3 My Future Positively Glittered
Those Landmark Years
Throughout 1976 I gradually sidelined my nostalgic super-elegant image in favour of a far rougher one inspired by the decade of Brando, Presley and Dean. Occasionally I'd relapse, but for the most part I affected the classic uniform of red windcheater, white tee-shirt and straight-leg jeans so memorably worn by James Dean in "Rebel Without a Cause". He'd died a week to the day before I was born in early autumn 1955, seen by many as the Year Zero of the Rock'n' Roll era, and the 20th anniversary of his death created quite a buzz as I remember, with Rock stars such as John Miles and Slik's Midge Ure affecting the highschool rebel look, while Punk waited in the wings, poised perhaps to devastate Pop's innocence forever. I remember one time in particular that I dusted down the old dapper dandy look. It was in the dying days of the long hot summer of '76, and I wore top hat and tails and my fingernails tinted bright red like a ghost from old Berlin to a party hosted by a friend from Brooklands. It was mid-September, and I know this to be an absolute fact because I was supposed to have been at sea at the time, on the minesweeper HMS Fittleton. I think it was only a couple of days afterwards that Fittleton capsized and sank to the bottom of the North Sea following a tragic accident involving another larger ship, the frigate HMS Mermaid. It resulted in the loss of twelve men most of whom I knew personally, given that only weeks earlier I'd spent a few days on Fittleton with more or less exactly the same crew.
HMS Fittleton had been accepted into the RN in January 1955, although she wasn't actually named Fittleton (after the Wiltshire village) until almost exactly 21 years later. She set sail from Shoreham in Sussex on the 11th of September 1976 with the intention of reaching the port of Hamburg on the 21st of that month for a three day Official Visit, but never arrived. On the 20th she took part in the NATO exercise "Teamwork" 80 miles off the Dutch coast in the North Sea, after which she was ordered to undergo a Replenishment at Sea with the 2500 ton frigate HMS Mermaid, and it was during this exercise that the bow waves of the frigate inter-reacted with those of the sweeper to cause the two to collide. For some reason I'd earlier decided to opt out of the trip by pleading sickness. It was a decision that came to haunt me...despite the fact that had I taken part in the RAS manoeuvre I'd almost certainly have been assigned what was known as Tiller Flat duty, as had been the case on many previous occasions during exercises of this kind. This would have put me below deck, making escape difficult although not impossible. In other words, I may or may not have survived the accident. Of the twelve who didn't survive I knew three quite well, and they were all men of remarkable generosity of spirit and sweetness of disposition, what I'd call natural gentlemen, and it broke my heart to think of what happened to them. I so wanted to comfort my shipmates for their loss, to bond with them and be part of what they were going through. I wanted to have survived like them. I went over it all again and again in my mind, until I drove myself almost insane with regret and grief. Once more I'd taken the easy way out, but this time it wouldn't be so easy for me to forget or explain away.
The landmark year of 1977 was in many ways a far darker one than those coming immediately before it, at least that's how I see it. It was after all marked by the inexorable rise of Punk, a musical and cultural movement which could be said to have fatally disabled Rock's uneven progress as an art form with its savage DIY ethic, and which, fused with an extreme and often horrifying sartorial eccentricity produced something utterly unique for the time. From its London axis, and yet with roots in the US, it spread like a raging plague throughout the year even infecting the most genteel suburbs. At first I remained unaffected, although I'd long incorporated elements of the Punk sartorial revolution into my own image, such as short hair, small-collared shirts and straight-leg trousers, but by the end of the year I was a Punk myself.
1977 was a year of endless hedonism for me, as one after the other of my old Pangbourne pals celebrated hitting 21 in houses and apartments in various corners of trendy west and central London. Of all of my college friends I was perhaps closest with Craig, a future mililonaire businessman, but they were all very dear to me, and still are. Craig fuelled my growing passion for the decadent London life of parties and clubs filled to the brim with the fashionable and the beautiful. One of his closest friends was a legendary fashion designer who forged cutting edge images for some of the most powerful trendsetters in Rock music, and we went with him to Maunkberries a couple of times. Soon after the start of the year, Craig had ditched his tired old velvet jacket and flares combo in favour of drainpipe jeans and black winklepickers. Within a short time I too was sporting a pair of cream-coloured winklepicker shoes which I went on to supplement with black slip-ons with large gold sidebuckles, imitation crocodile skin shoes with squared off toes, and a pair of black Chelsea boots, all painfully pointed. By the spring of '78 I think I'd junked the lot as a means of sparing my feet but for a time they were my pride and joy.
Being the suburban greenhorn that I was, I thought the look that dominated London's clubland was analogous with Punk, but I was way off the mark. Certainly like Punk it ran contrary to the long hair and flared jeans that were still ubiquitous throughout the UK at the time, but it was married to a love of sophisticated Soul music rather than primal three-chord Rock. It was the uniform of the so-called Soul Boys, flash white working class kids with a love of black dance music like the Mods before them, although I was not to discover this until later in the year when I was at Merchant Navy College in Kent. It was through one of the guys at this college in fact that I found out about the Global Village night club under the Arches near Charing Cross. which was a magnet in '77 for working class kids who were into the Soul Boy look, as well as a handful of Punks. Its key elements were the wedge haircut, which was often to be streaked with a variety of tints including red and even green, brightly coloured peg-top trousers or straight leg jeans, and the obligatory winklepickers...or for a time, beach sandals. The wedge was also allegedly taken up by certain hardcore fans of Liverpool Football Club who'd discovered a taste around '77 for European casual sports clothing while travelling on the continent for away matches. So, the Casual subculture was born, together with a passion for designer sportswear on the part of British working class youth which exists to this day, being visible in every high street and shopping centre in the land. For most of '77, it was the Soul Boy look I affected rather than Punk, not that I knew the difference. However, strolling along the Kings Road in what I think was the January of that year, I became confronted for the first time with the incredible vagaries of dress being adopted by Punks about that time, and it'd only be a matter of time before I too aspired to astound others the way they'd done me. By the end of the year, I'd effectively become a full-time Punk and was happy to remain so until the Mod Revival starting drawing me away around about the summer of 1979. But that's another story.
