60 albums
1973 - Status Quo - Hello

While I loved Black Sabbath but never saw them live I was fairly cool on Status Quo but saw them so many times, all over the country! This was because Ju and Paul were huge Quo fans, so I’d just tag along, just like they tagged along to the Motorhead gigs.

Status Quo - Hello (Vertigo, 1973)

Having said that Piledriver and Hello are both great albums. For many years I’d always say that Piledriver was my favourite Quo album but these days I’m just as likely to reach for Hello - but they’re pretty close, maybe because of the similarities. Where Piledriver has Paper Plane, Hello has Caroline; where Piledriver has Roadhouse Blues, Hello has Forty Five Hundred Times; where Piledriver has Don’t Waste My Time, Hello has Roll Over Lay Down!

Obviously the standard Quo criticism was they all sound the same but in a way that was what made them so good in the early 70s.

I was seeing the Quo in the 80s, their 80s albums are actually pretty rubbish, I don’t own any, but their live shows were always a joy. And Forty Five Hundred Times was always one of the highlights, often running over twenty minutes - but that was the joy. We’d all have a guess on the way to the gig how long it’d last!

And… Caroline is one of those songs I can’t help headbanging to… still… although these days in the privacy of my own room! Here they are playing it at The Milton Keynes Bowl in 1984. I am in that crowd headbanging… in public!

Status Quo - Caroline (1984) (play on YouTube)