1978-12-05 Dunstable - California Ballroom (England)

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Robert Smith
Laurence Tolhurst
Michael Dempsey

Day of the week: Tuesday
Tour: Supporting Generation X

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from the book 'Ten Imaginary Years'

On the 3rd December, The Cure played Bristol Locarno.
Lol: "After the gig, I wandered back through Gen X's dressing room to go to the toilet but someone at the door said I couldn't go in there. Well, I was desperate so I pushed past and went in, and there was Billy Idol up against the urinal in a rather compromising position with a young lady. He gave me his famous sneer but I thought 'Sod it, I'm not going away, so I walked right up next to him and pulled out my willy. He was going 'Don't be nervous, don't be nervous' and I turned to him and went 'Alright Billy' and pissed all over him!"
Michael: "Lol had this unfortunate ability to stumble across people in some sort of carnal act."
Robert: "We did one more date on that tour before they kicked us off and that was Dunstable California Ballroom because I don't think they could get anyone else to do it. The toilet incident obviously didn't go down too well but, as well as that, we were beginning to get too good a reaction, and that made them nervous."

from the book 'Cured - The Tale of Two Imaginary Boys' (Lol Tolhurst)

We started to set up the gear. Then I saw him, the tour manager, red-faced and striding purposefully toward us. "Last show for you chaps after that stupid prank!" We gave each other knowing looks. Apparently my accident in the Gents was not appreciated by the headliners. Or was it perhaps that our set was enticing too many of their fans that finally upset the apple cart?
That last night we trooped onstage to an audience made up mostly of snarling skinheads intent on mayhem. This was, after all, where most English bands will tell you the real trouble went down, not in the capital but the satellite towns. These were the chicken-wired stages, the Blues Brothers-type gigs of the UK.
We played our allotted time, while the skins lunged onto the stage to dismantle anything they could lay their hands on. Using my hickory drumsticks I smacked a couple of probing fingers that I caught trying to remove my drum mics. We exited stage right before they finally overpowered the black-suited bouncers in bow ties lined across the stage front.
Billy and Gen X came on and the place erupted into a sort of war zone that may be familiar to those who attended the earlier UK punk gigs. We sat backstage and contemplated whether we were being chucked off the tour because of the reaction to our songs or the actions of my penis (not the first time it got me in some trouble).
We were quietly absorbing this sorry state of affairs, after having spent much of Gen X's gig fixing the tire of our van in the rain, when suddenly the dressing-room door burst open and several fierce-looking skins more or less fell into the room. "Where is 'e?! Where's Billy?"
The looks on their faces indicated they didn't wish to have a polite conversation with Mr. Idol about the state of British punk music. Rather, they wanted to dismember someone with a peroxide haircut. In a flash of inspiration it occurred to us that we could redeem ourselves and save our own skins (pun intended) in one fell swoop.
We pointed the Neanderthal-looking youths in the totally opposite direction of Gen X's dressing room, and they hurtled around the corner into the arms of several of those mean-looking bastardy bouncers they had chased away from the stage front. The bouncers chortled with glee when they realized heads would indeed be bashed in after all!
We quickly made our escape out the backstage door and into our van, which was now ready to go, and shot across the dismal car park of the California Ballroom. A few miles down the motorway we felt we had escaped both the skins and the tyrannical tour manager.

from the book 'A Visual Documentary'

5 DECEMBER 1978
California Ballroom, Dunstable. The last night of the tour. Although Generation X continue gigging until the end of the month, they do so without The Cure. Rumours fly concerning the split, one claims the headliners were jealous of the way The Cure went down every night, the other accuses Lol of urinating down Billy Idol's leg.