Buffalo Tom at Village Underground

Buffalo Tom

Gerard Love

Village Underground, 10 October 2026

It took me long enough but I finally got to see legendary Boston band Buffalo Tom play a sold out headline show at Village Underground, after first seeing them at the Reading Festival back in the 90s: something I've been meaning to do for years and I honestly don't know why it took me so long.

Not long ago I saw the video for Buffalo Tom's fantastic song Tree House on Instagram bringing back a wave of nostalgia and reminding me of how much I loved their 1994 album Big Red Letter Day as a teenager. Although I did catch them once on the main stage in 1995, for some crazy reason I never went to see them play their own show. They went on hiatus for about a decade, during which I did see bassist Chris Colbourn play as part of a duo with Fuzzy's Hilken Mancini opening for Juliana Hatfield at Bush Hall in 2006, but reunited in 2007 and have been releasing records and touring regularly since. Seeing that video made me determined that the next time they announced a London date I would be there!

The band is obviously still well loved because this show and most of their European dates quickly sold out which made me confident that I was in for a good night. When I turned up to queue there were already a few dedicated fans wearing Buffalo Tom t-shirts waiting, which was nice to see, although I did notice most (including myself) were of a certain vintage.

Once inside I got a nice central spot and had only just settled when I saw opening act Gerard Love, formerly of Teenage Fanclub, crouching down at the front of the stage setting up his equipment, along with his accompanist Tom Crossley beside him. I thought they were just checking their instruments and then would go off and come back on at 8pm like most support acts but instead the lights darkened and the music went quiet and I realised at 7.15pm, just 15 minutes after the doors had opened, they were actually starting their set. Of course I was delighted by this, nothing like an early start! I later learned that the whole show had a strict curfew of 9.30pm, I'm assuming for a club night after, so I couldn't have been happier: an early start and early finish is the older gig-goer's dream!

Teenage Fanclub is another band I saw back in the 1990s and funnily enough Juliana Hatfield, who I mentioned earlier, was at that show supporting them. I also met them once at a Tower Records signing. I think we just happened to be instore when we saw they were there, so spontaneously decided to queue up in order to meet them but as we didn't have any records or CDs with us, instead I got them to sign my school philosophy book, which I still have (they crossed out the title and amusingly wrote "Teenage Fanclub Annual" instead). Mr Love was in the band then and his signature is still there in my book. It's definitely a really nice memory and I recall they were super lovely chaps!

Love looked a little older but still very much himself. He took up his guitar, while Crossley accompanied him, at times on keyboards, sometimes on xylophone and occasionally on flute (definitely a man of many talents!).  The first couple of songs I must say, the stage was very dark but the blue lights at the back were annoyingly bright and shining right in my eyes, which was uncomfortable. Thankfully they eventually fixed that and I could actually see, as well as hear, what was going on on the stage, but I'm not sure what is going on with the lighting at gigs these days, it can definitely spoil a show.

Mr Love sang a mixture of favourites from his Teenage Fanclub days (I don't think I realised how many classics he actually wrote) as well as songs from his Lightships solo record. 

More about Buffalo Tom's fun set soon...