The Restless and the Riotous
By the summer I was working as a sailing instructor in Palamos on Spain's Costa Brava. For a time my cousin Rod was around with Lucy, his lady love, although I can't remember whether Rod taught for the school or not. My dad stayed in Palamos for a while too, as did my brother Dane, although for the most part I was alone. Rod and his sister Kris, and my uncle and aunt, Peter and Marge, had lived more or less opposite us in Bedford Park in the sixties, and we'd holidayed together at my grandmothers' house near Montroig. A spellbinding guitarist since his teens, Rod recently revived his playing career.
After a few months I lost my job, but stayed on in Palamos for several months afterwards, idling by day, while trawling the city's bars and discos by night. These nightly revels had an almost Sisyphian quality to them, as if I was eternally drawn by what lay just beyond my reach, moving on once I'd secured it. Perhaps this passion for what I couldn't have was initially at the heart of my longing to be famous. After all at the time, I was still hopelessly ill-equipped for fame. I certainly didn't have the necessary mental toughness to push my way to the top. I had the pretty boy looks, but very few actors, or indeed musicians, become truly successful on the strength of looks alone, and this was especially true of the seventies I think it's fair to say. I'd not yet appeared in a single play, except for a handful at Pangbourne, and my acting had attracted some positive attention it has to be said. My roles included two elderly women, one of whom had to remain completely mute for a few minutes and that was the extent of my time onstage, this being in Max Frisch's "The Fire Raisers". The other was as a maid in a one-act play by George Bernard Shaw called "Passion, Poison and Petrifaction". Clomping around in a dress with studded military boots I can remember bringing the house down with that one. I also played a society beauty conducting some kind of illicit relationship with one of my best friends, Simon Miles, who went on to found his own cabaret club in the nineties called the Cupboard, but the name of the play escapes me. My only male role was in "The Rats", a little known Agatha Christie one-acter, and my perfomance as effeminate psychopath Alex showed real promise if the praise of the college nurse was anything to go by. In short, I was hardly a National Youth Theatre wonder kid. I'd penned a few simple songs, but my guitar playing was still desperately limited. I wasn't a natural player like my cousin Rod, but I went on to become a pretty good songwriter with my own playing style. My voice was good though, and incredibly versatile. As a budding writer, I'd filled countless pages with scribblings which I'd endlessly corrected, but there was nothing show for my efforts. In short there was precious little evidence of any kind of artistic talent on my part...and it could hardly be said that my future positively glittered before me.
My final voyage with the RNR came towards the end of the summer. My best RNR pal Colin was sadly not onboard, but other friends were, such as Adam, a tall red-headed man of about 26 who looked something like the actor Edward Fox, with a trace perhaps of Damian Lewis, or at least that's how I see him in hindsight. Like me Adam loved music and fashion and clubbing, and we hit it off from our very first meeting back at President. He later confided in me about his early life which'd been marked by one tragedy after the other, and his warm and courtly manners masked a troubled inner life which he kept almost entirely to himself, together with remarkable fearlessness. I remember one time in a bar on the south coast when for some reason a drunken sailor took a strong dislike to me, Adam put himself in harm's way to save my hide. It was typical of him. You overestimated his refinement at your peril. I can imagine though that there were those who wondered how he ended up serving as a rating, as they would have done me. I'm thinking in particular of some of the young guys of a certain RNR Division liaising with us to and from the port of Ostend in Belgium in that year of my final spell as a military man. There was one incident when some of these hard young seamen were grouping in an Ostend street for a scrap with some locals who'd offended them in some way. Adam and I made it clear we had no intention of joining in, and one of their number, a waiflike young sailor of about 16 or 17, previously something of a pal of ours, turned to us with a look of utter confusion on his beardless face and said: "What's wrong with youse guys?", before joining his pals for the gathering riot. Adam just didn't see the point in fighting unless it was absolutely necessary, but he was far from being a coward as I've already made clear. What's more, according to what I observed and what he himself told me, he was more than averagely successful with the opposite sex, unconsciously infused like me with the poisonous playboy values of the times. Yet, for his own reasons he chose to conceal his true nature beneath a show of gentlemanly reserve, and even languour. This secret inner strength would eventually see him being commissioned as an officer in the Royal Navy, which'd been his destiny all along. But not mine. My time with the London Division, RNR came to an end in late 1977 with an incredibly positive character report, for which I remain grateful to this day. The RNR did all right by me and I honour them for it, and if military life had never been for me, it's a part of who I am whether I like it or not. My life story would be all the poorer without it.
In late 1977 I joined the former Merchant Navy College in Greenhithe, Kent, which had merged with the Thames Nautical Training College HMS Worcester nine years earlier, as a trainee Radio Officer. I formed several close friendships there; but closest of all was with Jasbir, or Jesse, a lovable hard nut of about 18 with a thick London accent who'd been born into nearby Gravesend's large Asian community. Tough as he was he was loyal and kind-hearted towards those he liked and trusted, and for a time we were pretty well inseparable. I used to endlessly nag about his attitude, not that there was anything wrong with it...he was one of the kindest guys I've ever known...but he had a habit of talking tough which intimidated some people, including me at times. As things turned out, I was the one who quit college first, even if he did follow me soon afterwards, which caused Jesse to wonder why I'd taken what seemed to him like the moral high ground in the first place. I couldn't answer. It was through Jesse I think that I started going to discos at Gravesend's Woodville Hall, subject of the versified piece below. Pretty well every week for a while, a gang of us from the college would head out to the Woodville Hall, where we were treated like visiting royalty. Mainly white and Asian, Woodville Hall's Punk and Disco kids would dress in the most bizarre escapist fashions imaginable throughout '77, which stood out in such striking contrast with the drabness of their surroundings. English suburban life in those days didn't include such modern distractions as mobile phones, DVD players and the world wide web, and so was a fertile breeding ground for eccentric youth cults such as Punk, New Romanticism and Goth. The last two were yet in the future, but their seeds had been sown during the heydey of Punk, whose influence pervaded the Hall, as did the so-called Soul Boy fashion which was similar, although a lot less threatening. And these Soul Boys knew how to dance like you wouldn't believe...anybody'd think they were students of Jazz ballet or something, but they were just ordinary working class kids, who became stars once they took to the dance floor.
Woodville Hall Soul Boys
Soon after I'd paid
My sixty
0r seventy pence,
I found myself
In what I thought
Was a minitiure London.
