Foxtrot Tour
This is a ticket for the show at Worthing Assembly Hall, Worthing, West Sussex, England on the 14th September 1972.
A rare find and one that rewrites history, Laura (from Worthing) retells the story from the perspective of herself and her longtime friend.
The ticket was 60p. It was Thursday, 14 September 1972 and we’d nicked off school to be able to hang around town before the concert.
We finally ended up outside Worthing Assembly Halls and ‘glam’ England was just starting up, as we were to see David Bowie as Ziggy at Brighton Dome 8 months later and we’d either recently stood in line for hours getting tickets or were about to. We’d become fans of The Velvet Underground just a year before in ’71 when Bowie sang Andy Warhol on his Hunky Dory Album and Bowie had toured with Genesis. Anyway, we walked to the venue and a very attractive guy came up to us both and asked if we’d got change for the red phone box outside the venue. I was trying to stay cool, without a clue who he was – he explained he needed to phone his girlfriend Jill – and I ended up giving him sixpence. He got into the call box and we both walked off cooing about the handsome fella.
Fruupp were first on stage – we were sitting on the floor, but I don’t recall much of the set really – we heard a lot of stuff like that in those days. Prog rock fantasy. Short interval then Genesis sauntered on – I’ve vague memories of Richard Macphail telling some stories as an intro. but that might have come a bit later, as Genesis’ set was very bare bones and not many roadies helping out in those days. It was at this point (I think) that we twigged we’d met the lead singer outside the venue as Peter had a noticeable shaved patch which we’d thought was amazing.
I can remember clearly the opening song was Watching of the Skies – we were sitting on the wooden floor and the d-d-d-d-d-dut-dut was racing through through us – sort of rattling the floor. Then BAM, lights on a phone box Pete standing in front of us in full makeup, arms crossed, looking like something from an Egyptian tomb – all in black and scary! It was the Foxtrot tour, so I’m guessing they did most of the album – it was ALL new to us, we’d never heard any of their stuff prior to that gig. I’ve a feeling they did Visions of Angels as I loved that and purchased the album on retrospect shortly after the gig, along with Nursery Crymes and Foxtrot itself.
(An exceptional thank you to Laura from Worthing for this ticket and story)
