ED TUDOR POLE – THE CON CLUB, LEWES 9.5.25
I’ve been following Ed Tudor Pole on social media these past few years since the good old lockdowns when the YouTube algorithm kindly sent me in the direction of those early Tenpole Tudor albums. Up until that point I must admit my only knowledge of him was his awesome stint as the host on the TV game show ‘The Crystal Maze’, something I still enjoy watching repeats of to this very day.
Upon discovering his musical origins, I was always hoping that he might come and play somewhere close to the Brighton area. I mean he has been before, but only four times in the past 20 or so years, The Prince Albert (Mar 2004), Volks (December 2008), Concorde 2 (March 2013) and most recently at the Green Door Store (September 2016), but by heck it has been a while, I would see the odd dates popping up elsewhere around the country and started to wonder if I’d ever get to see him play. However rumblings of a forthcoming autobiography were afoot, and come the 22nd April 2025, it landed ‘The Pen is Mightier’ an autobiography of a punk rocker, not only that but there were also to be various acoustic sets coupled with Q&As and book signings. Imagine my joy when a Lewes date appeared, I could not have been any quicker in securing a ticket.
Ed does not seem to be the sort of chap that sits on his laurels, just by taking a look in the back section of his book which lists his tour dates, you can see he is ever active out performing his solo shows, clocking up gigs and dates seemingly everywhere aside Sussex.
So back to Lewes, here at the mighty Con Club, (an event organised by Bristol based Death or Glory Promotions) the stage was set, the lights were low and at 8:15pm the sound engineer announced “Ladies & Gentlemen get ready for Ed Pole Tudor”, perhaps not the best start getting his name the wrong way round, but no-one seemed to notice as the crowd slowly moved from the bar into the main room.
Ed emerged from backstage screaming “Lights, lights, lights, nice to see you all here, Rome wasn’t built in a day you know”, he continued “Rhythm, if it ain’t got that swing it don’t mean a thing, you’d better F’ing believe it”.
He was dressed in his traditional and timeless costume, a hand painted shirt with the familiar regimental lions as seen on his album covers, a waist coat seemingly home stitched and repaired many times over the years, an image that has never really changed harking back to the early days of Tenpole Tudor in the 80s and quite frankly what I had hoped to see. Holding his trusty battle-scarred acoustic guitar he was then away straight into ‘Roll Over Beethoven’, a fun and lively Chuck Berry cover.
Ed with his wild eyes full of energy shouted “Get rid of that whistle, I ain’t come here to muck about, I’ve come here to give you some rhythm, something you can dance to, you know what I mean, f’ckin hell” in response to the crowd’s applause. Next came another Chuck Berry cover ‘You Can Never Tell’, this was sung with vigour as only Ed could do.
Commenting on the crowd’s applause level, which became a focal point as the evening went on Ed said “got there in the end, now you’ve gone too quiet, let’s get it up, somewhere in the middle”, he continued his chat with “Blue Mink, who’s heard of them?” he then started to tell a story, “well Malcolm McLaren….., ah no, well let’s just play it.” The song was a cover of ‘Good Morning Freedom’, the original version by Blue Mink is quite a funky tune, Ed’s rendition has a far more rock n roll vibe to it, which featured regular use of his effect pedal to give his voice an echo reverb feel.
Ed continued to engage the crowd “Thank you, this is my first time in Lewes, and jolly nice it seems so far, with the lovely hills on the horizon, although you don’t need me to describe your lovely home town, you know it better than I do. Now is anyone here from the Farming community?” Silence then some laughter came from the crowd “What’s so funny, someone’s got to work on a farm, are you saying no farm workers are a Tenpole Tudor fan? Anyway this is a Farming song”, sadly I’m not too sure what this one was called, so we’ll call it ‘The Farmer Song’, it was fun number, simple a bit like a nursery rhyme, telling the tale of a farmer and his crop, then heading out to sell it, it ended with Ed breaking off saying “he sold the f’cking lot” to a big cheer and laughter.
Ed informed us that he would take requests, to which someone shouted out ‘Who Killed Bambi’, Ed replied “Pay attention, nobody killed Bambi, have you not seen the film”, pointing his finger out into the crowd, he exclaimed “They killed his mum”, he then added we wouldn’t get on to those songs just yet.
The next song was introduced with a story about his nephew saying he had a plastic moustache toy, so Ed cheekily side-eying the crowd said “There’s got to be a song in that and it took me a long time to find it”. The song was ‘He’s Got A Moustache’, a more recent song of Ed’s from the The Tenpole Tudor Vikings 2019 album, another fun tune, far more stripped down here tonight in comparison to the rocky version found on the album. Ed was ever hopeful for some crowd participation, by mouthing the chorus, to a very lacklustre response from a far too shy crowd.
With little turnaround time between songs, Ed was racing through them, “So, Lewes a southern county, do you like it, I do…..so far, I came down here on the train, so I’m going to sing a train song, I won’t get you to sing along as English people hate been asked to join in…..especially those that live down south”. I’m not entirely sure of the songs name, we will go with ‘Riding On A Train’, another great fun track, which had Ed dancing about with his guitar, talking to the his side “Tickets please, not now madam, I’m on duty”, he ended it with “We are now arriving into Lewes station”. This was one thing I noticed during the set Ed really did put in the town and local area as much as he could, be it slipping in the odd word to songs or just the between song banter.
Next we had ‘Rock & Roll Pilgrim’ a re-working of an old English Christian hymn that uses words of John Bunah’s The Pilgrim’s Progress from 1684, a good rousing number with the sound pedal in full effect, this was another from the more recent Tenpole Tudor Vikings album.
