Hugh Cornwell and EXTC at The Old Woollen, Leeds

Our evening begins with EXTC , the group put together by Terry Chambers who was the original drummer in XTC who are a band in so many ways are far too quickly forgotten when people think of that golden era of post punk British music. The guitarist starts by remarking about how ‘bloody cold it is in here ‘, he’s not wrong (Yorkshire was to be covered in snow twenty four hours after the gig thanks to the wonderfully named Storm Bert) but these plucky rockers won’t let a bit of cold hamper them. The set list is pretty great, Sergeant Rock, Towers Of London and Senses Working Overtime are greeted like long lost friends and this stripped down three piece bring out all the nuances of XTC’s sound. Peter Pumpkinhead and Waiting For Another Cuba are songs that make me want to dip further in to their back catalogue but it is their final song, Making Plans For Nigel that will surely seal the deal. It is a magnificent song, released in 1979 and was one of the first songs to have a video that helped propel it up the charts (even looking at that video today with it’s mental hospital setting showing a young man brainwashed by a sinister clown character gives me chills in 2024!!). It was great to hear these songs in a live setting and something I never thought I would do and so can you with UK, European and US dates planned starting in Nottingham in March.

On to tonight’s headliners, Hugh Cornwell who at 75 years old really does show that age is simply a number and he has not lost one ounce of his wonderful talent as the years pass by. We start with two tracks from his 2022 album ‘Moments Of Madness’, Coming Out Of The Wilderness and Too Much Trash which both are given extra sparkle in a live setting. Speaking of a live setting, Cornwell brings great cheers from the crowd when he asks a member of the audience to stop filming the show on his phone, he doesn’t ask for them to be removed or get the audience on their back but simply says…’live the moment, enjoy this experience we are all having and the memories you will have of us all experiencing this together will be better than a rubbish sound on your phone’….well said Sir.

This Yorkshire crowd don’t have to wait long to hear classics from Hugh’s days in The Stranglers with Nice ‘n’ Sleazy and Golden Brown coming early in the set early and sounding as good as they did when I first heard them. Further Stranglers classics that got an airing tonight include Tank and my own personal favourite, Duchess then a set that had snapshots from a career that older than this jovial Northen Irish rocker but all sound fresh and modern. Hugh Cornwell is a great storyteller too, taking the time to explain some of the stories behind the songs, which can be just as interesting as the music itself. This is particularly true of the songs that I was new to, Mr Leather written about Lou Reed and my new favourite, Pure Evel which salutes that hero of every 1970’s school kid, Evel Knieval!!!! Yes, the youngsters of these days may have their Xboxes or NetFlix but we had Evel Knieval jumping over buses and that….oh and The Banana Splits so there you go!

Curiously enough, I actually think that Cornwell saved the best for last with his encores which were songs that I do not believe I had heard before. Wired is the first track of a four song encore, all of which I understand Hugh had released with Robert Williams (oh , that there internet is reet grand as they say in these parts ha ha). The track reminds me of Fugazi which is no bad thing and is followed by Big Bug and Mothra which could have been written by Captain Beefheart with strange time signatures etc (which is no bad thing) and finally we have Wrong Way Round. As soon as Hugh leaves the stage, he towels himself off and goes in to the crowd and signs the albums of books or whatever the fans have bought from the merchandise stall. That is the way to look after your fans and I have to include myself as one after this evening’s very special show!