I saw girls
In chandelier earrings,
In stilleto heels,
Wearing evening
Dresses,
Which contrasted with
The bizarre
Hair colours
They favoured:
Jet black
0r bleach blonde,
With flashes of
Red, Purple
0r green.
Some wore large
Bow ties,
Others unceremoniously
Hanged
Their school ties
Round their
Necks.
Eye make-up
Was exaggerated.
The boys all had
Short hair,
Wore mohair sweaters,
Thin ties,
Baggy,
Peg-top trousers
And winklepicker shoes.
A band playing
Raw street rock
At a frantic speed
Came to a sudden,
Violent climax...
Melodic, rythmic,
Highly danceable
Soul music
Was now beginning
To fill the hall,
With another group
0f short-haired youths...
Smoother, more elegant,
Less menacing
Than the previous ones.
These well-dressed
Street boys
Wore well-pressed pegs
0f red or blue...
They pirhouetted
And posed...
Pirhouetted and posed.
Farewell Gilded Youth
Soon after returning from the Merchant Navy College in December '77, I auditioned for a place on the three year drama course at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama in the City of London, which was really what I'd wanted to do in the first place. Incredibly, as I'd already failed two earlier auditions for RADA, Guildhall accepted me for the course beginning in autumn 1978. I was exhilerated; but that didn't stop me sinking further into the nihilistic Punk lifestyle. Having been entranced by the hairstyle of one of a small gang of Punks I knew by sight from nights out in Dartford in late '77, I decided to imitate it a few weeks later. It was spiked in classic Punk style, with a kind of a halo of bright blond taking in the front of the head, both sides, and a strip at the nape of the neck. I've part of a photograph of myself wearing this style with a long Soul Boy fringe at the front, before I eventually had it cut into the spikes. By the spring of 1978, I'd shorn it all off and looked like a skinhead. It was genuinely dangerous being a Punk in the late '70s, and you lived in constant fear of attack or abuse if you chose to dress like one. After all, Punk's culture of insolence and outrage was extreme even by the standards of previous British youth cults such as the Teds, the Rockers, the Mods, the Greasers, the Skins, the Suedeheads and the Smoothies. Britain in those days was a country still dominated to some degree by pre-war moral values, which were Victorian in essence, and a cultural war was being fought for the soul of the nation. It could be said therefore that Punks were the avant garde of the new Britain in a way that would be impossible today. This explains the extraordinary hostility Punks attracted.
Close by to where I shared a house with my parents in the furthermost reaches of south west London where suburbia meets countryside I saw Hersham Punk band Sham '69 shortly before they became nationally famous. I already knew their lead singer Jimmy Pursey by sight; at least I think it was him I saw miming to Chris Spedding's "Motorbiking" at a Walton disco one night. This gig took place in a poky hall above a pub in the centre of a large bleak industrial estate, itself surrounded by drab housing estates and endless rows of council houses. I was often there on a Sunday in the late 70s, usually with my brother and friends, but sometimes alone. On one occasion that I remember, the Soul gave way to Punk which saw the tiny dance space being invaded by deranged pogo-dancers. On another, a Ted revivalist, a follower of classic Rock'n'Roll who favoured flashy fifties-style clothing, tried to start some trouble with me in the toilet. At this point, another Ted who'd befriended me about a year before when I dressed like an extra from "Rebel Without a Cause" or something...I think his name was Steve... stepped in with the magical words: "He's a mate!". Steve's intervention may have saved me from a hiding that night because Teds had a loathing of Punks informed by their essential conservatism. To them, Punks probably seemed to have no respect for anything. Later, or it may have been before I can't remember, he asked me whether I was really into "this Punk lark" or whatever he called it, and I assured him I wasn't. I may even have added that I still loved the fifties, which was actually the truth to an extent, not that that was the point. The fact is that I lied to him to look good in his eyes, which was a pretty low thing to do to a friend.
On New Years Eve, Jesse and I went to a party in London's swanky West End. It was one of the last, perhaps even the very last, in a long series of celebrations I'd gone to throughout '77 mainly as a result of friends from Pangbourne reaching the landmark age of 21. It was also one of the last times I ever saw Jesse. We stayed in touch until about 1983, meeting only once, before eventually losing contact altogether. It was my fault; Jesse did all he could to keep the friendship alive. Before arriving, Jesse and I met up as arranged with budding oil magnate Craig, an especially close friend from my days as Cadet C.R. Halling 173. Introductions over, Jesse saw fit to impress Craig and I with a terrifying solo display of his lethal street fighting skills. "I'm suitably impressed", said Craig, and he looked it, and Craig was no wimp, despite his upper class accent. An unlikely trio, we all three got on fantastically well on that insane night which at some point saw me pouring a full glass of beer over my head. What the beautiful dancer I'd spent most of the evening with thought of a nice guy like me doing a thing like that she didn't say. In the late '70s, I met so many people who might have done anything for me, and yet my true passion appeared to be the creation of endless drunken scenes, and a party wasn't a party for me in those days unless I'd caused one, after which I simply moved on. Well, I've got plenty of time to myself to reflect on it all now..and the sheer waste of youth, of life, of love, life makes me weep.
In the spring of 1978, I arrived in the famous Costa del Sol town of Fuengirola near Marbella, with the intention of helping to set up a sailing school with a young English guy of about 30 I knew only very slightly. He put me up in an apartment, which was decent of him, but as things turned out the project came to nothing. However, I stayed on in Fuengirola, living first in a hotel, and then rent-free thanks to an American friend I made in town in her own apartment. I became pretty well known locally as Coco, one of only two Punks in Fuengirola, and front man for a Hard Rock band playing nightly at the city's Tam Tam nightclub. '78 was my first year as a full-time Punk in fact, and among the clothes I favoured were a black wet-look tee-shirt with cropped sleeves, drainpipe jeans of black or green, worn with black studded belt festooned with silver chain kept in place by safety pins, flourescent teddy boy socks, and white shoes with black laces etc. I even had a safety pin, anaesthetized by being dipped into an alcoholic drink, forced through my left ear lobe by a friend. I removed it once it'd started to cause my whole ear to throb. I was always short of money, but I could order what I wanted at the Tam Tam, and when I was flat broke I was bought toasted cheese sandwiches and bottles of cold Spanish beer or whatever else I wished for by someone who's still one of my favourite people ever. We went clubbing a lot, and it was such a thrill to sit there with her when the evening was still young. One night the legend that was British racing driver James Hunt called to her from out of the darkness of a balmy Andalusian night, before vanishing as suddenly as he'd arrived. It was that magical a summer. We spent time at Lew Hoad's Campo de Tenis, at Mijas, Marbella, Torremolinos...it was an incredible time. But I had to return to London to take my place at the Guildhall towards the end of summer. After all, I was going to be a star wasn't I.
