16 Tons Tour Europe/cancelled dates due to Toppers injury.

last updated September 2004

Audio 1

master audience - Sound 3 - time 1hr 32mins - tracks 26
Poorer copies circulate

Spanish Bombs

Sound quality

Recently the master audience recording came into circulation; a very welcome upgrade on the poor quality, well-copied tapes circulating previously. The master reveals a good audience recording, which considering what was going on all around the taper that night is quite remarkable!

Its main problems are of distance to the stage resulting in a lack of clarity and detail particularly on vocals but also instrumentation. A reasonable range though and enjoyable, it suffers only when compared with the other better recordings from this final 16 Tons leg. If this were from the UK Jan/Feb 16 Tons leg it would stand as one of the best bootlegs from that period!

There are some mechanical tape flaws throughout and the taper missed the first 2 songs beginning abruptly with Safe European Home. An edit loses the start of Tommy Gun.

The importance of the recording is not as a document preserving a great musical performance (there are better sounding recordings from this period that do that job excellently) but it does capture the atmosphere in the Ballroom; you can almost “sniff that wind of ugly tension” that night at the Mayfair, “the jerks had got aggression!”

gone down in local folklore

The Clash’s only appearance at the much-missed Mayfair Ballroom and a night that has gone down in local folklore as one everyone claims to have been at: others include Led Zeppelin in 1972 and Nirvana in the early 1990s. With definite similarities to the infamous Hamburg gig, 2 months earlier, there were chaotic scenes of fighting, gobbing, and general mayhem.

Songs are interrupted, the mic is grabbed, and Joe and Mick appeal for calm. Before Jimmy Jazz, Joe angrily had a dig at those in the audience baying for punk purity; “Next we’d like to do this here tune, which ain’t nothing except a tune, which we caught a lot of flak for especially in Hamburg, where they think its 76 and act like it”.

Poster

Pass

Newcastle's Mayfair Ballroom

Newcastle's Mayfair Ballroom hosted Europe's largest and longest-running rock club, spanning four decades. Some of the biggest bands in the world played the venue early in their career, such as Pink Floyd, U2 and Nirvana, while Led Zeppelin returned from an American stadium tour in 1971, to say thanks to their fans in Newcastle.

As time and tastes moved on, a host of other acts moved in. The Clash and The Jam played at the height of their popularity, as did New Order and The Smiths. Rezerection staged the city's biggest raves in the 1990s.

But the legendary Rock Disco continued as the main attraction, Fridays and Saturdays, for thirty years. 5,000 people turned out to pay their respects on the closing night in the late 1990s. It was demolished to make way for a 'leisure complex' called The Gate.

The Mayfair was a typical oblong-shaped Mecca ballroom, capacity 1,500, with the small stage built flush with one of the longer walls (instead of at one end of the room), a large oval-shaped wooden dance floor in front of this, and a large balcony right around the room (and above the stage). Marshall Hall

“OK you’ve made your point, go back, go back!”

Tonight is not a night for concentrating on the playing but on trying to control the audience and stop people getting hurt; Joe adlibs in Safe European Home “OK you’ve made your point, go back, go back!” Joe does his angry rap about 76 and Hamburg before Jimmy Jazz. It’s one of the best performances of the night with Joe going into an extended stream of consciousness adlib (an accurate but too pretentious a description for Joe’s always different every gig, off the cuff raps);”My advice to you Jimmy boy, is not even to pack a suitcase, where are you tough guys from, smack, smack, smack” then tonight Topper gets included (for not too mystifying reasons!) in his Police Officer drug bust rap;“Are you Topper Headon, put up your hand, get a haircut!” Mick delivers a great solo and Joe barks out the words.

