One memorable gig as support to SLF at the Mansion House in Dublin only enhanced Clarkey's reputation as a 'bit of a hard man'. Whilst onstage Ruefrex came under a barrage of verbal abuse from a notorious Dublin gang called The Black Catholics, who then proceeded to pelt the band with missiles. Clarke got a bit pissed off, undid his heavy studded belt and cracked open the head of the first Black Catholic who got in his way. Trouble sorted! Paul Burgess said of this gig - "The gig surrounding the incident at the Mansion House supporting SLF was a bit special. Our behaviour led to us being corralled off from the others for the rest of the tour! Jake was a fully-fledged legend in his own head by then and the band was becoming very muso. We, with the innocence of part-timers honestly believed that we were flying the flag for punk rock! Food fights backstage; annihilation of all the drink provided by the promoters; baiting of an already hostile audience leading to the toppling of huge PA stacks into the crowd; the wanton destruction of Durys Inn (burning chairs in the lobby; a sea of broken glass in the bar; soap powder in the ornamental water fountain; skinning up joints in the restaurant) ... SLF never talked to us again! Looking back, it's incredible what you can get away with, when you really don't give a fuck!”Alan defends himself and plays down the bad press about his character.”We’re a passionate band and we sing angry songs. I can usually put up with things and I’ll try to diffuse any situation, but if someone’s intent on giving me a hard time I’ll show them no mercy. Supporting Stiff Little Fingers down in the Mansion House in Dublin there was this apparently notorious gang going round the city calling themselves the Black Catholics. They had a reputation for going to gigs and disrupting them. There was a bunch of them at the front of the stage this particular night and they were shouting a lot of things at me like `Go back to Belfast` and one thing or another. I had this big studded belt on which I took off. There were missiles coming up on the stage and everything. They kept it up and the next time I just followed it up and went …CRACK!…. a big buckle round the fucken head. Yer man just sank like a bag of spuds." That short three date tour supporting SLF at Cork City Hall, Mansion House Dublin and Ulster Hall, Belfast took place in September 1980 and although Paul felt the band played well `we behaved badly and our privileges were removed by SLF! `.

Ruefrex epitomised the non-sectarian, cross community spirit of the early Belfast punk scene probably more than any other band. They played gigs in places other bands steered clear off, in Loyalist and Republican ghettoes such as the Shankill and Turf Lodge, a brave and considerably dangerous thing to do at the time! Paul Burgess stated - "The idealism is in our lyrics, about bringing the two communities together and rearing them as one. It's something we really believe in."

Ruefrex featured in the 1980 BBC Northern Ireland documentary titled ‘Cross The Line’ (about peace walls), Paul Burgess recalls “The programme followed the band around the neighbourhood and to the local community centre where we talked about the motivations and the problems, which were numerous. It was a useful and interesting document on how the Shankill used to be before re-development. It was more a social commentary documentary than a music video and our recordings on it are fairly appalling but with some good live footage, particularly in Tyndale Community Centre (unbeknown to us, simultaneously used by the Shankill butchers for other things!!”  Tracks featured in the documentary include Cross The Line / One By One / April Fool /Playing Adult Games /Correct Your Fireside Manner & Don’t Panic. Paul Burgess, on recently viewing the One By One footage on youtube (see below) commented “The rather embarrassing close up ‘one by one’s’ were over dubbed later ...against my better judgment! (ditto the heavy-handed Queen Vic metaphor  imagery. No-one of course bothered to ask me what the lyric meant!). The recording is genuinely live. No post performance clean-up in BBC recording suite and Jackie fucked up the solo but I kinda like it now!” The programme was recorded in February 1980 and screened 25th July 1980. Paul Burgess again "There were many memorable early gigs - in community centres, church halls, youth clubs, then The Pound and Harp Bar. We played Jackie's Xmas works do once. Not what they expected!! We had a fairly loyal following of `Spidermen` as the punks called them and they attended the bigger gigs in the Ulster Hall, Kings Hall and QUB (Queens University, Belfast) but were a little cagey about the `Harp Bar` and `The Pound` due to sectarian tensions. Our most memorable was a gig in Republican Twinbrook estate for writer Martin Lynch. This was a fairly brave thing to do at that time and given our profile. However, we were convinced of its legitimacy from an anti-sectarian angle."

Later in the year Ruefrex played the `Sense of Ireland` festival at The Venue, London along with fellow N. Ireland bands Rudi and The Tearjerkers. Alan wore a powder blue Bowie suit and a `Diamond Dogs` t-shirt. They enjoyed the comfort of a plush hotel in Kensington, paid for by the promoter. However, Paul Morley slagged them off in the NME and they went home and sulked for months. Although they created a small mainland following, Allan got married and Burgess went off to study at Queens University. The band wouldn’t get back together again officially until 1983.

In 1982 though, Allan and Tom Coulter got the `buzz` to play again, however Paul Burgess was still away at University. The line-up was Allan on vocals, Tom Coulter on bass, Willy Foster on guitar and Ben Curry on drums. Calling themselves `Eden Way` they also recorded a session for Downtown Radio in September that year. The session featured `The Wild Colonial Boy`, `Even In The Dark Hours` and `Between Having And Wanting`. John McQuillan was added on keyboards for the session. They played several gigs around Belfast including a 'Battle of the Bands' contest at Queens University where they came second.

