In the company of my MU colleague Emily Iona Stewart, I visited The Forum in Tunbridge Wells to enjoy a grassroots performance featuring the Wilko Johnson Band, with the awesome Norman Watt-Roy on bass and excellent Dylan Howe on drums.
You can catch a glimpse of the gig on YouTube. As guitarist and founding member of the legendary Dr Feelgood, Wilko took his initial inspiration from Mick Green of The Pirates and in turn he proved a huge influence on the punk-era rhythm guitarists such as Joe Strummer.
The Feelgood’s series of albums in the mid 1970s not only made waves in Britain, but their 1976 breakthrough live album, Stupidity, reached reached No.1 in the official UK album chart and influenced many in the New York punk scene at the time. Wilko left the group in 1977 and later became a latter-day Blockhead alongside Norman in Ian Dury’s fantastic line-up. To catch the full story of the Feelgoods, I can highly recommend Julian Temple’s feature-length documentary Oil City Confidential.
