1 April 1999 and I’ve just finished a rehearsal, quite early on in the schedule, for One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest which will be staged at the Minack Theatre in 2 months time. Rehearsals are in a village called Madron, just past Penzance. It’s 45 minutes to get home to Falmouth and John Peel’s show is turned on the minute I start the drive back. Best of all, I’m leaving early enough to catch the very start of the show, although given that I won’t continue listening to it when I get into the house, I can’t think why it matters. Things are a little different tonight, the show is forming part of a four hour double bill with Lamacq Live as part of Radio 1’s week of Live in London shows - it’s nice to know the poor loves were being catered for.
Peel’s show, which is being broadcast from The Improv Theatre will later showcase a live set from Echo and the Bunnymen and Ian McCulloch and friends have their work cut out for themselves, because PJ Harvey is opening the show, accompanied by John Parish. I’m thrilled about this as I begin the drive back, but although Polly Jean announces her set as “wheeling out all the old faves tonight, in case you hadn’t noticed”, she’s caught out latecomers to her party like myself who only came in on To Bring You My Love by opening with a trio of songs from Dry and Rid of Me. I recover my bearings as she goes into Angelene and C’Mon Billy from Is This Desire? and To Bring You My Love. 50ft Queenie is a vague memory from when I had first heard her name, but hadn’t been interested enough to get involved in those scuzzy 1993 days. And then comes the standout performance of the night, the title track of Rid of Me which seems to pull all of Polly Jean’s personalities together at once: the needy pleader, unable let go of what she most desires, the dangerous hydra swooping down to suffocate her feckless love (“Don’t you wish you’d/never met her”) and then most staggeringly and frightening, the insatiable sex fiend - bellowing out in echo drenched ferocity to her paramour “Lick my legs and I’m on fire/Lick my legs and I’m desire” and on it goes until the music drops away and all that’s left is Polly Jean in full-on banshee mode demanding that the lover who struck for freedom get down on their knees and service her “injuries” and give thanks to his bad luck. When she stops singing, the audience reaction is an explosive release of delight, appreciation - all simultaneously shooting their loads like a football crowd celebrating a 96th minute winner. I know everything else that’s performed in the rest of the set, but that performance of Rid of Me overshadows it all. Peel, stuck in a radio van at the back of the venue references the astonishing audience reaction with pride and wonderment in his voice. He perceptively remarks that Polly Jean seems to be bringing multiple voices out of herself when she performs, and that this all serves to heighten her brilliance.
By 1999, Rid of Me was an acknowledged jewel in Harvey’s catalogue, but I’m pretty sure that its first radio performance comes seven years and, for me, umpteen shows earlier. Peel had spent most of his show on 1/5/92 trailing a mystery guest for that evening’s show and in the last hour, Polly Jean turned up, sans her band mates, to perform two tracks. Opening with a cover of Bob Dylan’s Highway 61 Revisited, she went at in the only way she knew how - full bore, but the end result left her glumly complaining that she couldn’t hear what she was singing. After a break for another record, she was back again to perform Rid of Me, which even in the embryonic form presented here demonstrated that whatever Polly Jean did next, it would be rawer and more jagged than anything done on Dry. The take is everything that Peel would have hoped for - teetering on the edge of collapse, slightly disjointed (not surprising given that it appears that the idea for her to come in was probably hatched earlier that evening). Although, we are treated to a quality display of domestic sound engineering from Peel’s engineer, Julie, who having obscured Polly Jean’s voice on the first track now reduces the guitar so it sounds like it’s playing in another room, but Peel didn’t mind. Neither did I and I hope you won’t too.
You’ll have to wait many years before I chronologically blog about this concert, so here’s the 1999 performance of Rid of Me to tide you over until then. Check out the crowd reaction - everyone there will still remember it to this day.
Videos courtesy of agile elefantus and stepintothegalaxy
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