Leaving London, in search of a dream 1971/74 and 1975 /79

Juliette broke my heart, what I thought was a budding romance, to her was just a passing dalliance, she moved on romantically while travelling on the Specials Tour, but I hid my pain and we remained friends and occasional colleagues.  I had a panic call from David Cunningham because his new Single on Virgin had entered the charts and they had to do 'Top of The Pops' the following day. Two things panicked him, one it would be impossible to recreate the track in a studio that night and he didn’t have anyone who could play drums and had a current musicians union membership. (For clarity TOTP rules were that musicians could not mime to the record that had charted, they had to re-record it in a studio under supervision and then mime to that recording of the track. ) I called Virgin and got the low down. What they did was book a (compliant) studio and when the Union rep turned up they would see the band setting up a bit late and the Promo guy or girl would then offer to take ...

  There were two more notable shows with Wayne and the Chairs that year. The band didn’t have a big enough following to sell out the London Lyceum and John Curd, the promoter, suggested that we share a bill with The UK Subs, who similarly wouldn’t have drawn enough of a crowd on their own. It was a mistake, Wayne was greeted by cat calls and what I can only describe as homophobic and  Transphobic abuse by the Uk Subs crowd, and throughout the show they threw beer cans, half full glasses and anything else that wasn’t nailed down, at the band, I joined the stage crew clearing up the debris between songs. One can that hit Wayne direct, she picked up and hurled back in the direction it came from but it was impossible to see where the worst offenders were, I walked around the crowd and evicted at least three of the offenders. We were please to get out. The rest of the UK shows went without much incident until  weeks later, the last date on that UK tour was at Brighton Univ...

Audio Here The squat where Wayne , Henry and JJ lived was magnificent, just off South Kensington, it was a fabulous Georgian town house near the Iraqi Embassy. It seemed to be a perpetual party, JJ’s girlfriend was a stringer for one of the Sunday tabloids and Henry’s girlfriend, Christina, had the patience of a saint, taking care of everybody. Wayne had a perpetual string of visitors from the trans community and the place had the air of a circus. At this point Wayne identified as “she” and had had work done in Germany to appear more feminine, was taking a course of hormones and had the intention to transition  within the year. Val, JJ and Henry, were adamant about renewing the sound and feel of the band, Wayne and Elliot were receptive and frankly excited by the prospect but they all needed some time and space to develop new material for the album, preferably out of London where Wayne’s social circle was a bit of a distraction. I went up to visit Val at his north London flat, ha...

Video Link My first delegated task from Dick was to take the Slits out to do some press interviews in Paris ( his passport was out of date !), where I got a better chance to meet them all. They were very independent, a bit scathing of having someone go with them and apart from the basic logistics of getting to and from places and timekeeping they pretty much got on with it without me. I had lots of banter from both Ari and Viv on the journey, around how they didn’t have any crossover philosophic alliance with    hippies ( nothing after the ‘beat generation’ at least) but the urgency of their argument and the heritage they drew on made me dubious, Ari, if born 10 years previously would have likely been living in Gwernogle and using Hughes' geodesic dome as a performance stage .  They were delightfully refreshing, if disappointed in their ability to shock or frighten. They did a much better job of that with the pubescent French boys in the audience and mainstream journalist...

  Dick suggested I move into his tiny flat in Leinster Square and John wanted to release another Krypton Tunes EP , I think we all knew it would be the last. I bought a pair of white shoes and a folding foam sofa bed on Bayswater Road and moved it into the sitting room, up four flight of stairs. John and I ran a small rehearsal room(s) in the railway arches in Camden. I mostly remember we had our own “space invaders” machine and the Boomtown Rats taking a block booking, paid for by Phonogram , large numbers of indy bands and a few demo’s for young hopefuls. I particularly liked the Phonogram money, a taste of the ‘crumbs from the table’ of the large multinationals. John had his favourite 3 songs left to release and I booked the best of the local studios that indies could afford for a couple of days, no rehearsal, both Dick and Brian came along to the session and I played the track that I knew and got Brian to played the two new ones. We fancied some female backing vocals and Di...

The following year I was torn between the sheer enjoyment of playing music, organising gigs, promoting the band, spending increasing amounts of time around West London and the simple pleasures of the shop and life in rural Wales. I became a bit of a waif that winter, we would play gigs in small towns and I’d stay near to the venue with whoever would have me, I would do a little work promoting shows in those towns for other acts and visit friends around the county. I began spending more time back in London, staying with Brian and at Dicks occasionally. We would play support and low key headline gigs at places like the  the Red Cow, The Nashville, the Moonlight in Hampstead, The Rock Garden. One of our shows was supporting Aswad and we turned up in my old Comma Van and the band were inevitably late sound checking leaving us just a few minutes before doors opened . I asked if, to save time, we could use their PA system and they said sure thing if we paid them £80.00. ( we were ...

I cut my hair and briefly dyed it green. I think in response, partly to a perceived complacency on the part of much of the local hippie community, partly as a statement of solidarity with the upcoming new wave of rebellious youth. An anti-establishment statement. I picked up a second hand leather bomber jacket and occasionally would inadvertently scare people I had know for years when I turned up at parties/gatherings. I remember being chided by Plum, (so many of the girls I knew had adopted names from nature, or romantic poetry, I never gave it a thought), for not wearing the recognised uniform of the hippie revolution. I didn’t really see much of Hillary, she didn’t like to go with me to gigs or rehearsals or take much interest in my musical exploits. As far as I’m aware she wasn’t at the flat above the shop much. I still came back and did most of the admin, worked behind the counter and talked to all the suppliers. She stayed through the winter of 76 I think, but I was busy now, w...