We were recently asked by our America-based pal Dave Ruch, who runs ‘Turntable Talk’ on his excellent Sound Day blog, what music-related destination, from anywhere in the world, we’d want to visit / re-visit.

Time machines were provided. 🙂

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Fire up the DeLorean, Dave – we’re going on a trip. A trip back in time.

You see, I’m a homely boy – Graceland holds no fascination for me; Abbey Road is just another studio and Madison Square Gardens is a boxing venue, right?

Even if the impossible were made possible, and I had all the money in the world, there is only one place of musical heritage I’d take you to:

Glasgow.

In the 1970s.

You’ll love it, Dave. Firstly, I’ll take you to my favourite record stores of the time. Back in the early Seventies, like most big cities, Glasgow could boast some wonderful ‘specialist’ and independent music shops.

I’m not sure of the year, but think it to be 1972, one year after the original store opened in London, Virgin Records appeared towards the end of Argyle Street. I loved that shop. It was really grubby looking, very dimly lit and reeked of burning incense sticks. (Whisper it, but it was widely acknowledged that the smell was used as a cover for another smell that wouldn’t have gone down so well with the local constabulary. 😉)

My memory’s a bit rusty, so it’ll be interesting to see if my recollection of there being a basement section as well as the ground floor is accurate. I know there’s a wee ‘listening’ section where I can maybe introduce you to some of the weirder end of the musical spectrum back then.

It’s in this shop I initially encountered, and bought, my first Captain Beefheart & His Magic Band LP. ‘Lick My Decals Off, Baby’ it was. I also bought Mike Oldfield’s ‘Tubular Bells’ in here.

With time to kill, we’ll make a few stops around town, before we head off to the highlight of the trip.  We’ll have a few beers in celebrated venues such as The Clutha Vaults, Burns Howff and even Strathclyde University Students Union. These venues, and others less well documented, attracted some fine bands of the time – not your really ‘big’ names, but bands that would go to warrant that description in the years that followed. (For example, Talking Heads and on another occasion, The Police playing support slots at the latter venue in front of crowds numbering a hundred at most.

Make sure you have your fill of beer in these bars Dave, but not too much! There’s no bar where we’re headed for our final visit of the trip. We’ll likely be frisked for illicit alcohol (and weapons – knives and razors) by the well renowned bouncers, and if they consider you’ve had too much already, you’ll ‘no’ get in.’

That’s right – we’re off to the famous Apollo, Glasgow.

Dave, what a place this is. I know we can’t go back to any specific event / gig, so we’ll sample a generic, sold-out, rock show … based on my memories of several Rory Gallagher, Sensational Alex Harvey Band, Lynyrd Skynyrd, and Man shows among many others.

Being at a show in the ‘70s would likely be the second of two visits to the venue for that concert. (‘Concert.’ How quaint. But yeah, that’s what they were then. Not ‘shows.’ Or ‘gigs.’ ‘Concerts.’) In all likelihood, most of the crowd, if they lived in or close to Glasgow, would have gone to the theatre a month or two beforehand to, hopefully, buy their ticket. Sometimes this entailed bunking off school, queueing for hours in the rain, or even waiting in line overnight.

(The alternative was to apply by letter, enclosing a cheque or postal order for the price, together with a stamped, addressed envelope. You then had to wait a few weeks to see if your returned envelope contained the ticket you so wanted – or just the return of your remittance. #fail.)

Now, I should warn you, Dave, once we’ve been given the ‘OK’ by the bouncers and we’re through the glass doors and into the entrance, don’t be put off by the smell. It’s all apart of the unique ambience – created by years of sweaty but happy and excited bodies gathering and dancing in celebration of their musical heroes.

If it’s a wet evening, that smell will be enhanced by the aroma of cold, damp clothing protecting the warm and heated bodies beneath. Body odour will permeate the air, mixed with that pungent smell of the wet, fake fur trimming on the parkas worn, principally by the lads.

Of course, your shoes will feel like they’re sticking to the floor. That could either be from the spat-out shewing gum of last night’s audience or the stale remnants of illicit booze and goodness what else has been smuggled into the venue over the years. (We Glaswegians are very resourceful when it comes to alcohol, you know.) 😉

Before we go in, there are two big ‘DON’T’s I need to mention:

• don’t let the bouncers see you’ve sneaked in a wee camera or tape recorder. If they spot it, you’ll never see it again.
• don’t stand on the seats. In fact, don’t stand!

We might get away with it if everyone does it at the same time, but the bouncers will do all they can to make us sit!

OK – so we’ll take a seat in the stalls. I’ve got us Row T. I know – that sounds like it’s quite far back, but from there we should see the whole band. You see, the stage is a bout fifteen feet high. If you buy a ticket for one of the rows at the front, all you’ll see are brief glimpses of the lead singer and guitarists as they step forward. Oh – and don’t be alarmed by the movement you’ll see in the balcony, the front edge of which will be over our heads. It was built to absorb the crowd movements but does visibly move. I once saw The Sensational Alex Harvey Band from Row #2 up there and it was a bit of a scary sensation to begin with.

The concert we’re going to see is a 3,500-capacity sell-out, so the atmosphere is going to be wild! Glasgow audiences, from theatre to music, to sport have a reputation for letting performers know exactly how they feel. We’re a hard lot, neither afraid nor ashamed to speak our minds. No band enjoys giving a sub-par set at The Apollo!

However, that won’t happen tonight, and you’ll see for yourself why bands such as Status Quo, King Crimson, Rush, AC/DC and others all recorded ‘Live’ albums or tracks at this iconic venue.

Compared to the cavernous yet soulless venues of today, The Apollo would be considered almost bijoux and intimate. And perhaps that’s why bands consistently produce electrifying sets that really bring the audience into play. They feed off each other.

So what d’you say, Dave? Beer, records and live music in a city famous for its earthiness and deadpan sense of humour. Come on – what else could you want?

So, are you ready? You ready to take a trip?

(I know – strictly speaking, The Shakin’ Pyramids are too ‘modern’ for this site, and bear no real relevance to the post. But the song title’s a perfect fit and it seemed a great opportunity to showcase a favourite local band of mine, who made it to The Apollo, supporting Shakin’ Stevens, in November 1981. 😊 )

Post by Colin ‘Jackie’ Jackson of Glasgow – October 2024

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