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Added 5th June 2007 by sbilts

Featured in the following Online Exhibitions:
Moss Side Stories

Artefact

Photograph
Russell Club
1979

This picture captures a typical night at The Russell Club in Hulme during the punk explosion. This was The Damned playing. I was right at the front at the start but due to the frenzy of flying fists and the quaint habit of spitting at the bands I quickly retreated out of the Mosh. As soon as the bands kicked off the place was a mass of punks doing this thing where they careered into the each other whilst kicking hell out of one another.I remember seeing Iggy Pop there when New Values was released, Glen Matlock was playing bass with the band. There were people deliberately gouging their arms with the broken bottles that always littered the floor. It must have been about 45 degrees in there. I had to go outside 1/2 way through the gig to tend to my mate who had passed out in the heat. It was difficult to get back to Levenshulme from there when you couldn't afford a taxi but always worth the hassle because of the quality of the stuff they had on, Throbbing Gristle, Iggy Pop, The Damned all within a few days of each other....
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Latest Discussion

“Wow. Vivid picture you paint - and great picture.”
“amazing photo! pictures like this are few and far between...”
“I have a few more , will upload soon”
“Great photo and story. Suprised the Damned were still playing club gigs in 79? I was 14 that year and started going to gigs at the Apollo - all the post/punk acts were playing there by then. Saw the Damned/Ramones/Clash/Siouxsie in 79/80 plus lots of the second wave acts.

Tell us about Throbbing Gristle - I love their album title - 20 Jazz Funk Greats!”
“The Damned played at Butlins recently I believe...Throbbing Gristle were heavy going by anybodys standards and I dont remember a whole lot about the gig. I spent most of it in the food bit upstairs. I was talking about it with Alan Hempsall the other night who is a total T.G Devotee and he says they played a lot of the stuff off 20 Jazz Funk Greats that night but I dont remember a lot. It was stomach churningly loud and pretty "challenging". I bet you can get a copy of the very gig as they aways record and release everything There is a boxed set of 24hrs worth of recordings available but even Alan admits to using the skip button on that......”
“Never saw TG but I can well imagine - saw PTV at the Hacienda - mentioned it on here somewhere. The idea of Jazz Funk fans taking their album home never fails to amuse me.

Sounds magazine in the early 80s ran a "difficult music chart" - bands like TG, PTV, Nurse With Wound, Clock DVA, Chris and Cosey, Test Dept, Neubauten, SPK etc. Can't say it's a section of my vinyl collection which I play very often. Some interesting gigs though!”
“I have the first 3 albums on vinyl and must say they rarely get an airing these days but I certainly admire them for their stance and there should be a T.G for every generation and less of this X factor shite Blah, Blah”
“tha damned played at Satan's Hollow on friday 13 april this year (2007 if you're reading this is the past/future)- that club is the same size as an average household kitchen so get the damned there on that day must have been a bit of a coup for the owner! machine gun etiquette is a classil lp, as is the first album.”
“The band I was in 'Armed Force', supported The Damned at this gig. It was such a memorable occasion, especially when one of the guitarists broke several strings while playing and it took ages to replace these while we all stood waiting on stage.
Captain Sensible must have took pity on us, so by the time we were ready to start playing again, he joined us on stage and sang along with Lynda and Muppet to 'Popstar'. What a great bloke and as has already been mentioned, the band always knew how to get the best out of their audience.
New Rose is and always be my most favourite song of this era. 'Is she really going out with him?'”
05 Oct 2008
“Armed Force..I remember them..was the drummer Ian Massey by any chance?”
05 Oct 2008
“No, The Drummer was Norman O'Neill, my Brother, but an Ian Massey played drums for the band I was in after Armed Force split up, could be one and the same person? I have also spotted a few people on the photo that I knew really well, so this certainly makes this picture even more special.”
05 Oct 2008
“Still remember the walk home from this gig me and my mate Andy Smalley we were about 14/15 and a long walk from Stockport”
01 Jul 2011
“Wasn`t this the gig when sensible stripped off and pissed on the front chaps?
I must have been stood next to the camera”
15 Oct 2012
“He definitely stripped off...and said "would anybody like to suck my c..k"? My mate was with his new,rather refined,girlfriend near the front...hilarious..I dont remember any piss though.I was scurrying away from the front about that time though..on another of my photos you see Sensible's undercrackers dangling from the ceiling lights above the stage....”
16 Oct 2012
“Wow, swear he did! I was only 16 and a lad I knew who was about 14 was at the front and kept looking around at me as if to say "I`m at the front" wasn`t too happy later!”
16 Oct 2012
“perhaps he had been stung by a Jellyfish and a quick thinking Sensible was giving first aid,urine is a quick fix I believe....”
16 Oct 2012
“I was there with my mate Hewitt and Trevor Owen, sensible definitely pissed on the crowd and wanted them to smash the place up as it was due to close down anyway. Nobody did as they wanted the club to keep going. We were 15 at the time!”
11 Jan 2014
“Goodness me the things you find on the internet... I was at this gig too as a 14 year old punk who somehow got past the doorman. I distinctly recall Sensible playing his knob as a guitar substitute after he'd stripped off. My over riding memory is of the rivers of gob that were spat at the band throughout the show, and the near riotous atmosphere in the crowd. happy days indeed. One thing though - weren't they called The Doomed at this gig?”
14 Sep 2014
“They opened in the dark with Love Song, and as soon as the bass intro finished the lights came and all you could see was a curtain of gob covering the stage!!

