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| Joe Meek, Joe
Orton, & March 22nd @ The Concorde
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| John Brown
arrived in a snow storm on Tuesday afternoon. We gave him a cup of coffee
and whisked him straight into a rehearsal in a converted public lavatory.
It's not as bad as it sounds in fact it's really very nice, and it also
has the distinction of being mentioned in Joe Orton's diaries.
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| Extract from The Orton Diaries, July 30th 1967: | ||
| In the evening,
braving the rain in a mac borrowed from Oscar, we all went into Brighton.
Our intention was to see the new James Bond film You Only Live Twice. We
couldn't get in. The others, including Kenneth, decided to see In Like
Flint. I couldn't face the idea. I said I'd go for a walk and then go
home. I left them going into the box office and trudged through the
drizzle about the town. After walking for a long while I found a gent's
lavatory on a patch of grass near a church. I went in. It was v. dark.
There was a man in there. Tall, grand and smiling. In the gloom he looked
aristocratic. When the lights were turned on (after about five minutes) I
could see that he was stupid, smiling and bank-clerkish. He showed his
cock. I let him feel mine. 'Oo!' he gasped, not noticing the sinister sore
that had developed on the end over the last week or so. 'Oo!' I asked if
he had anywhere to go back to. 'No,' he said, 'I don't have the choice of
my neighbours, you see. They're down on me and I couldn't take the risk.'
He nodded to a dwarf skulking in the corner of the lavatory. 'He'll suck
you off though. I've seen him do it.' He made a motion to the dwarfish
creature, rather as someone would call a taxi. The dwarf sucked me off
while the other man smiled benevolently and then, I suppose, went back to
his neighbours refreshed. I walked about Brighton. I had a cup of tea at the station. I thought a lot about Prick Up Your Ears. And things in general. Then I walked on and found myself, inexplicably, in Old Steine. I hit the Royal Pavilion at one point, got back to the front, found I was walking in the wrong direction, trudged three quarters of the way back to Shoreham and then managed to catch a bus.
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| It's got to be
the same toilet I'm not an expert on the public lavatories of Brighton
(or anywhere else for that matter), but the only other public toilet on a
patch of grass, near a church in Brighton, is too far away for him to have
gone to the station afterwards. It has to be the one. As I said, it's not
at all bad it's light, clean and airy and run by a friend of ours called
DJ Digitalis. Rehearsals are in the Gent's, and he's in process of
converting the ladies into a small recording studio, which somehow seems
right to me rehearsing is so much more macho than recording. (Now I've
upset the feminists but Ina agrees with me.) Imagine us rehearsing a song called Joe Meek in an ex public toilet where Joe Orton once had a fling . There's a possible connection. In a diary entry for Saturday 4th March 1967 Orton describes an orgy that took place in a "pissoir" under a railway bridge on the Holloway Road just a short walk from Joe Meek's home and studio, 304 Holloway Road. Joe Meek was a known frequenter of the local "cottages". I feel it would be quite wonderful if he'd been a participant in this particular orgy the most bizarre meeting of two greats of the sixties. I don't think I'd better include the diary entry I don't need the upset. You'll just have to look it up for yourselves and cross reference it with John Repsch's excellent book "The Legendary Joe Meek". | ||
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|
Having done exactly that, I've
just discovered that this couldn't have been Joe Meek blew his head off
with a shot gun on February 2nd 1967. Another time maybe
. Perhaps I
should explain that the first record I ever bought was a Joe Meek
production it was Globetrotter by The Tornadoes. I bought it because
they'd sold out of Telstar, and Globetrotter was the follow up. My parents
had just bought a record player. It was 1962. Last Wednesday (the day
before the Concorde gig in Brighton) we spent the day rehearsing, then
everyone came back to our place (except Will who went home and collapsed).
