1) History & 2) Anecdotes
History
The United Kingdom original 'Marble Index' began, for its naming, by a certain Matt Johnson (later of 'the the' fame) in 1978 after Chaz Blackburn answered his advert in the New Musical Express for
'Bass/lead guitarist wanted. Into Velvets/Syd Barrett.
In January/February three early rehearsals took place, the second of which issued the Chaz Blackburn song 'Automaton'. Further rehearsals took place the following November with the two Martin's on bass and drums, before the fledgling band crumpled, leading to Matt and Chaz agreeing to go their separate ways, though staying friends, seeing each others bands through 1979 and the subsequent eighties. Matt then put in a second advert for musicians into 'Throbbing Gristle/Residents' where he met Keith Law's, Peter Fenton Jones and Janice Higgs (drums); the latter only lasting one rehearsal; the band henceforth becoming 'the the'. Upon supporting PragVec and the headliners Scritti Politti, Chaz met with Janice & Martin (the bass player from previous band) where all three agreed to start a band for the summer. Before any rehearsals, Janice announced that she had agreed to meet another band in Tooting Bec. Together they then met:
Nick Neocleous (guitar)
Terry Wade (vocals)
Ian Derby (bass)
Immediately it became apparent just how diverse the bands personal musical tastes were:
Terry was a glam-rock/Bowie fan
Nick was into Roxy Music
Ian was a 'Mod', already in another band 'the Numbers'
Janice was a latter day hippie, all be it into the 'Residents'
Chaz was a post-punk guitarist.
By the early spring 1980, with Janice leaving to study in Wales and Nick dropping out, the nucleus of the 'Marble Index' began rehearsing after Terry's brother mentioned that the landlord of the 'Sekforde' pub in Clerkenwell was a drummer. After rehearsing via Terry's music teachers studio (Pete Bruno) Gary Leach invested in sound proofing part of his cellar, turning it into a rehearsal studio that would serve the band throughout the eighties.
Rehearsing through the spring, early recordings were made, with two gigs: a hostel in Hampstead and 'Billy's' in Soho off Wardour Street.
By the summer of 1981 with Gary and Ian refusing to perform a concert before an invited audience in Battersea, the band lay dormant until early in the following year.
1982. Seeing a new club opening, Terry and Chaz perform an impromptu set playing guitar and synth. On being invited back, they get back in touch with Nick Neocleous, who was by now seeing a young keyboard player named Sue Vickers, and began a fourth version of the 'Marble Index' as the resident band, performing 15 gigs.
NOTE: The 'Suns of Dada'/'Evening Falls' arts nightclub.
Begun by Steev B as an answer to Richard Strange's earlier cabaret nightclub, this was held every Friday evening through 1982 in the subterranean basement of a wine bar, the 'Slightly Oliver' in Holborn. Free to enter, it housed musicians and poets who performed in front of large white backcloth, where art slides were projected upon the performers: poets, JC1/4 and Marguerite and bands including 'By Wednesday' and 'the Tall Venusians', while artists drew or painted the work, writers such as Stewart Home (later to become famous for his art magazine/criticism 'Smile' as well as holding the first art strike) began their work.
1983. After recording seven tracks on Nick's Akai 'two track' machine, the band meet various record companies: CBS and 4AD/Cherry Red. Finding only bewilderment or indifference. The band perform three more gigs as a four piece with a drum machine before Nick and Sue split away (Sue was later to play for 'the Gymslips').
1984. Terry and Chaz record two tracks at a fellow club performers home studio 'four track' - Terry A. Tanx.
1985. The two re-introduce Gary Leach back on drums, then after advertising, 'Samson' rehearses with them, playing on bass. 3 tracks are recorded in a 24 track professional studio. Two professional 'U-'Matic' videos are made for £500 (!)
1986. Through Christmas, with 'Samson' departed, Terry and Chaz with Nick and Sue, record three final tracks at the same 24 track studio from the previous year, one of which is an updated version of 'Automaton' last recorded with Matt Johnson in 1978.
The band have never put their work to the public, until now.
'Bass/lead guitarist wanted. Into Velvets/Syd Barrett.
In January/February three early rehearsals took place, the second of which issued the Chaz Blackburn song 'Automaton'. Further rehearsals took place the following November with the two Martin's on bass and drums, before the fledgling band crumpled, leading to Matt and Chaz agreeing to go their separate ways, though staying friends, seeing each others bands through 1979 and the subsequent eighties. Matt then put in a second advert for musicians into 'Throbbing Gristle/Residents' where he met Keith Law's, Peter Fenton Jones and Janice Higgs (drums); the latter only lasting one rehearsal; the band henceforth becoming 'the the'. Upon supporting PragVec and the headliners Scritti Politti, Chaz met with Janice & Martin (the bass player from previous band) where all three agreed to start a band for the summer. Before any rehearsals, Janice announced that she had agreed to meet another band in Tooting Bec. Together they then met:
Nick Neocleous (guitar)
Terry Wade (vocals)
Ian Derby (bass)
Immediately it became apparent just how diverse the bands personal musical tastes were:
Terry was a glam-rock/Bowie fan
Nick was into Roxy Music
Ian was a 'Mod', already in another band 'the Numbers'
Janice was a latter day hippie, all be it into the 'Residents'
Chaz was a post-punk guitarist.
By the early spring 1980, with Janice leaving to study in Wales and Nick dropping out, the nucleus of the 'Marble Index' began rehearsing after Terry's brother mentioned that the landlord of the 'Sekforde' pub in Clerkenwell was a drummer. After rehearsing via Terry's music teachers studio (Pete Bruno) Gary Leach invested in sound proofing part of his cellar, turning it into a rehearsal studio that would serve the band throughout the eighties.
Rehearsing through the spring, early recordings were made, with two gigs: a hostel in Hampstead and 'Billy's' in Soho off Wardour Street.
By the summer of 1981 with Gary and Ian refusing to perform a concert before an invited audience in Battersea, the band lay dormant until early in the following year.
1982. Seeing a new club opening, Terry and Chaz perform an impromptu set playing guitar and synth. On being invited back, they get back in touch with Nick Neocleous, who was by now seeing a young keyboard player named Sue Vickers, and began a fourth version of the 'Marble Index' as the resident band, performing 15 gigs.
NOTE: The 'Suns of Dada'/'Evening Falls' arts nightclub.
Begun by Steev B as an answer to Richard Strange's earlier cabaret nightclub, this was held every Friday evening through 1982 in the subterranean basement of a wine bar, the 'Slightly Oliver' in Holborn. Free to enter, it housed musicians and poets who performed in front of large white backcloth, where art slides were projected upon the performers: poets, JC1/4 and Marguerite and bands including 'By Wednesday' and 'the Tall Venusians', while artists drew or painted the work, writers such as Stewart Home (later to become famous for his art magazine/criticism 'Smile' as well as holding the first art strike) began their work.
1983. After recording seven tracks on Nick's Akai 'two track' machine, the band meet various record companies: CBS and 4AD/Cherry Red. Finding only bewilderment or indifference. The band perform three more gigs as a four piece with a drum machine before Nick and Sue split away (Sue was later to play for 'the Gymslips').
1984. Terry and Chaz record two tracks at a fellow club performers home studio 'four track' - Terry A. Tanx.
1985. The two re-introduce Gary Leach back on drums, then after advertising, 'Samson' rehearses with them, playing on bass. 3 tracks are recorded in a 24 track professional studio. Two professional 'U-'Matic' videos are made for £500 (!)
1986. Through Christmas, with 'Samson' departed, Terry and Chaz with Nick and Sue, record three final tracks at the same 24 track studio from the previous year, one of which is an updated version of 'Automaton' last recorded with Matt Johnson in 1978.
The band have never put their work to the public, until now.
Anecdotes
'I Don't UNDERSTAND this!'
The A & R man's finger hit the 'stop' button - it was too late of course. He'd heard, first, our supposed 'pop' song, then a one phrase 'instrumental', but what really did it was hearing the one note bass throb, followed by the drums, then a rasping distorted guitar all topped off by Terry's echoed vocal gyrations.
'Look, I'll try and get to one of your gigs...'
Yeah, right. As we walked out of CBS's Soho building Terry was visibly upset; I was laughing at the absurdity. As though any record company would 'understand' the 'Index'. Ah, but we are getting ahead of ourselves...
Beginnings
'I've joined another band!'
Such was Janice Higgs exclamation at my suggesting a rehearsal...
I'd started work at Selfridges, since the winter of 1978, in the sub-basement meeting up every Tuesday evening with Matt Johnson to while the hours away in pub that had all the appearance of a sleazy hut; we always managed to get a booth to ourselves and in the low lighting no one questioned our age of course. We'd talk about music mainly, certain relationships (I'd begun dating certain girls at work and, in doing so, found myself upstairs at a party, alone, listening to 'Syd Barrett's John Peel session when my girlfriend walked in...), and how each was doing gigging and rehearsing...
Start As You Mean To Go...
