The Toy Dolls - Sept 22 Growing up in the North East in the Eighties, you couldn’t avoid The Toy Dolls – they were the first band to play on the legendary Tube TV show (She Goes to Fino’s) and when a reissued ‘Nellie the Elephant’ was in the UK Top 5 they were everywhere. As a complete antithesis to the increasingly politically charged punk bands of the period, they produced quirky fun punk rock that you couldn’t help but cock a smile at.

Tonight was part of the much delayed 40^th anniversary tour and was an opportunity to celebrate the songs and fun spirit that have kept this most enjoyable of bands on the road for so long.

First up are the equally legendary UK Subs. Charlie Harper may be close to eighty now, but there is little showing it. Joined by long time bass player, Alvin Gibbs, the band play a set stuffed with old favourites such as ‘Stranglehold’, ‘Emotional Blackmail’, ‘Riot’ and of course ‘Warhead’. Charlie may have plans to retire in the next few years, but on this showing, there’s still plenty of energy left in the band.  

Cheers go up as the famous Toy Dolls face backdrop comes down and we know it won’t be long. The lights go up (there’s no playing in moody darkness for the Dolls) and the band bound on for a raucous ‘Fiery Jack’. Resplendent in their red jackets, tartan trousers, green and orange hair, plus trademark sunglasses, the band have already put more colour in the set than most of the bands I’ve seen this year.  

The emphasis is on fun with the crowd bouncing around with wild abandonment (but being careful not to do an injury to those aging bodies!) It won’t be long before the perennial crowd surfers start to outnumber the security at the front of the stage. The band are as energetic as always with Olga and Tommy leaping into the air frequently and running around the stage in unison. This was one occasion that I wish I’d been in the pit with the other photographers.

The jackets and ties come off after ‘Cloughy is a Bootboy’ and we go into a frantic ‘Bitten by a Bedbug’.  Tune after tune follows with a welcome inclusion of ‘I’ve Got Asthma’. Olga’s shirt comes off and you begin to wonder if he has a picture in his attic – he looks no different then he did forty years ago. For ‘The Lambrusco Kid’, Olga is given a number of bottle sizes before finally settling on a six foot inflatable bottle which he rides and fires out confetti into the crowd. ‘Nellie the Elephant’ comes up next and the entire of the stalls seems to be moving. Amazing what a punk rock version of a children’s classic can do. The same applies to Johann Sebastian Bach and the band’s version of ‘Toccata in D Minor’.

The home run sees the band going through ‘Alec’s Gone’, ‘Harry Cross (a tribute for Edna)’ and a cover of the Surfaris ‘Wipe Out’. The spinning guitars are back for ‘Wipe Out’ and it is a fun effect. For the encore, Olga is back with another fun prop, the old triple necked guitar and the band launch into ‘Dig that Groove Baby’ from the debut album. ‘When the Saints Go Marching In’ is followed by ‘Glenda and the Test Tube Baby’ before the show is finished with a rousing ’Idle Gossip’.

The hot and very sweaty crowd disperses having been suitably entertained by the band. This was one of the most enjoyable gigs (visually and musically) I have been to in a while (and I have seen a lot this year). Here’s to the band playing for many more years to come.

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