So, as I said last time, I promised the wife that I was gonna forget about travelling up to Doncaster for this gig. Then Tony James makes another one of his little announcements, my old mate Jenny Z from Sonic State is to briefly join the band for 3 gigs, starting with Doncaster while Lisa is unavailable due to other commitments. I heard that Jenny was quite nervous about performing with the sPUTTy's so I thought the least I could do was go along and give her a bit of encouragement. Amazingly, the wife agreed (but what will my forfeit be)??

We got to the venue and I chatted for a while with a guy standing outside wearing an original F**K t shirt. He told me that he'd just started living in England again and was amazed that the 'niks were back together and gigging. I assured him that he was in for a great night and we entered the venue, which was surprisingly full, especially as we had been told that less than 20 tickets had been sold.

The doors to the function room finally opened about 9.00 at in we all trooped, there must have been 200+ people there easy, it certainly was packed and, once again, very very hot. The support act were crap, at one point the "singer" announced "you're not hear to see us then?", to which me and Jon yelled a suitable reply. Thankfully they left after quite a short set to make way for Martin and Co.

There is no way on or off the stage at this venue without coming through the crowd, which is exactly what they did. I've posted pictures, needless to say Martin was in red leather and Bruce Lee(?) t shirt. The guy I'd spoken to earlier and the rest of his gang went mad when sPUTTy took to the stage, launching into a chorus of "we're not worthy" ala Wayne's World. Martin said something about it being great to be back at Doncaster before going into Sex Bomb Boogie.

The set list

CLOCKWORK ORANGE
SEX BOMB BOOGIE
EVERYBODY LOVES U
21ST CENTURY BOY
ALIEN CHRIST
GUITAR MEDLEY
DEMON SEED
ALIEN@TION
VIRGINIA PLAIN
JAYNE MANSFIELD
SLAVE TRADE
LOVE MISSILE F1-11
RAY OF LIGHT
REBEL REBEL
ROCKIT MISS USA
SUCCESS

Also, somewhere along the way (I'd have to check the video to be sure) they did an impromptu (rather short) version of Dancerama after repeated requests for it. As always, the band were really up for it at this gig, playing to possibly one of the most receptive audiences I've seen yet. As usual, Love Missile went down best, tons of moshing to that one, poor old Simon, I got quite concerned about him and clung on to him for dear life. Jenny did a really good job with the effects, especially I thought on Jayne Mansfield. It's a shame they didn't do Rio Rocks as this kept being asked for too. As I said about the stage, after Love Missile the band weren’t given the chance to leave the stage, the front row were having none of it. The encore was not supposed to include Success, after Rockit Miss USA we just refused to let the band off stage, hence the hasty decision, after getting permission from the time keeper, to play Success.

Afterwards the band came out for chat and the usual photo's and autographs. I got the impression that most of the people there were either new fans or people getting back into Sputnik. Either way I decided to hang back and let these people get the photo's etc that they wanted. Neal spoke of how good he thought the sound was at this venue. Martin related some stories of how him and Yana used to hang around the recording studios in the small hours doing all the dub effects on the original EMI recordings, especially Hack Attack.

Everybody seemed very happy with the way this gig went, it certainly was a lot better than I expected it to be, I was ready for another low turnout like at Chelmsford. The only thing that bothers me slightly, and it's probably because I'm going to too many of the shows, is that I feel the set list is becoming a bit tired and could do with a change. I'd certainly drop Demon Seed and possibly Alien@tion (sorry aNNIe) and maybe add X Ray Eyez, Little Ceaser and Welcome To The 21st Century (plus the fact that a lot of people seem to be asking for Hack Attack and Rio Rocks!).

TAKEN FROM THE WINDOW AFTERWARDS, MUCH TO THE AMUSEMENT OF THE BAR STAFF

SET LIST

TICKET