To prove what life is all about

I guess it was 1979, I was on my holiday study/vacation, spending monotonous time in Torquay, attending english language courses all day long. Fortunately, we could go out in the evening and it was really wonderful for teenagers like us talking a walk downtown, going to discover record shops with vinyl & goodies we never saw in italy. Punk rock was all around but apart for some mohicans in the central square, I didn't know much about it. There was some kind of agitation that summer there because the Stiff Little Fingers were going to play soon in town and it was a real event there. Still I dunno how it could happen but me, a 14 years old spotty italian kid, well I was there in that venue that night and it was exactly just as a punk gig should be; no seating, walls painted dark, the whole place smelling of sweat, beer and cigarettes and a lot of terrible people (a lot of skins that i never saw before!) jumping around and screaming and fighting. That gig can´t be compared to any other I have been to and it changed my life! It was a mix of joy and terror, the second more than the first, but I discovered a new world made of dirty leather jackets, exploding guitars and, of course, Stiff Little Fingers! They were too great for me & I gotta say now that theirs is simply the definiton of music I wanna hear forever... The Fingers' approach to the punk music was surely powerful, but limited; what distinguishes them was their incredible sound. The song structures were sophisticated and the band played like punks, which means without a lot of skill but with a lot of spirit. They weren't faking it. They had meaning, and a message too. Years later, they also refused to keep forcing themselves of the punk straightjacket of their early music, but tried hard to evolve as a band. Unfortunately they couldn't... Fantastic songs anyway that was linked to their Northern Irish origins and the politics of the time. My mum used to hate them when coming back in Italy, I used to play Hanx at full volume in my room with a tennis racket in my arms as a guitar. I've been Jack Burns so many times from that night in Torquay...fucking happy days folks...