Bombsite Fanzine 1977; 999 live at Eric's

Photo 999 Eric's Liverpool

Saturday September 17th Eric's Liverpool;

In 1976 Nick Cash, Guy Days, Jon Watson and Pablo LaBritain started to play together. The first gig together was January 1st 1977 and their band was called The Dials. Soon they changed their name to 48 Hours, after that The Fanatics, and then in May 1977 they became 999. By July they were in the studio recording their first single "I'm Alive". The single was released in August and all 10000 copies were sold within a few weeks. The Bombsite also references the United Artist signing that occurred on Wednesday October 26th, and then the release of their brilliant punk classic "Nasty Nasty" that also occurred during October .


Above clip from Bombsite issue 5 - click to enlarge
During 1977 we watched 999 play on a few different occasions. They were always colorful energetic and full of action. Nick Cash entered into the punk movement through a a similar routing as Joe Strummer, whom had been a London squatter and played with the pub rock band the 101'ers. Kieth Lucas [later Nick Cash] had worked the pub circuit along with Ian Drury in "Kilburn and the High Roads" and were regulars at the Hope and Anchor in Islington. The London pub rock scene predated the punk movement and was an early signal of a rebellious change ready to kick the powerful progressive rock bands in the bollocks. Other pub rockers from the mid 70's included Dr Feelgood, Elvis Costello, Eddie and the Hot Rods, Wreckless Eric, The Stranglers and others. The economy was grinding to a halt and then someone lit the bomb and punk rock blew out of the city like a guitar crunching freight train.
Below; Kieth Lucas and Ian Dury in pub rock band "Kilburn and the High Road"

We shared a table in the Grapes before the show with Nick and Guy and spent the time talking about the UK music scene over a pint. After the show, we rode in a cab and Nick dropped us off in a derelict part of town. A lot of Liverpool was like that back then, vast areas where terraced homes or tower blocks once stood now a pile of rubble. We made our way across the wasteland toward a record store in Birkenhead where we planned to sell or give away some more fanzines. During the cab ride we gave Nick Cash a copy of Bombsite issue 2. The copy would reappear 30 years later as part of Dizzy's collection at Detour Records.
This performance at Eric's is interesting because there is little record of the event and few people attended the show.

The following are release dates of 999's early work

I'm Alive / Quite Disappointing (Labritain LAB-999) 9/1977
Nasty Nasty / No Pity (United Artists UP-36299) 10/1977
Emergency / My Street Stinks (Untied Artists UP-36399) 1/1978
Below; Nick Cash and 999 Emergency