Day: 9 February 2022

supplied by John Wilde

Could be The Marquee?

David Miller… He don’t minder the noise

The Breathers Intake Tour 1980

James Bell… sh#### that was intense!!!

Ric Hool… I recall most of the gigs vividly and for very different reasons. At The Green Tree, Bathgate the group turned up early to set up and sound check, our usual modus operandi, to be met by three beautiful women with trays of tea and fruit scones. That sort of welcome was not rare – it was absolutely unheard of ! The Breathers, as usual, were starving and got through several stacked trays of fare. The Green Tree, Bathgate was immediately earmarked, ‘must play again’. Sadly we never did. Elsewhere, Scotland took in The Breathers with open arms. People hosted us and gave us accommodation.
We were ‘strangers in a strange land’ but beautifully so, whilst the UK became hardened to the ‘dog eat dog’ climate of the Thatcher administration. For the night of the Herriot Watt Uni gig, we were put up by wonderful people who had every cupboard, and there were many, hung not with coats but huge bushes of drying cannabis. It was there I heard the Dire Straits’ lyric: ‘Rock away, rock away / From Cullercoats to Whitley Bay’. Raised in Cullercoats, I felt the full impact of location: being ‘of’ a place and coming ‘from’ that place. A lot further south, in Shrewsbury Music Hall, The Breathers played in an upstairs ballroom where the group and the audience shook the floor up and down. What a night ! We stayed in a beautiful loft at John Wilde’s mum’s house. The next day, returning to Hastings, the van engine seized…

Jeanette Wilde… Ric, brilliant piece thanks for sharing. Mum had loved putting you all up! Watched some awesome Breathers gigs.

John Wilde… What wonderful memories.