UK Tour June 1983

Pretty self-explanatory
sulky lad
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UK Tour June 1983

Post by sulky lad »

Following the recent discussion on this forum about Punch The Clock, I've been listening to and hunting out a few recordings of shows around this time and then received an email from Top Balcony about the possibility of a recording of Liverpool from 10th June. According to Going Through The Motions, the ECIS definitive guide to EC concerts from 1977 to 1985, there were only a handful of shows in June 1983: Belfast, Dublin, Loughborough and Norwich on 3rd,4th,6th and 7th respectively and then Canterbury on 24th and Dingwalls, London on 28th. About 2 years ago I bough a used ticket from eBay for a concert by EC at Hanley (near Stoke) for June14th and now Top Balcony mentions the Liverpool gig. It seems amazing that there was so little coverage of these shows back when Elvis was a very regular face in the music papers in the UK featuring almost every week in either the NME or Melody Maker. I was just wondering if anyone had any recollection about these gigs. I do have a couple of photos taken by Gordon Irwin of the show of Elvis at the Mayfield Leisure Centre in Belfast but there seems to be little evidence of these tours apart from the recordings from Dublin, Belfast, Norwich and London and a complete setlist from Canterbury. Any info, anyone ?
bronxapostle
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Re: UK Tour June 1983

Post by bronxapostle »

mail me a boot!!!!!!!!!!!!!! yeh, going through the motions is THE BIBLE!!!! answers HUNDREDS of questions accurately!
Hawksmoor
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Re: UK Tour June 1983

Post by Hawksmoor »

I'm fairly sure I was at the Liverpool gig but the memory is a little hazy these days. Was it the tour where Rank and File were the opening act?
FAVEHOUR
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Re: UK Tour June 1983

Post by FAVEHOUR »

Hawksmoor wrote:I'm fairly sure I was at the Liverpool gig but the memory is a little hazy these days. Was it the tour where Rank and File were the opening act?
I think that was the October leg.
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Re: UK Tour June 1983

Post by FAVEHOUR »

sulky lad wrote:Following the recent discussion on this forum about Punch The Clock, I've been listening to and hunting out a few recordings of shows around this time and then received an email from Top Balcony about the possibility of a recording of Liverpool from 10th June. According to Going Through The Motions, the ECIS definitive guide to EC concerts from 1977 to 1985, there were only a handful of shows in June 1983: Belfast, Dublin, Loughborough and Norwich on 3rd,4th,6th and 7th respectively and then Canterbury on 24th and Dingwalls, London on 28th. About 2 years ago I bough a used ticket from eBay for a concert by EC at Hanley (near Stoke) for June14th and now Top Balcony mentions the Liverpool gig. It seems amazing that there was so little coverage of these shows back when Elvis was a very regular face in the music papers in the UK featuring almost every week in either the NME or Melody Maker. I was just wondering if anyone had any recollection about these gigs. I do have a couple of photos taken by Gordon Irwin of the show of Elvis at the Mayfield Leisure Centre in Belfast but there seems to be little evidence of these tours apart from the recordings from Dublin, Belfast, Norwich and London and a complete setlist from Canterbury. Any info, anyone ?

The Elvis wiki (a better bible than GTTM) lists the June 10th date, but it's the first I've heard of it.
lenhodge
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Re: UK Tour June 1983

Post by lenhodge »

I seem to recall having a ticket for a Manchester Ritz show that was cancelled ,I then got a ticket for a Stoke/Hanley gig that I couldn't make due to it clashing with my sister's 21st Birthday party (30 Oct) I'm pretty sure Rank & File were the Support and that Elvis had a horn section with him ( possibly Rank & File's) or so my friend who had my tickets said ! Probably the only tour I've missed since 1980.
sulky lad
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Re: UK Tour June 1983

Post by sulky lad »

The October 1983 tour included a date at Hanley on 29th October and I've got a recording of it !! :lol:
bronxapostle
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Re: UK Tour June 1983

Post by bronxapostle »

FAVEHOUR wrote:
sulky lad wrote:Following the recent discussion on this forum about Punch The Clock, I've been listening to and hunting out a few recordings of shows around this time and then received an email from Top Balcony about the possibility of a recording of Liverpool from 10th June. According to Going Through The Motions, the ECIS definitive guide to EC concerts from 1977 to 1985, there were only a handful of shows in June 1983: Belfast, Dublin, Loughborough and Norwich on 3rd,4th,6th and 7th respectively and then Canterbury on 24th and Dingwalls, London on 28th. About 2 years ago I bough a used ticket from eBay for a concert by EC at Hanley (near Stoke) for June14th and now Top Balcony mentions the Liverpool gig. It seems amazing that there was so little coverage of these shows back when Elvis was a very regular face in the music papers in the UK featuring almost every week in either the NME or Melody Maker. I was just wondering if anyone had any recollection about these gigs. I do have a couple of photos taken by Gordon Irwin of the show of Elvis at the Mayfield Leisure Centre in Belfast but there seems to be little evidence of these tours apart from the recordings from Dublin, Belfast, Norwich and London and a complete setlist from Canterbury. Any info, anyone ?

