Concert T-Shirt
I didn’t go to a rock concert until I was a freshman, I think, at Hofstra. My floormates Lori and Sharon were aghast that I had never been to a concert. I also had never smoked pot. I still haven’t smoked pot, but I have been to a fair share of concerts.
Mod two-tone, eh?
My first concert was The Police during the Ghost In the Machine tour, in Spring 1982. This also marked me first buying cassettes.
Anyway, I don’t know where that Police shirt is. But my next show was the “final” Squeeze concert, also at Nassau Colliseum, where I went to see the Police. It was the week of Thanksgiving 1982 and it was their final show.
Except it wasn’t. By the time the concert started, it turned out there was another show the next night, AND, another show at some festival in Jamaica that weekend.
And then the group reformed in 1985 and I went to that concert also.
Last orders indeed. 28 year later, the group is still touring!
The funny thing about this final Squeeze concert was that the opening act was the English Beat. And opening for the English Beat was REM. Of course, back then, I had very little idea of the English Beat until the broke up shortly thereafter. And REM had that one mumbing hit in “Radio Free Europe.” I don’t even think they had an album yet.
The whole night was triumph for IRS and A&M Records. I went with my friend Ann, and maybe Mary, and a group behind us complained about REM. Then they complained about the English Beat, too. And then they complained about Squeeze. We wondered why they bothered to come. Especially the young couple that made out through all three acts.
And that is the story behind this collectible but probably not valuable t-shirt.