The following summer I was back in Spain; but not Fuengirola, despite the fact that my close friends from the band had wanted me to resume my position as lead singer. In my wisdom I'd chosen instead to to go to La Ribera with my parents, but it'd been three years since I was last there for any length of time, and the atmosphere had definitely changed. I felt a deep and overwhelming sense of exhaustion during my first few days in the town, but I don't recall being especially disappointed by the fact that only recently I'd be told by the Guildhall authorities that they thought it'd be best if I left...or rather strike out on my own in the acting world. I was resigned to it, although a little put out it has to be said. After all, my dream of being a gilded youth at the Guildhall had barely lasted a year. It must have been the Costa Calida sun that made me feel so burned out. Just before quitting Fuengirola the previous summer of '78 I'd been approached with an offer of singing in the Canary Islands, but I'd turned it down. Who knows where it might have led; but then had I travelled to the Canaries with the band, I wouldn't have gone to Guildhall through which so many incredible experiences came. It would take an entire separate volume to list them all. What I will say is that at Guildhall I was involved with a string of Rock and Pop bands who performed at the occasional Folk Nights when students gathered after classes at night to perform songs and so on at the nearby Lauderdale Tower
Through one of them, Rockets, I was talent-scouted as lead singer for a genius guitar player who was hoping to form a band at the Guildhall, and judging of what he'd seen of me, he thought I'd make a great front man. But for some reason, the band was never formed. As for the genius, he went on to play and write for one of the world's leading Rock superstars, something he's done for nearly twenty years now. He even went on to co-write one of the Summoner's most famous songs, the one about the fields, one of ten tales from the classic 1993 album. At some point he'd briefly allied himself with one of the most successful Jazz-Funk acts of the eighties together with another Guildhall friend of mine Mike. Mike'd even invited me to an early rehearsal...my mother made a note of this in green ink after speaking to him about it on the phone. Perhaps they could've done with a singer at that point. Through another, Narcissus, I found only disgrace. It was the seond version of the band, and I'd formed it with Mike, the drummer from Rockets, and another close friend Robin, two lovely, gentle guys...but our one and only gig was a disaster. I wore my normal make-up, but Robin had seen fit to paint his face like a warrior, while Mike had camouflaged his. We were greeted by a riot of good-natured heckling. I lost my rag which was very unlike me in those days, and ended up throwing a plectrum into the audience with a sarcastic "Here's to all my loving fans!", or something equally pathetic. I can't help thinking it did no end of harm to my reputation, because my chief stock-in-trade was not the forcefulness of the natural leader who demands and gains attention with ease, but the exquisite charm of the social climber, who carefully seduces his way to alpha status, like Julien Sorel, hero of Stendhal's "The Scarlet and the Black". Despite his humble origins, he succeeds in ascending to the very top of the social ladder armed with beauty, brilliance and ambition, only to come crashing down to the ground like Icarus, destroyed by his own hubris. My final band was the '50s revivalist act Z Cars, which even won a tiny fanbase for itself. I was Carl Cool, lead singer and songwriter with a tattoo painted onto my shoulder, Rob was Robert Fitzroy-Square the boy next door with the Buddy Holly glasses, who provided most of the comedy, Dave was Dave Dean, the punk kid with the don't mess with me stare, and Richard was Little Ricky Ticky, the baby of the band at only 18. I think it was Dave who left first, and for a time, the charismatic actor-writer Ian Puleston-Davies came onboard. Ian, Rob and I were also involved in the production of a musical comedy based on the Scottish play, "Mac and Beth", which survived my time at Guildhall, if only for a single performance. It was rewritten several times. There was a version by Michael Praed of "Robin of Sherwood" fame; and another which I wrote only a few years ago, only to come to the conclusion that it was too dark and violent. Most of it ended up in the trash. Somewhere, however, there's a VHS copy of one of a handful of Guildhall performances of the play.
There were emotional scenes at my farewell party held in the depths of the Barbican Estate's Lauderdale Tower and many cried openly because I was leaving. During the evening, a close friend Gill told me to contact a London-based impresario and agent well-known for offering young actors their very first positions within the entertainment industry. Her own brother, who'd recently starred in a TV comedy series had received his first break through this flamboyant and warm-hearted man. True to form, he gave me my very first paid job in the business a matter of months afterwards. So just before Christmas, I was doubling as Christian the Chorus Boy and Joey the Teddy Bear complete with furry costume in the pantomime "Sleeping Beauty" that began its run in Ealing in west London, culminating at the Buxton Opera House in Derbyshire. Then early on in the new year moreover, the famed theatre director Richard Cottrell offered me the part of Mustardseed in "A Midsummer Night's Dream" at the Bristol Old Vic. Maybe leaving the Guildhall had been the right thing to do after all.
From the Vic era, I offer the following relic from an unfinished tale which I went on to edit and versify. I rescued it last year from a battered notebook I was in the habit of scribbling in during spare moments offstage while dressed in my costume and covered in blue body make-up and silver glitter. While doing so, some of this glitter was transferred from the pages with which they were stained more than twenty six years ago onto my hands. It was an eerie experience.
Along Whiteladies Road
I remember the grey
slithers
of rain,
The jocular driver
As I boarded the bus
At Temple Meads,
And the friendly lady
Who told me
When we had arrived
At the city centre.
I remember
the little pub
on King Street,
With its quiet
Maritime atmosphere
And the first readthrough.
I remember tramping
Along Park Street,
Whiteladies Road
And Blackboy Hill,
My arms and hands
Aching from my bags
To the little cottage
Where I had decided to stay
And relax
In beween rehearsals,
Reading, writing,
Listening to music.
I remember my landlady,
Tall, timid and beautiful... Photos: 1978?/'79?
