When the curtain comes up, the band are all ready there, pumping out a fuzzy, semi-atonal, rhythmically confused version of left-field ’50’s music. They are swathed in silver lame, sparkling against hot white super-troupers, lights designed for stardom. There are six of them, guitar, bass, drums, keyboard, two horns. The crowd — which is neither Jethro Tull sophisticated nor quite Slade footballer — is beserk, mostly with impatience.

The guitar punches into one more chorus of the dog-eared riff, and then the white light goes blue. The glitter curtain parts, ever so slightly, and down a Bette Davis staircase comes a figure out of a rock fantasy. Trussed in a black cape, with two orange feathers sticking up like the wings of an angel, Gary Glitter is an imposing, if ridiculous, figure. He looks like a vaudeville mortician.