However, in 1983 Coleraine natives Cormac Tohill and Norman Johnston launched `Kabuki Records` primarily as an outlet for their band `Kissed Air` of which they both were members. They had been friends since 1977 and it was then that they both met Ruefrex. Having left Coleraine in 1980, both were now based in Dublin. They used their influence on sidekick Gareth Ryan who had now left Dublin and was working for Rough Trade in London. This connection of course helped them to get Rough Trade to finance their venture, assisted by their counterpart in London.  The bitter anti-nuke tirade Capital Letters was subsequently issued on the Kabuki label. The recordings had come from a re-mastered Downtown Radio `live session` and although Jackie Forgie appeared on the single, he had left Ruefrex at this stage to concentrate on his new band Colenso Parade, who went on to record for Goliath, and Fire Records in the mid '80s. His replacement Gary Ferris made his vinyl debut on their follow up single `Paid in Kind` which appeared on the `One by One` label.

Around this time Ruefrex had been labelled 'The Most Important Band In Britain' by the NME! The One By One Record label on which the Ruefrex single Paid In Kind appeared, was a local label set up by Keith McCormack and was named after Ruefrex’s debut single. In 1986, two years after the labels first release, a second 7" single was released - Not So Wonderful by a local band called The Keep. Soon after, the label released a compilation cassette album which featured a couple of old Ruefrex tracks, a remixed version of The Keeps - Not So Wonderful as well as tracks by several other N. Irish bands including Colenso Parade, Violet Sky, and Tie The Boy (who incidentally included in their ranks Peter Cunnah, who went on to achieve pop stardom with D-Ream)!

Another compilation cassette album was the next release titled A Cut Above The Rest. The full track listing is as follows: Ruefrex - New Zealand /'The Ruah, Out Of The Shadow  - Stranger To Your Heart / I Will Suffer, Lunatic Fringe - No More Flowers / Waxman, The Organisation - Julia / I'll Go, Reunion - Epitaph / The Reason Ends Here, Heavenly Bodies - Sacrament / Heavenly Bodies.
(Heavenly Bodies were formed from the ashes of Stage B.).

Ruefrex became a five piece when Forgie rejoined in time for the 1985 single release Wild Colonial Boy. This was to be the bands most important and most controversial release. Ruefrex had low expectations for the single. "This was to be our last shot," Burgess admitted at the time. "This was the song that had to be done. For every reason because of what we were trying to say."  The song itself was a scathing attack on (Irish) Americans, especially groups like Noraid, who were involved in raising funds to help sustain the IRA's campaign of murder and destruction in N. Ireland. It's quite ironic that large quantities of the single were bought in the USA by Irish Americans who presumably thought that the song was a modern version of the old Irish folk song of the same name! The first issue of the single was withdrawn because of the armalite rifle pictured on the sleeve. Little known fact is that the B side of this original pressing, The Wild Colonial Boy (Part 2) was co-produced by the late, lamented, multi-talented Mary Cigarettes aka (Gregory Grey), he also played on this version. The single was subsequently re released, with a new B side and re recorded A Side, all housed in a new sleeve, which depicted a little drummer boy standing in front of the Stars and Stripes. The single was shunned by most radio stations so the band were surprised when it was played by Janice Long on her BBC Radio 1 show, and she then invited the band to record a session for her show. Then Dave Robinson of Stiff Records offered their indie label Kasper Records a distribution deal.

Later in the year Ruefrex released their first album and Tom Coulter left to be replaced by Gordy Blair (ex Outcasts, Rudi etc). Also in the mid '80s they played a fund raising gig to raise money for Lagan Valley College, the first integrated school for Catholics and Protestants in N. Ireland.

Clarke was labeled by the press as a `hard nut` and when he made the front page of Melody Maker in March 1986 he was described as `devastating with biceps like bison, shoulders like cabers and most intimidatingly - huge, glistening tattoos
Ruefrex also appeared on the BBC's youth programme Channel One performing The Perfect Crime & Capital Letters. Incidentally an instrumental version of The Perfect Crime was used as the intro to punk film Self Conscious Over You. The band also performed Wild Colonial Boy & The Ruah on Channel Four’s The Tube (with Elvis Costello & The Red Wedge Tour). Ruefrex were also filmed in the 80’s by a CNN News team at their London rehearsal studio, the feature was subsequently broadcast coast to coast in the U.S. In 1986 Tom Coulter began work with his new project The 15th, who recorded a two track demo featuring Like Love and Friends Always. Old Ruefrex sidekick Allan Clarke provided the vocals.

Ruefrex  released one more single In the Traps in 1986 and their second and final album in 1987. At that critical creative time, the second album `Political Wings`, the core writing team had been broken apart, the creative relationship at the heart of the band had gone. "I did some good stuff with Jackie, but there was an obvious dearth of ideas and I felt that we had run our course and pretty much succeeded on what we'd set out to do, so I pulled the plug. I really didn't want to be making a living 20 years later, playing nostalgia Xmas gigs at the Ulster Hall! We stand over anything we released and are proud of it."

Jackie Forgie went on to team up with keyboard player, Andrew McFarlane, and Paul Garrett on vocals to form the band Black Taxi Ballads. Their subject matter included the Shankill bombing and the murder of Margaret Wright. The Neil Lennon affair is also covered in the track Shadows Over Windsor Park. They also covered acoustic renditions of old Ruefrex classics such as One By One, Wild Colonial Boy & Pain In kind.

Ruefrex did reform briefly in 2003 to perform at the book launch party of It Makes You Want To Spit! They aired some new material and a few subsequent gigs followed, with Brian Faloon (ex SLF) standing in on drums at one show. They have appeared sporadically in the intervening years, most notably on 21st June 2014 at the Oh Yeah Centre for a Strummerville Fundraiser and on 12th December 2015 at JamLive Studios on the Springfield Rd where they had several songs recorded by the BBC.

Paul Burgess released his first novel, White Church, Black Mountain in 2015 and this was followed in 2018 by Through Hallow Lands. 30th January 2024 saw the release of Paul's memoir of his time in Ruefrex entitled Wild Colonial Boys - A Belfast Punk Story.