Throughout 1976 I gradually sidelined my nostalgic super-elegant image in favour of a far rougher one inspired by the decade of Brando, Presley and Dean. Occasionally I'd relapse, but for the most part I affected the classic uniform of red windcheater, white tee-shirt and straight-leg jeans so memorably worn by James Dean in "Rebel Without a Cause". He'd died a week to the day before I was born in early autumn 1955, seen by many as the Year Zero of the Rock'n' Roll era, and the 20th anniversary of his death created quite a buzz as I remember, with Rock stars such as John Miles and Slik's Midge Ure affecting the highschool rebel look, while Punk waited in the wings, poised perhaps to devastate Pop's innocence forever. I remember one time in particular that I dusted down the old dapper dandy look. It was in the dying days of the long hot summer of '76, and I wore top hat and tails and my fingernails tinted bright red like a ghost from old Berlin to a party hosted by a friend from Brooklands. It was mid-September, and I know this to be an absolute fact because I was supposed to have been at sea at the time, on the minesweeper HMS Fittleton. I think it was only a couple of days afterwards that Fittleton capsized and sank to the bottom of the North Sea following a tragic accident involving another larger ship, the frigate HMS Mermaid. It resulted in the loss of twelve men most of whom I knew personally, given that only weeks earlier I'd spent a few days on Fittleton with more or less exactly the same crew.
HMS Fittleton had been accepted into the RN in January 1955, although she wasn't actually named Fittleton (after the Wiltshire village) until almost exactly 21 years later. She set sail from Shoreham in Sussex on the 11th of September 1976 with the intention of reaching the port of Hamburg on the 21st of that month for a three day Official Visit, but never arrived. On the 20th she took part in the NATO exercise "Teamwork" 80 miles off the Dutch coast in the North Sea, after which she was ordered to undergo a Replenishment at Sea with the 2500 ton frigate HMS Mermaid, and it was during this exercise that the bow waves of the frigate inter-reacted with those of the sweeper to cause the two to collide. For some reason I'd earlier decided to opt out of the trip by pleading sickness. It was a decision that came to haunt me...despite the fact that had I taken part in the RAS manoeuvre I'd almost certainly have been assigned what was known as Tiller Flat duty, as had been the case on many previous occasions during exercises of this kind. This would have put me below deck, making escape difficult although not impossible. In other words, I may or may not have survived the accident. Of the twelve who didn't survive I knew three quite well, and they were all men of remarkable generosity of spirit and sweetness of disposition, what I'd call natural gentlemen, and it broke my heart to think of what happened to them. I so wanted to comfort my shipmates for their loss, to bond with them and be part of what they were going through. I wanted to have survived like them. I went over it all again and again in my mind, until I drove myself almost insane with regret and grief. Once more I'd taken the easy way out, but this time it wouldn't be so easy for me to forget or explain away.
The landmark year of 1977 was in many ways a far darker one than those coming immediately before it, at least that's how I see it. It was after all marked by the inexorable rise of Punk, a musical and cultural movement which could be said to have fatally disabled Rock's uneven progress as an art form with its savage DIY ethic, and which, fused with an extreme and often horrifying sartorial eccentricity produced something utterly unique for the time. From its London axis, and yet with roots in the US, it spread like a raging plague throughout the year even infecting the most genteel suburbs. At first I remained unaffected, although I'd long incorporated elements of the Punk sartorial revolution into my own image, such as short hair, small-collared shirts and straight-leg trousers, but by the end of the year I was a Punk myself.
1977 was a year of endless hedonism for me, as one after the other of my old Pangbourne pals celebrated hitting 21 in houses and apartments in various corners of trendy west and central London. Of all of my college friends I was perhaps closest with Craig, a future mililonaire businessman, but they were all very dear to me, and still are. Craig fuelled my growing passion for the decadent London life of parties and clubs filled to the brim with the fashionable and the beautiful. One of his closest friends was a legendary fashion designer who forged cutting edge images for some of the most powerful trendsetters in Rock music, and we went with him to Maunkberries a couple of times. Soon after the start of the year, Craig had ditched his tired old velvet jacket and flares combo in favour of drainpipe jeans and black winklepickers. Within a short time I too was sporting a pair of cream-coloured winklepicker shoes which I went on to supplement with black slip-ons with large gold sidebuckles, imitation crocodile skin shoes with squared off toes, and a pair of black Chelsea boots, all painfully pointed. By the spring of '78 I think I'd junked the lot as a means of sparing my feet but for a time they were my pride and joy.
Being the suburban greenhorn that I was, I thought the look that dominated London's clubland was analogous with Punk, but I was way off the mark. Certainly like Punk it ran contrary to the long hair and flared jeans that were still ubiquitous throughout the UK at the time, but it was married to a love of sophisticated Soul music rather than primal three-chord Rock. It was the uniform of the so-called Soul Boys, flash white working class kids with a love of black dance music like the Mods before them, although I was not to discover this until later in the year when I was at Merchant Navy College in Kent. It was through one of the guys at this college in fact that I found out about the Global Village night club under the Arches near Charing Cross. which was a magnet in '77 for working class kids who were into the Soul Boy look, as well as a handful of Punks. Its key elements were the wedge haircut, which was often to be streaked with a variety of tints including red and even green, brightly coloured peg-top trousers or straight leg jeans, and the obligatory winklepickers...or for a time, beach sandals. The wedge was also allegedly taken up by certain hardcore fans of Liverpool Football Club who'd discovered a taste around '77 for European casual sports clothing while travelling on the continent for away matches. So, the Casual subculture was born, together with a passion for designer sportswear on the part of British working class youth which exists to this day, being visible in every high street and shopping centre in the land. For most of '77, it was the Soul Boy look I affected rather than Punk, not that I knew the difference. However, strolling along the Kings Road in what I think was the January of that year, I became confronted for the first time with the incredible vagaries of dress being adopted by Punks about that time, and it'd only be a matter of time before I too aspired to astound others the way they'd done me. By the end of the year, I'd effectively become a full-time Punk and was happy to remain so until the Mod Revival starting drawing me away around about the summer of 1979. But that's another story.
