Anyone who ever dares get nostalgic for the 1970s or tries to tell you it was a

[Burney]

better time needs to take a look at these pictures. Because, as any of us with even the vaguest memories of it know, 1970s Britain was in fact a ****hole.

https://www.theguardian.com/cities/gallery/2016/jul/28/fading-england-1970s-snapshot-people-and-places-in-pictures

[Sir C]

better time needs to take a look at these pictures. Because, as any of us with even the vaguest memories of it know, 1970s Britain was in fact a ****hole.

https://www.theguardian.com/cities/gallery/2016/jul/28/fading-england-1970s-snapshot-people-and-places-in-pictures

Quite. And those pictures don't even begin to address issues such as bomb sites, casual violence (every ****ing where) and strikes. Always the strikes.

The food was good though.

[Burney]

Quite. And those pictures don't even begin to address issues such as bomb sites, casual violence (every ****ing where) and strikes. Always the strikes.

The food was good though.

Or poor personal hygiene, worse teeth, man-made fibres, British Leyland and power cuts.

Being casually racist was fine, though. So it had that going for it.

[SWv2]

Surely nostalgia for a period when one was growing up is entirely normal.

Nobody really believes it was better, but it was different from the ****house world of being grown up and the attendant responsibilities and woes this brings.

[Sir C]

Or poor personal hygiene, worse teeth, man-made fibres, British Leyland and power cuts.

Being casually racist was fine, though. So it had that going for it.

TV: On The Buses. Are You Being Served. Mind Your Language. ****ing hell.

Rationing may have ended in 1955, but the bleakness of WWll carried on until May 1979 #bringmaggieback

[Sir C]

Surely nostalgia for a period when one was growing up is entirely normal.

Nobody really believes it was better, but it was different from the ****house world of being grown up and the attendant responsibilities and woes this brings.

I spent far too much of the 1970s in Ireland. It was... rank.

[redgunamo]

visiting a multi-million pound villa in Chelsea and returning with only photographs from under the teenager's bed.


better time needs to take a look at these pictures. Because, as any of us with even the vaguest memories of it know, 1970s Britain was in fact a ****hole.

https://www.theguardian.com/cities/gallery/2016/jul/28/fading-england-1970s-snapshot-people-and-places-in-pictures

[Burney]

Surely nostalgia for a period when one was growing up is entirely normal.

Nobody really believes it was better, but it was different from the ****house world of being grown up and the attendant responsibilities and woes this brings.

Sure, but I was born in 1973, so I suppose my time growing up pretty much exactly straddled the 70s and 80s. I therefore probably saw the contrast more clearly at the time. The 1970s world in which I grew up disappeared almost totally (and for the better) from the mid to late 80s, which I suppose made me realise just how squalid and backwards the 1970s had been.

[Burney]

visiting a multi-million pound villa in Chelsea and returning with only photographs from under the teenager's bed.

There's certainly some truth in that, but a couple of those pictures take me straight back there. At the time you don't know any different, of course, but now you look at it and you can't believe how basic it all was. It seems like an alien planet.

[Burney]

I spent far too much of the 1970s in Ireland. It was... rank.

Me too. I was in 'posh' bits like Dalkey and Donnybrook, of course, but they were still pretty ****.

Mind you, I wasn't too bright. I spent much of one holiday at my grandmother's bungalow refusing to believe there wasn't an upstairs and convinced people were keeping the location of the stairs a secret from me.

[7sisters]

Or poor personal hygiene, worse teeth, man-made fibres, British Leyland and power cuts.

Being casually racist was fine, though. So it had that going for it.

Being able to travel on the underground or a bus without feeling like a furriner in your own country :cloud9:

[Sir C]

Me too. I was in 'posh' bits like Dalkey and Donnybrook, of course, but they were still pretty ****.

Mind you, I wasn't too bright. I spent much of one holiday at my grandmother's bungalow refusing to believe there wasn't an upstairs and convinced people were keeping the location of the stairs a secret from me.

In the bogs of Co. Limerick it was positively 19th century. :cry:

I mean, when I think of a bar in the country with a ballad session going on, and I can smell the peat smoke and the sharp tang of stale Harp lager, and see the room thick with Sweet Afton smoke, I can almost feel an element of nostalgia, but then I remember the unwashed, tacky, self-indulgent lachrymosity of rebel song time, and the hypocrisy of the church-going women, and the vicious snobery, and the greyness, and the lack of hope, and I realise it was just like England but 10% worse.

