When will they, will they be famous?
A casual but erudite browser of the many and varied threads of the rich fabric that makes up this website will quickly glean three things:
1) A lot of no-longer-in-their-first-flush blokes have too much time on their hands
2) Either ladies don't like music, or have more sense than to spend their time in the endless debate
3) There are quite a few current or former local newspaper reporters rooting in this vast dustbin of trivia and quirk - and I mean that affectionately, given that I am of such pedigree.
So, given the experience and longevity of the Word readerhood, and the inky past of quite a few of us, some of you must have crossed paths at an early stage with people whose talents went on to blossom and spread beauty on the world.
In the ‘80s I used to write two music columns for a weekly newspaper series serving the Midlands city of Lichfield. And that meant spending many a happy night in pubs, rubbing shoulders with and enjoying the music of local bands striving for the big time, or just plain enjoying themselves. Ubik, Big Daisy, RPM, the Sucks, Sticky Fingers and others came, impressed and went. Others were just plain painful.
But one or two spawned real talent:
- Anthea & the Organelles featured Bill Pritchard, currently - I think - a cult recording artist in France who contributed to Leonard Cohen tribute LP I'm Your Fan.
- Victorian Parents were played by Peel and actually recorded for Polydor before dissolving soon after a catastrophic appearance in front of a live audience on TOGWT.
- Red Cassette were a great little good-time band whose lead singer was one Nic Harcourt, currently music director of Word favourite radio station KRCW, host of Morning Becomes Eclectic and respected taste-maker. Good to know him then, and I'm delighted he is where he is today, though having been in touch with him, he took a hard road to get there after leaving the Midlands behind.
Oh, and on a more tenuous note, I shared a Latin teacher (not in the Biblical sense) with one Bryan Ferry, who had passed through Washington Grammar School before I arrived. Miss (Dot) Lawson's opinion of the be-quiffed one after his debut appearance on TOTP - "Well, I didn't think Bryan Ferry was THAT sort of a boy!"
So, my own brushes with the nascent great and good have been minor. How about impressing/entertaining us with your own experiences?
- More from GeoffWashington.
- Login or register to post comments
On Stella Street,
where I grew up, everyone was just ordinary, like, no egos an' that. OK so some of the guys were in bands 'n' movies 'n' that, but, hey, it was just a regular street full of regular people, 'far as I was concerned.
Not I, but 'er indoors...
...is another matter. She was at school with various members of The Prefects, a fairly well-known Cannock band with several Peel Sessions to their credit. Two of her closest schoolfriends married Prefects - Graham Blunt and Alan Apperley, and she also knew Rob Lloyd of the band, who later went on to form The Nightingales. Some time after one of the two schoolfriends split up with her former Prefect, she married Rob Lloyd. This was a couple of years ago, and I was at the wedding, which Mr.Lloyd ensured had a very admirable and musicologically sound disco!
Is this a Lichfield day
by some chance? Can't believe these connections.I remember seeing many pub bands in the 70's and 80's some were good others were awful. Quill at the Hunters Moon were always very entertaining and then higher up the ladder was Steve Gibbons Band at the Railway in Birmingham. They are still playing the pub circuit indeed I believe they are playing Shenstone this weekend.
It is certainly Steve Gibbons week!
See my comments about him in the Live albums strand.
And, given the Lichfieldcentricity of this blog, clearly confirming the city as a magnet for those of wealth and taste, (well, taste, anyway), may I take the opportunity to ask if the Shenstone venue and shows are any good? I drive thru' the village often, always spotting the handwritten sign advertising reasonably recognisable names from the Brumbeat 60s to 80s circuit, viz Mr Gibbons, Emmitt Till, Roger Hill etc etc. Haven't yet the courage to explore further. But I know I must. And probably will.
Too much time on my hands? Past the first flush? I'm in my prime, me, but then I have never edited or written beyond the realms of the Uni Students comic of my youth.
Name dropping
I went on tour with Bill Pritchard once, and the 'big in France' thing was absolutely true. Over here he couldn't get arrested, but in Paris he was a proper star. Lovely fella, and genuinely talented. He's still about - although, in keeping with his popularity, Bill's website is only in French. The English bit is 'coming soon'.
Me mum. . .
was a reporter on the Middleton Guardian back when the female journalists (a word she hated, but I digress) who would cover anything and everything from flower shows to exhumations were very few and far between. One day in the early Sixties her editor - think Lou Grant in a flat cap - said she was in luck: she could choose her assignment that day.