The Restless and the Riotous
By the summer I was working as a sailing instructor in Palamos on Spain's Costa Brava. For a time my cousin Rod was around with Lucy, his lady love, although I can't remember whether Rod taught for the school or not. My dad stayed in Palamos for a while too, as did my brother Dane, although for the most part I was alone. Rod and his sister Kris, and my uncle and aunt, Peter and Marge, had lived more or less opposite us in Bedford Park in the sixties, and we'd holidayed together at my grandmothers' house near Montroig. A spellbinding guitarist since his teens, Rod recently revived his playing career.
After a few months I lost my job, but stayed on in Palamos for several months afterwards, idling by day, while trawling the city's bars and discos by night. These nightly revels had an almost Sisyphian quality to them, as if I was eternally drawn by what lay just beyond my reach, moving on once I'd secured it. Perhaps this passion for what I couldn't have was initially at the heart of my longing to be famous. After all at the time, I was still hopelessly ill-equipped for fame. I certainly didn't have the necessary mental toughness to push my way to the top. I had the pretty boy looks, but very few actors, or indeed musicians, become truly successful on the strength of looks alone, and this was especially true of the seventies I think it's fair to say. I'd not yet appeared in a single play, except for a handful at Pangbourne, and my acting had attracted some positive attention it has to be said. My roles included two elderly women, one of whom had to remain completely mute for a few minutes and that was the extent of my time onstage, this being in Max Frisch's "The Fire Raisers". The other was as a maid in a one-act play by George Bernard Shaw called "Passion, Poison and Petrifaction". Clomping around in a dress with studded military boots I can remember bringing the house down with that one. I also played a society beauty conducting some kind of illicit relationship with one of my best friends, Simon Miles, who went on to found his own cabaret club in the nineties called the Cupboard, but the name of the play escapes me. My only male role was in "The Rats", a little known Agatha Christie one-acter, and my perfomance as effeminate psychopath Alex showed real promise if the praise of the college nurse was anything to go by. In short, I was hardly a National Youth Theatre wonder kid. I'd penned a few simple songs, but my guitar playing was still desperately limited. I wasn't a natural player like my cousin Rod, but I went on to become a pretty good songwriter with my own playing style. My voice was good though, and incredibly versatile. As a budding writer, I'd filled countless pages with scribblings which I'd endlessly corrected, but there was nothing show for my efforts. In short there was precious little evidence of any kind of artistic talent on my part...and it could hardly be said that my future positively glittered before me.
My final voyage with the RNR came towards the end of the summer. My best RNR pal Colin was sadly not onboard, but other friends were, such as Adam, a tall red-headed man of about 26 who looked something like the actor Edward Fox, with a trace perhaps of Damian Lewis, or at least that's how I see him in hindsight. Like me Adam loved music and fashion and clubbing, and we hit it off from our very first meeting back at President. He later confided in me about his early life which'd been marked by one tragedy after the other, and his warm and courtly manners masked a troubled inner life which he kept almost entirely to himself, together with remarkable fearlessness. I remember one time in a bar on the south coast when for some reason a drunken sailor took a strong dislike to me, Adam put himself in harm's way to save my hide. It was typical of him. You overestimated his refinement at your peril. I can imagine though that there were those who wondered how he ended up serving as a rating, as they would have done me. I'm thinking in particular of some of the young guys of a certain RNR Division liaising with us to and from the port of Ostend in Belgium in that year of my final spell as a military man. There was one incident when some of these hard young seamen were grouping in an Ostend street for a scrap with some locals who'd offended them in some way. Adam and I made it clear we had no intention of joining in, and one of their number, a waiflike young sailor of about 16 or 17, previously something of a pal of ours, turned to us with a look of utter confusion on his beardless face and said: "What's wrong with youse guys?", before joining his pals for the gathering riot. Adam just didn't see the point in fighting unless it was absolutely necessary, but he was far from being a coward as I've already made clear. What's more, according to what I observed and what he himself told me, he was more than averagely successful with the opposite sex, unconsciously infused like me with the poisonous playboy values of the times. Yet, for his own reasons he chose to conceal his true nature beneath a show of gentlemanly reserve, and even languour. This secret inner strength would eventually see him being commissioned as an officer in the Royal Navy, which'd been his destiny all along. But not mine. My time with the London Division, RNR came to an end in late 1977 with an incredibly positive character report, for which I remain grateful to this day. The RNR did all right by me and I honour them for it, and if military life had never been for me, it's a part of who I am whether I like it or not. My life story would be all the poorer without it.
In late 1977 I joined the former Merchant Navy College in Greenhithe, Kent, which had merged with the Thames Nautical Training College HMS Worcester nine years earlier, as a trainee Radio Officer. I formed several close friendships there; but closest of all was with Jasbir, or Jesse, a lovable hard nut of about 18 with a thick London accent who'd been born into nearby Gravesend's large Asian community. Tough as he was he was loyal and kind-hearted towards those he liked and trusted, and for a time we were pretty well inseparable. I used to endlessly nag about his attitude, not that there was anything wrong with it...he was one of the kindest guys I've ever known...but he had a habit of talking tough which intimidated some people, including me at times. As things turned out, I was the one who quit college first, even if he did follow me soon afterwards, which caused Jesse to wonder why I'd taken what seemed to him like the moral high ground in the first place. I couldn't answer. It was through Jesse I think that I started going to discos at Gravesend's Woodville Hall, subject of the versified piece below. Pretty well every week for a while, a gang of us from the college would head out to the Woodville Hall, where we were treated like visiting royalty. Mainly white and Asian, Woodville Hall's Punk and Disco kids would dress in the most bizarre escapist fashions imaginable throughout '77, which stood out in such striking contrast with the drabness of their surroundings. English suburban life in those days didn't include such modern distractions as mobile phones, DVD players and the world wide web, and so was a fertile breeding ground for eccentric youth cults such as Punk, New Romanticism and Goth. The last two were yet in the future, but their seeds had been sown during the heydey of Punk, whose influence pervaded the Hall, as did the so-called Soul Boy fashion which was similar, although a lot less threatening. And these Soul Boys knew how to dance like you wouldn't believe...anybody'd think they were students of Jazz ballet or something, but they were just ordinary working class kids, who became stars once they took to the dance floor.
Woodville Hall Soul Boys
Soon after I'd paid
My sixty
0r seventy pence,
I found myself
In what I thought
Was a minitiure London.
