The best gig I never went to – and how The Pale Fountains taught me I was running on empty, and I really ought to remember to charge up my phone.

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The best gig that I never went to was a 2008 reunion gig by the Liverpudlian band The Pale Fountains. I’m told this on good authority, because while I was never there, several friends of mine were, and they spent most of the gig texting me annoying updates.​

Around the same time that the band broke into their anthemic 1984 ‘Jean’s Not Happening’, I was most definitely not happening. I was standing in a bus shelter outside the Shepherds Bush Empire desperately trying to call my boyfriend, who just happened to have my ticket.

​​When I look back, that night was full of the doomed poetry and missed opportunities that characterise so much of the band’s bittersweet catalogue, not to mention their curious history - which was best summed up when the NME said the founder Michael Head was one of the UK’s best songwriters, but ‘you’ve probably never heard of him’.

​That night was seminal for many reasons. Formed in the 1980's, bound by a mutual appreciation for Burt Bacharach, Arthur Lee’s Love, and English whimsical pop, the band started in a bidding-war blaze of jangly pop, but never quite fulfilled their commercial potential (musically, it’s a different story). After a decade of botched comebacks, burnt-down studios, lost mastertapes and rumours of heroin addiction, this was their first gig for years. The excitement was palpable. It was a big night for me too as I had just found out that I was pregnant with twins, and, looking after a two-year-old and shouldering most of the childcare, I was still reeling. It was the first night out that I had had for ages. A few hours of me-time seeing the band of my dreams seemed like pure, delicious fantasy,

​It turned out that it was pure fantasy as well. I spent most of the night in a bus stop. That night, I got home and burst into tears. I knew that something had to give.

​Looking back now, it’s notable how my frustrating night strangely mirrored the fate of the band itself, who had their fair share of setbacks. My parents had come up from the north especially to babysit and honour the happening. My partner and I were to meet straight after work (his, not mine.) outside Shepherds Bush tube and then go in together. Only, just as I was approaching Notting Hill, I was told to get off. Shepherd’s Bush tube was closed, so I had to backtrack. Only - nightmare of nightmares - I had forgotten to charge up my phone, so I couldn’t rearrange.

​I would like to report that my partner and I had the kind of rare osmosis, a shared telepathic link, that meant we could seamlessly reschedule our meeting just through the medium of frazzled thoughts. Only - spoiler alert - we didn’t.

​Around the same time as the band were bashing their way through their 1984 crowdpleaser ‘(Don’t Let Your Love) Start a War’, we were preparing for battle, traipsing around West London desperately trying to find each other. While my friends were lucky enough to spend the evening watching a tour-de-force performance of wry, whimsical pop from The Paley's first albums ‘From Across the Kitchen Table’ and ‘Pacific Street’, to soulful reworkings of Head’s later band Shack, I spent my evening wandering from station to bus stop and back to the venue, hoping in vain that my boyfriend would magically appear. The whole thing was a lesson in crossed-wires, missed opportunities and messed-up communication, which pretty much summed up our relationship at the time. A big talk was needed, indeed.

​That night taught me that I was running on empty and shouldering way too much of the childcare responsibilities. And that I really, really ought to remember to charge my phone.

​With retrospect, the sobering lessons of the night shouldn’t have surprised me. Michael Head had taught me many things throughout my life. He taught me how to navigate the north-south divide, which helped when I moved from Manchester to London (‘Southbound Excursion’); he taught me the virtues of gratitude (‘Thank You’); he even taught me about 1980's sexism (‘Just A Girl’), and he taught me that outer success is ephemeral and rarely necessary, and that brilliance isn’t always rewarded.

​As for me, it seemed that the clues had been written long before that fateful evening trudging through Shepherds Bush in the rain. In one of my favourite Pale Fountains songs (‘Reach’), he booms; ‘And in the morning when you rise, be sure to know your destiny because it’s all worthwhile.'

Michael, if only I had listened.