17 Sep 2009
9 Sep 2009
16 Jun 2009
The Flamingo Club in Wardour Street and the fight between Johnny Edgecombe and ‘Lucky’ Gordon
5 Jun 2009
Nottingham and Midlands part 2
Dave Hill, Alan Fletcher - Stodman St Newark 65
Dave Kimberley, Alan Tinsley Mac scooter
Newark Mods Cross Keys -no waiting
Newark and Grantham Mods inside Jolly Fisherman
Henry Anderson and crowd skeg scooters
source : Alan Fletcher , writer of the "Quadrophenia" and "mod crop" trilogy novels . - BBC Nottingham
also check out Nottingham and Midlands part 1
MODS INC.
The board of directors meet in John Stephen’s flat. Left to right : Dean Rogers, Myles Anthony, Angelo Uragallo, Ivy Dean, Frank Merkell, Keith Dodge, Bill Franks (managing director) and John Stephen. Except for Uragallo, everyone in under 30.He’s the Mod King of Carnaby Street.
Ask if he’s a millionaire and he says : “I don’t think I’ve got that much in ready cash – but I must be just about there in assets.”
Ask about the diamond rings on each hand and he grins and says: “I think I paid about £300 for that one … and this one, not more than £200. If I remember. I love diamonds.
Ask if he’s happy and he replies in his Glaswegian accent: “Oh, aye well enough – but I’d like to be REALLY satisfied with something I do.”
His name is John Stephen and he’s only 29. He’s the working class boy who made a fast fortune – not out of the SOUND of the Beat groups but out of the LOOK of them.
Fringe
In Carnaby street on the fringe of Soho London. John Stephen has seven shops all in a row, all selling the same thing – Mod clothes. Beat music pours out of each shop on to the pavement.
In Carnaby Street the Beatles first bought the collarless jackets that became known as Beatle jackets.
The Rolling Stones shop there. So do The Mojos, the Dave Clark Five and the boys of the Manfred Mann group.
Not to mention such switched on leisure wear connoisseurs as Peter Sellers and the Duke of Bedford.
Away from Carnaby Street John Stephen has fifteen more Mod shops around London – boutiques for boys called His Clothes.
He also owns two clothing factories, an estate agency, a driving school and a vegetarian restaurant.
And this week he’s negotiating to take over a hire-car firm with a fleet of Jaguars.
“Oh aye, I’ve come a long way since Glasgow.” Says John Stephen “My father’s mind boggles when he hears I’m giving the mills orders for things like £60.000 worth of trouser material …”
His father has a corner grocery shop in Glasgow. John who was expected to take over the shop one day left home ten years ago to see what London had to offer. He got a job selling uniforms in a big store.
A YEAR LATER he opened a boutique for a friend who put up the money – and turned a revolutionary line of striped denim trousers into a best-seller.
A YEAR LATER with his savings and the extra money he had made working nights in a coffee bar – he opened his own boutique.
“And with a lot of flair and a lot of hard work” said one of the young directors who now help to run The John Stephen Organisation “ he has got where he is today.
The flair was in gambling on such things as men’s fleecy mohair sweaters eighteen months ahead of anyone else – and in getting singer Cliff Richard to buy one.
The hard work was putting in twelve hours a day, six days a week. And he’s still doing that.”
The board of directors of The John Stephen Organisation were holding a meeting in his smart Chelsea flat when I called there at 8.30 at night.
Only one of them was over thirty – and they discussed with enthusiasm the “ new English double-breasted, slightly waisted suit with slant pockets.”
John Stephen told me: “One big secret of success is getting the right people around you.
Each one here can do something better than I can do it myself.”
Restless
He got up and suggested supper at a club.
”I get so restless” he said “Often I can’t sleep at night – and I relax by getting up and wandering around the streets studying the windows of my rivals…”
At weekends he drives down in Brighton in his Rolls Royce with his white Alsatian, Prince to gee up the decorators in his luxurious new house on the sea front.
He thinks he owns dozens of suits, knows he only drinks Scotch and smokes 8s 6d apiece cigars, but feels he is basically still an ordinary Glaswegian.
Image
“A year ago.” He said “I thought it might be better for my image if I tried to change my accent.”
But I decided it was better to sound like a working class man who knew what he was talking about – d’you follow? “
When I left John Stephen he was discussing a new girls wear department, the wholesale supplies for stores throughout Britain – and world export markets.
I had the distinct impression he knew what he was talking about.
Dixon Scott – Daily Mirror – March 1965
30 Mar 2009
25 Mar 2009
The Whiskey a Go-Go, Birmingham .
18 Sep 2008
2 Sep 2008
21 Aug 2008
The diary of a mod
Some extracts from the personal diary of 18 year old Bernard Schofield – October 1964
(Originally published in Extraordinary Sensations fanzine 24 years ago)
October 3
Thank God for Saturday night. Downed five blues. Took a tube to the Dilly + waited for Maureen. She was dead late, I thought she’d never turn up.
We walked up to
Maureen had to go home so I walked her down to
October 7
Those photos arrived today, of me & Maureen in
October 8
I guess I’m really attached to Maureen now, yet still it’s not completely fixed. Tonight could be my big night. Met her in the evening and she was pleased with the photos. Had some kinky dress on. Eventually Dave left for the Disque and we got down to it straight away. Dammit, she just wouldn’t let me shag her, I just couldn’t get her sexed up. I soon had both her dress & my trousers off. She didn’t like my hairy legs at first but she got used to them afterwards. We had our usual row about why she won’t let me – I think it’s because I won’t use anything.
October 9
Feeling desesperate now, I’m literally wasting my time doing nothing, going nowhere.
I don’t fit in anywhere.
Bought a blue polo neck today.
I really must organise my life.
Back home Dave went up the Disque.
Not looking forward to Saturday and I’m not taking any pills…
October 10
Didn’t go to work today and my hair’s a bloody mess. Met Maureen down the Dilly – she had a smart polo neck and a grey skirt on. We decided on the Flamingo so that’s where we went. It was incredibly hot and packed. There was a guy doing the most fantastic dance and his girl was good too – really sexy – you should have seen her arse! The Supremes weren’t on ‘till midnight so we had to stomach the boring Chessmen and the Topics, who both played the most played out number in the ‘Mingo – Green Onions -.
We came out at one stage and met Bob, Dave & Pete – Bob was as stoned as a newt. Maureen had to go home (what a drag!) so I dropped her off at
By the time we actually got to
Saw Dave, he said the fuzz were about to raid the clubs again tonight – he’d just been searched again.
Somehow I didn’t fancy the risk tonights so I sodded off home …
I woke up to the usual invasion from the Disque. Dave walked in with Sniffer, Pete, Brenda and a load of others. That Jackie’s a right little darling. That love bite I gave Maureen was
October 13
Maureen rang and said that the police had been round about that drinking fiasco & that they know all about our flat & our scene at Putney. They told her I would be best advised not to move – Bloody cheek!! Dave wants me to move up to the
October 22
Up the Disque tonight with my girl. A fight flared up at one point and some guy got it in the back of the head with a bottle of Hubbly. We were watching the dancing. It drive me wild to see those guys move! I just can’t get those complicated steps.
Don Middleton turned up with Dave who had picked up some right old scrubber. Later we all made it back to the flat. Buckingham was already there with his sort. I went to bed but couldn’t sleep cos Don was setting to with the scrubber and Buckingham was humping away on the floor.Dave’s bed was creaking and groaning away ten to the dozen. I just can’t stand it any longer…
(Part two of Bernard’s tales of (lack of) sex and drugs and r&b follow soon …)
19 Aug 2008
The Ace Face's Forgotten Story - Part One
Social revolution on Speed, Side Vents & The Scene club.
"I'm the face baby
Is that clear?
I'm the face
if you want it.
All the others are third class tickets by me
Baby
Pete Meaden for "The High Numbers" (1964).
The late Pete Meaden was he man who introduced The Who to the hardcore mod cult of 1963. He became their manager, christened them The High Numbers, and wrote their first record. These interviews uncover the sometimes disturbed visions of one of the leaders of the original mod movement.
By Steve Turner. (New Musical Express 17th november 1979).
Typing by Àlex M. Franquet.
(The story was reprinted in NME's Originals Mod issue - but some bits were missing ... so here's the first part of the unabridged article )
Towards the end of his life, Pete Meaden told me that he'd read an interview in which Nik Cohn, writer of the story that becaume "Saturday Night Fever", attributed the origins of the tale to his own memories of Shepherd's Bush mod society circa 1963.
In particular, it was from this experience that he took the idea of "The Face", an idea which focused itself in the movie when Travolta swept into the 2001 Odyssey disco to hushed whispers and respectful glances. Travolta was The Face.
The connection Meaden was making was that if the Goldhawk Club equalled 2001 Odyssey, and if The Face equalled The Face, then Pete Meaden was John Travolta. The last time something like this had happened was when The Who released "Quadrophenia" in 1973. He had listened to it and thought: "I am Jimmy. Townshend's writing about me!"