After two rehearsals with the two Martin's on bass and drums in the winter of 1978 Matt and me agreed to split up; though Matt would later used the name 'the the', the 'Marble Index (80)' stuck. At 'the the's' first ever gig playing third on the bill to headliners 'Scritti Politti' and 'PragVec' (at the Africa Centre), with Peter Fenton Jones, I met Janice Higgs, who had lasted one rehearsal with Matt and Keith, introducing her to the bass player, Martin; then and there we agreed to start a band, except nothing happened. So after ring one day, Janice told me she'd found another band, and was meeting them in south London; I immediately asked if I could come along.
At Tooting Bec station, the second incarnation of the band met; at the wrong station. The studio was in Tooting Broadway. What did we do? Walked two whole miles rather than take the underground train...
Another meeting was required that first week in August '79. I suggested my hostel room in Hampstead - 2.00 PM. Of course we took the cans and by five-thirty, walking by the 3 Horseshoes pub it was only natural that someone would suggest going in for a drink. As we sat in the corner near the door, I noticed one of the old guys nestle amongst us a moment.
'Did ya see that! He hit me,..'
Terry had been nearest to the guy. Who then promptly returned to have another go. Only, at that moment Ian got up to give him a straight punch to his face; the fight had started. A mean full on fist flying exchange. It was at that moment i turned to notice two guys march away from the bar. I immediately intercepted them...
'Hey guys,' I reasoned, 'we don't wanna' fight, you don't wanna' fight...'
'Yeah I DO!'
Ah...I looked over my shoulder: Ali and Frazier were still at it hammer and tongs. Somehow my telling the two guys about our leaving seemed to placate their violent urge; we all walked through the door to the outside.
'Where's Ian?'
He seemed relieved at my negotiating his leaving quietly.
First Rehearsal
'Seriously, it's working...'
I looked at Matt; looked at the four speaker cabinet; looked at Matt. £40 pounds was cheap, but lugging the thing that was another matter. In a way it was a fait accompli: we were rehearsing that afternoon and my amp needed to make some sound. So that Friday afternoon, Nick and I dragged the thing down the steps of 'De Wolfe' studios to the pavement of Wardour Street where we found a black cab passing. Someone had booked 'Rollerball' studios under the railway arches of Tower Bridge; little did we know who else had the idea.
It was as I was setting up my brand new 'Electro-harmonix' echo box I became aware of a figure standing behind me. Not so tall, but stocky with blonde hair he seemed just a few years older and obviously intrigued. After some moments I turned to find he'd disappeared. Funny.
The others turned up, tuned up, joked about, until Nick burst into our room,
'Guys! You're not gonna' believe it, Johnny Rotten's upstairs...'
At once I watched the entire entourage walk out the door to go up to the reception area. Huh, I thought, why should I be so impressed. But I was about to be a fan of their about to be released 'Metal Box' of course...
Soon the band ran through various songs: 'pale blue eyes', 'back street luv' and 'poison ivy' (POISON IVY???!!!). Ian had brought along the guitarist from his Mod band 'the Numbers' Gary, who promptly segued from the Small Faces 'all or nothing' to the Sex Pistols 'God Save The Queen' with Terry not knowing any of the lyrics just shouting the title. And the the door flies open: a blonde haired guy in leather jacket stepped in, looked about, (wrong studio...) and stepped out again. It was Keith Levene of PIL. Little did we know then of their persistent musical influence six months later...
Second Rehearsal
It was Rollerball studios again, only someone booked the cavernous ground floor. Terry mentioned that he knew a Greek Restaurant owner that may be interested in managing us...
Only there were a few un-accounted for problems. Some minor argument started that entailed Ian and Nick going to separate pubs while a new recruit, Janice's then boyfriend Nigel, immediately started downing a half bottle of whisky. Janice then promptly spent the next few minutes desperately trying to throw one of her only two drumsticks through a hole in the ceiling, much against Terry's wishes; after she finally succeeded the next argument started. Chaz looked on quietly, drinking a can of beer, before going down the road to a different adjacent pub. The erstwhile manager was to arrive in fifteen minutes time...
Somehow each of the pub goers found that they'd got bored by themselves; returning just minutes before Terry's friend arrived. We stumbled through 'pale blue eyes' & 'backstreet luv' with Nigel's arms flailing without rhyme or reason. Half an hour later, our manager was walking out and down the hallway towards the girlfriend waiting in his sports car. Terry ran up to wonder out loud what he thought.
'Terry you are a good singer, but get rid of the band...'
Matters came to a head afterwards when Janice let slip that she was leaving London to study at Cardiff University; ie no drummer. Nick drifted away, while keeping in touch as a friend.
1980 New Year.
'I know a drummer, runs the pub I go to for lunch...'
Terry's brother indeed suggested we visit Gary Leach in the 'Sekforde Arms'; we then began rehearsing in Pete Bruno's (a music teacher friend of Terry's) shed in the east end. Immediately there was a more robust professional musical process at work; Gary could more than hold a beat, working well with Ian's bass. Terry and Chaz showed them the new songs written a matter of weeks before (See Lyrics/First Light). Gary was sufficiently fired up after a month to then sound proof half of his basement for our very own rehearsal studio; the pub was to be our HQ for eight years.
Through the spring we rehearsed solidly every Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday early evening. Of course it didn't hurt Gary's profit margin with our usage of beer...only where to gig? How to gig?
By the late summer there was only one thing for it; I asked the boss of my hostel whether we could play there, in the leasure hall. One Sunday afternoon a large truck turned with a certain taciturn Scotsman driver fond of saying 'Ya ruckin' runt ya!' (or words to that affect). He promptly opened up the back panel to an all but empty inner; at the far end of which was our equipment.
Except there was one little problem; we hadn't rehearsed for two months. And it showed. There was Matt Johnson, Chris Wilson with his tape machine and sundry hostel friends and we were a mess of mis-timed starts and mangled endings. Then my top string broke. As the band carried on playing the 'First Light' riff, I went through the nearby door sat on the floor and began to put its replacement in next to a fellow guitarist 'Nick'.
'I don't want to go back in...'
Nick urged me to carry on, but I had my misgivings. Sure enough, after plugging in and beginning the first verse something wasn't right. By the end of it I realised the third string was utterly out; I just couldn't hear the strings outside because the band had carried on playing. By the time of the break, with my turn for a 'sound' non-solo, I began to more than a tad pissed off. Even the echo was playing up and so I just took it out on the strings... (there is Chris's recording of this).
Second gig. And it's at Billy's in Soho. A dive nightclub, one evening away from beginning the 'Blitz/New Romantics nights, courtesy of Rusty Egan at the controls. And it's now 8.45 when we're due on at 9.
'Uh guys what's happening?' I call from a phone box.
They were waiting for me, when I told them I'd be at the club. So, in true fashion, with Gary Eaton on board, they immediately packed everything in the van in double time, crossed Clerkenwell with Gary running a red light, finally arriving, setting up the equipment for nine. We went on stage for 9.15 in front of Matt, Keith and a certain 'Stevo'. This was a little curious. All evening I'd watched Matt and Keith take the piss big time; little knowing that by the end of the following year 'the the' would be appearing, along with 'Blancmange' amongst others, on Stevo's anthology to the new electronic music, on 'Some Bizzarre'...
It was still the time of 'Post-Punk' bands. Regularly, Matt, Chris and myself (plus other friends) would go to gigs (Cabaret Voltaire, Scritti Politti, Gang of Four, Souxsie & the Banshees) or visit the Scala cinema to watch old 'Avengers' or 'the Prisoner', black & white/colour TV films. Chris was a music librarian who knew everything about Pop and Classical. Later, he began making videos, adapting certain tracks to the three minutes of film cartridge; such was the technology of the time. Matt, meanwhile had just brought out his first single, produced by Gilbert/Lewis of 'Wire', 'Controversial Subject'; except everyone thought it was Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher at the beginning, rather than the Queen!
One morning. It wasn't the bedroom door creaking open. It wasn't even the surprise element of Chris's head popping up while my sleepy eyes focused...
'John Lennon's been murdered...'
The three of us got up to go to work. Chris later said people were crying behind their newspapers that morning. I remember we took the girls ice skating in Queensway and how Geof and I didn't take to it as much as Mick and the others. Later of course, the same, with less permanent results would happen to Ronald Reagan. But things tend to happen in threes...
I remember at the hostel disco after dancing the evening away that, as the snowballs were thrown outside, the DJ finally got it right by playing John Lennon's 'Imagine' at midnight. Then, just after Christmas, and after assuring he wouldn't be found out, Matt crashed in my room at the hostel, as one of my two other room mates, Geof was away and Mick Yeo didn't mind. It was only when I then assured him he'd be okay also having a breakfast in the canteen the game was up; he had to cough up for not just one nights money but the meal as well. As he drove me into the West End for my work as a foot messenger, I had another idea. All I had to do was pick up three easy local flight ticket jobs, that always came around again by the early afternoon, then we could go to a coffee bar. It worked; two hours later I returned to work, picked up another three in the same vicinity as the others; we went to the pub, for another two hours...
