Gordon Giltrap free gig; GeogAss festivities… & lectures!

Friday, 20th. February 1976

One of the best guitarists around – then and now – is Gordon Giltrap. Seeing him for free – to promote the new album ‘Visionary’ – was a a real treat. The new album was something of a departure from the complex folk tunes he was known for up to that point. He was drifting into rock, and even prog-rock.

Earlier in his career he was managed by Miles Copeland, who also managed Wishbone Ash, one of my favourite bands in the early 1970’s. Later in 1976 I was to see him again – supporting Wishbone Ash on their tour.

This was a day of interesting and enjoyable lectures, some of which are prescient 50 years later. For example, before Giltrap I was in a Geomorphology lecture on sea-level change, which would prove useful when I came to my M.Sc. course in 2002 on Climate Change. The following Soil Science lecture was also interesting and, once again useful for my 2002 studies – soil being one of nature’s critical ‘free’ services that we are, sadly, eroding right now – at the risk of future food security.

This evening was the GeogAss dance. GeogAss was the Geography Association, and we had a reputation to live up to! Of all the clubs and societies at the LSE GeogAss threw the best parties, with good music and wall-to-wall real ale. They were also the best attended, but my diary records a ‘disappointing’ turnout of only ‘100 or so people’. Sounds okay to me. The 50p ticket included a disco and a band – tonight the unpromising-sounding Country Vince. I have no memory of the band but my diary records them as being ‘not bad’.

Apart from the 50p GeogAss ticket I spent £1.20 on beer, which would have been quite a few pints, and 17p on lunch. Interestingly I paid £8 in rent, which I suspect may have been for the month. At the time I shared a flat with two others, so that sounds about right!