Fantastic”
21 Sep 2014
“Sensible was playing guitar as Brian James had recently left the band.He did a great job too...the new bloke playing bass was named Roman Jugg I think...”
21 Sep 2014
“I also remember this gig. Leaving the Russell was always provoked anxiety with the walk to Piccadilly, night bus to stockport then walk to romiley.....and no mobiles of course.
I can't remember who the Ruts were on with but a load of skinheads turned up and were battering anything that moved.”
06 Sep 2017
“i was there the capt ;did have a piss into the crowd.we had been drinking with the damned all day at the grants arms [ the pub over the road from the venue.. they had no fags and blagged all ours ..top night”
14 Oct 2017
“That night you are talking about I was about the same age? Oh my god did I have a shock when I seen his thing flipping back & 4th against his guitar .. When he bent over & some 1 spat a big gooey goz in the middle of his bum crease.. I thought that's enough for me & moved away from the front...That sight I never 4got (yuk!)
Saying that did any1 see stiff little fingers & victim play there??? The Dickies & soooo many....always had a great punk night in the Russel/Factory
Stretford, Urmston, O/T punks oi oi... C u at REBELLION B-Pool, Punk will never die. Till we do. haha :)”
04 Apr 2019
“Fantastic to find this - I have a hazy memory of a woman being on stage at the beginning of the set and Dave encouraging her to sing but I don't think she did. Was it this gig or am I confusing it with another one?”
16 Aug 2019
“I don't remember the woman
My mate Nev will... he remembers everything”
16 Aug 2019
“Lucky Nev! She wasn't on stage for long and looked terrified - don't blame her really. My mind could be playing tricks on me and it wasn't here at all so if Nev says not, then that's that I guess!”
16 Aug 2019
“I too was at that gig, didn't they play about 3 times at the Russell Club.
I had to get home to Bury so don't give me all your shite about how difficult it was for you 'local' boys n girls. I used to go to The Buzz Inn in Bolton on a Tuesday night too. Walking home from there was a piece of piss compared to The RC. Fantastic times, wish I could remember them though. Saw the Skids, Buzzcocks, Dickies & loads more I can't even remember, Newcastle brown amnesia.”
22 Apr 2020
“I was there in 1979.when the damned were on with the ruts and armed force. I'm sure Annie nightingale was there, and asked me where I'd come from to see the gig.”
04 Nov 2020
“this was the first gig I ever went to...capt sensible did piss on the audience cos it caught me the twat..my mate spent half the gig getting picked up of the floor which was sort of funny and then the scary walk back up to piccadilly station at the end..went on to see them a few times after that”
01 Feb 2021
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