My boss never sussed it out; but she did have the habit of questioning my working habits. Getting it all wrong in the process. Of course it was only one week before my employee rights (working for more than a year) would happen that she slyly insisted she would have to 'let me go'.
1981 and all that.
By the spring, Britain's economy was flat-lining: we all lost our jobs. After losing mine, one of my two room mates - Geof - announced that 'NOW!' magazine was closing. Both he and our bass player - Ian, who had been mending their photocopiers - were losing their jobs; due to half the members of our two bands (the Index/Numbers) working at a local carpet wholesalers, they would all be losing their jobs. What a mess.
Except I suddenly felt all too free (I didn't realise that the effect often comes after one finishes with a dead-end job). I soon realised that working for 38 hours per week in a dead end job, for a mere £15 pounds extra wasn't so clever. Now I had the time to organise gigs for the band, see friends - who had also lost their jobs - and generally have the time of my life for the summer. Hell, even if they managed to kick me out of the hostel, all I had to do was use the skeleton key I'd purloined from one of the cleaners, and I could enter the building through any of the five entrances; easy. For the others, especially if they lived with their parents it was different. And then there was the riots; Brixton and Toxteth. But if there were problems in those times; none of them were mine...
'Look, I'll try and get to one of your gigs...'
Yeah, right. As we walked out of CBS's Soho building Terry was visibly upset; I was laughing at the absurdity. As though any record company would 'understand' the 'Index'. Ah, but we are getting ahead of ourselves...
Beginnings
'I've joined another band!'
Such was Janice Higgs exclamation at my suggesting a rehearsal...
I'd started work at Selfridges, since the winter of 1978, in the sub-basement meeting up every Tuesday evening with Matt Johnson to while the hours away in pub that had all the appearance of a sleazy hut; we always managed to get a booth to ourselves and in the low lighting no one questioned our age of course. We'd talk about music mainly, certain relationships (I'd begun dating certain girls at work and, in doing so, found myself upstairs at a party, alone, listening to 'Syd Barrett's John Peel session when my girlfriend walked in...), and how each was doing gigging and rehearsing...
Start As You Mean To Go...
After two rehearsals with the two Martin's on bass and drums in the winter of 1978 Matt and me agreed to split up; though Matt would later used the name 'the the', the 'Marble Index (80)' stuck. At 'the the's' first ever gig playing third on the bill to headliners 'Scritti Politti' and 'PragVec' (at the Africa Centre), with Peter Fenton Jones, I met Janice Higgs, who had lasted one rehearsal with Matt and Keith, introducing her to the bass player, Martin; then and there we agreed to start a band, except nothing happened. So after ring one day, Janice told me she'd found another band, and was meeting them in south London; I immediately asked if I could come along.
At Tooting Bec station, the second incarnation of the band met; at the wrong station. The studio was in Tooting Broadway. What did we do? Walked two whole miles rather than take the underground train...
Another meeting was required that first week in August '79. I suggested my hostel room in Hampstead - 2.00 PM. Of course we took the cans and by five-thirty, walking by the 3 Horseshoes pub it was only natural that someone would suggest going in for a drink. As we sat in the corner near the door, I noticed one of the old guys nestle amongst us a moment.
'Did ya see that! He hit me,..'
Terry had been nearest to the guy. Who then promptly returned to have another go. Only, at that moment Ian got up to give him a straight punch to his face; the fight had started. A mean full on fist flying exchange. It was at that moment i turned to notice two guys march away from the bar. I immediately intercepted them...
'Hey guys,' I reasoned, 'we don't wanna' fight, you don't wanna' fight...'
'Yeah I DO!'
Ah...I looked over my shoulder: Ali and Frazier were still at it hammer and tongs. Somehow my telling the two guys about our leaving seemed to placate their violent urge; we all walked through the door to the outside.
'Where's Ian?'
He seemed relieved at my negotiating his leaving quietly.
First Rehearsal
'Seriously, it's working...'
I looked at Matt; looked at the four speaker cabinet; looked at Matt. £40 pounds was cheap, but lugging the thing that was another matter. In a way it was a fait accompli: we were rehearsing that afternoon and my amp needed to make some sound. So that Friday afternoon, Nick and I dragged the thing down the steps of 'De Wolfe' studios to the pavement of Wardour Street where we found a black cab passing. Someone had booked 'Rollerball' studios under the railway arches of Tower Bridge; little did we know who else had the idea.
It was as I was setting up my brand new 'Electro-harmonix' echo box I became aware of a figure standing behind me. Not so tall, but stocky with blonde hair he seemed just a few years older and obviously intrigued. After some moments I turned to find he'd disappeared. Funny.
The others turned up, tuned up, joked about, until Nick burst into our room,
'Guys! You're not gonna' believe it, Johnny Rotten's upstairs...'
At once I watched the entire entourage walk out the door to go up to the reception area. Huh, I thought, why should I be so impressed. But I was about to be a fan of their about to be released 'Metal Box' of course...
Soon the band ran through various songs: 'pale blue eyes', 'back street luv' and 'poison ivy' (POISON IVY???!!!). Ian had brought along the guitarist from his Mod band 'the Numbers' Gary, who promptly segued from the Small Faces 'all or nothing' to the Sex Pistols 'God Save The Queen' with Terry not knowing any of the lyrics just shouting the title. And the the door flies open: a blonde haired guy in leather jacket stepped in, looked about, (wrong studio...) and stepped out again. It was Keith Levene of PIL. Little did we know then of their persistent musical influence six months later...
Second Rehearsal
It was Rollerball studios again, only someone booked the cavernous ground floor. Terry mentioned that he knew a Greek Restaurant owner that may be interested in managing us...
Only there were a few un-accounted for problems. Some minor argument started that entailed Ian and Nick going to separate pubs while a new recruit, Janice's then boyfriend Nigel, immediately started downing a half bottle of whisky. Janice then promptly spent the next few minutes desperately trying to throw one of her only two drumsticks through a hole in the ceiling, much against Terry's wishes; after she finally succeeded the next argument started. Chaz looked on quietly, drinking a can of beer, before going down the road to a different adjacent pub. The erstwhile manager was to arrive in fifteen minutes time...
Somehow each of the pub goers found that they'd got bored by themselves; returning just minutes before Terry's friend arrived. We stumbled through 'pale blue eyes' & 'backstreet luv' with Nigel's arms flailing without rhyme or reason. Half an hour later, our manager was walking out and down the hallway towards the girlfriend waiting in his sports car. Terry ran up to wonder out loud what he thought.
'Terry you are a good singer, but get rid of the band...'
Matters came to a head afterwards when Janice let slip that she was leaving London to study at Cardiff University; ie no drummer. Nick drifted away, while keeping in touch as a friend.
1980 New Year.
'I know a drummer, runs the pub I go to for lunch...'
Terry's brother indeed suggested we visit Gary Leach in the 'Sekforde Arms'; we then began rehearsing in Pete Bruno's (a music teacher friend of Terry's) shed in the east end. Immediately there was a more robust professional musical process at work; Gary could more than hold a beat, working well with Ian's bass. Terry and Chaz showed them the new songs written a matter of weeks before (See Lyrics/First Light). Gary was sufficiently fired up after a month to then sound proof half of his basement for our very own rehearsal studio; the pub was to be our HQ for eight years.
Through the spring we rehearsed solidly every Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday early evening. Of course it didn't hurt Gary's profit margin with our usage of beer...only where to gig? How to gig?
By the late summer there was only one thing for it; I asked the boss of my hostel whether we could play there, in the leasure hall. One Sunday afternoon a large truck turned with a certain taciturn Scotsman driver fond of saying 'Ya ruckin' runt ya!' (or words to that affect). He promptly opened up the back panel to an all but empty inner; at the far end of which was our equipment.
Except there was one little problem; we hadn't rehearsed for two months. And it showed. There was Matt Johnson, Chris Wilson with his tape machine and sundry hostel friends and we were a mess of mis-timed starts and mangled endings. Then my top string broke. As the band carried on playing the 'First Light' riff, I went through the nearby door sat on the floor and began to put its replacement in next to a fellow guitarist 'Nick'.
'I don't want to go back in...'
Nick urged me to carry on, but I had my misgivings. Sure enough, after plugging in and beginning the first verse something wasn't right. By the end of it I realised the third string was utterly out; I just couldn't hear the strings outside because the band had carried on playing. By the time of the break, with my turn for a 'sound' non-solo, I began to more than a tad pissed off. Even the echo was playing up and so I just took it out on the strings... (there is Chris's recording of this).
Second gig. And it's at Billy's in Soho. A dive nightclub, one evening away from beginning the 'Blitz/New Romantics nights, courtesy of Rusty Egan at the controls. And it's now 8.45 when we're due on at 9.
'Uh guys what's happening?' I call from a phone box.