[Sir C]

Being able to travel on the underground or a bus without feeling like a furriner in your own country :cloud9:

You travel by bus and your issue with that experience is... foreigners?

**** me.

[Mo Britain less Europe]

Most of the best progressive music was released in the seventies. That alone saves the decade. And Pinter's plays although his best are from the late fifties and the sixties..

[7sisters]

You travel by bus and your issue with that experience is... foreigners?

**** me.

I've had the occasion ( quite rarely mind ) to hop on a bus when the northern line stopped at 7S. We all jump on the tube don't we ? I mean, **** Saville row parking at 20 quid an hour when the Victoria line beckons.

[Burney]

Most of the best progressive music was released in the seventies. That alone saves the decade. And Pinter's plays although his best are from the late fifties and the sixties..

No. It'll take more than ELP and excruciating pauses to reconcile me, I'm afraid.

[Mo Britain less Europe]

No. It'll take more than ELP and excruciating pauses to reconcile me, I'm afraid.

Not ELP. I'm not a fan. But Yes, Genesis, Wishbone Ash, Jethro Tull, Uriah Heep etc etc all brought out wonders. Not to mention the Moody Blues' "Seventh Sojourn", best lp of all time.

[Burney]

I've had the occasion ( quite rarely mind ) to hop on a bus when the northern line stopped at 7S. We all jump on the tube don't we ? I mean, **** Saville row parking at 20 quid an hour when the Victoria line beckons.

I can't remember ever taking a bus in central London. Mind you, I've no idea where any of them go.

[Burney]

Not ELP. I'm not a fan. But Yes, Genesis, Wishbone Ash, Jethro Tull, Uriah Heep etc etc all brought out wonders. Not to mention the Moody Blues' "Seventh Sojourn", best lp of all time.

:hehe: You are a constant source of surprises, mo, I'll give you that.

[Mo Britain less Europe]

:hehe: You are a constant source of surprises, mo, I'll give you that.

Which surprise B?

[Burney]

Which surprise B?

I wouldn't have spotted you for a hardcore prog fan, that's all. How do you feel about Focus?

[Mo Britain less Europe]

Don't know them well bar the few tunes they had as hits in UK. Interestingly, I was in The Hague last December and the one record shop I found gave the kind of prominence to Focus that might be given to real A listers elsewhere.

I loved the prog vibe. The only modern band that has something like that is Muse. The self-consciously prog modern bands tend to sound like copies of copies.

[Ash]

better time needs to take a look at these pictures. Because, as any of us with even the vaguest memories of it know, 1970s Britain was in fact a ****hole.

https://www.theguardian.com/cities/gallery/2016/jul/28/fading-england-1970s-snapshot-people-and-places-in-pictures

Corrugated iron and bomb sites. Flares. Long hair. Jumpers for goalposts. Ford Cortinas. Beans on toast for dinner. Milk floats.

Amazingly it was a very productive and creative era for British rock music though, according for taste. From blues-rock to prog and heavy metal and pub rock and punk and new wave. Development, refinement, sophistication, experimentation, stagnation, revolution, rebirth.

Of course aesthetics are subjective, but only to a point and anyone who doesn't think that Dark Side of the Moon was one of the finest moments of the 20th century is simply wrong.

[SWv2]

Corrugated iron and bomb sites. Flares. Long hair. Jumpers for goalposts. Ford Cortinas. Beans on toast for dinner. Milk floats.

Amazingly it was a very productive and creative era for British rock music though, according for taste. From blues-rock to prog and heavy metal and pub rock and punk and new wave. Development, refinement, sophistication, experimentation, stagnation, revolution, rebirth.

Of course aesthetics are subjective, but only to a point and anyone who doesn't think that Dark Side of the Moon was one of the finest moments of the 20th century is simply wrong.

I have always preferred Wish You Were Here and Meddle.

[Burney]

Corrugated iron and bomb sites. Flares. Long hair. Jumpers for goalposts. Ford Cortinas. Beans on toast for dinner. Milk floats.

Amazingly it was a very productive and creative era for British rock music though, according for taste. From blues-rock to prog and heavy metal and pub rock and punk and new wave. Development, refinement, sophistication, experimentation, stagnation, revolution, rebirth.

