Ruth PO!

Dress made from an old bed sheet; coat and jumper - mum's from the 1960s.  Hanging out in Newark Cemetery. After my three years 1979 - 1982 in Sheffield, where I was only in bedroom-style bands, I moved to Leicester. The reason was to do a PhD in the Communication of Science using new Information Technology. In fact, with a colleague, I published the first ever academic paper on data downloading. It was a mystery subject back then in 1981 and my research found that hardly anyone downloaded anything, let alone knew what the word meant. http://jis.sagepub.com/content/8/1/7.abstract The Soviets: Simon, Richard, Ruth, Andy I lived in a succession of bedsits, and was desperate to join a band. Before too long, I met other postgraduate students who shared my musical tastes and politics. Andy, Simon and I formed The Soviets - an overtly left wing political combo. We did have different bass players: Martin and Neil but they were less involved with the...

For 3 years after leaving The Devices and going to Sheffield Polytechnic in 1979, I did not play any gigs. Mind you, I went to plenty. It was a great time to be in Sheffield; my first few weeks included going to see Siouxsie and the Banshees, Echo and the Bunnymen, Orchestral Manoevres in the Dark, the Dead Kennedys, and The Human League at Doncaster Rotters club. I had chosen Sheffield for its music; my aim was to see Cabaret Voltaire, which I did - at the fantastic Psalter Lane Art School - supported by Clock DVA. My three years as a student were a rich musical banquet. I revelled in the fact that you could go out to the Limit Club and see Martyn Fry of ABC or Phil Oakey of the Human League out having a good time, and sometimes they'd say 'hi' to you. Pulp's Jarvis Cocker was a well-known guy around town; often to be seen in the pub which had hundreds of tea pots around the ceiling. Does that still exist? After a night out, the 2.30am late bus...