Even if neither connection was justified, Pete Meaden deserved to feel that he was the stuff of legend. After all, it was he who saw the possibility of calculatedly making a rock group the focal point of a teenage revolution. The Who, being the group. The mods, being the teenage revolution. Without his style, his "suss", it's doubtful whether The Who would carry the cultural weight they do today and it's doubtful whether Modism would have spread so far, so fast.
What Meaden had was a flair for image, a love of music and a gift for gauging the spirit of the times. What he didn't have was organisational ability and a tough business edge. His shortcomings saw him virtually giving The Who's management away just as the group were making it on the strength of his ideas.
I first met Meaden in the summer of 1975 when I was researching for a book, "A decade of The Who" (Fabulous Music Ltd.) After a series of 'phone calls, I tracked down the man nobody had heard of for years. He was a patient in a mental hospital just outside
Our first talk together on the 'phone got us off to a good start and resulted in the two interviews combined below – one of which took place in my flat, the other back at his room in the hospital. He’d talked to the press only once before and it was as though all the accumulated history was bursting out now he’d found someone to listen. He also seemed to feel that he’d found an opportunity to establish his role in the history of The Who.
Later I talked to Pete Townshend who admitted that there have been no Who as we know them today if it hadn’t have been for Meaden. Daltrey was too quick to confirm his role. “He didn’t really have to force his ideas on us very hard. He thought we could pick up on the mod thing and he was right because mods had no focal point at all and The Who became that, we became the spokesmen. When Kit and Chris took over management they basically just took Meaden’s ideas and made them bigger”.
I saw a lot of Pete Meaden during the three days following our interview. It was a time during which he pulled himself together after years of drug abuse, a nervous breakdown and a divorce. He got back into the music business co-managing The Steve Gibbons Band along with Who manager Bill Curbishley. A decade or more after The High Numbers, here he was back again in The Who camp.
The last time I saw him was in June 1978, when he came along to hear me read my poetry at a small theatre club in
Within a month, he was found dead in bed of barbiturate poisoning. He was 36 and back living with his parents in the home where he’d dreamed up The High Numbers and written “I am the face”. The coroner passed an open verdict although close friends feel that Meaden knew too much about drugs to die of a careless mistake.
It seemed a very mod place to die, a cramped terraced house in an
- Where do we begin?
- Existing is what it’s all about because with society as we know it breaking down, I think that survival is of the utmost importance. It’s all very well being immensely talented, having a good time and making great music – but not being able to sustain it. This sustaining bit is the most important of all, and The Who are survivors. That’s what I’m interested in, what I’ve always been interested in. There was a long period of time when The Who didn’t have any hit records at all, but their music is survival music, by the pure power of sustaining, sustaining power. That’s what you have to say about The Who. This is what I built on in the first place. I say I, because I think nodody’s had more effect on their career, as I did, in putting together The High Numbers. I met them with a guy called Bob Druce and another feller called Helmut Gordon. Bob Druce was an agent who booked them and he said he had a contract on The Who in his desk. I was introduced to The Who by my barber, via a friend of mine who was a mutual friend called Phil The Greek. Phil The Greek was later to appear on television on Ready, Steady, Go! with a loaded sawn-off shotgun, you know? He was one of the great legends of folklore and pop history.
- Do you think the Mod thing is still alive?
- I wonder actually where all the old Mods went. They’re probably all in garages, second-hand car outfits, scrap-yards, something like that. ‘Cos there’s such a thing as Mod Suss – you know – sussing out a situation. That’s what Mods are about – suss out a situation immediately, its potential, controlling it. Rather than letting the potential control you. So I would think they’d get in the car game – that’s were most money is made very quickly.
- Are you in touch with some of your old mates?
- Yeah, one’s a coke dealer, one’s in prison, and another one’s Phil The Greek, the guy who appeared on TV with a shotgun with The Who on Ready, Steady, Go! who was a great Mod leader of them all. Pete Townshend and I talk about him often.
The black girls are Mod chicks of today. Those little spade chicks you see running round in stacked heels and wedges, wearing sort of Ossie Clarke clothes. The blacks were always there in ’64, there weren’t so many of them – they were late-night kids like us – you’d go out on a three-day bender, you know? Hit out on a Friday night, high on speed, down to Ready, Steady, Go!, down to The Scene Club, dance all night till Saturday morning. Saturday, you’d go shopping, to buy a pullover, or scarf, or something – pair of socks, ‘cos your feet hurt dancing all night in Desert boots. And then all through Saturday night again at The Scene Club all through to Sunday morning, that’s when the come-down comes down, ‘cos you can’t sustain it much more than three days, two nights. Three days and you start heading home to Mama’s place, you know ‘cos you live at home, you can’t afford to live anywhere else. And then you crash, round about Sunday morning, if you can get a lift home to
- What do you mean when you say ‘you got The Who together?
- I got them together in that I love the life so much. I got The Who and I dressed them up in Mod clothes, gave them all the jingoism and all the paraphernalia of Modism, boxing boots and fashionable things, right on the buttom, timing just right, ‘cos timing is where it’s at.
- You were already a Mod by then?
- Yeah, I was a Mod. It was my life. There was as little club called The Scene, just a Ham Yard, off of 
You get girls that come up and dance around, little girls that just dance around in the pubs, just having a little dance, just having a little groove. The records were played by loud over those big speakers, like fairground speakers, and in a small room, which was what The Scene Club was, with concrete walls, so it comes bouncing back, hitting off the floor – there was no wooden floor, hits off the ceiling, so you’re getting saturated with sound, and then they start pulling down the stops, you’re getting a psychedelic record in ’64. So you’re picking up on the body all the time. This is what Mods are about, they’re very physical people. Drynamil is a drug for Mods, because it’s a functional drug, it’s a drug you can work on, you can steal in the shops on it, do all the things you need to do, you can dance on it – you lose all lack of confidence, you lose guilt. It opens up the capillary vessels of the body, therefore, with the aid of this drug you have your own society, you have Nirvana, in a single purple heart pill. Plus you got your togs, which is your clothes, you have the confidence, plus you have the sustaining power three days up, two nights up. I think it’s a groove, I think it’s fabulous, man!
- When did you first notice all this happening?
- When my doctor gave me Drynamil for anxiety. She gave me the original Drynamil, the original Purple Hearts. And I went back that night to my place, my parent’s house where I was working from, and I took one. It’s probably doing something physically way down your system and you don’t notice it. Then, suddenly, Bang! I was free! I was unburdened by chains of resistance. I was able to write and draw and do all the things I wanted to do, without the restraints of normal civilisation bothering me, like feeling it’s late, and having to go to bed. It was just as simple as that. I sat up through the night and finished the book in that one night.
- Were pills very popular then?
- No, well this is how I discovered them. This was 1962, actually.
- So the Mods weren’t in existence then?
- No, they weren’t in existence, but Jack Kerouac was. So anyway, I took the Drynamil. I finished the book that night and I was up for three nights trying to wear my energy off. My own personal feeling is that the debt you have to pay for drugs is too much to compensate for taking the drug in the first place. I always say don’t take the drug whatsoever. A few smokes, a few beers, speed a little bit now and again, be careful with anything else. That’s all.
- Did you sort of think that you were the king Mod at the time?
- No. I was the feller who saw the potential in Modism, which is the greatest form of life-style you can imagine – it’s so totally free – totally anti-family
Sid Price's Birmingham memories
I first knew I wanted to be a Mod at the end of 1963 early 64 at the age of 17. I was working in the centre of
I found I had a lot in common in their taste of music, fashion and the way they looked at life. Later, when I went to work at Cadburys I met 3 lads who were also Mods and got to go about with them and that is where I met my girlfriend who eventually became my wife in 1969.
I have always thought Mod and never wavered from it, it has always been with me, once a Mod always a Mod that is my belief. I am 61 now and still think the same as I did when I was 18, much more mature now but still with my beliefs. I know people that are still into the Rock & Roll scene, who are older than me and still ride motorbikes.
I still dress fashionably with suits and smart casual wear, Smedley tops, Levi 501’s, tailored shirts and trousers and listen to the music I listened to in the 60’s, and still go to Mod rallies. I don’t think there are many who think Mod as I do at my age.
The music I listened to back in the sixties was Soul, Rhythm and Blues and British Beat. My favourite soul was STAX and Tamla Motown. Artists like Ottis Redding, Sam & Dave, Booker T and the MG’s, Eddie Floyd, The Four Tops and The Temptations etc. Also British Soul: Geno Washington, Jimmy James and the Vagabonds. Also British bands: Georgie Fame and the Blue Flames, The Small Faces, The Who and The Yardbirds. My Favourite band from
The clubs I used to go to were mainly in the centre of
I saw John Lee Hooker and my favourite band Spencer Davis at a club called the Whisky a Go-Go. We used to meet every Thursday evening at our works (Cadburys) club, where DJ’s and our own local R&B band called The Cock- a- Hoops, who had an Hammond organ which I love the sound of, played.
We never got to any of the clubs in London as it was too expensive to travel, but a lot of the London Mods used to come up to the clubs in Birmingham.
I also saw The Small Faces at our local theatre called the Odeon.
