CityLife

The Stranglers

THE only good thing ever to come out of Guildford, The Stranglers showed they can still prowl the stage and pound out the menace just like they did 30-odd years ago.

Still three-quarters intact – only Hugh Cornwell has taken his garrote elsewhere – the group that coined the soubriquet Men in Black long before Will Smith was even out of nappies, pumped up the adrenaline for the Academy’s audience of ageing punks.

Are The Stranglers punk, post-punk or punk pretenders?

No one gives a fig anymore because they outlived all that ephemeral pigeonholing with classics such as Golden Brown, Duchess, Grip, Peaches, Walk On By, Always The Sun and Strange Little Girl, all of which got another airing on Friday.

But it wasn’t until Hanging Around that The Stranglers managed to really reach full throttle and incite some genuine retro pogoing at the front.

The band’s major flaw has always been the duopoly of lead guitarist and bass guitarist with no real front man, but non-original member Baz Warne took on the role of spokesman – mostly involving references to "effing Friday night” - leaving Jean-Jacques Burnel strangely schtum.

Any band, though, that can still sing about Sancho Panza and Leon Trotsky with such visceral intensity, as they did in the tumultuous encore of No More Heroes, can afford to let the music do most of the talking.

And for me, it was a wonderful, nostalgic reminder of the last time I saw them 31 years ago at my freshers’ ball at Plymouth University.

What did you think of the show? Have your say.

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