Setlist: Hassan I Sahba, Forge Of Vulcan, Brainstorm, Steppenwolf, High Rise, Robot, Wind Of Change, Jack Of Shadows, Spirit Of The Age, Sonic Attack, Damnation Alley, Uncle Sam’s On Mars, The Iron Dream
Encores: Reefer Madness, Master Of The Universe, Welcome To The Future
Hawkwind on the Spirit Of The Age tour supporting their new album Quark, Strangeness & Charm was the first ‘big’ gig I went to. I was a complete novice, as were my two schoolfriends – Steve Beckett and Russell Brown. The whole experience was new and as it turned out I had picked a pretty niche band for my debut. Niche because the Odeon and nearby Town Hall had a pool of people who attended the ‘rock’ concerts. You wouldn’t go to all of them but you would go to a lot. It meant, as time went on, that I would see the same people in the audience from gig to gig. The exception to that rule, as I later discovered, was Hawkwind. Sure they attracted some of the ‘regular’ crowd but they also pulled in people who didn’t – as General Manager Chris Mott told me years later -seem to see anyone else.
We ate at Pizzaland which was up at the top end of New Street. Delicious Margherita pizza there in a place full of fans! I remember the snow scenes well which were on every wall of the restaurant and seemed so incongruous. Most fans had congregated in the nearby pubs but this was something I never did.
We headed down to the Odeon then to soak up the atmosphere and vibe. There was already a queue! Now why there was a queue was puzzling, because it was all seated and all allocated. The only reason to queue was to get in the Odeon bars quicker or hit the merch stall which was just outside the Stalls doors. So we queued too. I was then 15 and everyone in the queue seemed much older and somewhat faded and grizzled. Noticeably next to none were women, which was a demographic that held largely true over my ‘rock concert’ going for many years. Exceptions would be those artists whose records had crossed over more into the mainstream or who had had hit singles. That seemed to pull more females into the audience.
The only thing to do while waiting in the queue was excitedly discuss what was possibly ahead inside , and we had little to no idea of that because there was little information you could absorb anywhere. The weekly music press all assumed you had some knowledge and they rarely went into the sort of details I, as a novice, would have liked. So this was a completely new experience and I was now about an hour away from getting completely blown away. Apart from excitedly chattering the other thing to do was look at the badges, posters and bootleg t-shirts (‘just £2 your t-shirt!’) which were being thrust at us by the unofficial merch sellers outside. This I had expected because the tickets and a sign at the Odeon warned us that ‘official merchandise’ was only available inside the venue.
The doors opened and the queue slowly headed inside. Slow because we had to be frisked and searched for contraband. Quite what this was was not made clear, but we weren’t carrying much at all so it was over with soon enough. Once inside we headed to the merch stall which was just awsome. Several shirts, badges and a programme – all with the already compelling Hawkwind style. Official did look better, that was true, but it was also a lot more expensive!
Then we headed into the stalls, where we were somewhere around the middle. There was already a haze developing in the air from the dry ice periodically pumped out from the stage mixing with the weed being smoked in copious quantities around us. We three were definitely the most lively and excitable, and likely annoying, in our area. Most of the audience were already laid back and laid out and I felt sure we were the only new fans there. The music over the PA was loud classic (although it was new then) rock stuff. An odd occasional shout of ‘Wally’ went up, picked up around the theatre by others. What the hell was this about? We will come back to it another time, because this was repeated for years at other gigs. Soon the lights went down and Hawkwind vocalist Robert Calvert appeared onstage to tell us the support band Bethnal were his friends, were really good and to give them a listen. What a lovely thing to do I thought; at future Hawkwind gigs I found out why. Support bands often got a tough time with a Hawkwind audience. Bethnal were punky and yet melodic and went down OK, polite applause, until they pulled out their cover of Baba O’Riley, which got everyone going.
The interval dragged to be honest, but that was all forgotten when Hawkwind came on, probably at 9 as this was when most bands came on. The band had undergone changes (a regular trope) since 1976 and had spent 1977 touring with a reduced five-man line-up with new bassist Adrian Shaw joining Dave Brock (guitar, synth, vocals), Robert Calvert (vocals), Simon House (synth, keyboards, violin) and Simon King (drums). They were solid, tight and still had that unique Hawkwind driving sound with accompanying swoops, dives and burbles from the synths. In Brock, Shaw and King they had a rhythm section that, for me, was still as terrific as when Lemmy had been in the band. Shaw was a more melodic bass player than Lemmy, a different style. His bass runs and licks were a real highlight especially on Uncle Sam’s On Mars. In Simon King they had the greatest Hawkwind drummer ever. His fills and rolls had always been legendary and it was just amazing to see and hear him at work powering the band along. The other Simon, House, was the icing on the cake. He got to add the textures and colours that made things pop – either on his synths or his eerie violin.
There was no pause in the set at all, never a quiet moment, and there were no song introductions. Songs just came and went and you knew them or you didn’t. It turned out there were four as yet unrecorded songs in the set which showed just how strong this line-up was. All four would appear two years later on the PXR-5 album. Musically there was no drop in quality. It was a fabulous set with wonderful slide projections and lights. They had opted for just a handful of well-chosen classic oldies including the immense Brainstorm and my personal favourite – Master Of The Universe. Brock’s chugga-chugga rhythm defined the band sound and even then he was very much the main man of Hawkwind. That would grow to be even more true as time went on. He only took one solo as such in the set, during the then new song to us High Rise. His playing was generally more overt on the oldies and my only regret was he didn’t sing any lead vocals except for the call and response parts on opener Hassan I Sahba. Brock had a great voice, perfect for Hawkwind but the decision had been made to let Robert Calvert handle all the lead vocals when he had returned to the band in 1975. This was understandable in as much Calvert gave the new songs an extra dimension – he inhabited and brought the lyrics to life, most notably on his own songs, such as Steppenwolf, High Rise and the eternal favourite, but at the time still new, Spirit Of The Age. Calvert was also known for his spoken word pieces and he literally brought the house to a standstill with Sonic Attack and Welcome To The Future.
All that being said I still would have let Brock take at least one or two lead vocals. Nobody would have stopped him so this must have been a personal choice. The older songs would have benefitted from his voice which would have better fitted Brainstorm and Master. A regular highlight of the set at this time was Wind Of Change. This was not just because it’s a beautiful but powerful instrumental (which it is) but also because of the simple but memorable slideshow sequence called ‘The City and The Tree’. An acorn grows into a tree and slowly houses and bigger buildings are added around the tree till eventually it is invisible. As the song ended the city collapsed to ruins, leaving the tree still there. An eco-message back in 1977! So I was bitten by the live experience. The Odeon would become a regular haunt and Hawkwind, after this performance, were now one of my favourite bands, which they still are to this day.
