A Strange Communication

in order...

British Sea Power
Spear of Destiny
The Waterboys

In descending order...

The Fall (about 60 times, probably more)
British Sea Power (in the 40s)
I Like Trains (30 - odd)

An honourable mention should be made of AC Temple, who I must have seen at least 20 times from the mid 80s to mid 90s because they were the support act of choice for anything a bit noisy.

BSP (101)

All others have been regular BSP supports (but seen them all more times not supporting):

iLT (13+)
Brakes/Morton Valance (10ish each).

Sorry for a massively unsurprising answer (aren't we all just waiting for someone to reveal they've seen someone massively obscure or unexpected a load of times?) but...

British Sea Power (lots)

Air Cav (69, - admittedly I was managing them for a while but also saw them numerous times before and after that and would have definitely gone to at least some of the others if I'd not been managing them, but then some of them may not have happened... it all gets a bit complicated really)

Puressence (68, though they are our mates and some of these were largely an excuse for an awayday / drinking session)

ILT are my only other half century (53 - that does include some where they supported BSP and a couple where Air Cav supported them) but there are around 25ish bands I've seen 20 to 40 times; I seem to either get bored with them or they split up / fizzle out after that.

Congratulations on the century RedC, which gig was that?

I think BSP and The Fall are both somewhere in the 20s for me.

After that I don't know, but they'd be a fair way behind. Probably someone I've forgotten but possibly Teenage Fanclub, or maybe House Of Love or JAMC or summat.

Blackout wrote:.

Congratulations on the century RedC, which gig was that?

A rather long and odd event most notable for the extreme brevity of BSP's performance(s): the ton up was destined to be in Derby, but I got a last minute call-up to that ESPN FA Cup warm up show. I did get to see Tim Vine & Bob Mills at very close quarters though ;-(

For what it is worth this seems a good point to put the record straight on a post I made re; The Fall on another thread; they are far from my favourite band, but I do not think they are dogshit, I was being mischievous, or just a tit (or maybe a bit of both).

Thinking about it more I believe I've seen REM as many times as The Waterboys, and James Yorkston and Green on Red just behind them. My most painful no-show was Thin White Rope cancelling their Ruby Sea tour show at The Joiners Arms in Southampton due to poor ticket sales, thus depriving me of ever seeing them full-stop. It still hurts, as I'm sure this isn't the first time I've cathartically banged on about it here.

I'm also running this thread on the Brighton & Hove Albion message board North Stand Chat, and interestingly BSP and Hawkwind are jointly winning so far. Of course the fact that BSP play more than their fair share of Brighton shows will be a factor to some extent, but it is still a heartening start.

for a variety of reasons, i don't go to that many gigs. not many at all. so a top 3 looks soemthign like;

British Sea Power (lots)
Arctic Monkeys (3 times)

and then a load of bands about 2 times.

I'm going to see Spear of Destiny in Brighton in October. It'll be the first time I've seen them in 25 years, which shows how often I saw them in the 80's!

Does he still get terribly upset when people mention Boy George?

I'll ask him and find out. I love Kirk, he once sang virtually the whole of Mickey to me as I hung from the lighting rig at The Top Rank in Brighton. I wasn't dressed as Boy George by the way.

Haven't really kept track of other bands, but BSP number one by miles, then probably some of the smaller London-based acts. No way of checking, but Morton Valence must surely be number two. Must be a lot in and around the 20s - iLT, Brakes, Luxembourg...

In terms of larger bands, New Order. First saw them in 84, and regularly if infrequently since then. Seen Suede, the Bunnymen and Radiohead a fair few times too.

Blackout wrote:Does he still get terribly upset when people mention Boy George?

I was introduced to him in a bar in Hastings, once, and the first thing he said to me was, "Where do you go round here to meet girls?", before going on to mention his girlfriend several times. It reminded me of Tom Hanks repeatedly bringing up his wife during his 'Philadelphia' oscar acceptance speech.

My top three most seen live acts (not counting friends' bands and others who play local pubs all the time) are probably:

1. British Sea Power
2. Guided By Voices
3. Cardiacs

25 Mostly Autumn
23 British Sea Power
16 Feeder

BSP did some major closing in after 4 Krankenhaus' and 3 From the Sea... over the past year-ish.