Mods came to this venue from all over the country, at the same theatre I saw a STAX show featuring Booker T, Sam and Dave, Jimmy Ruffin, Arthur Conley, Wilson Pickett and The Bar-Kay’s.
I also saw at the Rainbow Suite, a band called “Listen” whose lead singer was Robert Plant who was a Mod at the time and later fronted Led Zeppelin.
I used to and still do wear Smart Mohair Italian Style suits, three covered buttons,
Later around 1965 I wore hipsters, my favourite pair of hipsters were a Rupert Bear check in a camel colour that I wore with a polo neck or turtle neck sweater and desert boots. Also had a grey short Military coat, grey with a mandarin collar, centre vent and patch pockets. I wore this with a black polo neck sweater. Shoes I wore were mainly loafers, desert boots and bowling shoes. In the early sixties we used to wear striped or plain shirts with detachable collars which were fastened with a stud, it was very tricky as you had to fasten one at the front of the collar and one at the back, wore with slim knitted ties.
The Sixties Mod scene was brilliant we all liked the same sort of things, Fashion, Music, Scooters whether it be a Lambretta or Vespa, my preference was a Lambretta as they looked more streamlined. Mods also went Ten Pin Bowling, we had a local bowling alley where we used to go once a week, hence the bowling shoes being fashionable.
There was always something to talk about, always something new happening which is what the Mod scene was all about, and always somewhere to go whether it was clubs or a weekend trip to the seaside, which was a Mod thing to do. Also riding your scooter through the streets dressed really smart gave you a buzz!! Sometimes we had encounters with Rockers but it never ever come to much. The clubs were superb we all loved dancing with always a new dance to learn virtually every week. It was a really cool scene.
Drugs raised their ugly heads sometimes - they weren’t hard drugs though. Uppers and Downers were taken by some to get through all-nighters, and also Bluey’s which were a bit stronger. Not all Mods took drugs and neither myself nor my girlfriend now wife ever touched them.
This is how the scene was every one had there own taste and individuality and it changed all the time. All the Mods I knew were dedicated to the scene and what it meant.
Thanks to Sid for the article and photos ... also thanks to Claudio.
16 Jul 2008
Gotanygearmate?
Soho - Peter Brooker recalls the all-niter and a method to stay awake - July 2008
The word “gear” for the mods out on a Saturday night in the West End , didn’t refer to clothes and fashion, but was the word commonly used for amphetamines or doobs, blues, dexies, bombers, ‘earts or even plain old pills.
I suppose I was a bit naive on my first ventures to the clubs to dance and listen to the music. I spent a lot of Saturday nights in the old Ronnie Scotts club, stretching out the length of time it took to consume my lagers ( twice the price that they charged in the pub) so that I could watch and hear some of the jazz greats. I knew about the clubs that were in that area , especially the ones that stayed open all night , but had never been to them.
It was in a coffee bar one night before going to Ronnie Scotts, that I got talking to a couple of girls, Pam and June, who were on their way to the Flamingo club a little later.
I saw them both at a local dance hall the following Thursday night and they told me what a great time they had at the Flamingo, great music and atmosphere and that they were going “up West” again this Saturday. I talked to my mate, Paul, and we decided we would try the Flamingo ( really it was called the Allnighter ) that Saturday night as Tubby Hayes was playing there as well as Georgie Fame and the Blue flames.
We arrived there for the 12-6 session and the atmosphere and music was hard to beat, but a little after 3:00 am , I found myself sitting in the seats near the stage and feeling really tired. I dropped of to sleep and missed the second sets from the bands, while all around me mods of both sexes danced the night away and talked non-stop.
I returned home on Sunday morning, still tired and went to bed thinking that if I was to return to those clubs I would stay in bed most of Saturday so that I would be able to stay awake all night.
The following Thursday I again met the two girls and related what had happened. They laughed and said they had been to the Scene club in Ham Yard that night because they didn’t like jazz that much.
“You’ve got to take some doobs if you go to the allnighters” Pam told me. I looked blankly at her. “Here” she said leading me to a quiet corner. “Take these before you go next time” she said and discretely handed me 5 triangular shaped mauve coloured tablets from a packet in her hand bag.
I was quite shocked at the time. To me drugs were that hashish stuff the beatniks used to smoke, or that heroin which was instantly addictive and ruined peoples lives, I’d seen it happen in the pictures, so it must be true. “Don't worry” she said , we take them every weekend, they won’t hurt you.”
Sometime later in the club, I found myself feeling very hyper and wanting to move to the music that was pounding out, and I danced with several of the girls who were on the dance floor. I was also wanting to smoke more heavily than I usually did, and felt the need to chew on gum to keep mouth moist.
I was talking a lot to Paul who by then was eying me somewhat suspiciously. After the Blue Flames first set, John Mayall came on, and even after the pills, I didn’t really want to sit and listen to his wailing , so I suggested a walk round to the Scene. We walked to Piccadilly, up Windmill Street and turned into Ham Yard which was packed with mods including a bunch who were sat on their scooters.
The two girls were there talking with a couple of lads so I didn’t bother going over, but Pam spotted me and waved for us to come and join them. We walked over and when they got a close look at me they started laughing.
“ Your blocked aren’t you” June said, and here was me who didn’t think it was obvious.
I had to explain to John what was going on and, as he was always game for most things, he asked if he could try some too. June asked one of the boys if he had some and he swiftly produced a brown packet which turned out to contain 10 pills. “ Five bob” he said ( it had cost us ten shillings to get in the Flamingo). “ How many should I take?” John asked. “ I usually take the ten” said Pam “ but maybe you should take five now and five later.” John borrowed a swig of her coke and swallowed five. After talking and hanging around for 30 minutes we decided to wander back to the all-nighter and on the way Johns pills started to kick in and soon he was talking away ten to the dozen and snapping his gum furiously. Back at the club we danced and chatted up the girls, and took a trip to the bathroom to finish off the rest of the packet between us.
When the club closed at six am we made our way home via public transport, still feeling the effect to some extent and agreed to meet for a drink later that night. I dozed on Sunday, unable to sleep properly and ate nothing except for some fruit. That night at the pub we both felt pretty lousy ( my very first comedown ) and snapped at each other and at people around us who gave us a wide berth, they could see we were in rotten moods.
On Monday I felt a little worse for wear, but not too bad, and felt no physical craving to take the drugs again. But I did start to think about what I great time I had that Saturday and I knew that the allnight clubs would be my destination the next weekend.
22 May 2008
28 Mar 2008
Any Price For Style - Part One
Restless, ‘Rich’ and Bored, British Youth Reflects a Widespread Problem
THE ‘MODS’ vs THE ‘ROCKERS’
Thrice this year, at holiday time, segments of Britain’s youth have exploded into senseless, savage rioting, and details of Britain’s police – ready to wield their rarely used truncheons and equipped with fast cars – await with understandable concern the coming of the Bank Holiday of August 3.
Comprising the mobs were « Mods » like the lads shown at the left, who fancy themselves modern, and «Rockers » like the youths below and at right, who derive their name from their taste for Rock’n’Roll rhythms.
Rival groups, they scorn each other’s modes and manners but both hold a tremendous, virtually irresistible attraction for Britain’s adolescents and represent a widespread phenomenon : they have counterparts among France’s Blousons Noirs, Sweden’s Raggare, Russia’s Stilyagi and America’s street gangs.
« It’s a key decision in the life of every British teen-ager who has reached the maturity of 14 or 15 years » cables Life correspondent Tim Green from London, « to choose the side he will join ».
Will he become a Rocker, clad in a black leather jacket garnished with shining studs, blue denims and heavy boots, doing ‘the ton’ (a speed of 100 miles per hour) on his motorcycle along Britain’s inadequate roads ? Or will he become a Mod – a dandy in pastel suits, shirts with tab collars and fancy cuff links, and a dashing boater on his head as he putt-putts on his scooter ? He can of course opt to be a ‘Mid’ but a ‘Mid’ these days is definitely out.
« Whichever side they choose or stumble into – and most elect to be Mods – Mods and Rockers have two things in common. First, British teen-agers have far more ready cash to spend than did those of any preceding generation. In the few glorious years between starting work and getting married, they can just give ‘Mum’ a few shillings every week and the rest of their wages is theirs to spend on high living. Many teen-agers, with overtime, can earn up to the equivalent of $ 60 a week, and the combined spending power of the nation’s teen-agers is $ 2,500 million a year. They have for the first time enough cash to buy themselves scooters, motor bikes or even second-hand cars, and this makes them the most mobile teen-age generation that Britain has ever known.
If the word goes out that there will be fun or a punchup at Clacton, Brighton or Margate, Mods and Rockers can be there in droves within hours.
« The second point Mods and Rockers have in common is a sense of frustration and boredom. For both, the fun is the actual journey – zooming along the roads, swerving in and out of traffic. At both ends of the journey, they are bored. The most commonly hear phrase among the two groups is «’What else is there to do ?’
« Lacking anything constructive to occupy their minds, they stand or wander endlessly around the cafés of their home towns or the beaches of seaside resorts. Though they do not set out deliberately to fight each other, inactivity and boredom often lead to the taunting of one side by the other, and quickly to battles which become riots. » (The taunts often include references to homosexuality, but actual homosexuality is apparently rare among both groups, and « birds » - i.e., girls – are more or less popular.)
