Chapter 6

The four of us wandered slowly over to the Union just after eight o'clock; we had learned from experience not to turn up too early to a concert. The bands were never on stage before nine, often later, and drinking too much beer while waiting for them to appear meant that you were queuing for the loos during the concert itself.

Steeleye Span had no warm up act, so some of their earlier recorded work was playing on the speakers. It was a much less imposing stage set-up than for Pink Floyd, but then the whole idea of folk music was to be more accessible to the audience.

The Great Hall was about half full as we showed our tickets at the door and had our hands stamped to allow readmission; the audience seemed to be mainly freshers, judging by the young and excited faces, mostly in small same-sex groups of housemates and flatmates. The pairing up into boyfriend / girlfriend couples was yet to come.

Sian and Malcolm bumped into each other at the bar almost as soon as we arrived; they were soon chatting away and discussing the music.

Julie and I smiled at each other as the two of them drifted over towards the back wall. That part of the plan still seemed to be working okay. They had become friends and now seemed genuinely pleased to see each other, and I hoped that they would move on to be very good friends, and hopefully, lovers.

Their 'date' to go walking together in the Black Mountains the next weekend was another good sign; a shared interest for the two of them to do together.

We finished the first beer, and decided to wait for a while before getting another, as it looked like the band were about to come on stage. The hall was now quite crowded; I had been correct in anticipating a full house for the first concert of the year.

I could see a few of the freshers taking advantage of their new-found freedom to buy alcohol; they were unlikely to make it to the end of the concert at the rate they were trying to tip it down their throats. Mind you, I had been that silly a year earlier, having spent a while talking to God on the Great White Telephone, as my system purged itself of the Lager and Blackcurrant I had consumed.

The roadies finally finished messing about with the amps and the speakers, and Steeleye Span appeared on stage. They were greeted with enthusiastic applause.

There were five of them in the band at the time; Maddy Prior of course as the lead vocalist, and not actually the one with the longest hair. A couple of the guys had amazing moustaches; the bass player (Rick Kemp) wore a hat, and Maddy's flowing gown was composed of several layers of different shades of yellows. Although they were billed as 'Electric Folk', it almost looked more hippy than that.

The concert was good; obviously nothing like as dramatic as the Pink Floyd one for the Summer Ball, which my sister Jen had so enjoyed, but there was a great atmosphere, and it was much easier to feel part of the performance, rather than just be part of the audience, which had been the case with Pink Floyd. It was also nothing like as loud!

From the excited looks on their faces lot of the freshers were clearly experiencing their first ever concert, and I remembered warning Adrian and Sheila about the dangers of drinking 'Snakebite'. Presumably it was the Bristol Freshers Ball that night as well?

That, of course, then got me thinking, and worrying about, Jen, knowing that she was probably attending her own Freshers Ball in Reading, and wondering if she was being chatted up at this very moment. At least she had the Pink Floyd concert under her belt, and was not going to be so hyped up by the excitement of seeing a well-known band perform live that she would make a fool of herself.

Listening to the lyrics of 'The Weaver and the Factory Maid', I was tormented by the lines describing the weaver seeing the girl's two white breasts, and part of me hoped that no long-haired layabout would be mauling my kid sisters boobs that night.

Those thoughts were not helpful; I tried to pull myself together, and when the band took a break, I took Julie into a relatively quiet corner and explained my fears.

"You've got to let her live her life, darling, you can't protect her any more than you have already. She's a big girl, and you've warned her of the dangers - she's a lot more aware of them than I ever was!"

"I just feel that she would have been fine, but because I've arranged for her to find out that she really enjoys sex, she's now vulnerable because she'd like to have sex again!"

"I think you are doing her a disservice - yes, I'm sure that she would love to have sex again, but she's going to be careful and only do it when she feels safe. She's not going to fall for one of these smarmy Casanovas, she's got far too much about her for that."

I felt a little bit better, but not much. There was quite a bit of pond life about in the Great Hall tonight. I saw one of them approach Vee, who was standing on her own, and then depart quickly, as she clearly told him she wasn't interested.

Vee then came over to us.

"Did he try to make you an offer you couldn't refuse?"

She recognised my reference to 'The Godfather' immediately, and smiled.

"Yes, slimy git, he thought I was a fresher! I said that I only went with men with ten-inch dicks, and he backed off pretty quick."

I hoped that Jen would have a similar rude retort ready when she was accosted!

The band came back from their break, and started off with 'Hares on a Mountain', which had a great rhythm and we were soon dancing about. Then, as the bar was fairly clear, I bought a pint of bitter lemon top for Julie and I to share. It actually had more than a trace of lemonade in it; I would have said it was closer to shandy, but it was refreshing, and satisfied our thirst more than a pint of bitter would have done.

Vee was now chatting to a couple of young lads, and Sian and Malcolm were trying to talk above the hubbub, their heads close together. Julie and I moved closer to the stage so that we could hear more of the music unamplified; it sounded more like traditional folk music when you could hear the individual voices. Then of course they sang 'Alison Gross', with its heavy use of electric guitar chords, and we were back in the 1970's with a bump.

They finished with 'One Misty Moisty Morning', and then did 'Gaudete' from their previous album, 'Below The Salt', as an encore. They sang it pretty much a capella; a tribute to their vocal stamina that they were able to hold the notes so well at the end of the concert. They got a lot of very well-deserved applause.

We decided to head for home; Vee was still talking to the two freshers, and signalled that she'd be back later. Sian and Malcolm came over to join us, and we made our way to the back door, negotiating the odd puddle of spilled beer and a couple of broken glasses on our way. The steps down to the road were a little more difficult to manage; there were a few puddles of vomit, and several groups of people sitting together while the fresh air cleared their heads.

There would be some suffering in the morning - it looked to me as if many of the freshers had never had a hangover, or certainly nothing to match the one they were going to have. If they had known what it would be like, they wouldn't have been knocking back the drinks in the way they had.

Malcolm refused our invitation to come back for a cuppa on the grounds of wanting to get to bed, but he kissed Sian good night and said that he might pop over on the Sunday afternoon once he'd done his weekly wash at the launderette. Vee hadn't caught us up by the time we got back to the flat, so we put the kettle on, and chatted for a while before going to bed ourselves.

As expected, Julie and I slept late that Sunday morning; we had sat up over a pot of tea with Sian for a short while after coming home, and then had slowly made love until gone three in the morning.

Julie had reassured me after my earlier wobble worrying about Jen; she thought that the sight of so many innocent young fresher faces had started it off. I felt foolish; of course I knew that my sister was made of sterner stuff than some of the youngsters I had observed earlier. Jen would be fine.