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On this day, 21 March 1975, one of UK music’s most original writer and performer’s Steve Harley played Cardiff’s Capitol Theatre. Support was provided by Sailor.
The band had recently scored a massive UK no 1 hit with their single Make Me Smile (Come Up And See Me) taken from the album The Best Years Of Our Lives, released earlier in the month and peaked at no 4 in the UK album charts.
In November and December 1974, the band recorded The Best Years of Our Lives at Abbey Road Studios and Air Studios in London. Speaking to Record & Popswop Mirror in November 1974, Harley said, "The best work I've done yet is on the new LP. I find that I'm not writing in such a surrealistic way anymore. I'm writing slightly more blatant, less subtle. The whole album is a theme. The whole story is a dialogue, almost between two people – or a group of people and the artist: questions and answers. It's kind of like a guy who goes through a metamorphosis and comes out of it in good shape – alive and kicking." He added to the magazine in 1975, "This album is something I believe in. It means so much to me than anything I have done before."
To promote the album, the band embarked on a UK and European tour from March 1975 onwards. On the tour, the band hired guitarist Snowy White to play rhythm guitar. In a January 1975 issue of Record & Popswop Mirror, it was announced that the upcoming tour would feature "a specially built set and lighting to reflect songs and images featured on the forthcoming album". Later in the year they toured America, as a support act for The Kinks.