« Of the two groups, » Green continues, « the Rocker is definitely the conservative. His clothes are unchanged from year to year, he is still twisting, and he still likes ‘Rock’n’Roll’. He strongly defends his black leather uniform with the question ‘How do you ride a motorbike in Mods’ clothes ?’ and the explanation ‘You can’t change a plug and get all greasy in a lightweight suit. This gear is washable and you can wear it year in and year out.’ His bike is his first love. ‘I’ve had a bike since I was 16,’ says John Clarke, 20. ‘I saved up for it at school. I wouldn’t give it up for a car. If you have a car you just sit there in a traffic jam. But on a bike there is a sense of pleasure and a sense of speed all the time. You can have more fun on a bike, swerving in and out.’
« ‘There’s more skill to riding a bike,’ says Charlie Williams. ‘You can just sit in a car and steer, but on a bike you’ve got to concentrate all the time.’ »
Man in mirror. Bob Yeats, 19, tries on new outfit in a Stephens shop. He paid $ 13.50 for boots alone.The Mods
Artist. A Mod who is a commercial artist, Roger Earl,18, earns $ 25 aweek, spends much of it in Carnaby Street shops that sell apparel which helps wearer « stand out in a crowd ».
Apprentice. In from Peterborough to update wardrobe in Carnaby Street, Dave Richens, 17, is engineering apprentice who earns $ 15 a week. He wears pointed boots with heels 2 ½ inches high.
Electrician. Colin Bond, 18, spends $ 9 of $ 20 weekly earnings on clothing. Mods explain, « You’ll meet a mod who will say ‘I haven’t a penny to my name’ – but he is very smartly dressed . »
Auto Worker. David Payne, 20, earns $
Electrician. Rocker Charlie Williams, 23, is from
Racer. Peter « Spud » Hucklesby, 17, has taken part twice in annual Dragon Rally in
Fitter’s Mate. Ray Southgate, 19, hails from
« Ask almost any Mod why he is a Mod, » Green reports, « and he says ‘Oh, I’m not a Mod, I’m an individualist.’ » But while the Rocker could not care less about fashion, the Mod works hard at conformity to the latest styles in his own and his scooter’s adornment.
« Mod fashions change every four days, » Mod Magazine declares, and the chief beneficiaries of Mod dedication are the owners of shops in
Shoppers. Mods consider a Carnaby Street purchase. Some travel hundreds of miles on Saturdays to buy the newest in Mod garb, and many spend as $ 30 a week to be in style.
Seller. Shop manager Pat Simm,22, runs down Carnaby Street with striped Madras jackets, the rage of the moment. Salesmen dress like Mods so that "they are on the same wave length" as patrons.
Garb to dance in. Bound for dance, Barry Hall, 17, Ken Todd, 18 and Brian Hemmings, 17 (all with face powder), show off their new suits. They spend $ 15 a week on garb like that.
21 Mar 2008
28 Feb 2008
Gay London at Le Duce
Haydon Bridge's history of gay clubbing in London
The 60's - In which queers shift their traditional allegiance from prostitutes to the black community; Italy and France influence the style of the secretly queer mod movement; and the partial legalisation of homosexuality makes no difference to the London queer scene - or does it ?
Peter Burton (centre) and his sister Pamela and friend Stevie posing in D'Arblay Street 1967where we went
Are you ready for the story of gay clubbing in
Yes, we really have been partying for that long - even before the first discothèque opened in 1960.“There’s a great myth that gay life didn’t start until
the gay mod club, Le Duce, which writer Alkarim Jivani calls “one of the trendiest places to be seen in
“Amber”, now 71, arrived in
We had more places then than now.”
Most of the bars were in basements and attics.They were tiny, but some had a juke box and people would dance.Amber reminisces about the Mambo in
“It was the pits.
When they all started jiving, you could see the floor going up and down.”
Homophobic police stepped up raids on queer meeting places.They rarely made arrests, but intimidated everyone by taking names and addresses.
Corrupt cops also took cash and booze from bar owners. Queers took refuge in illegal drinking clubs.
Gay activist, Claire Andrews, remembers, “They were usually run by black people, who were sympathetic to lesbians and gay men who didn’t have a place to go.”
In 1964, when homosexual law reform had become inevitable, the Director of Public Prosecutions warned the police to ease up. But by that time gay life in
It wouldn’t recover until the late 80s. In a double irony, the renowned Le Duce was co-owned by an ex-cop, Bill Bryant.
In 1964, he and his partner, Geoffrey Worthington, had opened a discreet queer bar, The Lounge, in
Le Duce was open all night every Saturday.The basement room had a door policy that kept the club fashionable (and predatory older men out).Working class poofs and straight dolly birds danced to black music – Jamaican blue beat,Tamla Motown.
“They spoke directly to us,” says Peter Burton, who was in charge from 1966 to 1968, when he
moved on.
By then Soho had been carved up by
The queer scene moved to
“It was a long cellar and everyone would cram up the far end,” recalls gay historian Dr David Lawrence.“The lights were dim. It was like a scrum. Nobody ever came up and stopped anything.”
Alan Jones, co-author of disco history, Saturday Night Forever, is more explicit.“The first time I was ever given a blow job was in the Gigolo,” he reveals.
Meanwhile, in 1967, homosexuality was made legal according to the Wolfenden recommendations. It was little more than a rubber stamp.“It never changed my life in any way,” declares Amber.“It didn’t provoke a rush of new clubs,” agrees Peter Burton. But drag legend Pip Morgan feels that after 1967 there was a subtle change.“You used to keep an eye open for people who were in trouble,” he says regretfully.
“But when everyone could do what they wanted, people stopped being nice to each other.”
what we wore
“GROWING up gay and realising that one is different means a constant questioning of who you are,” says “John”, interviewed by the Victoria and
Aged
... Next to advertisements for John Stephen - Man alive published such ads for Domino mail order - fantastic text ...
On a trip to the South of France, he noticed such novelties as black jeans and tight swimming trunks.
Within months of the film’s premiere,Vince marketed “bum freezer” jackets, drain-pipe trousers and winklepicker shoes.
Green’s sales assistant, John Stephen, left to open His Clothes, around the corner in
Were these first skinheads as gay as the skins at Hard On?
“They were always gay!” laughs Alan Jones.
“Braces! Even then it was a gay code.”
what we listened to
For decades working class queers and female prostitutes formed a natural alliance against the authorities that wanted the trouble makers off the streets and into jail.
But from the early 60s, when the legalisation of “discreet” prostitution and homosexuality became imminent, working class queers began gravitating towards the immigrant community from
This defining relationship between outcast societies can be traced through to the present day (and makes the homophobia of some Jamaican dancehall stars all the more preposterous).
From 1963, both straight and gay mod clubs played danceable records by Jamaican blue beat stars like Prince Buster and Desmond Dekker, music which became part
of the soundtrack of the mod era.
But queers also liked the whole package – the beat, the lyrics and the camp image – of US soul groups like The Miracles, Martha and the Vandellas and especially The Supremes.
At Le Duce the only white music played was “blue-eyed soul” by the likes of Dusty Springfield, who also happened to be gay and made-up like a drag queen.
Although ‘The Green Door’, a hit for both Frankie Vaughan and Jim Lowe in 1956, allegedly refers to a queer bar, the first unequivocally queer song,‘See My Friend’ by The Kinks,
reached number
For the rest of the decade queers generally ignored protest songs and flower power in favour of bubblegum music, the camp fun of Tiny Tim and Harpers Bizarre, and stuff promoted by gay radio jock Kenny Everett.
Incidentally, all records played in gay clubs in the 60s were on juke boxes. London’s first disco, La Discothèque, and its more successful rival, the Whisky-a-go-go, were in Wardour Street from the early 60s; but there was no openly gay club night in the capital until Tricky Dicky (richard Scanes) began at the Father Redcap in Camberwell in 1971.
how we danced
The jive and its variations, introduced to the
Queers preferred the rare luxury of dancing arm in arm. everything changed in the early 60s, with the arrival of the twist, first popularised in
The first dance in which partners didn’t hold each other, the twist was perfect for queer bars.
When the police arrived, dancers quickly turned towards a person of the opposite sex.
Unfortunately, this didn’t work when the pretty police were on the floor.
In 1962, David Browne, manager of the Kandy Lounge in
Browne’s counsel maintained that the men concerned were dancing the
It didn’t wash. Browne was found guilty.
The twist spawned several variations - the fly, the mashed potato, the locomotion, the pop pie – whose names were more familiar than their steps. (When Kylie revived the Locomotion in 1988, nobody could be found who remembered Little eva’s original dance).
In 1963, despite the continuing success of the twist, its prime exponent, Chubby Checker, turned his attention to the limbo.The next major development was the blues, the first of the “standing still and twitching” dances, supposedly invented by Dave Clark as a publicity stunt for his record ‘Do You Love Me?’ (1963).
