Free Suggs and the City: Journeys Through Disappearing London by Suggs Page A

Robinson’s, who was head of Stiff. He had expressed an interest in the band but had been too busy to come and see us perform - so he booked us to come to him instead. As a rule, I don’t suffer from stage fright but I must admit to getting a bout of nerves that night when I spied a few familiar faces in the audience, most notably those of Elvis Costello and our great hero, Ian Dury, who’d both become massive stars through their recordings on the Stiff label. A few days later we became Stiff artists ourselves, so we obviously did the business at the wedding, and the icing on the cake for us was the advance we got in exchange for signing on the dotted line. Trouble was, being strictly ‘cash only’ up until this point in our lives, none of the banks in Camden appeared willing to let us open an account and the cheque was burning a hole in our pockets.
    No doubt unimpressed by our appearance, most of the bank managers in the vicinity refused to give us an interview and weren’t remotely interested in taking care of our hardly earned cash. However, we finally got lucky with a friendly manager at Williams & Glyn’s Bank in Camden (I can’t remember whether it was Williams or Glyn we saw, but he was a jolly decent bloke) and it wasn’t long before we opened our account in the singles chart too, with ‘The Prince’. Things were looking up.
    Now, if the Dublin Castle started putting new bands on the musical map from 1979 onwards, the Electric Ballroom was the place to go and see established groups or those on the cusp of the big time. The venue had already given Camden a bit of a shove up the rock and pop ladder by the time we set foot on its capacious stage, and playing there was a real step up for us. It’s not much to look at from its entrance on Camden High Street, just a small blue shop front with a neon sign. Blink and you might well miss it. But inside it’s a Tardis of a place and stretches as far as Kentish Town Road to the rear.
    The Electric is a great venue, although it does have its drawbacks for those of a fastidious nature. For instance, when you come off the stage you have to exit the building and walk down a small alley in order to get to the dressing rooms, which in winter, in a sweat-sodden suit, is a less-than-pleasant experience. And if you wear sunglasses on stage, which I’ve been known to do, they instantly steam up as you enter the fresh air and render you blind. Which can make it tricky to find where you are meant to be going.
    In spite of these small inconveniences, the show must go on, and on 12 October 1979 we appeared as the headline act on a bill featuring Echo and The Bunnymen. What a confusion of haircuts there must have been that night! A month later we played three consecutive nights at the Electric and each one of them was wild. We were in that crossover period between punk and 2 Tone, and it is fair to say that the crowds could get a little lively. They certainly did at those three gigs. We might not have been the cup of tea of choice for everyone in the audiences but the energy that was sparking throughout the place was incredible and we loved it.
    When the going’s good at the Electric, it’s very, very good indeed. You can’t beat the atmosphere when the whole place bounces up and down as one and condensation drips from the ceiling, causing sparks to fly off the lighting rigs, or when you stand on the PA stack as it sways with the crowd, making you feel like you’re on the prow of a ship. The absence of Kate Winslet does not diminish this experience in the slightest.
    Not only is the Electric a great gig to play, it’s also the perfect place to watch a band. As with all the best venues, it holds about 2,000 people and is long and wide, allowing good visibility all round. That sounds like an advert for a Chelsea tractor, I know, but it happens to be a fact. I’ve had a perfect view of some greats at the Electric in my time, including the Pretenders, Iggy Pop, the Clash, Ian