The Elvis wiki (a better bible than GTTM) lists the June 10th date, but it's the first I've heard of it.

come on Dave...you KNOW i'm the old fashioned type! you CAN'T hold the WIKI in your hands, like THE GOOD BOOK!!! :D :D :D



not to mention...where do you think wiki acquired all those old setlists and stats from anyways????
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krm
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Re: UK Tour June 1983

Post by krm »

No discussions! Going through the motions is the book to have. EC wiki is full of info and quite accurate, but utterly boring. GTTM is a work of love and passion.
Thinking that RG wrote it without any help of eMail or internet makes it even bigger and better!
bronxapostle
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Re: UK Tour June 1983

Post by bronxapostle »

EXACTLY!!!!!!!!!!
FAVEHOUR
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Re: UK Tour June 1983

Post by FAVEHOUR »

Let me backtrack. I have both of RG's books and they were a great source of info and I was so happy to get them when they were published. And you're right, it was a lot of work for RG to do them, especially pre-internet. And I enjioyed it and consulted it enough that I bought two copies of GTTM, so that one would be preserved while I rifled thrugh the other. I should have said that now, the Wiki site is where I go. It's constantly updated, easily searchable, all those digital things.

dave
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Top balcony
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Re: UK Tour June 1983

Post by Top balcony »

There appear to be two threads to this thread :

i) the June 1983 tour - I'm convinced the Liverpool Royal Court referrence on the Wiki is a typo. This makes me feel better as it means I didn't miss the gig. Whilst I remain interested in the truth of all this, on balance I'd prefer it not to have taken place. The October 1983 show at this venue was attended by Mr and Mrs Top Balcony, and was wonderful.

ii) Going through the motions vs the wiki - no contest. that's because there is no contest, it's not a race where there is a winner. Both are amazing. The book woud be my choice of reading material if I ever did Desert Island Discs. As for the Wiki unless I click on it each day I get withdrawl symptoms, a fantastic resource.

Colin Top Balcony
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krm
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Re: UK Tour June 1983

Post by krm »

Top balcony wrote:As for the Wiki unless I click on it each day I get withdrawl symptoms, a fantastic resource.

Colin Top Balcony

agree!
sulky lad
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Re: UK Tour June 1983

Post by sulky lad »

Wish I hadn't mentioned GTTM now ! :oops: :roll:
However, like most people I use both as a reference - having collected live shows from 1981, the appearance of GTTM was pivotal in my continuing trading and building up my collection ( I bet Favehour can remember when I though I'd limit myself to just UK shows when trading with him !). It had a few errors in the printing and on a couple of tapes and my original copy fell to pieces through overuse many years ago. However, it still seems a source of both information and inspiration and Top Balcony's request for info regarding EC concerts in Liverpool set me off thinking about the June 1983 mini-tour and without the wonderful layout and structure of GTTM I wouldn't have started the thread even though I obviously went on to use the wiki as a further source of info.
I also use the equally wonderful setlist printed in Beyond Belief and dream of a day when all concerts have setlists and annotated details of songs published in whatever format ( are you listening Fave Hour ?!!)
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Top balcony
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Re: UK Tour June 1983

Post by Top balcony »

sulky lad wrote:Wish I hadn't mentioned GTTM now ! :oops: :roll:
Quite the opposite Mr Lad, I'm glad that this legendary publication got a mention.

I gather that it had a forerunner, written by the same author. I've never see it though, what's it like?

