I’m a freelance journalist, blogger and occasional author, and I’m responsible for the reviews of Tru80s gigs around the north of England. I’ll also post other useful information as seems fit, such as forthcoming gigs of note, or new music. I don’t intend to write about which songs were played and in what order; this is of interest to no-one. I intend to write more of detached reflection of the show as experienced by a third party; how the audience responds, the nature of the location, the mood and how the music affects it all.

I graduated in English Language and Journalism from De Montford University in Leicester during the 1990s and have since earned a living writing for various media on various topics.

Music from the 1980s is not an obvious choice for me; my age means that I was too young to remember much from the period, my tastes originally being Seal and REM, but I have more recently immersed myself in popular 1980s electronica and now consider myself converted.

For reasons I don’t fully understand and which I hope to disclose in a later post, it became important for me to attend as many of this band’s gigs as possible. This doesn’t relate directly to the band, the music or its’ musicians, it’s a response to a trauma I experienced several years ago which left me a with a profound sense of loss, but without and understanding of what. A recent experience led to a conviction that someone or something at one of these gigs will help me understand the events of my past.

I have no direct connection to Tru80s and have never met any of the band, at least not in way of which they will be aware – I attend the gigs incognito. However, after a third-party recommendation and a number of incognito online conversations, the band has given me access to create blog posts, so here we go. I hope you find them interesting and worth reading.