Once again trying to elicit some energy from the crowd Ed asked “Now how are you, I can’t really see your faces, I’m sure there are some lovely people here, perhaps I’ll gaze upon you afterwards, yeah?”….silence, “Yeah?” To which I shouted yes as the cat seemed to have got the rest of the crowd’s tongues and Ed seemingly thankful for a response, replied a big “Yeeeah, thank you mate”.
A Tenpole Tudor classic ‘Throwing My Baby Out With The Bathwater’ followed, watching him perform this whilst acoustically done, Ed showed no lapsing of energy and joviality.
“Thank you everyone, any requests, you know this evening is split into two parts right? The second half will be stories, you know that right?”, a rather muted “yes” came from the crowd to which Ed head in hands joked “Well you might even like them better than the songs”.
He started the next song saying it was going to be ‘Playing On My Mind’, but stopped saying “Are you up for singing yet?”, the crowd replied with a “yes!” he joked back “You said that last time and then you wouldn’t, and I was left with egg on my face, now this is a simple song with a simple chorus which you can join in with once you hear it”, the song was one he wrote in response to being told he was not a punk up in Gateshead, he couldn’t believe it so he wrote this song in revenge, it was called ‘You’re Not A Punk’, another a great song, amusing with its shout back chorus line perhaps being a little too rude to print here. By the point he expected the audience to chant it, everyone was a little bit slow on the uptake, forcing Ed to stop, looking exasperated he exclaimed “Surely you must know the words by now, is Lewes an unintelligent area or is it just the people in this building” prompting much laughter, “Come on once more” this time everyone did chant back those 3 rude words in unison, to which Ed replied “Thank goodness, I was beginning to think you didn’t like me”, he then played the slower calmer song ‘Playing On My Mind’.
“Any requests? Have any of you actually heard of me before?” he laughed, “Well if you like any of this tell your friends”, he repeated again, “Any requests, I know you are southern and shy”, adding whilst raising his eyebrows “I’m actually Southern you know”, I and another person shouted ‘Wunderbar’, to which Ed responded, “Wunderbar, you’ve got to be joking, so you are telling me you are going to sing it full throated, like a drunken football crowd, I doubt it, that’s the only time that works, I’ll do a slow one so you can dance with somebody”, that song was ‘Slow Dance’.
On the recommendation of Dave on the merch stall chap, we were treated to a warming rendition of Eydie Gorme’s ‘Blame It On The Bossa Nova’, it was very upbeat and now the crowd were warming up we got the excellent ‘Who Killed Bambi’, the song Ed did as part of his short time with The Sex Pistols. He of course did this in full on performance mode capturing the funny voice in the way that it sung, afterwards complementing the crowd that “Those in the south sing the quiet bits really well”.
To close the set we had two legendary Tenpole Tudor stone cold classics, ‘3 Bells In A Row’ and ‘Swords Of A Thousand Men’, Ed demanded “You’d better sing along” and thankfully everyone did, it was an awesome end to the set. Clocking in 15 songs over 50 minutes, this truly was value for money.
Next followed a fifteen minute break, before Ed returned to the stage for his Q&A session, which lasted another 40 to 45 minutes. I think it would be wrong of me to go into detail here of all of what was said, Ed teased us that some of these stories were ones left out of the book and he joked (or did he!) that if we thought any of the ones actually in the book were not good enough, then to let him know so he can get them taken out for the paperback.
However as you can imagine Ed the eternal punk had plenty to say, I was unsure if he was going to be perhaps be interviewed, but he stepped down off the stage and stood amongst the crowd solo giving us a full on tale of things such as, coincidences, Santana, stolen cigarettes, Clint Eastwood, MusikLaden, acting, Kim Wilde and of course lots of tales about sex, drugs and rock n roll.
I think if you want to find out more you are going to have to go and buy his new book. I did, along with a lovely Tenpole Tudor t-shirt and I certainly am looking forward to reading it and hopefully learning more about the man himself. Ed is truly a performer, it is hard to tell if he is just playing a character or if he really is like this stage persona 24/7, he is clearly an intelligent chap, very quick witted, nothing seems to faze him.
During tonight’s performance, the Q&A and even the book signing showed no sign of waning energy or excitement from him. Boy would I love to just have a beer and sit down and chat with him. Sadly tonight was not the night as home was calling, but I do recommend going out and getting his book if you can’t make one of his shows in person. All in all, I feel super happy to have finally met and been in the presence of a punk legend.
Ed Tudor Pole setlist:
‘Roll Over Beethoven’ (Chuck Berry cover)
‘You Can Never Tell’ (Chuck Berry cover)
‘Good Morning Freedom’ (Blue Mink cover)
‘The Farmer Song’ (possibly the Good Samaritan Potato song?)
‘He’s Got A Moustache’ (Tenpole Tudor Vikings song from 2019 ‘3 Bells In A Row’ album)
‘Riding On A Train’ (?)
‘Rock & Roll Pilgrim’ (Tenpole Tudor Vikings song the 2019 ‘3 Bells In A Row’ album)
‘Throwing My Baby Out With The Bathwater’ (Tenpole Tudor song)
‘You’re Not A Punk’ (?)
‘Playing On My Mind’ (?)
‘Slow Dance’ (Tenpole Tudor Vikings song from 2019 ‘3 Bells In A Row’ album)
‘Blame It On The Bossa Nova’ (Eydie Gorme cover)
‘Who Killed Bambi’ (Sex Pistols cover)
‘3 Bells In A Row’ (Tenpole Tudor song)
‘Swords Of A Thousand Men’ (Tenpole Tudor song)
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Great review! Wish I’d been there.