for lefties too stubborn to quit
Thought this may be of interest to some of you.
In case you missed it…….. This went up a weeks or two ago on the excellent Fanning sessions site.
The Blades – In Concert (1985)
It’s really great stuff.
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The Cedar Lounge Revolution
‘Don’t be getting rowdy now’! I had that tape. Great band and fantastic live. I remember around that time Paul Cleary would dedicate ‘young, gifted and black’ to the Dunnes Stores strikers.
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+1, a great Pop band. Evidently, there is a box set including unreleased demos being released soon.
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‘I suppose I can’t be choosy
When there’s not too many choices.
It’s the problems of the nation.
I’m not waiting at the airport,
I’m not waiting at the station,
I’m standing at the busstop.’
You said it, Paul. Thirty years ago. Even your bus stop has probably gone now.
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Wow – thanks for finding this – brings back some memories. As for Paul Cleary – he was seriously good at the Rock the System concert in Liberty Hall which took place at the same time as the so-called ‘Self-Aid’ Concert (I wonder how long it will take Louis Walsh to dust that one down to get more publicity for the Jedheads).
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Don’t give them ideas. Self Aid may have been one of the most ludicrous notions ever but it was striking how many bands and performers felt unable to resist the temptation of strutting their stuff on the big stage. Don’t know which was more cringeworthy, Bono smiting Eamonn McCann with the sword of righteous justice or the Christy Moore doggerel song at the end that captured the whole ‘on your bike’ Norman Tebbit flavour of the thing. Really shameful.
The Blades were magnificent, I’d go for The Bride Wore White as
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As best song, (these boxes are kicking up a bit lately WBS).
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Thanks for this. Seeing The Blades at the TV club was part of my teenage years, I especially remember their final concert at the Olympic ballroom…
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Cross party support for the Blades emerging here. I first saw them in Theatre L in Belfield one lunchtime. Brilliant.
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Thank you so much for this. Paul Cleary should be as rich and as revered as Bono by now if there was any justice. He and the band had such great integrity, not to mention stonking songs. Loved them.
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Bono might be rich but I doubt that he is revered.
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Ghost of a chance is one of my favourite songs ever. Ever, I tell you!
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My fav is “Hot For You”. First heard it on the Pat James rock show, Radio Dublin, 253 metres on medium wave. Depending on the atmospheric conditions the station would drift in and out and flip over to radio Moscow Worldservice. True.
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Excellent!
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Memory Lane struggles but wasn’t Rock The System a week after (the frankly ludicrious) Self-Aid?, and if I recall U2 played Maggie’s Farm at that train wreak?, Cleary played Hard Times and we all thought things could only…
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Frankly ludicrous is too kind. Train wreck is too kind.
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Sorry, Neil DeB, just rereading my last comment it might seem like I”m slagging yours off, but that wasn’t my intention. I was trying to say I agree with you but ha in a way it was even worse.
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Not a problem, didnt take it way, I was grinding my teeth as the repressed memories surfaced!
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I know that feeling 🙂
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A thought comes to me, listening to Young, Gifted and Black: were The Blades The Commitments?
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Another theory was the Commitments were based on the Commotion. A Northside soul/pop band from that played in Tommy Dunnes Tavern around 83/84.
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They – the Commotion – certainly thought so.
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The Commotion certainly existed prior to the publication of the “The Commitments”. They didn’t last long as a group if I remember correctly…, didn’t they do some Left related benefit gigs?
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Did a lot of stuff for Militant including a weekend in Offaly as far as I can remember. Shay their drummer is a member of the SWP these days. The Jim Larkin poster they used to promote their gigs was excellent, wish I had kept a copy.
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The Commitments were obviously based on The Commotion. And the difference between The Commotion’s demos which Dave Fanning used to play and The Commitments appalling overblown soul covers, (a bad idea to rank with Self Aid), is perhaps the difference between music driven by love and music driven by the love of money. I remember with particular fondness a song called, ‘Don’t Close Your Eyes, Don’t Say Goodbye Today,’ (or if it wasn’t called that that was how the chorus went.)
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Roddy Doyle is a good writer and he knows his music. He was known to have gone to a couple of their gigs in Tommy Dunnes. But it’s good that he never came out and said who he used as his template for the book – adds to the mystique and gives another topic to us music obsessives to chat about.
To a certain extent, the quality of the music would been out of his control once the film went Hollywood but the music in the Commitments is dire – second rate Pub rock. I am sure with insight, if he had any control over the film soundtrack he could have commissioned Paul Cleary or The Commotion to have written a couple of tracks for it.
You have the name of the song right, (Don’t Say Goodbye) Today. It was included on a compilation of Irish Mod Pop Garage bands called ‘Hip City Boogaloo’ (Hotwire Records).
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[…] the popularity of the Blades Concert posted earlier in the year, The rather wonderful Fanning Sessions Archive is after digging up another recording of a Blades […]
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The 1980 Blades Fanning Session….
The 1980 session features the original three-piece with Paul Cleary and his brother Lar, with Pat Larkin on the drums with some cover versions not available elsewhere. The line-up for the 1981 session featured Brian Foley on bass, and Jake Reilly on drums.
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