Heart of a Punk Soul of a Rasta

BBC 1979 vesus Brixton 2009

Now we have a wide expanse before us. The choice is "Concrete Jungle" sung as recorded by Terry or sung by the writer Roddy. The Beeb version is more Specials………..whilst the Brixton version of "Concrete Jungle" is more Clash than Specials, fast, furious and to be perfectly fair you have to be there, get your hands warm and your body thrown around. "Too Much Too Young" weighs in at only 2 minutes 14 seconds on the BBC recording and that's including Terry's words of wisdom prior to the off. It is a blink and you'll miss it immaculate ejaculation (if that's possible) still its tight as a ducks anal duct. At Brixton "Too Much Too Young" is 2 minutes 33 seconds including the "starter's orders" trumpet. Perhaps the amphetamines were left at home 'cause 19 seconds is a long, long time or perhaps it needed to be savoured either way the duckin A is still tight. "Nite Klub" on the beeb and Terry's mike is bust in the intro. The brass is abrasive rather than rasping and it under achieves when compared to Brixton by almost 1 minute 30 seconds - it's a no contest. "Gangsters" is a big disappointment on the Brixton CD but "Nite Klub" makes up for it in spades. It swings from the g of go - Horace is in sublime form, but everyone is pretty sublime here; everyone gets their moment, the crowd, the trombone, the harmonics, it's a peach. "Gangsters" '79 version, Horace and Brad add snap and absolute tightness during Roddy Radiation's dysfunctional guitar break. Rico and Dick's playing of the central hook of Gangsters is immense and irreplaceable. The outro with Staple's echo laden toasting is quite unequivocally top. At Brixton "Gangsters" has crowd participation but with no Rico or Dick if fact no brass section at all, it's just a 2D faded facsimile compared to the '79 version.

OK so there's a load of other stuff on the each CD, but we haven't go time to go there, we are sticking purely to the eight common tracks. Someone in my earpiece is asking if this is just a bit of fun, is it bollocks; this is fucking serious shit here. Bollocks to peace talks, global financial meltdown, climate crapolla, we're making a big decision here, which era rules supreme '79 or '09. The final score is:

BBC 4.5 v 3.5 Brixton.


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So '79 rules supreme at least until November.