This was another local gig with bands that some friends were in. Laughterland were pretty good fun, Dreadheads on this occasion were ok but nothing special.

One of the nice things about Barnet in the late 80’s/early 90’s is that we had two very good ‘alternative/student’ pub pretty much opposite each other at the end of the High Street. The Moon Under Water – a standard Weatehrspoons pub (aka cheap drinks, decent food, no music) – and The Green Man. The Green Man had a fantastic jukebox which the landlord actually took suggestions from us all about what to put on there, so it was full of metal, indie, punk, goth, and a range of alternative bands that you’d rarely ever see on a pub jukebox. He knew his clientele and things like getting Fields of the Nephilim and Pop Will Eat Itself on the jukebox meant he had a very loyal clientele. The Green Man also had several pool tables upstairs (where the jukebox was).

Between the two pubs you pretty much catered for most of the alternative crowd in the area and they both hosted many fantastic evenings – either in their own right or as a warm-up for going clubbing to out partying after the pubs closed at 11pm (as they did back then….). A number of the crowd were in bands, or DJ’d various clubs. It was a nice little social bubble. The police generally didn’t stop by as neither of the pubs ever had any trouble, whereas you’d pretty much have police vans parked outside the pubs further along the High Street due to drunken fights breaking out pretty much every Friday/Saturday night at the aptly nicknamed Bat & Flickknife or The Red Lion, which both catered for a more ‘casual’ crowd. I think the only times we saw police at ‘our’ end of the High Street was either checking for underage drinkers or drugs.

Anyway, I can’t really remember much about this gig – it was in a pub and lots of my mates were there – what can I say! ;p