It became the mods’ favourite dance, and was later “mod”ified into the hitch-hiker and the shake.The latter superseded the twist, but by the end of 1965 it had evolved into the frug, which became the staple dance of the late sixties.
how we got wasted
AS QX said in 1998,“Queers are always first to discover a new drug.”
And so it’s always been. Most of the queer bars of the 50s and 60s didn’t serve alcohol. Cocaine, which had virtually disappeared before World War II,hadn’t returned.
Therefore queers went in search of new excitement.
A popular destination was the branch of Boots on
(You snapped or “popped” the capsule into a hankie and inhaled.
Poppers weren’t widely available in bottles until the late 70s).
Queers and Jamaicans bonded not just because of music but weed.
Cannabis was unknown in the
The first drug bust was in
Amphetamines, notably Benzedrine, were widely used as stimulants during World War II; and under their street names – purple hearts and black bombers were most common – “uppers” became the mods’ favourite drug.
Sleep became difficult without barbiturates (“downers”).
Pip Morgan remembers that the dealers were often girls (they were good at charming prescriptions out of doctors).
Peter Burton says that the fish in the tank at Le Duce kept dying because clubbers threw their pills into the water whenever there was a police raid.
He also saw clubbers removing the wadding from Benzedrine inhalers and dunking it in Coca Cola, and Samantha the transvestite cat burglar sniffing her wig cleaning fluid.
Queers (or “gays” as we became known from about 1969 onwards) generally remained loyal to uppers and downers well into the 70s.
Lysergic acid (LSD), which arrived around 1966, didn’t suit queer club culture.The swirling patterns and dreamy,jangly music that contributed to the first Summer of Love in 1967 were pretty much a hetero thing.
Originally published in QXmagazine
1 Feb 2008
It was a tribal thing
This writer, a pioneering mod, recalls a world of clubs, cliques and fearless tailoring
IN THE FIFTIES, everybody grew up looking like their parents. It was just so grey. There was no music, no clothes and you didn’t have that many places to go. My sister Gloria, who was four years older than me, was a bit of a Beat, as they were called at the time, and she used to go to
This was round about 1959. Then she really got into R’n’B music, people like LaVern Baker, Joe Turner, Ray Charles, the Drifters. Her big favourites were the Shirelles and she actually got to run their fan club, which unlocked a whole lot of things because then she started taking me to the clubs where all this music was going on. I guess I was about 14 and we used to go along with her pal and her brother, Geoff Lewis. So my sister was the one who told me: “Get some pointed shoes,” and got my mother to take up all the turn-ups on my trousers and put buttons on my shirt collar.
I was now a Mod. I used to come up to London and buy clothes but an awful lot of stuff you got made or you made it yourself or you found things in bizarre places. We used to buy cricket whites, cheap cotton ones from C&A, and dye them ourselves — bright yellow, orange — because you couldn’t buy bright coloured clothes.
We would have them shortened by two inches so you could show off your socks. I remember buying a scarlet shirt and my dad saying to me, “Where are you going? Bullfighting?” He’d never seen a scarlet shirt before. My mother was brilliant because she was a dressmaker and she used to make stuff. At the time, we used to go to the Scene club in Ham Yard (
All they made were dancing shoes but they had these shoes with a Cuban heel and a seam down the middle, which was very unusual. I think they were flamenco shoes and somebody saw them and said: “Right, I’ll have those.” This was well before the Beatles.
We used to go to Heathrow airport on our scooters. There was a bowling alley there and the shoes were fantastic, three colours and with your size written on the back. So we would put on our sy shoes and walk out in a pair of these bowling shoes, cost you nothing. Then you would get a coffee late at night in the airport.
Mods were not that interested in groups. We were into records. Monday nights we used to go to the Lyceum in Streatham and the Orchid in Purley, sometimes both on the same night. Tuesday we stayed in. Wednesdays was the Wimbledon Palais, Thursdays it was the
You had to watch it a little bit if you went to clubs in different parts of town that were not your own. You tended not to chat birds up at those places although there weren’t that many good-looking Mod birds to go round.
It was a very male thing. It was also a tribal thing. There was a period when all the East London boys wore blue suits and all the
In my team there was Denzil (who appeared on the cover of the Sunday Times Magazine, August 2, 1964 – See “Changing Faces” elsewhere on the blog) and Pete Saunders who later became a DJ. The other one who was a pal was Mickey Finn, who got pally with the DJ Guy Stevens and later on teamed up with Marc Bolan in T. Rex.
There were a few fights but unlike what Stan Cohen, the sociologist, says about it all being speed orientated, it wasn’t. People only really took speed at the weekends and they did so to keep awake. Then they started thinking, “This pill isn’t bad,” and stepped up the dosage until they got right out of their boxes.
The end of it was
What broke your heart was that it all got so big, plus it didn’t help when the papers blew up the stories about the pills. The centre of gravity moved from
From July 28, 2003
29 Jan 2008
Are you a Mod or a Rocker ? - 1963
Pass the test ! (but we won't divulge our results !!)
thanks to Alvaro & Mocky Dimples for this early article from Motor Cycle magazine Dec. 1963
28 Jan 2008
Elegancia 1964
Alvaro & Mocky Dimples have sent these great scans of a Spanish magazine called Blanco y Negro dated 11th July 1964.
Thanks !
24 Jan 2008
London Shopping
Back in 1965,
Silly article, nice pics.
Christine Rout, Susanne Frost and Louise Freeman are our guides …
Boy-watching is just as popular as window-shopping, at least it seems so for Louise.
The Stephen House caters to record fans as well as to gals who buy the Mod clothes.
Well, let’s have a closer look. HER CLOTHES inside a store for HIS CLOTHES.
Why not ?
It’s common for boys to shop with their girlfriends. Each selects the other’s clothing.
“It’s as much fun to look at the boys’ clothes as it is our own. Lots of times I’ve gone shopping just looking at what the male side of our sex is wearing. That way we can tell which boys are ‘in’ when we meet them at parties or other places.”
(Which shows how Mod logic works.)
22 Jan 2008
18 Jan 2008
Blues in England - Part Two
T-Bone Walker
Live at the Klooks Kleek 1965
by Tony Lennane - From Blues Unlimited - April 1965 Issue
Just a few weeks short Klooks from
It is located on the first floor, bars and carpets everywhere: not the kind of place I would have expected to see T-Bone Walker.
See him I did.
This was one of Klooks better nights. By nine pm it was quite packed, though little known to the present generation of beat enthusiasts, there was quite a lot of genuine appreciation evident that night. It was March 9th; the doors were opened at 8.00 pm and we were allowed in for a very reasonable 7/- (how do they manage it ?)
Our first entertainers, and entertain they did, were the “Bluesbreakers” led by John “heart and soul in my music” Mayall, a true musician deeply involved in the true traditions of the American Negro.
I feel just recognition should be given where it is rightly due. Here is a man who knows the music, in fact a true enthusiast of the pure blues, definitely the best group we are fortunate in having here in Britain.*
After having been told of T-Bones appearance having been set for a full hour at the end of the evening between 10 and 11 pm, he appeared without warning at approximately 9 o’clock for the first of the two sets of the day.
First we were to be impressed by a five-minute guitar instrumental which, though, simple in construction , had us all rockin’. Once again credit is due to the boys for a very able backing. T-Bone told me later “they have a true feeling for the blues”.
He liked the boys, as he explained later in the bar, over a gin and orange.
The highlights of the evening were the two numbers he featured on the “Original American Folk-Blues Festival” (Polydor LPHM 237-597), “I wanna see my baby” and “I’m in love”, both among my particular favorites by T-Bone.
Other exciting – if commercial – numbers to be performed for our eager ears included the rock classic of the fifties “Linda Loo”, originally recorded by the now unheard Ray Sharp, and “T-Bone Shuffle”, an item remembered from his Atlantic label employ.
After half-time in yonder bar we pushed our weary way to the front to find John Mayall running through a few popular R n’B items – “My Babe” etc…etc…etc… T-Bone appeared to back John for a few numbers before taking the spotlight himself.
To end the night of unforgettable music we were given a form of Hooker-cum-Reed-cum-Walker “Boogie Riff”. It took 4 encores and nigh on twelve minutes before he finally disappeared behind the door, to appear very briefly with a bow and a broad smile.
This was a night never to be forgotten, and for Klooks Kleek I sincerely hope, a paying one.
More performances by visiting US artists to such as the Kleek club will undoubtedly bring out the best in all of them, thus rewarding the bluesophile with better than the average shows.
T-Bone’s tour of
the Cliffs Pavilion Southend to
the Regency Ballroom
Market Hall,
Club-A-GoGo,
Dungeon Club,
Twisted Wheel,
The Whiskey-A-GoGo,
Ricky Tick, Windsor;
Doghouse Club, Harrow;
Crawdaddy,
and many other colourful places with such names as
Cooks Ferry Inn,
Concord South Bank Jazz Club,
Public Hall,
Trade Union Hall !
Quite a selection ……
T-Bone spent two evening in full rehearsal with his group at the Marquee Club in Wardour St., London prior to his opening night at the Flamingo, which lacked the spark of his Klooks performance, a night that ignited a blaze of new interest in one of the greatest of old time bluesmen.