They were waiting for me, when I told them I'd be at the club. So, in true fashion, with Gary Eaton on board, they immediately packed everything in the van in double time, crossed Clerkenwell with Gary running a red light, finally arriving, setting up the equipment for nine. We went on stage for 9.15 in front of Matt, Keith and a certain 'Stevo'. This was a little curious. All evening I'd watched Matt and Keith take the piss big time; little knowing that by the end of the following year 'the the' would be appearing, along with 'Blancmange' amongst others, on Stevo's anthology to the new electronic music, on 'Some Bizzarre'...
It was still the time of 'Post-Punk' bands. Regularly, Matt, Chris and myself (plus other friends) would go to gigs (Cabaret Voltaire, Scritti Politti, Gang of Four, Souxsie & the Banshees) or visit the Scala cinema to watch old 'Avengers' or 'the Prisoner', black & white/colour TV films. Chris was a music librarian who knew everything about Pop and Classical. Later, he began making videos, adapting certain tracks to the three minutes of film cartridge; such was the technology of the time. Matt, meanwhile had just brought out his first single, produced by Gilbert/Lewis of 'Wire', 'Controversial Subject'; except everyone thought it was Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher at the beginning, rather than the Queen!
One morning. It wasn't the bedroom door creaking open. It wasn't even the surprise element of Chris's head popping up while my sleepy eyes focused...
'John Lennon's been murdered...'
The three of us got up to go to work. Chris later said people were crying behind their newspapers that morning. I remember we took the girls ice skating in Queensway and how Geof and I didn't take to it as much as Mick and the others. Later of course, the same, with less permanent results would happen to Ronald Reagan. But things tend to happen in threes...
I remember at the hostel disco after dancing the evening away that, as the snowballs were thrown outside, the DJ finally got it right by playing John Lennon's 'Imagine' at midnight. Then, just after Christmas, and after assuring he wouldn't be found out, Matt crashed in my room at the hostel, as one of my two other room mates, Geof was away and Mick Yeo didn't mind. It was only when I then assured him he'd be okay also having a breakfast in the canteen the game was up; he had to cough up for not just one nights money but the meal as well. As he drove me into the West End for my work as a foot messenger, I had another idea. All I had to do was pick up three easy local flight ticket jobs, that always came around again by the early afternoon, then we could go to a coffee bar. It worked; two hours later I returned to work, picked up another three in the same vicinity as the others; we went to the pub, for another two hours...
My boss never sussed it out; but she did have the habit of questioning my working habits. Getting it all wrong in the process. Of course it was only one week before my employee rights (working for more than a year) would happen that she slyly insisted she would have to 'let me go'.
1981 and all that.
By the spring, Britain's economy was flat-lining: we all lost our jobs. After losing mine, one of my two room mates - Geof - announced that 'NOW!' magazine was closing. Both he and our bass player - Ian, who had been mending their photocopiers - were losing their jobs; due to half the members of our two bands (the Index/Numbers) working at a local carpet wholesalers, they would all be losing their jobs. What a mess.
Except I suddenly felt all too free (I didn't realise that the effect often comes after one finishes with a dead-end job). I soon realised that working for 38 hours per week in a dead end job, for a mere £15 pounds extra wasn't so clever. Now I had the time to organise gigs for the band, see friends - who had also lost their jobs - and generally have the time of my life for the summer. Hell, even if they managed to kick me out of the hostel, all I had to do was use the skeleton key I'd purloined from one of the cleaners, and I could enter the building through any of the five entrances; easy. For the others, especially if they lived with their parents it was different. And then there was the riots; Brixton and Toxteth. But if there were problems in those times; none of them were mine...
A NEW WAY OF RECORDING:
I believe I'd heard about the Rolling Stones, Keith Richards recording 'Jumpin' Jack Flash'. I'd just bought a small dictaphone, that I could secrete in my 'Harris Tweed' jacket, to take about anywhere around London, if I found some 'la la' ideas. I was at Martin's & Chris's Higham's flat, with an acoustic guitar, and needed to record a riff. There was only one thing for it. I shoved it into the sound hole, but underneath the lower, 'high' E string,to hold it inside/outside, it meant I couldn't play the string, but I could use the other lower note strings to play my riff. What hit me, as I played the riff back on the dictaphone, was the distortion. Amazing! I immediately made a note of it for the future. (See end of recording for song 'Never Again'.) But I digress...
'Excuse me could you show me the way to Paul McCartney's house...'
The young girl dressed in a black dress during the height of summer, talking in an eastern European accent immediately had my attention. I was just on my daily Mon-Fri walk into town in the morning, necessitated by the fact that I had to leave at 9 am with all those working, to look as though I was still in employment, and on taking the Wellington road route via 'Swiss Cottage', meant passing St. John's Wood tube station...
'I have a map, it is here...'
The girl appeared insistent. I looked at the map to find that the road she was pointing to, was indeed around the corner. Well what else should a gentleman do, when he has all the time in the world...
The large double metal doors, one of which seemed to be slightly ajar caught my companions eye; she rushed to walk through. Inside the small court yard, in front of the old gas lamp stood a bedraggled old man adjusting his bycycle clips. Confronted with the girls question of whether the landlord was in he suggested a deal:
'Give me ma' beer money, an' I'll show you the garden...'
After placing five pounds into the gardener's palm, we were whisked away, down by the side and through into an all too provincial small forty yard wide garden, strewn with various beach, and willow trees. As she asked of Mr McCartney's whereabouts I explored the greenery farther. There at the end appeared a large bed inside what appeared to be the equivalent of the front of a perspex squash court frontage: strange. I looked around. No one was about. I became a little concerned; this was someone's house...
'You'd better go now, I have to do some shopping.'
At the gardeners call, we left through the front gate and watched him cycle, somewhat unsteadily, away. The girl, I now found out to be Linda, began to cry. She had not met 'the Beatles' bass player. After trying to placate her, I suggested that what we had seen probably wasn't the musicians house at all:
'That place could've been anybody's.'
'No,' she insisted, taking me back to the huge gates once more.
There on both lay the marking of all the previous visitors; in differing hues of ink pen, complete with different handwriting were all four names of the 'Fab four'.
The day lay ahead and so, after taking some cash out of the bank before taking a drink at the 'Gluepot' around the corner of BBC's Broadcasting House, the events of meeting my sister and Terry at a pub in North London meant...
'Where'd ya' meet 'er then?' Asked Terry.
'Uh outside a tube station..'
'Oh yeah...'
'She wanted to see Paul McCartney...'
'Oh yeah...'
'But he wasn't in...'
'Oh yeah...'
'So we saw his garden instead...'
'Oh yeah,' he replied, disbelievingly.
I remember looking back from the bar at my sister; she looked utterly bewildered by my new girlfriends accented English. The rest of the day would see us meeting other friends and taking more drinks at the upstairs bar of the 'Porcupine' opposite Leicester Square.
Through the early summer my happiness began to morph into downright euphoria, if I wasn't hanging out with Mick and Linda with her friends, I was dropping in Chris's new flat in Highams Park north London where other friends Martin (from my first job at Selfridges) and his visitors. A look in my diary has an entry for the songs I was listening to:
Shake Some Action - Flamin' Groovies
I'm beginning to see the light - the Velvet Underground
I'm a conservative - Iggy Pop
I'm not losing sleep - David Bowie
Eight Miles High - the Byrds
I dig everything! - David Bowie
But I digress. The band required another gig. On my travels around the capital, I'd come across a little known Church, in Battersea, with its own basement available for renting out; I stumped up the £25 out of my remaining one hundred and suggested the band would need to rehearse. On the week of the Friday gig, we duly rehearsed Mon, Tues and Weds through the evening up until two in the morning where upon, I found I could run for the night bus at 2.15 AM and be back at a friends in way up on the outskirts of North London. There, Chris had taken the upstairs room in the flat (I'd introduced Martin to Matt, a year earlier during concert days). At the time the band were learning two new songs, with various missed cues etc, but with the others, it was enough for a gig in front of friends. Only Gary was disgruntled; it could be heard on the cassette recording. But the gig was still on.
The pub opposite was huge. Multi levelled, with all manner of nooks and crannies; it really did feel like the inside of huge schooner. Although only three tickets had been sold, various friends had made up the clientele to twenty five odd; considering the gig was two miles from the nearest tube, with no discernible bus route this didn't appear too bad. It was seven-thirty when Gary alerted us to the others arrival. I followed him out, leaving Terry to entertain the throng. Walking in, the amps were already being set up courtesy of Ian and Gary Eaton helping out. I put Terry's stereo hi-fi on the table and cabled up the speakers, before heading back to the pub to tell the others how things were up and running. It wasn't until another ten minutes when Gary walked up again to Terry and myself: 'we don't 'ave enough plugs...' I responded that he knew as much as I did about such things. He walked away. As Terry and I carried on talking, I silently became a little un-nerved. Something within told me to return back to the church. I walked through the drive, past the white van and down the steps that led to the side where the door lay. At that moment someone, carrying a huge drum that obscured their head ran straight past me, strange. I ran to the entrance, looked in; empty. Just as I'd originally found it before. Running back, I saw the white van, our equipment, the band, quietly rumble away into the distance.