We got somewhat spliffed up and had a very silly evening that culminated
in a lot of Joe Meek records, because we all love him and I wrote a song
about him. So we listened to Wild Wind by John Leyton, a powerful
testament to the efficacy of Purple Hearts in matters such as this; and we
had The Honeycombs on Is It Because, Who Is Sylvia, I Don't Love Her No
More (with a key change effected by slowing the tape down half way
through), and Have I The Right which got the girls dancing on the table.
We were shagged out the next day. | ||
| The Next
Day
22nd March @ The Concorde, Brighton, with The Blockheads
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| Talk about
pressure. By the time we got there I'd had a headache for six hours. I
think I woke up with it. The trouble is that this isn't just the first gig
with the new line-up, it's also the hometown gig, we're playing a
completely new set (admittedly some of it's my old songs, but I haven't
played them for years), we've got to condense the set down to forty
minutes, we're probably under-rehearsed, and on top of all that I've got
to do Clevor Trever with The Blockheads. The Blockheads are evidently
feeling a little under-rehearsed too their soundcheck seems to be a
rehearsal of the whole set, and while they're doing that I'm being
harangued by the crew to be ready with Supro bass and fuzz box to rehearse
Clevor Trever, which we eventually do by playing it through once. Thank
God we're doing my version now and not the speeded-up version of Ian &
The Blockheads that we did at Brixton. I remember feeling like a man
auctioning horses trying to fit all the lyrics in at that tempo. By the
time they've finished there isn't a lot of time for our soundcheck and the
local crew are moaning because Will's using his own kit. They'd like him
to use Dylan Howe's kit but Dylan doesn't like anyone else to use it,
which is fine by us because Will's just bought a 1970's Gretch kit in
silver sparkle finish and we want to use that. So everybody's happy.
Except the local crew. It's all a bit of a rush but by this time we don't really give a fuck anymore it's too late for that. So we just went on and did it. Apparently we went down very well but my recurring thought as we played was that everybody was going to be furious with us afterwards for being complete crap and wasting their time, and that I'd never be able to go in the local supermarket again. But when we came off the stage they asked us if we wanted to do an encore. "No," I said, "we're not an encore sort of band." Later on, when I went on to do Clevor Trever, I was astonished by the applause I somehow hadn't noticed it before. It went well I really enjoyed it (even though I couldn't remember the arrangement and had to stop Johnny from singing my bit before I did). Later on they were joined by Phil Jupitus and Mark Lamarr which was OK but I can't help thinking they're living out a rock'n'roll fantasy and they'd be better sticking to comedy. (That's even more people I've upset.) And at the end we all went back on and did Sex & Drugs & Double Chins. I played my guitar and didn't sing . | ||
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© Eric Goulden, March 27th, 2001 |
| March 25th
2001
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| I don't know
whether this should be in News, The Stiff Re-(s)-Erection page, or even an
Eric Land Special. I don't even know what I'm going to say because I
haven't said it yet. The fact is I got told off in Swindon by a lady drunk
who thought the site wasn't clear enough. She couldn't find a list of
dates "don't you want anyone to come to your gigs" she slurred. Of
course I do, but also we're not running a hospital trust site you know
the kind of thing log on, get the information, get out quick. This is
supposed to be fun, diverting, entertaining a little adventure you can
have in cyber space
. I can't even keep a room tidy so I'm not even going
to start on the website. Anyway, we like it as it is.
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| Salut les
Swindoise! | ||
| Swindon was a
fairly bizarre experience. Ina had to bunk off teaching watercolour
technique to a gang of pensioners so that she could come with me. We went
by the scenic route by way of Midhurst and Petersfield and across the
Weald possibly, or it may have been the Ashdown Forest I didn't pay
enough attention in the Geography class at school when they were doing
that bit. Hampshire was quite heavily involved in the journey. As we
passed the Welcome To Hampshire sign I remember Ina singing a snatch of
Sorted For E's & Wizz by Pulp. (If you can't figure the connection go
and listen to Different Class repeatedly.) | ||
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| It was even on
the receipt, which I threw away because I'm not sure that a pot of tea is
all that tax deductible. I think we'll call her Glennis. Glennis was
either hard of hearing or the chip fryer was making too much noise. She
didn't understand my order for two pots of tea and told me she couldn't
hear what I was saying. When I finally got it through to her she asked,
"to eat here or takeaway?" I said, "we'll eat it here." Then I realised
the ridiculousness of that and corrected myself. "We'll drink it here" I
said "you don't eat a cup of tea, you drink it". Glennis looked at me as
though I was a lunatic. We were very near Swindon, and Swindon was a bit
of an unknown quantity, but I was beginning to get the feeling I wasn't
going to fit in. Back in the car rehearsals began how would a French
group kick off? Obviously with a hearty "Salut les Swindoise!"