Colin TB
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krm
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Re: UK Tour June 1983

Post by krm »

GTTM....Beyond Belief.....ECIS..... I had to go and dig out all those again. HOw many issues of BB were printed, by the way?
sheeptotheslaughter
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Re: UK Tour June 1983

Post by sheeptotheslaughter »

I was at the dingwalls show. I believe it was to celebrate 10 years of Capital radio the London radio station and the tickets were scarce.
I only got a ticket because a women I worked with had a spare and asked someone I knew if he wanted to go he said no but put my name forward. I never knew this woman but we did become quite good friends after that and she went to more Elvis shows with me than either of the Mrs Sheeps.
The main things that stick out were the TKO horns playing with Elvis for the first time that I had seen them,
The as I call it showbiz/ soul show Cant stand up for falling down ending.
and the fact I was getting married two weeks later and had to keep the gig a secret from my soon to be wife. Who probably wouldn't have taken kindly to the fact her fiance was at a gig with a strange women.

It was one of the best Elvis shows I have attended. If memory serves me right
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verbal gymnastics
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Re: UK Tour June 1983

Post by verbal gymnastics »

I think the Camden show was for Capital's Help a London Child.

Funnily enough this was one of my least favourite tours because the shows were so samey.

And for what it's worth, GTTM is a fantastic piece of work.
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Ulster Boy
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Re: UK Tour June 1983

Post by Ulster Boy »

I was at the Belfast gig, think I still have the ticket stub and a local newspaper's review somewhere. This gig was hastily arranged, I think, as a previous one from 1982 had been cancelled, certainly the merchandising (such as it was) was all Imperial Bedroom t-shirts, cos I bought one. Horrible, long-sleeved thing. The venue, Maysfield Leisure Centre, was basically a bare-brick sports hall. Was E&theAs first gig in Belfast since 1978 and I don't recall there being a huge crowd there - maybe 500 or so - and the PA played the then-unreleased Pills and Soap before the show. I remember the shock when the brass section came on, it seemed such a departure, but it was a brilliant gig. Haven't listened to the recording yet - only just recently realised there was one.
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Re: UK Tour June 1983

Post by Neil. »

I'm slightly embarrassed to be asking this, but... what exactly is GTTM? :oops:
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Otis Westinghouse
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Re: UK Tour June 1983

Post by Otis Westinghouse »

Image

Great thread! I'd never even heard of GTTM before.

I love the wiki, e.g.
http://www.elviscostello.info/wiki/inde ... ance_Index

Great fun! I've also just spent a while locating every setlist of all the Costello shows I've seen (apart from Guernsey 1980, that is). 'Wow, I don't remember him playing that!', 'Oh yes, now THAT was brilliant!', etc. For example, Roundhouse July '96, I recall this being the first time I'd heard Black Sails in the Sunset, and being blown away, but not that he then went into Oliver's Army, still just with Steve, and then Pete and Bruce came on.

Oh to relive all those days over once again. Well, at least I'm reliving Birmingham '83!
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sulky lad
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Re: UK Tour June 1983

Post by sulky lad »

Going Through The Motions is a book written by the founder of the Elvis Costello Information Service, Richard Groothuizen and based in Holland. the magazine was started in the late 70s and then took on a new format in 1982 and has been published every two months ever since. Pre-internet days it was an invaluable source of all thing Costello and Richard published 2 books, So Far which was a book based on the early versions of ECIS and then GTTM. The latter summarised Elvis work from the end of So Far 1980-81 to 1985 but most importantly had collected the data from nearly all the available recordings of live concerts and presented them in setlist form.Whilst not 100% accurate many due to typesetting I would guess, this was like the oracle for those of us collecting concerts back in the heady days of tape trading in the late 70s and 80s. As far as I'm aware copies of GTTM are still available from Richard - I've only got the two - like Fave Hour!
sulky lad
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Re: UK Tour June 1983

Post by sulky lad »

Yes Otis, I recorded all the London shows in 1996 - which one did you see and would you like a copy !! :P
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Re: UK Tour June 1983

Post by Man out of Time »

krm wrote:GTTM....Beyond Belief.....ECIS..... I had to go and dig out all those again. HOw many issues of BB were printed, by the way?
The final issue was issue 28, but many were double issues, so if you had a copy of every BB published, you would have 23 in all.

MOOT
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krm
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Re: UK Tour June 1983

Post by krm »

Man out of Time wrote:
krm wrote:GTTM....Beyond Belief.....ECIS..... I had to go and dig out all those again. HOw many issues of BB were printed, by the way?
The final issue was issue 28, but many were double issues, so if you had a copy of every BB published, you would have 23 in all.

MOOT
thanks for info. my last issue is vol3-number2-issue11 so I guess I need to catch up here...
My last issue is from June 1997. Sort of lost EC fokus at the time due to a thing called "life" :-)
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