I saw girls
In chandelier earrings,
In stilleto heels,
Wearing evening
Dresses,
Which contrasted with
The bizarre
Hair colours
They favoured:
Jet black
0r bleach blonde,
With flashes of
Red, Purple
0r green.
Some wore large
Bow ties,
Others unceremoniously
Hanged
Their school ties
Round their
Necks.
Eye make-up
Was exaggerated.
The boys all had
Short hair,
Wore mohair sweaters,
Thin ties,
Baggy,
Peg-top trousers
And winklepicker shoes.
A band playing
Raw street rock
At a frantic speed
Came to a sudden,
Violent climax...
Melodic, rythmic,
Highly danceable
Soul music
Was now beginning
To fill the hall,
With another group
0f short-haired youths...
Smoother, more elegant,
Less menacing
Than the previous ones.
These well-dressed
Street boys
Wore well-pressed pegs
0f red or blue...
They pirhouetted
And posed...
Pirhouetted and posed.
Farewell Gilded Youth
Soon after returning from the Merchant Navy College in December '77, I auditioned for a place on the three year drama course at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama in the City of London, which was really what I'd wanted to do in the first place. Incredibly, as I'd already failed two earlier auditions for RADA, Guildhall accepted me for the course beginning in autumn 1978. I was exhilerated; but that didn't stop me sinking further into the nihilistic Punk lifestyle. Having been entranced by the hairstyle of one of a small gang of Punks I knew by sight from nights out in Dartford in late '77, I decided to imitate it a few weeks later. It was spiked in classic Punk style, with a kind of a halo of bright blond taking in the front of the head, both sides, and a strip at the nape of the neck. I've part of a photograph of myself wearing this style with a long Soul Boy fringe at the front, before I eventually had it cut into the spikes. By the spring of 1978, I'd shorn it all off and looked like a skinhead. It was genuinely dangerous being a Punk in the late '70s, and you lived in constant fear of attack or abuse if you chose to dress like one. After all, Punk's culture of insolence and outrage was extreme even by the standards of previous British youth cults such as the Teds, the Rockers, the Mods, the Greasers, the Skins, the Suedeheads and the Smoothies. Britain in those days was a country still dominated to some degree by pre-war moral values, which were Victorian in essence, and a cultural war was being fought for the soul of the nation. It could be said therefore that Punks were the avant garde of the new Britain in a way that would be impossible today. This explains the extraordinary hostility Punks attracted.
Close by to where I shared a house with my parents in the furthermost reaches of south west London where suburbia meets countryside I saw Hersham Punk band Sham '69 shortly before they became nationally famous. I already knew their lead singer Jimmy Pursey by sight; at least I think it was him I saw miming to Chris Spedding's "Motorbiking" at a Walton disco one night. This gig took place in a poky hall above a pub in the centre of a large bleak industrial estate, itself surrounded by drab housing estates and endless rows of council houses. I was often there on a Sunday in the late 70s, usually with my brother and friends, but sometimes alone. On one occasion that I remember, the Soul gave way to Punk which saw the tiny dance space being invaded by deranged pogo-dancers. On another, a Ted revivalist, a follower of classic Rock'n'Roll who favoured flashy fifties-style clothing, tried to start some trouble with me in the toilet. At this point, another Ted who'd befriended me about a year before when I dressed like an extra from "Rebel Without a Cause" or something...I think his name was Steve... stepped in with the magical words: "He's a mate!". Steve's intervention may have saved me from a hiding that night because Teds had a loathing of Punks informed by their essential conservatism. To them, Punks probably seemed to have no respect for anything. Later, or it may have been before I can't remember, he asked me whether I was really into "this Punk lark" or whatever he called it, and I assured him I wasn't. I may even have added that I still loved the fifties, which was actually the truth to an extent, not that that was the point. The fact is that I lied to him to look good in his eyes, which was a pretty low thing to do to a friend.
On New Years Eve, Jesse and I went to a party in London's swanky West End. It was one of the last, perhaps even the very last, in a long series of celebrations I'd gone to throughout '77 mainly as a result of friends from Pangbourne reaching the landmark age of 21. It was also one of the last times I ever saw Jesse. We stayed in touch until about 1983, meeting only once, before eventually losing contact altogether. It was my fault; Jesse did all he could to keep the friendship alive. Before arriving, Jesse and I met up as arranged with budding oil magnate Craig, an especially close friend from my days as Cadet C.R. Halling 173. Introductions over, Jesse saw fit to impress Craig and I with a terrifying solo display of his lethal street fighting skills. "I'm suitably impressed", said Craig, and he looked it, and Craig was no wimp, despite his upper class accent. An unlikely trio, we all three got on fantastically well on that insane night which at some point saw me pouring a full glass of beer over my head. What the beautiful dancer I'd spent most of the evening with thought of a nice guy like me doing a thing like that she didn't say. In the late '70s, I met so many people who might have done anything for me, and yet my true passion appeared to be the creation of endless drunken scenes, and a party wasn't a party for me in those days unless I'd caused one, after which I simply moved on. Well, I've got plenty of time to myself to reflect on it all now..and the sheer waste of youth, of life, of love, life makes me weep.
In the spring of 1978, I arrived in the famous Costa del Sol town of Fuengirola near Marbella, with the intention of helping to set up a sailing school with a young English guy of about 30 I knew only very slightly. He put me up in an apartment, which was decent of him, but as things turned out the project came to nothing. However, I stayed on in Fuengirola, living first in a hotel, and then rent-free thanks to an American friend I made in town in her own apartment. I became pretty well known locally as Coco, one of only two Punks in Fuengirola, and front man for a Hard Rock band playing nightly at the city's Tam Tam nightclub. '78 was my first year as a full-time Punk in fact, and among the clothes I favoured were a black wet-look tee-shirt with cropped sleeves, drainpipe jeans of black or green, worn with black studded belt festooned with silver chain kept in place by safety pins, flourescent teddy boy socks, and white shoes with black laces etc. I even had a safety pin, anaesthetized by being dipped into an alcoholic drink, forced through my left ear lobe by a friend. I removed it once it'd started to cause my whole ear to throb. I was always short of money, but I could order what I wanted at the Tam Tam, and when I was flat broke I was bought toasted cheese sandwiches and bottles of cold Spanish beer or whatever else I wished for by someone who's still one of my favourite people ever. We went clubbing a lot, and it was such a thrill to sit there with her when the evening was still young. One night the legend that was British racing driver James Hunt called to her from out of the darkness of a balmy Andalusian night, before vanishing as suddenly as he'd arrived. It was that magical a summer. We spent time at Lew Hoad's Campo de Tenis, at Mijas, Marbella, Torremolinos...it was an incredible time. But I had to return to London to take my place at the Guildhall towards the end of summer. After all, I was going to be a star wasn't I.