hmm
I saw Wishbone Ash at the Brighton Dome in 1971 and instantly hated them before they'd even played a note because one of the guitarists said "Good Evening Brighton" in that pregnant, upspeak kind of voice that people who say pratty things like that always seem to use. By the end of a couple of numbers I knew I was right, they were horrible precious, anti-septic and very white. This may seem like a bit of a digression, but there is a slightly tenuous connection. The support band were called Glencoe and the bass player was Norman Watt-Roy. I just spoke to Norman on the phone and he said he hated Wishbone Ash too, but they had to say they liked them to get on the tour. Glencoe mutated into Loving Awareness, and Loving Awareness as everybody probably knows are now The Blockheads.<>BR> But more about that later I'm still on the road to Swindon. When we actually hit the town centre there was a roundabout the like of which has never been seen before or since. I think it was designed by Morris Men. People like Glennis probably think that someone like me designed it. I can only describe it as the jewel in the Swindonian crown and pause for a drawing of it. The warning sign for it looked like the Thames Valley Constabulary logo and Ina thought it'd been built on the site of, and to commemorate a set of ancient Anglo Saxon burial mounds. If anyone can email us and explain how the roundabout works we'd appreciate it. On the way home there wasn't any traffic we could follow, so we disregarded most of the thing and kind of drove through the middle. It should come with an instruction manual. | ||
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| Clubwise the
promoter was a bit of a misery with a John Otway fixation. I'm sure John
Otway is a very loveable and talented human being, but he isn't an artist
that I choose to align myself with. But it was Otway this and Otway that
until I wished he'd shut the fuck up. The rest of the staff were great
though, so were the audience. I couldn't begin to tell you what I played
without delving into the recesses of my guitar case for the set list which
I wrote out in an adjacent Indian restaurant. Even then it'd be difficult
because me and the set list seemed to part company half way through. I
know I'd played Joe Meek, Lureland, School and The Consolation Prize from
The Donovan Of Trash. My solo gigs are always fairly Donovan Of Trash
heavy it seems. I also played more songs from the Stiff era than usual, in
honour of the re-release. I would've liked to have played Denim 'n' Lace
from Karaoke, but some of the audience were possibly too drunk to take it
in and I didn't want to risk losing them. I played some of my Len Bright
Combo songs too a very good Golden Hour Of Harry Secombe and Someone
Must've Nailed Us Together which went into True Happiness via a broken
string interlude during which I played a raga on the two bottom strings
while Ina replaced the D. I had a bit of a sticky moment at the midpoint
of True Happiness when I realised I'd completely forgotten the chords.
Luckily this coincided with a verbal exchange with an idiot who said I was
rubbish and then confessed to being a hippy after I berated him for his
hideous moustache. By the time we'd got through that I'd remembered the
chords. And that's about as much as I'm prepared to remember for now.
The audience loved it but the promoter didn't seem to. He told me afterwards that if he'd just been the promoter, and not the pub landlord too, he'd have been weeping. He never said thank you so neither did I. Apparently bad weather and an admission charge on the door doesn't usually conspire to keep people away, even though it doesn't always rain heavily in Swindon, and you can see a local tribute band for free any night of the week in his pub. I'm so sorry it was only nearly full. | ||
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© Eric Goulden, March 25th, 2001 |
