Sounds Like The Pests

A long long time ago, I had some friends in a punk band, and I spent many drunken hours seeing them, and many others, play live.

The Pests, Wasteland, Los Bastardos, Panixsphere, The Senseless Things, The Cardiacs.... and lots more.

We saw them at pubs like the Red Lion in Teddington (since gentrified more than once and full of PSA mums), the Red Lion in Twickenham (once owned by my friends parents and now a Tesco Metro). Also the long gone Clarendon and The Greyhound, and tons of other stinky venues that I've long forgotten.

They also all played at The Ailsa in St Margaret's - still there - which was where I saw Sounds Like The Pests, an amalgamation of a couple of the bands, playing a load of the old songs.

It was a really fun night; hearing the old songs, seeing a load of old faces I haven't seen in years.

It was so much like old times that I even left my bedroom looking like a bombsite, I forgot my house key, left my hair straighteners plugged in, went on the bus with six mates, drank pints and made a drunken midnight phone call asking, 'can someone come and pick us up, pleeeese?'

This post makes me sound about a hundred. I am, fact fans, a sprightly forty-four.