Trouble flares again during a remarkable Spanish Bombs. Mid song amidst the mayhem the band stop playing, all except Joe who continues on his own for a while singing solo accompanied only by his Telecaster strumming. “Sorry got carried away there, oblivious to the mayhem!” he says. “You tell me if I get any really big goolies [presumably he meant gob!] in my face, will you shout, which means you lot much as I hate this I’m going to carry on anyway just to show you” Then there’s a stage announcement presumably from the bouncers “Try to calm things down fookin’ behave yourselves, we gonna cause a fookin’ racket if you don’t behave yourselves” which is met with shouts of “Fuck off” from the crowd! Chants of “Geordies” and the band restart the song.

There is a mass singalong on White Man In Hammersmith Palais with Joe barking out the lyrics. But the trouble continues and an angry and distressed Mick shouts “You fuckin’ cunts, your fucking it up for everyone else, you bastards ”. Some of the crowd are presumably now on the stage as Joe gets a laugh when he says ironically “As we’re all standing here anyway, this is something new entitled Some one got murdered”. As the song ends there’s more chanting and Koka Kola soon breaks down with yet more fighting. Joe says “Anybody out there? Anybody want to come up here and tell us what’s going on?” Joe obviously concerned that the bouncers maybe the cause of the trouble. No response so “Sod it” restarts Koka Kola but as it segues into I Fought the Law, Mick shouts, “While you’re all fighting the real fuckers laughing his bloody head off”.

An edit restarts with Jail Guitar Doors probably not losing any songs based on previous set lists. “Lock em up” shouts Joe who adlibs as usual a verse but the sound is not good enough to understand what he’s singing. Topper strikes up a constant beat and Joe shouts echoed Hit the Road Jack calls before the intro proper to Police and Thieves kicks in.

Clampdown gets a “Dedication to the Heaven Boys” and Joe adlibs at length over the ending, but again his words are unclear. Then Mick says “My turn to be gobbed at, apologies, but I can’t sing this song with conviction with all this gob going on my face, and I really mean it, this song is called Stay Free”

It’s the charge then through to the encores via English Civil War, I'm So Bored With the USA and into Complete Control. The audience singalong and then scream, chant and clap for more.

As the band return someone’s bent Joe’s microphone but he’s in a good mood “It’s only a microphone, hang on a minute, might even win a design award for this!” As Armagideon Time begins Joe introduces Mikey Dread who toasts in the gaps left in Joe’s vocals. Keith Thompson who was at the gig remembers Mikey too so reports in Marcus Gray’s book of a falling out over The Clash’s refusal to pay for Mikey to bring a backing band over from Jamaica would appear wrong. An edit at the end of the song loses the start of an intense Tommy Gun. London's Burning is even better with Joe screaming out adlibs over the ending. The crowd love it calling the band back for a second encore.

Mick plays the current variation on the intro to Capital Radio (less effective maybe) with Topper adding drums and Joe shouting out the initials of the song, before Mick screams out “1-2-3-4” and the song proper crashes in. Its straight into more 77 crowd pleasers, with What's My Name (adlibs unclear) and then “We’d like to do one more number” leads into an intense Garageland. But it’s not the last song as Topper immediately beats out the intro to White Riot with Mick shouting as it begins “Alright then, you’ve been fucking asking for it!” Various voices shout the lyrics either because the fans are on the stage or because Joe is passing the mic to them. It is probably the former as although the song gets its usual reprised final verse there is no more singing and the song soon breaks down and the House PA comes on.

Did you go? Comments, info welcome...

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Newcastle 80 Fanzine

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Blog: The Clash Newcastle Mayfair

June 12th 1980
Posted July 17, 2012 by vintagerock

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Newcastle 12 June 1980

Photos from Newcastle

Setlist

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26

Safe European Home Jimmy Jazz Revolution Rock The Guns Of Brixton Train In Vain London Calling Spanish Bombs White Man In Ham Palais Somebody Got Murdered Koka Kola I Fought the Law Jail Guitar Doors Hit the Road Jack Police and Thieves Clampdown Stay Free English Civil War I'm So Bored With the USA Complete Control Armagideon Time Tommy Gun London's Burning Capital Radio What's My Name Garageland White Riot