* Note that, as the “Bexhill Observer” so rightly says, “Any opinions stated by our correspondents do not necessarily reflect those of the editorial staff.” So don’t plague us with letters (as once happened).
15 Jan 2008
Young Londoners
Young Londoners fall into two main groups which are divided by the usual distinctions of age, occupation and money.
First there are the teenagers, referred to generically as ‘mods’. Clearly some are modder than others, but if you watch the crowd scenes in the various television programmes devoted to pop, you will get the general idea of the current fashions in this group. (Boys on these programmes whose fancy dress appears to be fancier than most, and girls of immodest appearance, are probably not mods at all but specially hired to give colour to the proceedings.) Mods like to look as much like one another as possible, and their girls are rather demure. Elder mods are sometimes as old as twenty-two. No one knows what happens to old mods because we haven’t had a whole generation of them yet. Presumably they marry, have children, and settle down to form the backbone of
Mods continue to earn more than their parents ever did when young, and they spend their money almost exclusively on pop records and clothes. The correct attitude in this group is exceedingly cool, almost blank. The young girls may scream occasionally at the pop group of their choice, and the boys may have the odd Saturday night or Bank Holiday punch-up, but emotional behaviour or any kind of frolicking is otherwise unseemly. They are not strictly chaste – but the girls are preparing for a white wedding. Mods don’t go to bistros, they prefer the Gold Egg type of restaurant. Wherever you see gigantic orange light fittings and décor which looks like one huge fruit machine, you will know that the mods are inside eating square meals in round buns. Mods’ night-life ends around midnight during the week. They have nine-to-five jobs and live at home, so they don’t go to the expensive late-night discothèques.
The mods are responsible, as principal consumers, for the progress of pop music, and the tabernacle and heart of
… The Marquee moved about three years ago from its old premises in
In
The Stones, in the days when they really were dirty, had their first central
His music was much harsher and harder than anything around now, and the Marquee then was not exactly fashionable. There were always a lot of old, ugly and unexplained people around.
Some nights the rucksack-beard-and-bedding-roll group would arrive from hitchin in some unknown Thumb Country, and there was usually a sort of habitué circle of Negroes with hip flasks dancing in front of the bandstand.
The Negroes have moved on now to the Flamingo and All-Nighter Club in Lower Wardour Street, home of Georgie Fame & The Blue Flames, and Zoot Money and The Big Roll Band.
The hitch-hikers have disappeared altogether from the beat-club scene. They were the extremist end of the Rocker tribe, which is now almost extinct. But you can still see nomads in
They are filthy and hairy and lost, and they sit there nursing their blistered feet after a trek from god knows where. Most of them grow out of it and get over it, but they suffer for their art and make a change sometimes from the neat little mass-produced mods.
These mods, the ones who care more about The Look than The Sound, congregate nightly at a place called Tiles just a block down
The music of Steve Darbishire and The Yum Yum Band, or of Everett of England, or the Anteeks, is relayed out into the street via speakers placed in neighbouring shop doorways.
Inside they dance actively, and spend their money in the night-time shops built in the maze of corridors that surround the main dance floor. The birds’ clothes shop is called Plumage, and if you’re not a success on arrival you can nip in there and come out again in something new.
On nights when there’s no live music they still crowd near the bandstand and listen to the patter of the tiny DJ. But they dance less and inspect one another’s clothing more.
The girls gather in serious little groups and tell one another the price of things, and the boys go peacocking around catching their own reflections in the glass swing doors.
Wall-to-wall mirrors in this welter of narcissism would send the sales of plumage for both sexes up by 50 per cent – or bring the whole enterprise to a halt.
... to be continued
21 Dec 2007
Blues In England - Part One
John Lee Hooker 1964
Contrasting reviews
John J. Broven
The incredulous, it seemed, had happened when it was announced that John Lee Hooker was to tour
It was not to be.
Hooker started his tour on Monday, June 4th at the Flamingo Club, after a perfunctory appearance at the Rediffusion Studios on “Ready Steady Go!”.
In the broiling atmosphere of this one-time modern jazz centre, we had a full two hours of synthetic rubbish from the Cheynes and John Mayall’s Bluesbreakers.
It was then learnt that Mayall would back Hooker, and despite protests to John Lee before the show, it was to be. Hooker appeared, and with Mayall’s organ and harmonica (yes! – he plays both at once!) striving for the limelight, he was content to strum his way through meaningless things like “Dimples”, “Boom Boom”, “Hi Heel Sneakers” and others.
In his whole act he only did two slow blues and of these, only “I’m In The Mood” came off to any degree. But most disappointing was that his guitar work was kept to a minimum.
Undaunted, I saw Hooker twice later in the tour at
Apart from a magnificent “Late Hours At Midnight” at
What went wrong?
Why was one of the greatest living bluesmen transformed into an unexceptional R&B artist?
Obviously a lot of blame must go to whoever teamed Hooker with Mayall.
If he must have a group, OK, but not an organ! Also John appeared to be under the misconception that he was playing to a “pop” audience, judging by the stream of medium-tempo songs – which soon began to pall, being so alike.
Blues enthusiasts were definitely to the fore at the Flamingo, and if this wasn’t so elsewhere, wasn’t this the perfect opportunity to educate the uninitiated?
My opinion of Hooker has not fallen on account of this tour.
He has shown, in odd flashes, what a great bluesman he is. It’s just that this tour, for a blues lover, has been so badly presented, if financially a great success.
Simon A. Napier
If you happen to feel like writing, by all means do.
It may be worth mentioning that John, Mike Leadbitter, Graham Ackers and yours truly took JLH along on June 2nd to “
Whatever, this could have had some effect on his act, seeing the audience reaction to Chuck.
Hooker is a fine man, but he is very aware of any commercial angles and willing to put them to good use if it turns out to his benefit
From Blues Unlimited – August 1964 issue
________________________________________________
… and another view from Graham Ackers from the September issue …
Cleveleys, Nr. Blackpool 8/7/64
Wednesday, July 8th. John Lee Hooker played a most unlikely sounding venue at the Savoy Ballroom, Cleveleys. About 8.30 Dave Ward and I emerged from the bar and heard the last few numbers of the Groundhogs set. This group, previously unknown to us, was quite a surprise. They weren’t bad at all and instrumentally very like the originals.
Later they accompanied Hooker.
Then followed some noisy group of ruffians, who, after two verses of “What’d I Say” drove us barwise again!
We re-emerged slightly more amicable in frame of mind, soon dispelled by Georgie Fame and his mob. Admittedly they are technically quite adept, but what a bore the whole thing is!
We even had a Negro bashing some tom-toms, contributing less than nothing (!) – meant to add authenticity I suppose.
After this aural torture, Hooker came on to a very enthusiastic reception.
The message seems to have permeated to the far, windy shores after all.
He rolled straight into “Shake It Baby” with great power – perhaps a little too much – as a string broke after two verses!
Anyway, true to the maxim of all good showmen, he finished the number to great applause.
The next number he played with a Groundhog Fender – a somewhat unusual sight.
The Groundhog repaired his Gibson and finished the number with it.
Many followed including “Night Time Is The Right Time”, “Boom Boom”, “Hi Heel Sneakers”, “Dimples” (twice) and a blue version of “
Every number was received with enthusiasm to such a degree that five encores were performed in all.
A special mention for the Groundhogs who throughout played admirably. All in direct contrast to the “let’s see who can play loudest” approach of John Mayall and crew.
In fact everything was just right – atmosphere, backing, amplification and temperature (compared to Tropical Flamingo conditions) and everybody, including Hooker and the Hogs, had quite a ball.
________________________________________________John Lee Hooker – returned later that year for another tour …
7 Dec 2007
Sheffield : King Mojo Club Memories
By John Smith (published in Soul Time fanzine)
Although it is not more than 30 years since the club closed down, the memories of the King Mojo Club in Sheffield are still fresh for the people who used to go there every week or every time that news about the Peter and Geoff Stringfellow brothers appear in the press.
The club was opened in 1964 by brothers Peter and Geoff. They were making a name for themselves thanks to the club and they were successful enough to attract the The Beatles for some shows. This success took them to sign similar bands and to promote gigs for the Rolling Stones and other British R &B bands.
The brothers were offered an old dancing hall, Day's Dance Hall, and they rented it for 30m pounds a week after refurnishing it. They choose the name Mojo after hearing the song "Got My Mojo Working" and the club soon attracted a new set of people who followed blues and soul music. It soon earned a great reputation because of the enthusiasm of the two brothers.
At the beginning, it only was open on Thursday, Friday and Saturday, but soon an allnighter was added on Saturdays, always with an American soul artist. On Sunday it was time for British R & B or soul bands, opening from 8pm until 11pm.
Sometimes, Pete and Geoff could not afford the money a great artist demanded, like Wilson Pickett, so they asked him to sing at 2am, after he had sung at a bigger club earlier the same evening. The artist always charged them less for doing so.