The following Wednesday Terry and I ordered a drink at the Sekforde Arms and asked for Gary. It was in the back room, as we were playing pool, that he walked in; we asked him about the previous Friday.
'Well, there won't nobody there, was there?'
'Gary there was twenty-five, plus a few converts ready to go across the road...'
'Well,' he gulped, 'ya' should've told us.'
And with that he walked out and up the stairs. To say Terry and me were dismayed would be an understatement. But it was the end of the band at that point. I'd lost my so-called girlfriend, finding that she always began to cry whenever I tried to kiss her. But now this...I visited Nick Neocleous. Recorded an instrumental and two songs one of which happened to be titled 'Let it Ride'. The 'high' from my mid-seventies depression had reached its peak; the slow decline was to follow. I was to see Ian later about another rehearsal but...Gary was surplus to requirements for the next four years. Ahead lay the real 'eighties'; and the nastiest comedown I could have ever dreamed about.
The Fall
The Autumn of '81 found me living for free in the hostel broom cupboard, courtesy of my skeleton key; one of the cleaners had left their belongings: a suite, complete with cushions and all I needed to do was hide my sleeping bag every morning for the nine o'clock waking call. They were strange times.
Meanwhile Matt was changing up a gear: his solo, first LP 'Burning Blue Soul' had garnered rave reviews. He'd turned up, out of the blue, with it under his arm, at Martin and Chris's flat and the only equipment we could play it on was a children's plastic portable record player. To this day I prefer it with the bass down, treble up. I noted the third verse of the second track/first song about the third shooting within six months; the Pontiff, head of the Catholic Church had now been shot. Messages of hope were in short supply.
That October a two piece electro outfit had played Richard Strange's Cabaret night and had just released a cover version of soul standard called 'Tainted Love'; all the way to the number one spot. And who was Matt friends with? The 'Some Bizzare' supremo himself, Stevo!
While this was all beginning, 'I'd suggested to Matt seeing ATV in a pub basement off Great Portland Place. Having downed one too many drinks I attempted to chat up a young lady next to me; her response was to throw her drink at me. Only in my enebrieted state, I'd fallen back; Matt received the full glass full instead. The commotion! That night, having driven back the Higham's Park flat, we sat quietly talking in his car. It was to be the last conversation between us, free of others interruption. He wondered about signing record contracts: would a small label really be for the best? How should the money be negotiated for? As for myself, everything was the opposite: no band, no music to show anyone. When he asked about what I was to do, I truly could not answer. Ahead lay a two month sojourn back at my home town up north for the Christmas and New Year.
1982
Touchdown; back to London. And using my special key, my broom cupboard is empty; nothing except a concrete floor. Luckily, with Mick's three bedroom being just down the hall and in the basement I began to stay illegally in his room. To celebrate my return, the two of us promptly visited one of our old pubs where the 'Super Fun' disco used to be. I found myself talking to a girl; walked her through the door and down the road until...
'You don't have a car?'
To say she was surprised at my appearance next to her supermarket checkout desk was an understatement:
'I only chatted you up to get a lift back home...'
Maybe my luck could change with a job. Ah but you need a stable home. With Mick getting scared of being thrown out of the hostel there was only one thing for it; I began to sleep in his car. There I was scrunched up in the back of his second hand Ford Anglia.
Meanwhile, I ventured into the 'Music Machine' club for the last time to see 'the the' play; it was to be the last gig for a good while barring one off's. I was allowed backstage and talked to Matt one last time they were performing as a three piece with a certain Simon Turner on bass; I swear he looked familiar and found he had indeed appeared on TV in 'Tom Brown's school days' ten years before. Did Keith know this was to be their last gig together? No one was letting on. And after a half hour set that was the end of 'the the' part one.
In troubled times it can be all too easy to succumb to drink of course and it is also preferable to have not only one guardian Angel watching over you...
Scenario 1
I am apparently lying on a bed in Mick's bedroom. Terry notices me choking. I am taken to the toilet at the far end of the corridor, but cannot bring anything up; he reaches into my throat with two fingers and brings out the largest chip, un-blocking my oesophagus, allowing me to eject the contents of my stomach into the toilet bowl.
Scenario 2
Having ingested a pizza, I am sitting in Pete the Poets flat on his settee, head back, as he and Terry's brother chat at my feet. They begin to hear a gurgling sound.
'He's choking,' Boz insists, 'get his head down...'
In my state of semi-consciousness I do not like my head being put between my knees; apparently Boz could feel the wind pass by his nostrils as a certain fist flew up only just passing his tilted back face.
Scenario 3
I am arrested in Camden Town for being 'Drunk' though not disorderly and after being taken by a van to the court the next morning, am fined the princely sum of £3.
Except I wasn't the only one to hit the hard times...
'I've just seen Keith on TV!'
Chris had returned to the hostel the previous Autumn, and now was insisting that a Sunday documentary showed 'the the's' erstwhile keyboard player living in a east end hostel. It looked like I wasn't the only one falling on hard times just as Matt was negotiating a supposed six figure contract for CBS's Epic label. (Legend has it Stevo sent a teddy bear with a cassette in its mouth to CBS's conference, instead of himself, to insist on the terms of the contract).
For Terry, after briefly joining a rehearsal session, then found himself equally at a loss. Ian, meanwhile expressed no particular desire to carry the band on. By the April, after staying in the spare room at Nick's Mum's flat, I found the only re-course was to sleep on the streets. Sunday night to Friday I would leave Terry's flat near Old Street to walk across town where I knew I could enter some council flats at midnight, to sleep on the sixth floor where the heat was carried up from the boilers down the below. In the morning, making sure my black lapel jacket was moderately spruced up, I would then steal some bread from outside a restaurant doorway or finding the benefit money, buy my paupers breakfast: a pint of milk and a 'Mar's' bar, before the trawl around for jobs. And the inevitable drop in once more to Terry's in the afternoon, where later the process would begin once again. It felt a little peculiar sitting in the inner circle of Regents Park surrounded by the new flowers, eating my breakfast to the dawn chorus. (I remember visiting a club, north of Oxford Street, one morning where the owner showed me around, as a possible promoter for the band: 'yeah we had a young band on last night funnily enough, uh...'Haircut One Hundred.')
Except, well things didn't have to be like that. There was always the commute method. IE every second week, I'd jump on a train from Hull sign on, visit my friends and wonder how to stay in London once more. Suffice to say I finally found a second, not so new, hostel half a mile down in Belsize Park (known as lower Hampstead!) Across from which, lay a late night bar: the 'Avacrap' as we came to call it. Mick would bring his new roommates, Bert, fresh from public school and about to join the army as a 'squady' and a young Aussie called Glen etc. But what was Terry and I to do?
'Son's of Dada' multi arts club. Every Friday. Free.
There it was in the 'Time Out' listings. Having walked that Friday lunchtime,into the wine bar in Holborn and asked about a gig, all the barman could answer was turn up and ask the guy who runs it 'Steev B'. I marched to Terry's flat and told him of the gig. That night we turned up, he with his pre-set mono synth, I with my guitar and echo. We began playing having no songs rehearsed, not even a riff: by the five minutes Terry became so nervous his fingers started doing the walkies over the keyboard, regardless of rhyme or reason; all I could do in return was play a one chord riff in response. Fin!
So there we sat down the road at the junction of Farringdon road and Theobolds, in the old Metropolitan pub; instruments by our side.
'Well, that's it then...'
'Yeah,' Terry responded.
'We blew that one...'
'Yeah.'
'No gigs there...'
'No.'
'That Steev guy, must have wondered...'
'Yeah, shame there's no band.'
'What d'ya mean shame?'
'Well he said we could come back next week.'
'What,' I wondered, 'for a gig?'
'Yeah, but he said we had to have a band. And we don't so...'
'Hang on course we've got a band! All we have to do is ring Nick and Sue. Even Ian could play bass...'
So instead of rehearsing in Gary's pub, we immediately took five songs to Nick's flat on the Tuesday: which is where the backing track, the cassette, was recorded for 'It Really Scares Me'. The original of which has a certain Ian Derby congratulating the rest of the band for 'Not keeping to that beat once!' Of course Ian never returned or even saw us play.
