TheTopHat wrote:

---

The list has now reached December 09 and still no Dublin gig.

---

Scottie wrote:

---

WHAT! you kidding mate, lots of women lying with their legs open.
Exactly the same I think.

---

I thought much the same!   Reckon I'm one of the quite a few fans from the 70s mentioned   A few news items on the tour popped up today. Hopefully it will generate some interest, I noted a few dates that have gone off the list.

For those who are too lazy to folow the link, the article in full.

A MASSIVE hit in the 1970s and 80s, The Boomtown Rats toured the world, were internationally acclaimed, and sold millions of albums not bad for six guys who started out in a Dublin kitchen.

As the first Irish rock band to reach number one in the UK charts with Rat Trap, the band Garry Roberts, Simon Crowe, Bob Geldof, Pete Briquette, Gerry Cott and Johnnie Fingers had numerous hit singles as well as six albums before going their separate ways in 1986.

Now Garry and Simon have reformed as Boomtown Rats, playing the band's old material, with Peter Barton and Darren Beale as new members.

Garry formed the new band after listening to the original first album The Boomtown Rats and decided to get back into the business.

He said: "The length of time that had gone by since I'd heard it made it sound like somebody else had recorded it. I just thought some of the songs sounded really good and there was no point in putting this stuff away."

Starting out again, he realised that small and sparse arrangements work better than big bands and set-up with two guitars, a bass and drums.

"It is the ideal set-up," he said.

"I know of good bands which have been like that The Beatles, AC/DC it is a classic line-up really. You don't need a lot of musicians on the stage to make a big sound. 

"That is what we are aiming for to get up there and make the songs sound big the way I always felt they should have been played."

The band played a few gigs last summer and received nothing but praise for their sound.

He said: "It was great, quite a few fans from the 70s came to see us and said it was good. 

"It was an amazing morale boost for us, we didn't really know what people would think." 

He added: "We really enjoy it, it's great and we find it really exciting. I'm really looking forward to the tour."

Garry has always been interested in music, but went to medical school and trained as a gynaecologist.

He said: "The sights I would have seen as a gynaecologist would have been a lot different to what I saw in the band."

He spoke of his travels around the world as one of the best parts of his career, including visiting the Grand Canyon as part of a tour.

But another memory that sticks out is playing at Live Aid in 1985.

"It was amazing. It didn't matter if you were completely rubbish or not because everyone was there, punters, the audience, bands, for a single purpose," he said.

"It was an amazing feat for Bob Geldof."

After the band split up, Garry embarked on a career in sound engineering, working with bands such as Simply Red, and then went on to work in woodwork and plumbing. He now lives in Herefordshire and has two children Lily, 18, and Piers, 15. 

The Boomtown Rats, Alnwick Playhouse,Thursday, January 29, 7.30pm. Tickets £16.50, £15.50 conc.

Anonymous - no doubt a poster/lurker on here takes me to task!  Fair enough.  I have to be able to take it if I dish it out.

Anonymous said...

they cancel more gigs than Geldof does how many more will go.They sold over 220 tickets at Bedford which is nearly half the venue so its nothing to do with sales.It's more than likely greed by their agent as Bedford only do % deals of the door, they should get a new one.You critised Gldof about cancelling shows why are you not up in arms over this as well?.I've read your comments on both of those forums it's very clear your biased towards the Rats which is yor choice but you open yourself up for critism by not reacting the same way you hve with Geldof play the game fairly.

Thursday, 22 January, 2009

ArrGee said...
They haven't cancelled as many gigs as Geldof (yet).

I don't know the details of how many tickets were sold for Bedford, but if it is 220 then they should have played. However, from what I understand there were far fewer tickets sold.

I did criticise Geldof for cancelling shows, but if you check the forum post Cancelled Concerts , I would suggest my initial tone was very moderate. I was provoked to a more extreme reaction by having these posts removed see Why have all the cancelled concerts threads gone? .

As for the cancellations, I have marked all the cancellations on this blog and also in the forum. I'm not hiding anything.

I will confess to a bias towards The Rats rather than Geldof at present, but I would not agree that I have reacted differently. The situation with Geldof developed over time, and should the Rats continue to cancel then I probably would be more up in arms.

It is hard to criticise them on the cancellations as they set up this tour without any real knowledge of how much interest there would be, and given that they played Wakefield to a very small crowd, I don't think they cancelled the other gigs on a whim.

Much of the criticism of Geldof centred on
i) high ticket prices [not an issue with The Rats]
ii) Large Venues [maybe The Rats overstretched themselves here, but the venues were still moderate in comparison to Geldof]
iii) the attitude of his management [Again the Rats could be more open about why the concerts were cancelled on the listings, but last year they did give an explanation of what happened with the cancelled Crewe gig, which is due to take place tomorrow]

I don't believe I should react in the same way as the circumstances are different, but accept your comments are a perfectly valid viewpoint.

"Consistency is the last refuge of the unimaginative" Oscar Wilde (though I do believe Geldof used this quote in a debate once upon a time)

Thursday, 22 January, 2009 

Anonymous said...
fair enough i like costructive answers and you put some valid points.It is a fact 220 tickets were sold for Bedford and that could be seen on ther website with their seating plan showing sold and usold seats.Taking you point of not knowing the exact reason for cancellations can be frustating but why would any management give anyone a reason. They would only do that if it was them that cancelled if no reason was given by them it is then quite obvious it was at the venue end, so why would the artist or management be held resposible?.Years ago i worked in the business at the bottom end and gigs were pulled by venues if 1, they hadn't sold enough seats to make it pay(rare but did happen) 2.It was in their interest to pay an artist a cancelation fee than a full fee(usually 50%) as they lost less money
Most venues don't pull gigs outside promotors do or a classic is a promotor pleads poverty and trys to get the artist to do the gig for less at the last minute forcing the artist to cancel(hapened on at least 3 occasions in the venue i worked at).
Ticket prices are decided by the promotor not the artist he doesn't have a say in it usually unless he or management has privately booked the theatre.Standard theatre practice is a graded pricing system of £20,£18 then £15(it was a few years back) if an artist booked it then they had adhere to their pricing.Outside promotors did their own pricing so you really shoud aim your critism in that direction not the artist.I hope to contnue this debate further.

Thursday, 22 January, 2009 
ArrGee said...
I did check their website yesterday and every seat bar two seats on the three levels (stalls/tiered/circle) had gone.

But the day before according to another forum member there were plenty of seats. I don't know how many tickets were sold, but I suspect it wasn't over 200.

Given that Peter Barton himself arranges these concerts through RAM; The Rats, unusually, are the promoter, agent, management and artist.

The nature of the venues that have been booked suggest to me that low ticket sales were the reason for the cancellations.

I would be quite happy to continue the debate, but would suggest that the forums (either http://www.activeboard.com/forum.spark?forumID=48603 OR www.boomtownrats.co.uk) rather than this blog would be a more appropriate place. Might even engage a few others in the debate.

ArrGee1991 wrote:

---

bump - Where are those London/Dublin gigs ?  

---

ArrGee wrote:

---

ArrGee wrote: Thursday 17th Electric Ballroom, London as special guests of The Blockheads and Eddie and The Hot Rods

---