PETER & THE TEST TUBE BABIES + THE FISH BROTHERS – THE PRINCE ALBERT, BRIGHTON 4.2.22
Each year after the Christmas festivities and before New Year celebrations there has always been a lull in proceedings on the music front. The only pre-covid decent punk bash’s have been put on by those ‘Peacehaven Wild Kids’ Peter And The Test Tube Babies with their annual Christmas residency at The Prince Albert in Brighton. This great pub/venue is located literally a stone’s throw from Brighton train station, which makes it a very viable stop off for out of towners who fancy a bit of punk rock!
Covid got a hold of their December 2021 gig plans and they added a second night due to demand too. Thus they were ceremoniously moved forward to this evening and tomorrow night and so became ‘The Test Tubes Babies’ first gigs of 2022.
Peter And The Test Tube Babies (or Test Tubes for short!) need little or no introduction to the punk fraternity, but here is a quick lowdown for the uninitiated. They are a Brighton punk band who were originally formed by a couple of ‘Peacehaven Wild Kids’, by the name of Peter Bywaters and Derek ‘Strangefish’ Greening, in the grand old year of 1978. After completing a Peel session, their first recorded release was to be featured on the legendary ‘Vaultage 78’ compilation album, which was a showcase of local punk talent at the time. Since then, they’ve released at least 15 albums with the last one being 2020’s ‘FUCTIFANO’ which was released by Arising Empire Records on 6th March of that year. This followed on from the highly acclaimed ‘That Shallot’ album from 2017. The debut was the legendary ‘P*ssed and Proud’ live recordings platter that was originally released in 1982 on No Future Records. It was recorded at three venues Hammersmith, Wood Green, and Brighton during the August bank holiday of 1982.
Down the years, the band’s lineup has rotated slightly, having at least nine or possibly ten former members, – whatever happened to Trapper? – but the mainstay has always been frontman Peter Bywaters on vocals with Derek “Strangefish” Greening on guitar. Tonight at The Prince Albert they are still on the case and are accompanied by Sam Fuller on drums and instead of Nick Abnett on bass, we have Aggro (or is it Agro) instead! Not sure if this is permanent or not?
They performed a 67 minute set that commenced at 9:57pm and ended at 11:04pm. Prior to them taking to the stage, there were no classic punk records to fire up the mixed age crowd to get them in the mood for what was about to hit them and to be honest it was feeling rather flat – no actually make that very flat – prior to the bands entry. The place just didn’t have the vibe! This is most unusual as I have seen ‘The Test Tubes’ more than any other punk band down the years and this hasn’t previously been the case.
They as usual kicked off with firm fan favourites the classic ‘Moped Lads’ and then launched into ‘Run Like Hell’ and ‘Jinx!’. Since I last saw them just over two years ago, Peter’s midriff has undergone further expansion, clearly it’s Merrydown twins and Del was sporting a new-look shaved side of head look, although he was still using his trusty old Gibson Les Paul guitar and Sam was the same sat behind his Mapex drums. Aggro was in charge of a Marcus Miller bass for this evening.
‘Never Made It’ was up next and was followed by the first of two Facebook loving tunes (sic), that being ‘Facebook Loser’ and the second followed eight numbers later in the form of ‘U Bore Me’.
‘Every Second Counts’ and ‘My Unlucky Day’ came and went and were followed by the essential set including ‘In Yer Face’ and ‘Up Yer Bum’, which saw fractions of the crowd liven up a tad. The drinks were starting to kick in then!
As you would expect, Sam’s drumming on the ‘Spirit Of Keith Moon’ was rather decent. In fact it was all night. After a few more tracks we were served ‘Maniac’ which for tonight was surprisingly the pick of the bunch for more. It’s always amusing watching Peter’s face during this tune as he throws so much expression into it – a photographer’s dream!
As usual, local punk and Test Tubes mascot ‘Smelly’ was in attendance tonight, doing his best to disrupt proceedings in his own annoying way. It’s the same every time. Maybe he should refer to Side A track 5 of The Smiths ‘Meat Is Murder’ album from 1985.
‘Banned From The Pubs’ arrived and the moshpit got going without a covid care in the world. This was followed by ‘Blown Out Again’ which was rather good indeed and according to the setlist that was it. But no, we had two encore tracks, the Attrix Records classic ‘Elvis Is Dead’ and the decent ‘September’.
Tonight, I clocked up yet another Test Tube performance, surely it must be up to around 30 times by now, but this evening to be honest was far from the best. It felt very much like going through the motions, especially from the crowd. They do it all again tomorrow too! Purchase your tickets from that concert HERE.
Peter And The Test Tube Babies setlist:
‘Moped Lads’
‘Run Like Hell’
‘Jinx!’
‘Never Made It’
‘Facebook Loser’
‘Every Second Counts’
‘My Unlucky Day’
‘In Yer Face’
‘Up Yer Bum’
‘Spirit Of Keith Moon’
‘None Of Your F*cking Business’
‘Keys To The City’
‘U Bore Me’
‘Shake My World’
‘Maniac’
‘Banned From The Pubs’
‘Blown Out Again’
(encore)
‘Elvis Is Dead’
‘September’
Official website: www.testtubebabies.co.uk
Support this evening came from the Fish Brothers who as you would expect are neither fish or brothers! This was not my first encounter with them and I knew what was coming and thus at 8:37pm they commenced their ‘Carry On Comedy Punk’ set for 36 minutes until 9:13pm. Support tomorrow night will be Penny Blood.
