# The Who, Floyd, Led Zep and the great college circuit that launched 1,000 bands

Page: https://stenobird.com/podcast/word-in-your-ear-3755187/the-who-floyd-led-zep-and-the-great-college-circuit-that-launched-1-000-bands
Text version: https://stenobird.com/podcast/word-in-your-ear-3755187/the-who-floyd-led-zep-and-the-great-college-circuit-that-launched-1-000-bands.md
Podcast: [Word In Your Ear](https://stenobird.com/podcast/word-in-your-ear-3755187)
Published: 2026-05-12T21:42:01+00:00
Episode link: https://www.patreon.com/wordinyourear
Audio file: https://sphinx.acast.com/p/open/s/5ff0586154e2a73589267809/e/6a039ea9b44336455688ed46/media.mp3
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Duration seconds: 2995

## Resource

Cheap tickets, warm beer, draughty halls and refectories, a whole new cobbled-together rock circuit was born in the ‘60s for an audience who watched and listened intently. Which allowed the music to take a different route. Paul Sexton spoke to Mark Knopfler, Nick Mason, Justin Hayward, Phil Manzanera and many others to piece together ‘Rock Goes To College: the Campus Music Scene That Shaped A Generation’ and talks to us here about the fans and amateurs who ran it and the lost world of motorway caffs and Ford Transits, stopping off at …   … Hendrix, Fairport, Free, Queen, Dire Straits: tales of the campus gig foot-soldiers   … no security, no lightshow, no seat, no stage: how the idea of live entertainment changed in 50 years     … Pink Floyd not being allowed front-of house in Top Rank theatres without a tie   … the Stranglers and the Damned refusing to play college shows “unless townies were allowed in”   … the “chart clause” - £50 extra if a band’s in the Top 3!   … the Stones playing an Oxford ball   … bands market-researching songs before recording them   … why Leeds could afford the Who and Leonard Cohen   … what Harvey Goldsmith, Paul Conroy and Chris Wright learnt from booking bands   … why Wings chose the college circuit   … and the arrival of DJs and disco that put a nail in the college gig coffin, “a golden age with nothing like it before or after”.   Order ‘Rock Goes To College’ here: https://www.amazon.co.uk/Rock-Goes-College-campus-generation/dp/0008722412/ref=tmm_hrd_swatch_0?_encoding=UTF8&dib_tag=se&dib=eyJ2IjoiMSJ9.EWpbXfJjfIq6DOGDGU8HMQMTbZ6fxtMSFJLLqnswcYo.7mGYWOOBglb6F5p42gs88d1lJ0uLxzWS4w3W0vPrwN0&qid=1775764128&sr=1-1 Help us to keep The Longest Continuous Conver…

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