vii: lost in music: age of chance
it was the autumn of 1984. i was by then a freelance journalist whose passport bore the job-description ‘cultural commentator’. yes, i was serious. i had been dispatched to darkest yorkshire by a well known labour party supporting broadsheet to cover the dramatic events of the unfolding miner’s strike. being a new yorker born and bred, britain to me equated to london, and i had never in my, by then, four years on british soil ventured north from the capital.
staying at the third-best hotel the city of leeds had to offer in those days, my difficulties were compounded by not being able to understand any of the local variation on english. maybe the odd word. more than once i recall uttering the phrase ‘anyone here speak english?’ only to find that my own brand of wit had not quite made it that far north yet. in short, i found myself in a dark and alien landscape.
on my final night there, i reluctantly dragged myself away from the hotel tv and cabbed over to a venue which was a mile or so from the city centre called (i think) the trades club, where there was a fund-raising event taking place in support of the families of striking miner-workers. much as i applauded the cause, the entertainment on offer – faux folk, poetry-reading and the like – was standard worthy fayre and i began to wonder if i had come to the right place.
standing at the lonely end of the bar, i lapsed into a hastily-induced state of jack daniels for the evening. my attention became briefly aroused at some point when i overheard someone mention that a new musical express (the biggest selling music paper back then) journalist was also present, and that his name was the legend. funny how some things stay with you. i’d personally never read that particular publication but recall wondering if this individual had, like me, travelled all the way from london for this, and if, like me, he spoke english.
the night wore on, punctuated by occasional polite applause.
the venue’s stage seemed (thankfully) miles away, and boasted theatre-style curtains, which were closed. the front-of-stage area, a latter-day dancefloor, was completely devoid of people, bar one awkward-looking individual whose hunched posture and peculiar body language, even from some distance, made me presume he was one of the locals. i was later to discover that this was the legend.
in time, the taped music stopped. there was a stoney silence, whilst some activity became evident behind the curtains, and a pa speaker buzzed uncomfortably.
the awkward individual stiffened attentively as a massive, far-too-loud guitar motif, somewhere between rockabilly and musique-concrete chimed forth from behind the curtains, which then proceeded to open, burlesque-style, to reveal four musicians; the singer and (female) drummer were standing bolt-still, while the two guitar-players were in symmetrical kneeling, quasi-devotional postures. the entire room collectively stood with mouths agape. the sound was amplified to a level far too high for the size of venue, but this added to the spectacle, if that’s the correct term. as far as i recall, (and i remember few details) their set lasted for around twenty minutes, maybe less, with no gaps between the songs, at the end of which i went backstage and drunkenly introduced myself to the band. (they later described my demeanour as ‘nervously euphoric’). thus began the longest-lasting relationship of my life, then as now.
long story short, in time i became a sort of fifth, non-musical band-member. (my description, not theirs).
i was someone who they would come to bounce ideas off of, fight with, seek advice from, and on occasion, write about. (‘who’s afraid of the big bad noise’, a later release, was inspired by my reaction to seeing them on the very night i have just described).
a piece i wrote about an age of chance under-18’s evening the following year became the inner-sleeve notes to their ‘the twilight world of sonic disco’ release. if it were now, i’d be name-checked as their lifestyle coach on album sleeves and probably be in line for some kind of financial remuneration. or maybe not. our relationship lasted until time, geography and, in my own case, sobriety, intervened.
(extract from ‘free to roam – collected writings of john falcon power’).
© john f. power, tompkins county, new york 2009.