All-nighters began in 1965 with a one pound entrance fee and the sessions started at midnight. Soon, a regular crowd began to go, with people from Sheffield and nearby cities like
Of the two brothers, Peter was always the showman and he also liked to DJ. In 1963, ITV had started "Ready, Steady Go", where you could see lots of black artists like Major Lance, Otis Redding or Inez & Charlie Foxx. Peter Stringfellow enjoyed the programme so much that he went to the ITV offices to talk with one of the producers, Vicki Wickham. They gave Peter the task of entertaining the audience in the studio before filming began. He also controlled the dancers. He worked on “Ready, Steady, Go” for a year. During that time, every Thursday he travelled to
If you were a Mojo regular, Peter would give you tickets to the show, but I never took that offer because you had to spend a lot of time there on a Thursday and also to pay for the trip to
The Mojo soon changed its name to King Mojo. It was in
The club’s policy was to play 95 per cent of soul music and some Blue Beat and ska. At the end, there was a record ("My girl, the month of May"- Dion) that was a well known flower power track. It was covered by The Alan Bown Set, one of the main English soul bands of the time, just because of the popularity that song had at the Mojo.
Some of the records that caused an impact at the all-nighters were things like "Love a go go" by Stevie Wonder, "You've been cheating" (Impressions), "Determination" by The Contours", "365 days" by Donald Height, "Oh baby you turn me on" by Willie Mitchell, plus the singles of the time from artists like Jackie Wilson, Homer Banks or Motown. The Artistics sounds “I’m gonna miss you” was the most important song: it meant the end of every all-nighter.
The best American artists played there: Ike & Tina Turner, Billy Stewart, Alvin Cash & the Crawlers, Ben E. King, The Spellbinders, Garnett Mimms and Stevie Wonder. The best English bands also were there: Geno Washington, Jimmy James & The Vagabonds, Chris Farlowe, Alan Bown Set, Georgie Fame, Zoot Money and Jimmy Cliff (who was then still in this soul phase). Even the Small Faces had one of their first gigs there.
The stage was opposite the dressing rooms, so when the club was crowded it was a problem for the artists to go up and down to the stage. The night Ike & Tina Turner were at the Mojo, they had to push their way to the stage with the three Ikettes and the 13 piece band. That helped creating an atmosphere for every show.
Peter was a real Yorkshireman. He wanted as much as he could from every band he signed. That’s why he sometimes encouraged the audience to block the way for the artists to the dressing room until they had performed a couple of more songs. That night with Ike & Tina Turner, they had to sing three more songs. Then, he asked the crowd to let them go to the dressing room. As the club had no air conditioning, sweat and condensation fell from the walls.
Around 1966 and 1967, having a great record collection was not important for your status. To be with the in crowd you had to wear the correct clothes: Mohair suits, Levi’s, brogues shoes, leather gloves… You also had to be good at the latest dances. Then, dances changed every seven or eight weeks. The best dancers performed on the stage. If you were brave enough, you could dance on a barrel that was close to the stage.
The only problem was that it was placed on the outskirts of the town and it was complicated to get there at night. Being out there also spelt the end for it. As it was surrounded by a residential zone, the neighbours complained. In a bid to stop the complaints, no more allnighters were organised. The last one was on April 15st in 1967 with Geno
Alldayers were held on Sundays, along with live shows and more young people could go to the club. When it was clear that the police would not support a new license for the club, a show with Jimmy Cliff & The Shakedown Sound was prepared on September the 30th in 1967. We had an incredible atmosphere. The next week it was time for the last show at the Mojo: an alldayer with Stevie Wonder. This time, lots of young people were able to go and that spoiled the atmosphere a bit.
Thanks to his status in the North and the
The Stringfellow brothers did not leave the scene and opened new clubs. The old Mojo was turned into a Bingo hall and with the money from that deal, the brothers invested in a
Peter became a multimillionaire. In
The Mojo might be only a name from the past for the soul music fans of today, but I can say that the legend that was built around the Twisted Wheel in
The ads for the last all-nighter at the Mojo had nostalgic and funny lines:
And so it came to pass,
the great and famous
King Mojo All-Nighters
had to stop!
A wailing and crying as
never heard before over took
And an the last one,
Saturday XV April MCMLXVII
multitudes of all needs gathed
(except the dreaded greasers)
and paid homage.
And from in their midst
came the great Prophet:
Geno Washington & His Ram Jam Followers
24 Oct 2007
It's the Blue-Beat Craze !
A look at the latest craze to take the record industry by storm.
IT’S THE BLUE-BEAT CRAZE
Norman Jopling – Record Mirror February 15, 1964
The record industry thrives on new crazes and sounds. And at the moment three record companies are thriving on the Blue Beat craze which is just being taken up by the industry in general as a potential money spinner for all concerned
Just for the record, and for those who probably haven’t heard it yet, just what is blue beat?
Well, it’s a strictly Jamaican sound with a pulsating on-beat played on stop chords throbbing mercilessly through the disc. Most of the songs are down-to-earth items that don’t usually deal with love, and the tunes are strictly secondary to the beat.
The craze has been “in” with the Mods since last summer because of the marvellous dance beat and of course has been bought by the West Indians in
But it was only when the larger record companies heard of fantastic sales for such blue beat discs as “Madness”, “
ORIGINS
Anyway, let’s take a look at the small blue beat companies – after all on of the attractions the music had to the Mods was that the music was exclusive to the smaller and virtually unknown labels.
Firstly there’s the Blue Beat label itself. Owned by Melodisc records run by Siggy Jackson this label was formed some two years back. It boasts many of the biggest blue beat artistes including Prince Buster, Derrick Morgan and The Folks Brothers.
“The blue beat rhythm itself was started by Prince Buster” says Siggy. “He had been singing in
Although Buster invented the blue beat rhythm, I invented the name for our label.”
The other two blue beat companies don’t agree about the origins of blue beat. Both 
Island records is run by Chris Blackwell, an enterprising young white Jamaican who was fascinated by blue beat and started his own company here well over a year ago. His best seller is “Blazing Fire”, while another good one is “Housewives Choice”. Most of his numbers are recorded in
“So far all of our discs have sold well and we haven’t had one flop” Chris told me. “My aim is to see a blue beat disc in the charts – even if it was only at n°
Chris also owns two more labels. One is Sue, the great US R&B label which Chris bought when he was last in the States. Some of
The other record company is R & B, the smallest of the three. Like
There are smaller companies, the ones who pioneered blue beat. How about the larger ones?
First of all, Decca has put out a disc called “The Blue Beat” by the Beazers. All of the small companies unanimously say “This isn’t blue beat, and if people think it is – it will do us harm”. The record itself is sung by Chris Farlow and backed by Cyril Stapleton. And no one anywhere seems to think it is blue beat. Decca are also reported to be leasing some tracks from Melodisc for release and next week will be recording some genuine blue beat groups to be put out on Decca.
PRIORITY
EMI are issuing two discs in February by Ezz Reco and the Launchers with Boysie Grant and Beverley as vocalists. This is a genuine blue beat group and if the discs are fairly successful EMI will be issuing more. But it is certainly an unprecedented step for a big record company to issue two discs by the same artiste within two weeks!
And so far no word from any other companies. So it looks as if the Blue Beat craze is destined to catch on in a big way with the two biggest record companies giving it top priority.
But once it starts breaking big nationally it looks as if the mods are going to have to find something more exclusive.
Keep your eyes open record companies…
Manchester - Roger Eagle 1985 Interview
Very interesting as well.
Spotlight on a DJ : Roger Eagle
Back in ’64 in
Over twenty years on, the Twisted Wheel is no more but Mr. Eagle is back in
In this short interview Roger Eagle tries to help us revive those Twisted Wheel days …
How did you come to be DJ-ing at the Twisted Wheel ?
I walked in there one afternoon when it was the “Left Wing Coffee Bar” with a pile of Chuck Berry and Bo Diddley imports on Chess and Checker and this guy asked me if I knew anything about Rhythm’n’Blues.
Naturally I said yes, so he asked me if I wanted to dj.
I’d never DJ-ed before but I thought I’d take a shot at it and that’s how it started.
How did you cope DJ-ing for the first time ?
I didn’t really know what to do, I just put records on and I never used to say much. But the people who used to come down were really fanatical about sounds so if it was a good record they would know what it was within seconds, it was that kind of crowd.
Was you involved with the mod scene at that time ?
I suppose I was the dj the mods would listen to if they were going to clubs because the Wheel was the allnighter scene in
We started bringing the artists over and it was amazing to see people such as Howlin’ Wolf, Otis Redding, Rufus Thomas, Muddy Waters etc… getting the same sort of reception that normally only big pop stars got.
The only thing I don’t like about the mod scene is that some people are very narrow in their tastes, we were very broadly based when we started at the Wheel. It gradually narrowed down to Northern Soul which I think was a mistake.
Did you have live bands at the Wheel ?
Yeah, we used to get American artists over to play, people such as Chuck Berry, Screamin’ Jay Hawkins, T-Bone Walker, John Lee Hooker.
Muddy Waters and Howlin’ Wolf didn’t play but they did some live stuff for the local TV station.
We had loads of them down there all the time, Jimmy Reed used to sell out the place.
When Sonny Boy Williamson came over he freaked over English girls wearing mini skirts. He was wandering around looking up all the girls saying ‘Heaven Hath Come Down’.
