The Poppies were a band who were phenomenal live. Don’t get me wrong, they were also great on the stereo and definitely kicked ass on the dancefloors too… but live they were… just, wow. No, not wow… WOW!

They were one of the first bands to experiment properly with the connection of indie rock and dance music. Pioneers that were ahead of themselves, but opened the floodgates for bands like The Prodigy a few years later. They still managed to have a string of Top 50 hits through, with their 1993 “Get The Girl! Kill The Baddies!” getting as high as #9 in the UK Charts. They’d been around since the mid/late 80’s but this was the first time I’d managed to see them live in concert.

They were supported by The Atom Seeds, who were pretty good, but the crowd of us who’d descended on Brixton really only had the Poppies in our minds.

…and they really didn’t disappoint.

Clint Mansell, who I always felt made the Poppies the band they were, was fantastic. I was upset when the band eventually broke up in 1996 and Clint vanished off to America and became a very successful, and in-demand, soundtrack composer (Pi, Requiem for a Dream, The Fountain, Smokin’ Aces, Moon, Black Swan, Mass Effect 3, are just a few among his credits) but I did get to relive the PWEI live experience again in 2005 when the band, including Clint, got together for a handful of shows in the UK and were, as before, still phenomenal live 🙂