Coming straight from their Rebellion festival appearances, The Queers and Handsome Dick Manitoba performed rare London sets. The Queers, headed by frontman ‘Joe Queer’ King, played in majority from their 1993 second studio album, ‘Love Songs for the Retarded’, originally recorded by the band’s classic lineup of King, bassist Chris “B-Face” Barnard and drummer Hugh O’Neill. The tracks were non-stop generic hardcore but which pioneered the pop-punk genre.
Headliner, Handsome Dick Manitoba, who liking to talk, told tales of his time as the roadie and occasional singer of NYC proto-punk band, The Dictators, alongside Andy Shernoff, Ross Friedman, Scott Kempner and drummer Stu Boy King, recording on all of the band’s albums. In what turned out to be a fantastic lively rock ‘n’ roll set, Manitoba performed covers from their back catalogue with their ‘Go Girl Crazy!’ debut album tracks ‘The Next Big Thing’ and ‘Two Tub Man’ and others such as ‘Stay with Me’ alongside his own 2019 solo material, ‘Born in the Bronx’, with the biographical ‘Magenta Street’. The band also did some of the covers featured on Dictators albums such as The Flamin’ Groovies’ ‘Slow Death’, Iggy and The Stooges’ ‘Search and Destroy’ and MC5’s ‘Kick Out the Jams’, the latter of which he paid tribute to the late Wayne Kramer but which was unfortunately cut short after he stormed off stage due to confusion about curfew.
02/08/24: Handsome Dick Manitoba + The Queers @ The Underworld, London.
Photos © Ayisha Khan.
© Ayisha Khan.