Son's of Dada
Nestling under the 'Slightly Oliver' wine bar, away from the sober afternoon clientele, its subterranean environs included some ten tables and chairs with the stage area and white back cloth at one end and the toilets near the stairs at the back (where apparently certain drug shenanigans happened). While various artists drew quick portraits, a poet might be reciting, while Steev attended to the slides being shown over them. Un-like Richard Strange's version it was arty but free to get in as well. There was no membership, no fees and anyone who had an idea generally got a chance to show their wares. Somehow we became the 'house' band, playing every Friday on a rotating order. That first gig proper, we played without a bass until I realised Terry's synth could play the notes in bass mode. Next, after eight gigs, I bought a 'Dr Rhythm' drum machine, so we could begin to play to the drum beat! Meanwhile, the clientelle amounted to anything from thirty to more than a hundred with the excess standing at the back. Around this time, a recording of the band was made on cassette. Our set lasted 20 mins; but the cassette showed 50 mins: our tune-ups between the songs lasted longer than the our set! With the 'Dr Rhythm' I continually tried to hurry up the inbetween song 'hanging about' tune-ups. 'Let's get a little professional here guys!'
After the initial soundcheck, around 7PM, the musicians would retire to one of the pubs outside. There were two; we would be in the public bar of the 'Enterprise', while 'By Wednesday' had begun to hang out across the road in the 'Dolphin', until the performance was due to begin. Other performers were Terry A. Tanx, who released a single afterwards. There was a night with 'punk poet' Patrick Fitzgerald, and a memorable headline act 'the Tall Venusian's', filmed by Chris Wilson.
1984 The Reunion...OH DEAH!
By the end of October the club was closed; Steev was becoming tired with the weekly run. Though he promoted gigs in Soho and later at the London Musicians Collective (LME), the momentum had begun to slow down. At a New Year's Eve gig at the LME Terry didn't turn up, later stating he was ill with the flu; Nick and Sue never performed live with us again.
'Excuse me could you show me the way to Paul McCartney's house...'
The young girl dressed in a black dress during the height of summer, talking in an eastern European accent immediately had my attention. I was just on my daily Mon-Fri walk into town in the morning, necessitated by the fact that I had to leave at 9 am with all those working, to look as though I was still in employment, and on taking the Wellington road route via 'Swiss Cottage', meant passing St. John's Wood tube station...
'I have a map, it is here...'
The girl appeared insistent. I looked at the map to find that the road she was pointing to, was indeed around the corner. Well what else should a gentleman do, when he has all the time in the world...
The large double metal doors, one of which seemed to be slightly ajar caught my companions eye; she rushed to walk through. Inside the small court yard, in front of the old gas lamp stood a bedraggled old man adjusting his bycycle clips. Confronted with the girls question of whether the landlord was in he suggested a deal:
'Give me ma' beer money, an' I'll show you the garden...'
After placing five pounds into the gardener's palm, we were whisked away, down by the side and through into an all too provincial small forty yard wide garden, strewn with various beach, and willow trees. As she asked of Mr McCartney's whereabouts I explored the greenery farther. There at the end appeared a large bed inside what appeared to be the equivalent of the front of a perspex squash court frontage: strange. I looked around. No one was about. I became a little concerned; this was someone's house...
'You'd better go now, I have to do some shopping.'
At the gardeners call, we left through the front gate and watched him cycle, somewhat unsteadily, away. The girl, I now found out to be Linda, began to cry. She had not met 'the Beatles' bass player. After trying to placate her, I suggested that what we had seen probably wasn't the musicians house at all:
'That place could've been anybody's.'
'No,' she insisted, taking me back to the huge gates once more.
There on both lay the marking of all the previous visitors; in differing hues of ink pen, complete with different handwriting were all four names of the 'Fab four'.
The day lay ahead and so, after taking some cash out of the bank before taking a drink at the 'Gluepot' around the corner of BBC's Broadcasting House, the events of meeting my sister and Terry at a pub in North London meant...
'Where'd ya' meet 'er then?' Asked Terry.
'Uh outside a tube station..'
'Oh yeah...'
'She wanted to see Paul McCartney...'
'Oh yeah...'
'But he wasn't in...'
'Oh yeah...'
'So we saw his garden instead...'
'Oh yeah,' he replied, disbelievingly.
I remember looking back from the bar at my sister; she looked utterly bewildered by my new girlfriends accented English. The rest of the day would see us meeting other friends and taking more drinks at the upstairs bar of the 'Porcupine' opposite Leicester Square.
Through the early summer my happiness began to morph into downright euphoria, if I wasn't hanging out with Mick and Linda with her friends, I was dropping in Chris's new flat in Highams Park north London where other friends Martin (from my first job at Selfridges) and his visitors. A look in my diary has an entry for the songs I was listening to:
Shake Some Action - Flamin' Groovies
I'm beginning to see the light - the Velvet Underground
I'm a conservative - Iggy Pop
I'm not losing sleep - David Bowie
Eight Miles High - the Byrds
I dig everything! - David Bowie
But I digress. The band required another gig. On my travels around the capital, I'd come across a little known Church, in Battersea, with its own basement available for renting out; I stumped up the £25 out of my remaining one hundred and suggested the band would need to rehearse. On the week of the Friday gig, we duly rehearsed Mon, Tues and Weds through the evening up until two in the morning where upon, I found I could run for the night bus at 2.15 AM and be back at a friends in way up on the outskirts of North London. There, Chris had taken the upstairs room in the flat (I'd introduced Martin to Matt, a year earlier during concert days). At the time the band were learning two new songs, with various missed cues etc, but with the others, it was enough for a gig in front of friends. Only Gary was disgruntled; it could be heard on the cassette recording. But the gig was still on.
The pub opposite was huge. Multi levelled, with all manner of nooks and crannies; it really did feel like the inside of huge schooner. Although only three tickets had been sold, various friends had made up the clientele to twenty five odd; considering the gig was two miles from the nearest tube, with no discernible bus route this didn't appear too bad. It was seven-thirty when Gary alerted us to the others arrival. I followed him out, leaving Terry to entertain the throng. Walking in, the amps were already being set up courtesy of Ian and Gary Eaton helping out. I put Terry's stereo hi-fi on the table and cabled up the speakers, before heading back to the pub to tell the others how things were up and running. It wasn't until another ten minutes when Gary walked up again to Terry and myself: 'we don't 'ave enough plugs...' I responded that he knew as much as I did about such things. He walked away. As Terry and I carried on talking, I silently became a little un-nerved. Something within told me to return back to the church. I walked through the drive, past the white van and down the steps that led to the side where the door lay. At that moment someone, carrying a huge drum that obscured their head ran straight past me, strange. I ran to the entrance, looked in; empty. Just as I'd originally found it before. Running back, I saw the white van, our equipment, the band, quietly rumble away into the distance.
The following Wednesday Terry and I ordered a drink at the Sekforde Arms and asked for Gary. It was in the back room, as we were playing pool, that he walked in; we asked him about the previous Friday.
'Well, there won't nobody there, was there?'
'Gary there was twenty-five, plus a few converts ready to go across the road...'
'Well,' he gulped, 'ya' should've told us.'
And with that he walked out and up the stairs. To say Terry and me were dismayed would be an understatement. But it was the end of the band at that point. I'd lost my so-called girlfriend, finding that she always began to cry whenever I tried to kiss her. But now this...I visited Nick Neocleous. Recorded an instrumental and two songs one of which happened to be titled 'Let it Ride'. The 'high' from my mid-seventies depression had reached its peak; the slow decline was to follow. I was to see Ian later about another rehearsal but...Gary was surplus to requirements for the next four years. Ahead lay the real 'eighties'; and the nastiest comedown I could have ever dreamed about.
The Fall
The Autumn of '81 found me living for free in the hostel broom cupboard, courtesy of my skeleton key; one of the cleaners had left their belongings: a suite, complete with cushions and all I needed to do was hide my sleeping bag every morning for the nine o'clock waking call. They were strange times.
Meanwhile Matt was changing up a gear: his solo, first LP 'Burning Blue Soul' had garnered rave reviews. He'd turned up, out of the blue, with it under his arm, at Martin and Chris's flat and the only equipment we could play it on was a children's plastic portable record player. To this day I prefer it with the bass down, treble up. I noted the third verse of the second track/first song about the third shooting within six months; the Pontiff, head of the Catholic Church had now been shot. Messages of hope were in short supply.
That October a two piece electro outfit had played Richard Strange's Cabaret night and had just released a cover version of soul standard called 'Tainted Love'; all the way to the number one spot. And who was Matt friends with? The 'Some Bizzare' supremo himself, Stevo!
While this was all beginning, 'I'd suggested to Matt seeing ATV in a pub basement off Great Portland Place. Having downed one too many drinks I attempted to chat up a young lady next to me; her response was to throw her drink at me. Only in my enebrieted state, I'd fallen back; Matt received the full glass full instead. The commotion! That night, having driven back the Higham's Park flat, we sat quietly talking in his car. It was to be the last conversation between us, free of others interruption. He wondered about signing record contracts: would a small label really be for the best? How should the money be negotiated for? As for myself, everything was the opposite: no band, no music to show anyone. When he asked about what I was to do, I truly could not answer. Ahead lay a two month sojourn back at my home town up north for the Christmas and New Year.
1982
Touchdown; back to London. And using my special key, my broom cupboard is empty; nothing except a concrete floor. Luckily, with Mick's three bedroom being just down the hall and in the basement I began to stay illegally in his room. To celebrate my return, the two of us promptly visited one of our old pubs where the 'Super Fun' disco used to be. I found myself talking to a girl; walked her through the door and down the road until...
