Pop comes to campus: your memories

As Vice-Chairman of Carnival Committee in 1957, I arranged a number of dances, including a Jazz Ball in the Debating Hall with Mick Mulligan and his vocalist, George Melly.

I was at Birmingham when many bands that would become famous played. I saw Jethro Tull, Fairport Convention and The Move play on the same bill at Deb Hall and Ten Years After, Family and Simon Dupree and the Big Sound at High Hall, again on the same bill. Great times!

Myself and two friends all remember seeing Thin Lizzy (fronted by Phil Lynott ) play on the Vale site in the mid 70s. My friends also remember seeing Mud in the Students’ Union and The Strawbs in the Great Hall.

I saw The Police in 1977, at a ‘punk night’ at Lake Hall. They played some of their own songs and then stayed on stage as the backing band to Cherry Vanilla. I also saw UB40 in their early days at Deb Hall in 1980, when they’d just come off a tour supporting The Pretenders.

I remember seeing Gong at the Guild and Robin Trower at Lake Hall — the latter was brilliant, the former, very strange. I reviewed a few Birmingham performances for Redbrick — including Dr Feelgood at the Odeon — immortalised under the by-line Any Smith.

We had excellent discos every fortnight at Mason Hall and it was a great place to live as a new student. I remember seeing the Tom Robinson Band. In 1982, I saw Dr Feelgood at the Students’ Union. They were brilliant. In 1990, I came up from London specifi cally to see Salvation who played the Union.

A girl I met during Freshers’ Week in 1983 told me about a band who were playing at the Students’ Union who came from where she lived. The band in question were The Smiths. A month or so later they had burst onto the scene and later became one of the most iconic bands in music history. I am so pleased that I got the chance to see them in their early days and it was free!’

Music is a huge part of my life as it was at University. I remember seeing Hot Chocolate with Big Errol fronting them at the Guild and the Lemonheads in the early 90s. We saw Crowded House and Del Amitri at the Aston Sports Centre whenever they were in town and John Gorka at the Town Hall.