 other drummers.  Laff (AKA Mark Laffoley) had previous drummed with Subway Sect and joined Generation X following the completion of a support slot on The Clash’s nationwide tour.

The new look line-up is the final piece in the Gen X jigsaw and record companies are now starting to take note.  They will record a John Peel session on 12 July 1977 and sign a long-term deal with Chrysalis Records the following day.

The band would return for another appearance at The Nag’s Head in August 1977 before releasing their debut single, ‘Your Generation’ the following month.

References:

Generation X – Day by Day – http://www.nemsworld.com/genx/