Band Review - Badness and All Mod Cons at the Piper Club - 29th Dec 03 By Jane Foster

Badness

I went to see Hull's favourite Madness cover band - Badness- at the Piper club on Newland Ave. They were supported by All Mod Cons, who are a tribute to The Jam. It was a fantastic night.. I'm old enough to remember Madness quite well, I confess..although at the time I wasn't particularly into them, they were definitely a band for the lads.

I don't know why this 'lad band' thing came about, but I have vague memories of groups of lads doing the 'Madness walk' in the school playground - that is, shuffling along behind each other whilst making strange jerking arm movements..weird Punk and ska music brings out that strange and predominantly male phenomenon known as pogoing . I saw plenty of this at the gig - mainly blokes in the thirtysomething age bracket who probably sang along to 'Baggy Trousers' in the school playground too.

This song I remember well, along with Pink Floyd's 'Another Brick in the Wall' as an anti-school anthem... you didn't get many of those in the charts so they stuck in the mind. Badness formed in 1994 and were selling out venues within six months, in the UK and Eire. They claim to have played just about every town and city in the UK, and have toured Israel, Germany and Spain.

Doing the pogo.

I have to say they played all the songs really well, they are a tight band and great showmen too, they know how to please the audience. As well as covering all the best Madness songs they also did a great version of Gangsters by The Specials.

I'd like to have heard a few more covers of other ska bands. Over the years I've come to be quite a big fan of ska music. It seemed to flourish briefly and then disappear too quickly - so it's good to see a band bringing it back.

Badness were joined later on in the set by 'Buster Beefburger' an almost identical version of the ex Bad Manners frontman. Launching into 'Lip up Fatty' and ending with the Can Can, he was brilliant too, with a very fetching pair of braces (!) continued below

Band Review - Badness and All Mod Cons at the Piper Club - 29th Dec 03 continued By Jane Foster

Badness are always busy touring and obviously have a great local following - the Piper was packed out, and it was a Monday night. It was a great atmosphere, and despite the dancefloor being full of bouncing blokes, I managed to get some quite good pictures!!

It was good to see an old friend of mine Mike Rye, from way back on Orchard Park. He was doing the lighting for this band but plays in another tribute band - Showmaddymaddy -with other members of Badness . I'll be checking them out too, when they do a local gig..

Visit Badness website www.badnessaka.co.uk

All Mod Cons

All Mod Cons are a great tribute to The Jam, and come from Boston , USA. They formed in 1989 and starting touring in 1992. They pride themselves in being one of the first tribute bands, along with Bjorn Again and the Australian Doors.

They are the original and longest running Jam tribute band, and have close links with members of the Jam themselves.

I have seen this band before, when they were supporting Heart of Glass, a Blondie tribute, at the Adelphi. However, with the PA system at the Piper sounding clearer and the venue much bigger, they sounded ten times better. Also a really tight band and good performers, they went through all the hits as well as some lesser known tracks and were called back for an encore.

I didn't manage to get any pics of them so I've put some on from their website.. Visit All Mod Cons website www.allmodcons.net All in all a thoroughly enjoyable night and I'd go to see them both again.

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