"So what's it to be - an inquest in Manchester or some variety interview I don't mind if we take or leave, to be honest with you?"
Oh, Jesus. Another "make sure you're getting all this down, dear" session with madam chairman of the Moston and Blackley Conservative Club's Entertainments Committee? No, no, the inquest will do very nicely, ta.
The interview was, of course, with the Beatles.
i read that as
'lou grant in a cat flap...'
Happy Hour
In the early eighties I started trying my hand at this 'alternative comedy' lark. Whilst working in York I scored a gig hosting a festival of Yorkshire talent. On one bill were a couple of lads from Hull who sang a few songs. Next time I saw them they had a bassist and drummer. I liked them alot, both as a band and as people.
I moved to London and kept in touch, getting them in on some Miners Benefit gigs. They were getting better and, with the songs they had, coupled with their live presence, I was convinced that they were going to hit the big time.
I moved to Newcastle, when ever they played, offering them floor space to kip on. I had a wager with a housemate that between the band he was championing, Middlesbroughs' Flaming Musolinis and my faves The Housemartins, my heroes would make it big, first and better. I won.
Madness
Suggs was my babysitter when I was a kid! Straight up, no messing...my mum knew his mum.
I particularly remember arguing with him when he wanted to watch the new cop show and I didn't (later I would grow to love Starsky and Hutch...)
Also I went to school with Ray Davies' daughter. Had to miss her birthday trip to see Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory as I had german measles or something.
My Dad!
In the mid 70s my dad was working as an extra on tv and in films: so my dad was in z-cars, I Claudius, Stand Up Virgin Soldiers, The Spy Who Loved Me...and my proudest claim to fame: my dad was a stormtrooper in Star Wars!!
(He also has a couple of chapters in the Danny Wallace book Yes Man. Which is also pretty cool.)
That's the best book title I've heard for ages
My Dad Was a Stormtrooper in Star Wars - brilliant. Amazon could sell it as a twin-pack with Stuart Christie's Granny Made Me an Anarchist.
My memoirs!
Yeah, I guess it is a good title for my memoirs!
Head-banger
Was he the one who banged his head while storming through some mothership or other? A famous blooper.
Regards
Denis Norden
No!
That would make him the most famous of the stormtroopers. Nah, he's one of four who came up on a lift in the Death Star, and the same four later run towards the lightsabre duel. There's also a scene where he was running down a corridor following some little robot.
I did also see Kt Tunstall
I did also see Kt Tunstall at the Kashmir Club about 8 or 9 years ago, which I think may have been her first London gig. She was bloody good too!
Kasabian
When I was music editor for the local uni rag, they came knocking trying to offload their demos... my co-editor loved them and saw all their early gigs, while I failed to give them time of day.
Similarly, I saw Razorlight when they were bottom of the bill, below Suede and Gemma Hayes and assumed they would never get anywhere.
Which is probably why I'm not in A&R.
On the other hand
it may why you ought to be in A&R.
Here's one I just remembered!
While at journalism college, I sat next to one Paul Woods. Now, when discussing musical likes and dislikes, Paul always promoted soul acts such as the Temptations. Lo and behold, a couple of years later he turned up as one of the singers (the small dark one, if you remember them) in The Kane Gang, mackem soulster labelmates of Prefab Sprout. Last I heard, he was working as a sub-editor on the Sunderland Echo, though that was some time back.
The Hollies
They used to rehearse at bass player Eric Haydock's house in the early sixties. I lived on the same street (Victory Street, Portwood, Stockport). The neighbours would continually moan about the noise with comments of "turn that racket down" and "those bloody Teddy Boys". Eric (real surname Haddock), after at least 3 or 4 big hit singles with the Hollies, was persuaded to quit the band by his wife who didnt like him being on the road. He went to work at Needham's Foundary in Stockport. He later founded Eric Haydock's Rockhouse and was then rumoured to have become Allan Clarke's personal driver. 2 years ago I was back in Stockport for a visit and looked through the rain streaked window of a small music store just off the town centre and there was Eric selling a young musician a guitar. I have often since wondered what sort of thoughts of regret might have been running through his mind aa he was selling this young kid the guitar?
Aint seen Steve Gibbons in Shenstone yet
which makes me feel pretty ashamed. Should really make the effort to support a local venue putting on live music and good live music at that. Will definitely make the effort next time.