They Might Be Giants

Stop me if you think you've heard this one before.... sorry, no that's The Smiths, but I know I have wittered on about this on the interweb before...

They Might Be Giants was the first proper gig we went to, me and Liv and Nic. Nic and I were 14 and Liv was 12. Liv and I had been to numerous folk events but not a concert on our own with tickets.
We went straight from school, and hung about until 7pm. Here is a photo of me and Liv, in our school uniforms outside the UEA students' union, waiting for something to happen. It was taken by Nic. I don't even remember if we changed out of our school uniforms. My bag looks pretty full of books.
Anyway we hung about so long the sound crew took pity on us and invited us in to hear the sound test, hidden behind a curtain, which was pretty cool.
I seem to be going through my most unprepossessing stage of adolescence. If you squint you can see my braces. Looking at it today though, I think I can see a bit of Alexander in there. Shortly after I did get a German army coat and a army and navy rucksack...

We love(d) this They Might Be Giants album, which Nic had (and we pirated). It is also pictured here as Nic later gave it to me, I think because she got it on CD - hope she doesn't ask for it back now! I've been listening to it this afternoon. I can sing it all the way through - but only if I start from the beginning. I will do Birdhouse In Your Soul on karaoke, if you get one classy enough to offer it.

We used to go on long driving holidays and our dad Mr Kelly (now known as Prickly Grandad) would be very grumpy about letting LIv and me have our music on. So we used to put it on our walkmans. We had our own walkmans, none of this sharing earphones business, and we would start the tapes at the same time, and sing. If you remember walkmans you know that they were never very accurate and if the batteries ran down then one of us could be several lines out by the end of an album, which I'm sure added to the exquisite torture for Mr Kelly. He should have let us put it on the car stereo.

On one occasion though Liv was listening on her own, quietly, but came to a bit in Istanbul (Not Constantinople) with some 'Eastern' vocal styling, and threw her hands in the air and started yodelling. Mr Kelly nearly drove off the road.

The reason this comes up is Nic is very into science and has found a kids album by TMBG. I can't stop humming this now. I've ordered a copy for Alexander.

N.b. Mr Kelly is addressed as such as he was a headteacher for a long time and is under the impression he still has staff. The most likely way to get a response from him therefore is to address him respectfully as Mr Kelly.