The following summer I was back in Spain; but not Fuengirola, despite the fact that my close friends from the band had wanted me to resume my position as lead singer. In my wisdom I'd chosen instead to to go to La Ribera with my parents, but it'd been three years since I was last there for any length of time, and the atmosphere had definitely changed. I felt a deep and overwhelming sense of exhaustion during my first few days in the town, but I don't recall being especially disappointed by the fact that only recently I'd be told by the Guildhall authorities that they thought it'd be best if I left...or rather strike out on my own in the acting world. I was resigned to it, although a little put out it has to be said. After all, my dream of being a gilded youth at the Guildhall had barely lasted a year. It must have been the Costa Calida sun that made me feel so burned out. Just before quitting Fuengirola the previous summer of '78 I'd been approached with an offer of singing in the Canary Islands, but I'd turned it down. Who knows where it might have led; but then had I travelled to the Canaries with the band, I wouldn't have gone to Guildhall through which so many incredible experiences came. It would take an entire separate volume to list them all. What I will say is that at Guildhall I was involved with a string of Rock and Pop bands who performed at the occasional Folk Nights when students gathered after classes at night to perform songs and so on at the nearby Lauderdale Tower
Through one of them, Rockets, I was talent-scouted as lead singer for a genius guitar player who was hoping to form a band at the Guildhall, and judging of what he'd seen of me, he thought I'd make a great front man. But for some reason, the band was never formed. As for the genius, he went on to play and write for one of the world's leading Rock superstars, something he's done for nearly twenty years now. He even went on to co-write one of the Summoner's most famous songs, the one about the fields, one of ten tales from the classic 1993 album. At some point he'd briefly allied himself with one of the most successful Jazz-Funk acts of the eighties together with another Guildhall friend of mine Mike. Mike'd even invited me to an early rehearsal...my mother made a note of this in green ink after speaking to him about it on the phone. Perhaps they could've done with a singer at that point. Through another, Narcissus, I found only disgrace. It was the seond version of the band, and I'd formed it with Mike, the drummer from Rockets, and another close friend Robin, two lovely, gentle guys...but our one and only gig was a disaster. I wore my normal make-up, but Robin had seen fit to paint his face like a warrior, while Mike had camouflaged his. We were greeted by a riot of good-natured heckling. I lost my rag which was very unlike me in those days, and ended up throwing a plectrum into the audience with a sarcastic "Here's to all my loving fans!", or something equally pathetic. I can't help thinking it did no end of harm to my reputation, because my chief stock-in-trade was not the forcefulness of the natural leader who demands and gains attention with ease, but the exquisite charm of the social climber, who carefully seduces his way to alpha status, like Julien Sorel, hero of Stendhal's "The Scarlet and the Black". Despite his humble origins, he succeeds in ascending to the very top of the social ladder armed with beauty, brilliance and ambition, only to come crashing down to the ground like Icarus, destroyed by his own hubris. My final band was the '50s revivalist act Z Cars, which even won a tiny fanbase for itself. I was Carl Cool, lead singer and songwriter with a tattoo painted onto my shoulder, Rob was Robert Fitzroy-Square the boy next door with the Buddy Holly glasses, who provided most of the comedy, Dave was Dave Dean, the punk kid with the don't mess with me stare, and Richard was Little Ricky Ticky, the baby of the band at only 18. I think it was Dave who left first, and for a time, the charismatic actor-writer Ian Puleston-Davies came onboard. Ian, Rob and I were also involved in the production of a musical comedy based on the Scottish play, "Mac and Beth", which survived my time at Guildhall, if only for a single performance. It was rewritten several times. There was a version by Michael Praed of "Robin of Sherwood" fame; and another which I wrote only a few years ago, only to come to the conclusion that it was too dark and violent. Most of it ended up in the trash. Somewhere, however, there's a VHS copy of one of a handful of Guildhall performances of the play.
There were emotional scenes at my farewell party held in the depths of the Barbican Estate's Lauderdale Tower and many cried openly because I was leaving. During the evening, a close friend Gill told me to contact a London-based impresario and agent well-known for offering young actors their very first positions within the entertainment industry. Her own brother, who'd recently starred in a TV comedy series had received his first break through this flamboyant and warm-hearted man. True to form, he gave me my very first paid job in the business a matter of months afterwards. So just before Christmas, I was doubling as Christian the Chorus Boy and Joey the Teddy Bear complete with furry costume in the pantomime "Sleeping Beauty" that began its run in Ealing in west London, culminating at the Buxton Opera House in Derbyshire. Then early on in the new year moreover, the famed theatre director Richard Cottrell offered me the part of Mustardseed in "A Midsummer Night's Dream" at the Bristol Old Vic. Maybe leaving the Guildhall had been the right thing to do after all.
From the Vic era, I offer the following relic from an unfinished tale which I went on to edit and versify. I rescued it last year from a battered notebook I was in the habit of scribbling in during spare moments offstage while dressed in my costume and covered in blue body make-up and silver glitter. While doing so, some of this glitter was transferred from the pages with which they were stained more than twenty six years ago onto my hands. It was an eerie experience.
Along Whiteladies Road
I remember the grey
slithers
of rain,
The jocular driver
As I boarded the bus
At Temple Meads,
And the friendly lady
Who told me
When we had arrived
At the city centre.
I remember
the little pub
on King Street,
With its quiet
Maritime atmosphere
And the first readthrough.
I remember tramping
Along Park Street,
Whiteladies Road
And Blackboy Hill,
My arms and hands
Aching from my bags
To the little cottage
Where I had decided to stay
And relax
In beween rehearsals,
Reading, writing,
Listening to music.
I remember my landlady,
Tall, timid and beautiful... Photos: 1978?/'79?
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