I’d been back from Europe for less than a week and I was off again, this time down to San Francisco to see a performance by the band Supergrass. I had been planning this for ages, and would be staying overnight in the city. I got into Supergrass back in 1995 when I was still just about a teenager, but in all those years I never got to see them play live. They were doing a special tour playing their first album I Should Coco, the mark its 30 year anniversary. Now is the real resurgence of the old 90s Britpop bands, coming back out and playing again; we saw Pulp for the first time in 2024, then they brought out a new album in ’25, but the big news comeback was the massive reunion tour of Oasis (another band I was well into but missed seeing live). I knew there was no chance I’d get to go to that tour, since it sold it out so quickly, and tickets were astronomically overpriced. Supergrass though was such an exciting prospect for me, I loved that youthful optimistic first album, but I was massively into their second album In It For The Money. My friend James in England (fellow Supergrass fan when we were at uni) saw them at the Roundhouse (and was standing next to James McCartney at the show) and had told me how good it was, that they also played a bunch of other classics as well as running through the album. So I was well looking forward to it. Then the night before leaving, I was talking to my wife and she said that, well you know Oasis are playing in Los Angeles this weekend, there are apparently still some tickets. Yeah, but I’m going to San Francisco to see Supergrass, I can’t do both. Why not, she says. We looked, there were still some good seats at the Rose Bowl on Sunday evening. Sure, but where would I stay at this short notice? Flights would cost so much, too days out. As it turned out, I had a Southwest credit from a cancelled trip to Vegas earlier that year (I had planned to fly down meet my friend in Vegas, who was participating in a big poker tournament, but he had to cancel due to illness). My wife was able to find a room at a nice hotel in Pasadena on points, and so I booked the ticker… this was going to be the big 90s Britpop weekend, Supergrass and Oasis, 19 year old me would be freaking out with excitement, and it only took me thirty years and a lot of mileage to finally see them. Sure I was still exhausted after the long summer trip but as they say, here we go.

I took the Amtrak down, sketching the view from the window. I planned to hang about in the city during the day before checking into my (cheap) hotel, and going to the show. I’d be getting up next morning to fly from SFO down to LAX, but as always I try to fit in as much extra sketching as I can, because there’s NEVER ENOUGH SKETCHING is there. I jumped onto the Muni, and headed out to the Inner Sunset area around Irving Street. I like it up there. I drew some of the colourful shops (and then didn’t even colour two of them in). Sketching in the bigger portrait format like this I tend to do larger drawings, and they tend to take a bit longer, and I tend to get bored drawing them. But I enjoyed standing out on this street watching everyone go by and drawing these buildings, I know I have sketched this row before (see how it looked in 2010 when that ‘Easy Breezy’ cafe was a placed called ‘Tutti Frutti’). This place must have a contract that when it becomes something new, it should still have a rhyming name.

I had some lunch in Crepevine on Irving Street, and sketched a couple of people chatting in my little brown book. I just liked the pinks and greens.

Later in the afternoon I went over to the Little Shamrock pub, opposite Golden Gate Park. I have sketched here before; they still have one of my drawings on the wall, which I did back in 2013. It is one of the oldest pubs in the city, established in 1893. I sat on one of the little benches outside and sketched in pencil, but regretted the pencil I was using and wish I’d drawn in pen. It’s this two-page portrait format, it seems like a good idea, then I get bored and impatient with it, the bigger size. Still it’s good to sit and observe. I was being observed by the people at the bar, who would occasionally come out to have a look.

When I was done, I came in for a pint. It’s cash only, I rarely carry cash any more. I do like the interior, there is a lot to draw and usually a good atmosphere, on a Saturday afternoon. I’ve never been in the evening. I sat and sketched this interesting little corner, and then turned and drew the bar area. I used my fountain pen this time. I think I was a little conscious of time, and unwilling to really dive into too many details. I still had to get back to Union Square and check into my hotel, eat something, then head to the Supergrass show.

So I did that. My hotel was the King George, and it was a bit crummy to be honest, the room was pretty grim. I was going to stay in the nice new hotel next to the Warfield, but figured I was not going to be there long enough to need anything nice. In hindsight I wish I had; the couple of blocks or so between the King George and the Warfield were, well very sketchy to say the least, classic Tenderloin. It did not feel very safe walking down there during daylight, and I’d have to come back this way after dark as well. A lot of very dodgy people hanging about, it’s not a great place to be by yourself. I got to the Warfield early; it’s a fantastic venue. I last went there in 2015 when we saw Noel Gallagher, and the acoustics were very impressive, like being inside a gramophone. A lot of famous bands have played here over the years. My seats were good. There were some Italians seated next to me; I was wearing my AS Roma shirt. The opening band were pretty good, I did do a quick pencil sketch of them singing about the A1 road in England (or maybe it was a song about European paper sizes, I don’t know). Then Supergrass came on, and I was 19 again. Well no, if I was 19 I’d have been pogo-ing about down in the crowd and not wearing glasses. They were really good, for being older (they weren’t very old when they first started so we’re about the same age; singer Gaz Coombes is a month younger than me, the drummer Danny Goffey shares my birthday but is two years older, the bassist Mick Quinn – not the former Coventry and Liverpool striker – was born in 1969 so he is ancient). We all look good for our ages I think. Supergrass had a lot of fans in San Francisco, mostly of a similar age to me. They played the whole of the I Should Coco album, including my favourite track from that, Sofa of My Lethargy, which I used to listen to over and over in my old bedroom in Burnt Oak. They stopped and started on a couple of tracks, maybe a bit out of practice, or maybe some of the album tracks are just well difficult to play live, they were really creative with their switching of time signatures and interesting chord sequences. This was live music though, man, and it felt pretty real, hearing these songs I only knew from my old CDs being played in real time. Watching the drummer put in a proper shift. It was great stuff. They played a few other classics, including Richard III, which I rocked out to in 1997, Late In The Day, and Sun Hits The Sky, which definitely had a different element to it as a live track. There were no fancy theatrics, just really good live music. They finished with Pumping On Your Stereo, which was never my favourite of their singles but had a fun video, and was a feelgood way to round off the show. Well enjoyed it.

I didn’t enjoy the walk back to the hotel. Market Street after dark was not somewhere to hang about, and there were plenty of spaced-out unpredictable people outside the venue. I took a slight detour away from Mason Street, which was dark and foreboding but was the quickest route to my hotel, and grabbed a chicken burger in Carl’s Jr a block away, though that was a fairly scary experience itself, like I was stuck in a scene from Blade Runner. When I finally got my greasy tasteless food, I left the grotty fast food place and headed towards the hotel. There’s an Irish pub on the way that I remember going to once (with my Mum, when we stayed down here years ago; she actually loved the Tenderloin), Johnny Foley’s, so I popped in to have a post-show beer and sketch. There was a band playing old 60’s numbers, they were really good. I sat at the bar and sketched it, while tourists from China came in and drank pints of Guinness next to me. It was then time to to go to bed, because I had a long day ahead of me on Sunday – Oasis in Pasadena.