Heart of a Punk Soul of a Rasta

Peter Doherty - The Lines - Billy Bones
Wulfrun Hall Wolverhampton 20th September 2011

And so I ask myself: what's occurred in the world since we saw Peter last back in May, in Digbeth? Well British soldiers have been dying on a daily basis in Afghanistan and twenty thousand men women & children have been slaughtered in Libya in the Coalition's War; the coalition being the Oil Companies & NATO obviously. David Cameron has told us that 20,000 human lives is a price well worth paying (for what?) and it's something for us to be proud of. You're 42 years too late Cameron you self serving used car salesman twat. Since May we've also had the UK Riots. Or the TORY RIOTS as I like to call them. There's nothing like a TORY Government to bring division where there was none. Works like a dose of Senna Pods to the arse, only this time we're really having the shit kicked out of us.

Since May the invalid Coalition Government have continued implementing it's ideologically driven policies, the same old policies the Tories used between '79 to '84 - the only difference is this time round it's been re-branded as "deficit reduction". The Liberal dim wits have kept up their one and only mantra too "if we hadn't done it, the TORIES would have been worse" X 1,000. Yes that argument might work on your own hobbyist rank & file dicks, Liberals. But in reality if the TORIES had gone it alone with a minority in the HOUSE OF C they wouldn't be in power now. And then a mountain of KA$H wouldn't have been pissed away on policing, bombs and iniquity. But not to worry the last four months have seen more people chucked on the dole and no jobs and no growth and no future. Happy days! But still we can endure. We can take it. We can hang on in quiet desperation. We can go down, fighting? Err perhaps not. Sleep on Britain, you're too late, there's nothing left worth saving.

And what has happened in the world of Pedro & the Shamberleroes since we saw him in May? Well there's being the usual drug related court cases, six weeks of doing bird in chokey (whatever that means); Wolfman got considerably more. And Amy Winehouse has passed over to the other side. All has been quiet in the Carlos front. All has been quiet on the Babyshambles front. And all has been quiet on the new music front. Everything is pretty much the same, quiet times, and the same old same old.

Tonight dead and dying and dirty Wolverhampton is the same too. The dark nights are drawing in and there's a decided chill in the City air. The pavements are greasy and wet and everything's painted grey. Small pods of dull faced thirty something's plod like automatons towards the hallowed turf of the Molineux to see the Golden Babies play Millwall in the Carling Cup. There was a time long ago when the lore of the Wolves would have taken me a different way, not now. We make our way to the Wulfrun Hall or senses dulled by another days graft for very little return. But tonight (for me anyway) it's not going to be a case of the same old same old, because there's something new, as well as old, prior to Pedro.

The new came in the form of "Billy Bones", not seen them before, they looked like a rag tag and bob tail bunch of HURDLE BUNTERS - (this is a Shropshire term - don't look for it you won't find it). Banjo, Accordion, Upright Bass, Drums, Fiddle, Guitar & Vocals, so a six piece combo. I was hoping for The Pogues, maybe a pinch of the Levellers, something to take me by the throat and shake me. Something to boot me up the jacksy and out of my solemn somnolence, but it didn't really happen. They've definitely got the look "Billy Bones" no doubt about that, but do they have the "luck"? Who knows? I spent twenty minutes desperately wanting to like them. Perhaps if they'd have done "Billy Bones" by The Pogues rather than their own version or "What the Moon Saw" by The Band of Holy Joy I would have given them my heart. But they did neither. Perhaps I was expecting too much? I hope not. Give them a listen, and tell me about it. (This statement is rhetorical obviously)

Next up were Wolverhampton's only credible indie band "The Lines". They are Wolverhampton's No. 1 indie band. There's no doubting this. And there were a load of "Lines" fans dotted around the place waiting to see the four local lads play a slightly modified acoustic set. I've only seen The Lines once before, at The Slade about a year or so ago. They played tonight as they did then "as tight as a ducks do dah". But there lies the rub. Because, you see, however much I might want to love this band that hails from my hometown the truth is I can't. The Lines do for me exactly what the Mighty Lemon Drops did for me back in the eighties, NOTHING. Luckily I'm in a majority of one tonight. The Lines played on, to rapt attention whilst I inwardly hummed "Regulations" by Neon Hearts and drifted. I followed this with "Smoking My Ganja" by Capital Letters and was about to start "West Park" by Weapon of Peace when the house lights came back up. The audience then shuffled the deck, some drifted away fulfilled, others pushed a little closer.

When 9 o'clock came around we got pretty much a replay of May with a few minor adjustments. Mr Doherty took to the stage wearing a check jacket purloined from the wardrobe of Victor Kiam circa 1979. He looked steadier on hisns (there was no need for the rocking chair tonight). He opened with "In Love with a Feeling" and then meandered once more through the back catalogue stopping at most destinations. Between the music PD gave us a quick reminder of the score between Wolves & QPR from last Saturday. The ballet girls were back too, triping the light fantastique during "For Lovers", "Sheepskin Tearaway" "Music When the Lights Go Out", and also "Albion" draped in Union Jacks. It reminded me a bit of the film Jubilee. And that can only be a good thing surely. "Don't Look Back into the Sun", "Can't Stand Me Now" and "Fuck Forever" got the most peoples dander up. The encores were "Back from the Dead", Amy Winehouse's "Tears Dry on Their Own" - which seemed to make sense - and then "Time for Heroes". FIN.

With "the world collapsing around our ears", with "panic on the streets of London & panic on the streets of Birmingham", with loved ones dying, and with romanticism being suffocated by poverties pillow you'd think the greatest English songwriter of his generation would have enough grist for his creative bleeding mill. But that doesn't seem to be the case for Peter Doherty at the moment. Its two long years since his perfectly formed, poetically imbued Grace/Wastelands. So what gives? Hey Pete were gasping out here it's time to flog us a new tune! For fucks sake let's hope its soon……..