'You don't have a car?'
To say she was surprised at my appearance next to her supermarket checkout desk was an understatement:
'I only chatted you up to get a lift back home...'
Maybe my luck could change with a job. Ah but you need a stable home. With Mick getting scared of being thrown out of the hostel there was only one thing for it; I began to sleep in his car. There I was scrunched up in the back of his second hand Ford Anglia.
Meanwhile, I ventured into the 'Music Machine' club for the last time to see 'the the' play; it was to be the last gig for a good while barring one off's. I was allowed backstage and talked to Matt one last time they were performing as a three piece with a certain Simon Turner on bass; I swear he looked familiar and found he had indeed appeared on TV in 'Tom Brown's school days' ten years before. Did Keith know this was to be their last gig together? No one was letting on. And after a half hour set that was the end of 'the the' part one.
In troubled times it can be all too easy to succumb to drink of course and it is also preferable to have not only one guardian Angel watching over you...
Scenario 1
I am apparently lying on a bed in Mick's bedroom. Terry notices me choking. I am taken to the toilet at the far end of the corridor, but cannot bring anything up; he reaches into my throat with two fingers and brings out the largest chip, un-blocking my oesophagus, allowing me to eject the contents of my stomach into the toilet bowl.
Scenario 2
Having ingested a pizza, I am sitting in Pete the Poets flat on his settee, head back, as he and Terry's brother chat at my feet. They begin to hear a gurgling sound.
'He's choking,' Boz insists, 'get his head down...'
In my state of semi-consciousness I do not like my head being put between my knees; apparently Boz could feel the wind pass by his nostrils as a certain fist flew up only just passing his tilted back face.
Scenario 3
I am arrested in Camden Town for being 'Drunk' though not disorderly and after being taken by a van to the court the next morning, am fined the princely sum of £3.
Except I wasn't the only one to hit the hard times...
'I've just seen Keith on TV!'
Chris had returned to the hostel the previous Autumn, and now was insisting that a Sunday documentary showed 'the the's' erstwhile keyboard player living in a east end hostel. It looked like I wasn't the only one falling on hard times just as Matt was negotiating a supposed six figure contract for CBS's Epic label. (Legend has it Stevo sent a teddy bear with a cassette in its mouth to CBS's conference, instead of himself, to insist on the terms of the contract).
For Terry, after briefly joining a rehearsal session, then found himself equally at a loss. Ian, meanwhile expressed no particular desire to carry the band on. By the April, after staying in the spare room at Nick's Mum's flat, I found the only re-course was to sleep on the streets. Sunday night to Friday I would leave Terry's flat near Old Street to walk across town where I knew I could enter some council flats at midnight, to sleep on the sixth floor where the heat was carried up from the boilers down the below. In the morning, making sure my black lapel jacket was moderately spruced up, I would then steal some bread from outside a restaurant doorway or finding the benefit money, buy my paupers breakfast: a pint of milk and a 'Mar's' bar, before the trawl around for jobs. And the inevitable drop in once more to Terry's in the afternoon, where later the process would begin once again. It felt a little peculiar sitting in the inner circle of Regents Park surrounded by the new flowers, eating my breakfast to the dawn chorus. (I remember visiting a club, north of Oxford Street, one morning where the owner showed me around, as a possible promoter for the band: 'yeah we had a young band on last night funnily enough, uh...'Haircut One Hundred.')
Except, well things didn't have to be like that. There was always the commute method. IE every second week, I'd jump on a train from Hull sign on, visit my friends and wonder how to stay in London once more. Suffice to say I finally found a second, not so new, hostel half a mile down in Belsize Park (known as lower Hampstead!) Across from which, lay a late night bar: the 'Avacrap' as we came to call it. Mick would bring his new roommates, Bert, fresh from public school and about to join the army as a 'squady' and a young Aussie called Glen etc. But what was Terry and I to do?
'Son's of Dada' multi arts club. Every Friday. Free.
There it was in the 'Time Out' listings. Having walked that Friday lunchtime,into the wine bar in Holborn and asked about a gig, all the barman could answer was turn up and ask the guy who runs it 'Steev B'. I marched to Terry's flat and told him of the gig. That night we turned up, he with his pre-set mono synth, I with my guitar and echo. We began playing having no songs rehearsed, not even a riff: by the five minutes Terry became so nervous his fingers started doing the walkies over the keyboard, regardless of rhyme or reason; all I could do in return was play a one chord riff in response. Fin!
So there we sat down the road at the junction of Farringdon road and Theobolds, in the old Metropolitan pub; instruments by our side.
'Well, that's it then...'
'Yeah,' Terry responded.
'We blew that one...'
'Yeah.'
'No gigs there...'
'No.'
'That Steev guy, must have wondered...'
'Yeah, shame there's no band.'
'What d'ya mean shame?'
'Well he said we could come back next week.'
'What,' I wondered, 'for a gig?'
'Yeah, but he said we had to have a band. And we don't so...'
'Hang on course we've got a band! All we have to do is ring Nick and Sue. Even Ian could play bass...'
So instead of rehearsing in Gary's pub, we immediately took five songs to Nick's flat on the Tuesday: which is where the backing track, the cassette, was recorded for 'It Really Scares Me'. The original of which has a certain Ian Derby congratulating the rest of the band for 'Not keeping to that beat once!' Of course Ian never returned or even saw us play.
Son's of Dada
Nestling under the 'Slightly Oliver' wine bar, away from the sober afternoon clientele, its subterranean environs included some ten tables and chairs with the stage area and white back cloth at one end and the toilets near the stairs at the back (where apparently certain drug shenanigans happened). While various artists drew quick portraits, a poet might be reciting, while Steev attended to the slides being shown over them. Un-like Richard Strange's version it was arty but free to get in as well. There was no membership, no fees and anyone who had an idea generally got a chance to show their wares. Somehow we became the 'house' band, playing every Friday on a rotating order. That first gig proper, we played without a bass until I realised Terry's synth could play the notes in bass mode. Next, after eight gigs, I bought a 'Dr Rhythm' drum machine, so we could begin to play to the drum beat! Meanwhile, the clientelle amounted to anything from thirty to more than a hundred with the excess standing at the back. Around this time, a recording of the band was made on cassette. Our set lasted 20 mins; but the cassette showed 50 mins: our tune-ups between the songs lasted longer than the our set! With the 'Dr Rhythm' I continually tried to hurry up the inbetween song 'hanging about' tune-ups. 'Let's get a little professional here guys!'
After the initial soundcheck, around 7PM, the musicians would retire to one of the pubs outside. There were two; we would be in the public bar of the 'Enterprise', while 'By Wednesday' had begun to hang out across the road in the 'Dolphin', until the performance was due to begin. Other performers were Terry A. Tanx, who released a single afterwards. There was a night with 'punk poet' Patrick Fitzgerald, and a memorable headline act 'the Tall Venusian's', filmed by Chris Wilson.
1984 The Reunion...OH DEAH!
By the end of October the club was closed; Steev was becoming tired with the weekly run. Though he promoted gigs in Soho and later at the London Musicians Collective (LME), the momentum had begun to slow down. At a New Year's Eve gig at the LME Terry didn't turn up, later stating he was ill with the flu; Nick and Sue never performed live with us again.
It arose due to the fact I'd heard that they were going ahead with 'their meeting'; Janice's dictum, to Ian and Terry, about meeting five years later should be put by for the future.
AUGUST
I don't recall who told me, it may have been, Nick or Ian; Terry had told me some time before, but the meeting was due. Of course it had to be at the 'Beehive' on 'New North Road'; right in the centre of where the 'Index' lived (apart from me). True to form, it was an unmitigated disaster...
Having talked to Nick and then Ian, I visited Terry's council flat and told him. Well, the fact that the pub was across the road made it a 'given'.
Terry & me entered the pub to look to the left, Nick and Ian were there with Janice. We sat down, with Janice nursing her pint of Giunness; Terry near them and myself opposite. Except we were taken aback: Janice was dressed in khaki trousers, a green army jacket and heavy boots; she looked more 'butch' than the rest of us put together. As soon as we sat down she started.
'What are you doing here?'
She was addressing me, (remember I was the only one who had not fancied her in any way...) while Terry reminded her of her previous proposal some years before, I thought, 'uh, excuse us but us two ARE THE FUCKIN' Marble Index, dear!'
But no one spoke about the past three years of recordings or, yes, Janice, how we'd performed fifteen successful concerts WITHOUT YOU!
She retreated, with Ian to play pool in the next room. Well, me n' Terry couldn't help laughing at the scenario, and started singing Bowie's 'She's Got Medals...' (If you know the song...)
She returned, having beaten Ian utterly at pool, to then start at me...
'What are you doing here, you were never asked...'
'I'm part of the 'Marble Index'...
'This is between me and Ian and Nick...'