Of course aesthetics are subjective, but only to a point and anyone who doesn't think that Dark Side of the Moon was one of the finest moments of the 20th century is simply wrong.

It probably helped that the over-generous dole allowed people to lounge around doing nothing more useful than playing and creating music all day, of course.

[Ash]

It probably helped that the over-generous dole allowed people to lounge around doing nothing more useful than playing and creating music all day, of course.

And a damned fine investment it was too. Can you imagine the cultural loss if these chaps had been forced to screw lids on toothpaste tubes all day? It's one of the reasons why music is **** these days. No state support. :shrug:

[Ash]

I have always preferred Dark Side of the Moon and Meddle.

I said Dark Side. Did you mean Wish You Were Here?

Meddle has, ISTR (haven't owned a copy for years) one excellent side and one not-so excellent side which is completely ruined by Liverpool fans. :-(

[Burney]

And a damned fine investment it was too. Can you imagine the cultural loss if these chaps had been forced to screw lids on toothpaste tubes all day? It's one of the reasons why music is **** these days. No state support. :shrug:

Was it? I'm not convinced we couldn't have lived pretty happily without The Slits and Dr Feelgood. Besides, in financial terms, the very few who became successful almost immediately moved abroad in order to avoid paying tax here.

[Ash]

I've had the occasion ( quite rarely mind ) to hop on a bus when the northern line stopped at 7S. We all jump on the tube don't we ? I mean, **** Saville row parking at 20 quid an hour when the Victoria line beckons.

Hang on 7s, I'm pretty ****ing certain that Northern Line has never stopped at Seven Sisters.

[Burney]

Hang on 7s, I'm pretty ****ing certain that Northern Line has never stopped at Seven Sisters.

That's a good point, actually. We need fash to make a judgment on this.

[Ash]

Was it? I'm not convinced we couldn't have lived pretty happily without The Slits and Dr Feelgood. Besides, in financial terms, the very few who became successful almost immediately moved abroad in order to avoid paying tax here.

Culturally - definitely. Financially, I expect so too. The tax on the record company profits would probably have dwarfed the pitiful royalties paid to the artists, never mind the whole wider economic activity of the industry as a whole and all the knock-on effects of that.

But thanks for mentioning Dr Feelgood. Wilko & Brilleaux :bow:


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6nyeSGaBcrA

[SWv2]

I said Dark Side. Did you mean Wish You Were Here?

Meddle has, ISTR (haven't owned a copy for years) one excellent side and one not-so excellent side which is completely ruined by Liverpool fans. :-(

Noted and indeed corrected.

I spent a ridiculous amount of time stoned listening to Meddle in North London during the late 80s.

[Ash]

I spent a ridiculous amount of time stoned listening to Meddle in North London during the late 80s.

Me too. Except in Coventry and Birmingham.

[Ganpati's Goonerz--AFC's Aboriginal Fertility Cult]

I have always preferred Wish You Were Here and Meddle.

As songs, Shine On You Crazy Diamond {put all together} and Echoes were perfect, but as an album as a whole, DSOTM was the best.

[7sisters]

Hang on 7s, I'm pretty ****ing certain that Northern Line has never stopped at Seven Sisters.

You're right. I meant the Victoria.. They'd run a bus service to Tottenham Hale when it either broke down or there was a leaper on the tracks.

[Burney]

You're right. I meant the Victoria.. They'd run a bus service to Tottenham Hale when it either broke down or there was a leaper on the tracks.

I read that as 'a leper on the tracks' and was quite confused for a moment.

[Alberto Balsam Rodriguez]

better time needs to take a look at these pictures. Because, as any of us with even the vaguest memories of it know, 1970s Britain was in fact a ****hole.

https://www.theguardian.com/cities/gallery/2016/jul/28/fading-england-1970s-snapshot-people-and-places-in-pictures


Avocado coloured bath tubs and conker brown wall paint :-(

[Ash]

Avocado coloured bath tubs and conker brown wall paint :-(

I had lime green painted walls on my bedroom.

Subbuteo though! With floodlights. And springy throw-in men. :cloud9:

[Burney]

Played, Balsam.

Mind you, I'll see your aesthetic bathroom horrors and raise you those wall-mounted gas fires we used to have in lieu of central heating.
You know? The ones that you had to ignite using a remarkably ineffective button that made a 'ker-chunk' noise and, as a result of their iffy ignition, left the house smelling vaguely - but permanently - of gas?