Scarcity Part 2: Gang of Four & The Tom Tom Club

The Gang of Four are belting out a funky tune called “Love Like Anthrax” – whose chorus goes

“Love will get you like a dose of anthrax/
And that is something I don’t want to catch”

and I start thinking that perhaps this isn’t an appropriate message for the two teenage girls standing next to me. Another chorus goes

“I’m thinking that I love you/
But I know it’s only lust”,

and it dawns on me, since the girls are wearing Access All Areas passes, that maybe they’re watching their parents on stage. Now that must be weird, especially if Dad is happily married.

When Dave Allen left Gang of Four back in the early 80s in the middle of a US tour, the band found an incredible bassist called Busta Cherry Jones to help carry on. When Dave and drummer Hugo Burnham left this time, a few weeks before their Meltdown Festival appearance, it made me wonder what rabbit would be pulled from the hat. The sight of a female skinhead entering the darkened stage and I knew it was okay – Bowie bassist Gayle Ann Dorsey was on hand. New drummer Mark Heaney matched her in elegant intensity.

As singer Jon King said, Gang of Four don’t play very often, so the crowd was immediately on its feet and cheering from the get-go. When they first appeared almost 30 years ago their sound was unique, yet another fresh route careening away from the main road of punk, a compelling drive of funk rhythm, keening chords and feedback sandpapering against desolate lyrics. Not a combination to conquer the charts; even at their peak of popularity it felt like a special club. Only in the past few years have we learned that those funky rhythms have inspired many a modern Ferdinand.The band mostly played from their first album, ‘Entertainment’. Maybe it was a subtle message. The later highlight was “I Love A Man In A Uniform”, Jon revealing that the US Air Force had wanted to use it in a recruitment ad, showing that the military is, as expected, free of irony. The rhythm section was finely tuned and powerful – perhaps it helps to dive in at the very deep end. Jon and Andy played only as people who’ve been together a long time can. It probably helps that they haven’t played the songs to death.


Over 25 years you can forget the details of what a band can be like on stage. I remembered Andy Gill staring at the crowd as he Fendered huge chunking chords and painful feedback attack, but I’d forgotten what a lunatic Jon King is. In the course of the night he used three different mic stands, jerked in a floor-clearing dance, and lost the buttons on his shirt. No surprise then when he got out a baseball bat and demolished a microwave oven to the beat.

The Tom Tom Club was a rhythm section spin-off from Talking Heads, popular at the same time as Gof4. Their take on bootylicious rhythms, however, had a very different effect. “Genius Of Love” immediately spawned a number of 12” spinoffs, including the equally cool “Genius Of Rap”. Mariah Carey built one of her biggest hits around a sample of its hook. Tonight, they dropped it halfway through the set. It has one of my favourite lyrical hooks: “He’s the genius of love/He’s so neat.” (Bet Mariah couldn’t write that innocently.) The place went mental because it still sounded so damn fresh. They followed it with their first hit, “Wordy Rappinghood”, a paen to their favourite dance artists and another trove of clever words. From there on it was a big party. They encored with “Take Me To The River”, and while Tina Weymouth would hate to hear it, Talking Heads used to do it much better.