(Oh, not Terry...), 'We're all in the band...'
She immediately got angry, saying I wasn't part of 'their' meeting, (leaving out Terry).
The atmosphere was so bad I said, 'I'm going Terry...'
Five minutes later, Nick got up to leave. This left Ian with Terry; they both had a previous relationship with Janice.
Except Terry was appalled by what she'd turned into; he got up and left to leave, leaving Ian and Janice sitting there.
The two of them never saw each other again. But there was one other. Nigel, ever faithful, carried on with his relationship, despite her shenanigans, regarding the band & Cardiff University.
With the gigs having dried up, Terry and I was offered a free recording at Terry Tanx's flat, the two tracks backing tracks, a second 'Carradines Paradise' and 'the Hunger Tribe' were recorded on 2 Saturdays. Unfortunately, Terry's private life had taken a turn for the worst which meant every Saturday after recieving his dole cheque he'd go walkabout until the afternoon. Finally, the vocals were completed, all be it with his 'Carradines' vocal drenched in echo. There were still no takers on Radio stations so...
1985
I found myself with a small sum of cash; it being left by my Granny upon her death. So...
We began recruiting other musicians specially for recordings. Having found a bass player, 'Samson' and with Gary agreeing to help out on drums, the band began rehearsals for a leap away from 4-track to professional 24-track studio recording. 3 songs were recorded in an afternoon, 'Reflections of You', 'Second Visions' & ' 'Don't Become A Stranger'. All first takes as per usual, with Sue adding a keyboard overdub to the latter ballad; through a friend I was working with on a video, Suzie, I found Sara who played saxophone. Putting some echo on, characteristically, allowed her to breath the notes out, blues style. She did two takes, where I asked everyone should they both be there, or just the one for the middle eight; they all suggested the single take. To this day, I don't know which was the better version, but if it works...
With the music and lead vocal finished, I began to realise how 'Reflections' should end: Terry and I sang backing vocals. Terry was on form, but it needed more...
Chaz: "Terry could you sing the title, holding the note on 'you...'"
Terry: "For how long?"
Chaz: "Oh, just a couple of minutes..."
Terry: "What!"
Despite his protestations and giving me a look from the microphone to me at the mixing desk. The end of the song was duly rolled out. He hit the right note first time, holding it there, all the way through to the end.
Finding a friends flat being there for use, a professional format 'U-Matic' video was shot in one day...
Terry: 'Uh, Gaz y'know that huge Bowie poster...'
Gaz: 'My rare one over the fire place, yeah.'
Terry: 'Well, Chaz thought it'd be better if he cut the outer edges with the scissors...'
Needless to say when Gaz turned up at his flat..
Terry: Now, ya have to remember that we're shooting professionally...'
As Terry guided his friends feet amongst all the yards of leads that led to the two huge arc lights and cameras I could tell Terry's friend appeared all too dazed by what his flat had been changed into...'this is the camera man, Gary's on hand with ideas for the shoot with Suzie...'
The real problem began when Terry and I visited the headquarters of the Video company. The guy began insisting on editing the three tapes worth on VHS; thereby ruining all the subsequent copies by subsequent generations. After an hours arguing the guy finally turned to Terry to ask his view; I knew if Terry sided with him the game would be up. Thankfully all Terry could do was truthfully state that he didn't know which version was best. Losing his temper, the guy offered all 3 U-Matic tapes for £60, YES!
Catching the tube train down to Marylebone to a cheap pub I knew, Terry appeared upset, as far as he could see we now didn't have a finished video at all.
'Hi, Suzie, we've got the tapes, you said you knew a video editing suite...'
Another round of drinks later, and I'd booked an hour for the following week. In that hour the engineer and me took the first 15 mins to edit 'Don't Become A Stranger', with the 3/4 of an hour left for 'Reflections of You'. We'd made 2 professional quality videos for £500! Job done.
Except yet again no record company bothered to watch them. Some didn't even send the tape back. Job NOT done.
1986
Winter found me staying at Terrys council flat in Hackney. While the days were taken with some drinking, the idea took shape to go into the studio once more except this was to be a far more difficult affair...
As I was paying for the time, I felt a proper recording of 'Automaton' should be recorded, this together with my idea for a more danceable rhythm that became 'Never Again' became the basis for returning to the previous studio. Only they'd changed everything around: the mixing desk and effects were now in the large room; the recording was to be in a small booth: meaning we had to do overdub on overdub, meaning far more cash being spent.
Things started out okay. I'd noticed a bass guy playing in Tottenham Ct. Road tube and after giving my number, he turned up, played the track in one take by the mixing desk before I handed him £30 for his ten minutes of work. Only, my relationship with the engineer made itself apparent; his special suited friend shook Terry's and my hand.
'When he shook your hand Terry, everything usual?'
'Yeah.'
'Well the guy promptly tried to crush mine, while smiling...'
Matters became compounded by the first engineer when re-recording the conga's from Tall Steve (ex-drummer of Mark Smith's 'The Fall), over the 1st version. By take 3 all was lost entailing me to negotiate the wasted 5 hours with the boss, due to the incompetence of said engineer. I asked for the 2nd engineer as replacement.
2nd engineer: Uh, can you re-record your original guitar?
I said I didn't know when the breaks came, why?
2nd E: Well, there's far too much noise.
In other words, our 1st engineer had screwed up the recording from day one.
For the ending of 'Never Again', I needed a special distortion I'd discovered when putting a dictaphone into the sound hole of an acoustic guitar. And so doing the same, I asked our 2nd engineer to shove the fader on the mixing board into the red.
'You can't do that!'
'Uh, well I can...'
'No you can't, listen...'
It immediately fed back with a howl.
'If you cut the top frequencies down to 2, the mid down to four with the bass at six, try that.'
He grudgingly did as I asked and found that it indeed worked with its own type of distortion. But of course it made him look foolish.
By the time we'd finished 'Automaton' the money was ebbing away. Whereas the year before we'd recorded in an afternoon, we were now moving into a second week and on my money. At such a rate, the worry became real that there'd be nothing left for mixing. Meanwhile the group were clearly disenchanted: Terry found himself sitting on the sidelines, he'd already begun his acting career. Nick and Sue clearly sensed all was not well; they were already recording their own music, while later Sue would join 'the Gymslips'. I remember sitting with them all in the awful modern backstreet pub; it had a lousy atmosphere anyway, but between the band there was a palpable, deflating, lack of chat between us.
“I'm gonna' get some air…”
Standing in the doorway that late evening, the rain continued to fall. I looked down, to see where the drips were falling into the puddles, while a constant small stream rushed past my toes. Following said stream, I noticed the water disappear down the drain by my left toe. In that moment, a thought occurred to me, ‘that’s where all my money is going…'
A decision: after a quick mix, I needed to pick up the 24 track master tape and walk away, only our 'wonderful' recording 'team' had one last try..."Oh, just leave the tape with us, we'll look after it..." Yeah, right. I picked up the master tape and got the hell out of there. Afterwards, the band as a working unit, now had effectively fallen apart.
CODA
The original members of the band having gone their separate ways; I recruited a drummer, Mark Martin (who remains a good friend to this day), and two bass players, in sequence, making six decent tracks (not released to the public).
Afterwards, Mark, in turn got together some musicians for a number of rehearsals, one of which yielded the recording of my song, 'When all is lost', complete with a fine trumpet solo; hence it's inclusion on the music site.
This band went on to become 'the Bush Ghosts' playing a couple of gigs in London, before breaking up in 1988.
In 1989, with Terry having sang the odd vocal previously, at our rehearsals, I thought I'd introduce him and Mark to the previous 'busker' bass that had featured in 'Never Again'. A rehearsal duly took place with the best songwriter/singer I'd met, the best drummer and technically the best bass player: it didn't work. From the first note, I could tell. There was a collision between the songs and the backbeat. We all went our separate ways afterwards.
Fin.
Copyright 2013 Charles T. Blackburn. All Rights Reserved. No copying, no publication, without prior authorisation from the author.
CODA
The original members of the band having gone their separate ways; I recruited a drummer, Mark Martin (who remains a good friend to this day), and two bass players, in sequence, making six decent tracks (not released to the public).
Afterwards, Mark, in turn got together some musicians for a number of rehearsals, one of which yielded the recording of my song, 'When all is lost', complete with a fine trumpet solo; hence it's inclusion on the music site.
This band went on to become 'the Bush Ghosts' playing a couple of gigs in London, before breaking up in 1988.
In 1989, with Terry having sang the odd vocal previously, at our rehearsals, I thought I'd introduce him and Mark to the previous 'busker' bass that had featured in 'Never Again'. A rehearsal duly took place with the best songwriter/singer I'd met, the best drummer and technically the best bass player: it didn't work. From the first note, I could tell. There was a collision between the songs and the backbeat. We all went our separate ways afterwards.
Fin.
Copyright 2013 Charles T. Blackburn. All Rights Reserved. No copying, no publication, without prior authorisation from the author.