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At the age of twelve, in 1967, I was too young for the summer of love. Now, at twenty-two, I'm too too old for the summer of hate.
Or so I thought. But at the punk/New Wave concert last night at Huddersfield Polytechnic, I was by no means conspicuous by my old age.
There were a few youngsters there, but for the rest — well, they may still claim to be bored and in the dole queues, but it's a long time since they were school-leavers.
All you need is hate and a packet of safety pins and you too, it seems, can be a punk.
The evening with Generation X, Elvis Costello, Penetration and The Jerks was not musically very exciting.
Elvis Costello was by far the best. As for Generation X — what they do, they do well, but I don't really like it. Penetration were energetic, aggressive and boring, and to pass over The Jerks as quickly as possible, they were not very good.
Several hours of beer spitting, repetitive and limited chord sequences and incoherent lyrics with the inevitable "one-two-three-four" chant before almost every song was more than enough for me.
But just because I don't particularly like this kind. of music, I don't want to knock it. At least it has aroused some response from that most apathetic of species, Huddersfield people.
But back to the chain and safety pin bedecked punk fans, whose main concern seems to be being seen looking as outrageous as possible by as many people as possible.
My companion last night suggested that perhaps they are all bank clerks by day. It's a nice thought.
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