Gig 070-071 Tom Robinson Band, Stiff Little Fingers / Carnival Against the Nazis II
Gig 070 Tom Robinson Band / Stiff Little Fingers Oxford New Theatre 23 September 1978 Gig 071 Carnival Against the Nazis 2 Brockwell Park, Brixton 24 September 1978 When an act graduated from college gigs to the New Theatre they’d pretty much made it, inasmuch as they had reached a mass audience; from here they might go on to even greater things – or conversely they might have already peaked. Sadly for the Tom Robinson Band, who now had a chart album and a high profile in the media but would never have another hit, the latter fate awaited. As mentioned in Gigs 41 and 55, Tom was impressive in so many ways: brave, principled, radical, an advocate for gay rights who refused to comply with the prevalent stereotypes: Tom absolutely didn’t do camp. Problem is, if we’re being honest, camp was part of rock’n’roll from before the start, and lyrical allusiveness, sartorial flash and physical sensuality was integral to the experience. In this sense Little Richard wasn’t a world away from L...