Fact #116974
When:
Short story:
King Crimson play at Starkers (in The Town Hall), Devizes, Wiltshire, UK.
Full article:
Dave Gregory (guitarist, XTC) : I lived in Purton, just three miles from Swindon, but it was an event just to go into Swindon. Could we afford the bus fare? None of us had any money and a car was out of the question until you’d had a job for a couple of years.
Actually, most of the bands we saw locally were at The Corn Exchange in Devizes. It was one of those venues where bands would do their warm-up gigs before setting out on a major tour. You’d get to see them fresh out of rehearsals, trying out the set on a live audience for the first time.
We saw it as a major venue. I used to dream about my band, Orange, being big enough to play in Devizes Corn Exchange.
I saw Yes there twice, I saw King Crimson, Blodwyn Pig, Rory Gallagher on his first solo tour after he’d split from Taste, which is still to this day one of the best live shows I’ve ever seen, just for pure atmosphere, where a guy on a stage can transport you to another place by sheer energy and talent. Looking back at it now, the music was fairly flimsy, it wasn’t a great cultural learning experience, but he was such a fantastic performer, loaded with charisma.
As a venue, it was easy to get to from Swindon, and it was quite cheap to get in, 7/6d usually. One of my teenage mates had access to a car, and that’s how we’d get there.
It’s said to be the place where the Small Faces played their final gig. There’s conflicting reports, actually. Ian McLagan in his book says that his first and last gigs were in the Swindon area. His first was at the Swindon Locarno, and his last was at Devizes Corn Exchange.
On the other hand, there was a report in Beat Instrumental at the time which said their last show was in Jersey, but that might have been Immediate Records trying to fudge it for tax reasons or something.
I think the Corn Exchange stopped putting gigs on round about 1973.
(Source : interview with Johnny Black, January 2008)
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Actually, most of the bands we saw locally were at The Corn Exchange in Devizes. It was one of those venues where bands would do their warm-up gigs before setting out on a major tour. You’d get to see them fresh out of rehearsals, trying out the set on a live audience for the first time.
We saw it as a major venue. I used to dream about my band, Orange, being big enough to play in Devizes Corn Exchange.
I saw Yes there twice, I saw King Crimson, Blodwyn Pig, Rory Gallagher on his first solo tour after he’d split from Taste, which is still to this day one of the best live shows I’ve ever seen, just for pure atmosphere, where a guy on a stage can transport you to another place by sheer energy and talent. Looking back at it now, the music was fairly flimsy, it wasn’t a great cultural learning experience, but he was such a fantastic performer, loaded with charisma.
As a venue, it was easy to get to from Swindon, and it was quite cheap to get in, 7/6d usually. One of my teenage mates had access to a car, and that’s how we’d get there.
It’s said to be the place where the Small Faces played their final gig. There’s conflicting reports, actually. Ian McLagan in his book says that his first and last gigs were in the Swindon area. His first was at the Swindon Locarno, and his last was at Devizes Corn Exchange.
On the other hand, there was a report in Beat Instrumental at the time which said their last show was in Jersey, but that might have been Immediate Records trying to fudge it for tax reasons or something.
I think the Corn Exchange stopped putting gigs on round about 1973.
(Source : interview with Johnny Black, January 2008)