OK a show you shouldn’t miss if you’re in the Hague or Amsterdam 24/25 February. The Zips and Helmettes Here’s the press release which puts it better than I can!
OK a show you shouldn’t miss if you’re in the Hague or Amsterdam 24/25 February. The Zips and Helmettes Here’s the press release which puts it better than I can!
Two legendary punk bands will play side by side in Maloe Melo, Amsterdam (Friday 24 February) and De Vinger, The Hague (Saturday 25 February). Scottish band The Zips
(founded in 1978) will perform in The Netherlands for the very first time. Pioneering Dutch punk act Helmettes will do two exclusive shows with a full-band line-up.
The Zips were a popular band in the Glaswegian punk scene of the late seventies. Their socio-political message and melodic guitar songs placed the band led by front man Jonzip McNeill firmly in the tradition of The Clash. Because punk bands were banned in Glasgow in 1977, an injunction kept in place until well into 1978, The Zips chose to play pop songs in pubs under assumed names like Magic Moments. The money they earned doing this was used to release punk singles on their own label. ‘The Zips EP’
(1979) with catchy songs like ‘Take Me Down’ and ‘Don’t Be Pushed Around’ was played regularly by John Peel in his legendary radio show. Today, the EP is a true collector’s item. Magazine Record Collector ranked the EP at number 37 in their top 100 of most collectible punk records.
After the punk storm died down, The Zips quit in 1981. It wasn’t until the noughties that McNeill decided to resurrect his band, initially to counter the bootleg-production of their old singles. The Zips are now more active then ever before. After releasing five EPs on their own label Tenement Toons, they issued – 27 years after the release of their first single – debut album ‘Guitars4Hire’ in September 2006. Follow-up ’19 Forevva’ was released in the autumn of 2011 and was met with enthusiastic write-ups from the critics. Anti-warsongs like ‘Angerland’, ‘Stop The War’ and ‘(Straight To) Helmand’ – a nod to ‘Straight To Hell’ by The Clash – indicate what The Zips stand for. Decades after their debut single their melodic punk songs and intense live shows are more convincing than ever.
Helmettes started as a one-off collaboration between members of punk bands God’s Heart Attack and the Softies, with then fifteen-year-old Joris Pelgrom as vocalist. Their single ‘1/2 2/ I Don’t Care What The People Say’, released by the No Fun label in 1978 and produced by Mecano front man Dirk Polak, became a true Dutch punk classic. This single too, is nowadays an unaffordable collector’s item. In 2003, Helmettes were invited to perform live in television series Jiskefet. Since then, guitarist Pieter Kooijman (God’s Heart Attack/ Mecano) and singer Joris Pelgrom have performed together irregularly. Especially for the shows with The Zips, they brought together a complete band, with the one and only Max Franken (Minimal Compact/ Githead) on drums and eighteen-year-old bass player Lieselot Elzinga.
Friday 24 February/ Maloe Melo, Amsterdam
Doors: 21:00/ Start: 21:30
Entrance: €5
Saturday 25 February / Café de Vinger, Den Haag
Doors: 20:00/ Start: 21:00
Entrance: €5
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