He was probably the greatest harmonica player of them all, maybe even better than Little Walter, which is saying a lot.
How did you know Guy Stevens ?
We knew each other, we knew what we were doing, he used to send up records.
He came up once with Inez and Charlie Foxx. He gave me a Don & Dewey single ‘Stretchin’ Out’ and he mailed me an album by Frank Frost & the Nighthawks which was out on Sam Phillips ‘Phillips International”.
I used to go to the Scene club in Ham Yard before it was the Scene but I moved up to
Where did you get your records at the time ?
Mostly I used to get them from American record companies or from a specialist import shop. I used to get records sent from the Stax label, Stan Axton the owner used to send me records.
I used to get records sent from Tamla Motown,
Roughly, what would be the Twisted Wheel top ten in 1964 ?
The favourite record of all time at the Wheel was ‘It Keeps Raining’ – Fats Domino. That was probably the most played record, then you would go to something like ‘Walking The Dog’ – Rufus Thomas.
Then you could go to any one of a dozen Muddy Waters records, probably something fairly obvious such as ‘Tiger In Your Tank’. The next on the list would be ‘That’s What I Want To Know’ – James Carr, then one of Bobby Blue Bland’s ‘Turn On Your Lovelight’.
Then would come ‘Amen’ by the Reverend Robinson and ‘Long Distance’ by Garnell Cooper and the Kinfolks which was one the rare unknown ones that we played a lot. You could pick on any one of a dozen records by Booker T & The MG’s, probably one of the more up-tempo ones such as ‘Can’t Be Still’ or something like that. There was always plenty of records from the Stax label in the top ten and also there was quite a lot of Tamla Motown floating around in there as well.
But there was not quite so much Tamla Motown as people like to think. I didn’t play that much Motown or Spector stuff just because it was so widely available and the chart stuff.
I was playing gospel stuff, but after 4 years at the Wheel it was down to that one fast Northern Soul dance beat which I tough was very boring and that’s why I left in mid ’67.
3 Oct 2007
Changing Faces
They have been called the « anti-hoorays ».
« But you can tell us by the way we walk – feet out », said one Mod.
« Rockers are hunched. We hope to stay smart for ever, not shoddy like our parents. »
Photographs by Robert Freeman. Report by Kathleen Halton
« Next year it will be dead. Fellows of 15 and 16 are giving it a bad name : It’s these scooter Mods who live and die in their anoraks. They go down to the coast, hang around and then, there’s trouble. » the speaker is Jack, 18, who works on a building site.
But Denzil (see cover), also 18, says, « You go down to the sea because you get bored. The summer comes around, you keep saying you’re going to do something different – go to Jersey or do a season. You keep saying you’re going to do something about it. Then all of a sudden it’s september again.
« Once you’ve got to 20 you consider yourself a bit old-mannish. If you’re a bit juvenile, you can get away with it. But you know yourselfyou’re getting on, you’re going to be left out of things. » Denzil (above) livesin Streatham where his father is a garage mechanic.
He says things used to be lively in Streatham « till the kids started going up to the West End and getting introduced to the pills, getting edgy and argumentative. There’s a lot of lying when you get ‘blocked’ – the number of girls you get in a week, the price of your suit. But the drug kick is dying out a bit. »
« Most of these real beaty girls are only looking to boys for companionship. They’re sexually dumb. » says Eric Burdon (one of the Animals). A boy may like a girl he meets at the Scene club in Soho. But she comes from Hounslow and he comes from Purley so the make their own way home.
Most Mods live with their families –« I don’t tell my parents I go up to the West End, » said one girl. « I mean, would you let your daughter do it ? » « Not very many go steady these days, » says Ted, who is a ‘leader’.
« That’s mostly Rockers. There’s nothing else for them to do, no dancing. Very few girls are worth taking out more than once. » Denzil says « The fellow’s got to like a girl a lot to have her around with his friends. Of course you get the all-night parties. Jumping around to a gramophone. Then all of sudden you get tired, and go to sleep. »
« If you can’t dance you might as well go home. Or you have to dress really smart to make up for it. » Quick changes, like this one outside a Soho club are part of the game. Tuesday is the best night at The Scene. Monday is Mecca night (Hammersmith Palais or the Orchard at Purley), Wednesday for staying in, Thursday for washing your hair – and Friday for nothing special ? Then Saturday night-all night in the West End. « Movies or football ? » says Denzil. « We don’t have time for them, because Sunday’s meant for the Flamingo, or sleeping, and Saturday for shopping. »
« There’s a place for choice Mods left of the band. Rockers wouldn’t dare stand there. » The choice place is at the Orchard Ballroom – which has two bars, ultra-violet lights that play on the dancers, and a blue grotto for sitting out. It costs 3s. to get in -–if you get past the ‘bouncers’ ; they know the trouble-makers.The ‘choice’ Mods don’t use the term ‘Mod’. « You wouldn’t be pleased to call yourself that, » says Denzil. « Though you might call us stylists, orfaces. » « New faces are being snubbed now, » says Louise, « because the old ones are still in power. By the time it’s the young kids’ turn, something else will be in. »
I don’t really mind about keeping up with the Joneses but when your friends look at you and say, ‘We’ve got a car or a fridge … » Jean (Below) who works as a hairdresser is 19. Her husband Mike is 22. He’s a post office engineer. They live in a small flat in Hammersmith, and collect stones, knives and cheap antiques. Both are Mods but they look forward to staying at home at least one night a week. Mike wears carpet slippers after work. Both of them are saving up for things. Most Mods are more worried about having a good time than a good job.
Say you get something unusual like going to the coast in a lorry, you look forward to it. »
Or a shuffle boat party on the Thames, or sitting around on the beach at Margate with your transistor. « Everybody wants to go abroad, » says Denzil. « Some get ‘blocked’ and say they’ve been washed up in Switzerland or Casablanca. But you know it’s not true. » « Some boys put up pylons in the summer – you get a good tan that way, » says Louise.
A few years ago, when the coffee bars were in, you pretended you were intellectual. Now you just chatter. « We don’t talk politics or religion – we hate attempts to make religion with it. It’s always Rockers on those tele programmes. »
30 Sep 2007
19 Sep 2007
Bowie The Bowie Man
Timothy White speaks to David Bowie about his mod years.
Tell me about adolescence, your early teens. I had the usual desire to break ties with home and parents, the general anger of youth. I have a half brother brother and a half sister, neither of whom I've ever been particularly close to, because they've never lived at home. I was brought up ostensibly as an only child, and they put in these lightweight appearances.
I lost contact with my stepsister Annette when I was 12 that was the last time I saw her she was quite a lot older than me and went to Egypt to get married.
We've none of us heard a word from her since, and we've tried to trace her.
I was living up in Brixton until I was 11 years old, and that was enough to be very affected by it. It left great, strong images in my mind.
Because the music that was first happening in my early teens was happening in Brixton, it was the place one continually had a relationship with.
All the ska and bluebeat clubs were in Brixton, so one gravitated back there. Also it was one of the few places that played James Brown records, other than two French clubs in town, La Poubelle and Le Kilt.
A friend of mine, Jeff McCormack, who ended up as Warren Peace in the Diamond Dogs band, had the big ska record collection, and it just wasn't worth competing with him, so I went straight into buying Chuck Berry, Little Richard and the blues stuff.
Were white teenagers welcome at the shebeens?
At that time it was cool. If you expressed an interest in the music and got off on what was happening in the clubs, it was a lot easier, I guess, than it is these days. Although I don't know; I haven't been to those clubs in years.I've hardly been in London in a social, living way for so long that it's almost an alien city to me now which is unfortunate in some respects, but you lose some and gain some.
At the start of your career you spent a lot of time around the legendary Marquee Club, which had weekly R&B nights featuring twin bills like Sonny Boy Williamson and the' Yardbirds. What was that scene like in the early 1960s?
I got friendly with the owners; for me there were no rules at the door so I used to creep in and watch what was happening. The Marquee, the Scene, Eel Pie Island in Twickenham, they were all a circuit.
At the time 16 years old, for me when I was frequently in those places it was during the era of the first batch of mods. There were two batches of mods in England, the first lot being in 1962-63.
The initial crop called themselves modernists, which reduced itself down to the mods. That was excessively peacocky.
These weren't the anorak quilted, gabardine raincoated mods that turned up later on motor scooters. The scooter thing wasn't quite as big with the early mods at that time; it was still trains.
But the first mods wore very expensive suits; very, very dapper. And make-up was an important part of it: lipstick, blush, eyeshadow and out-and out pancake powder not Clearasil. It was very dandified, and they were the James Brown-lovers. Elitist. Pills always played an important part; everything was fast.
You weren't supposed to like bands like the Rolling Stones, and especially the Action, the Who and all that crowd who came along later these were the anorak boys in the later `60s because they weren't real mods.
I did secretly. But I felt sad the former fashion had died out.
I dressed the archetype: mohair suits, two-tone suits; the shoes were high pointers; Billy Eckstine shirts with big roll collars. You either had a pinned collar or button-down or roll collar.
How would you earn the money to dress up?
(Snickering, with a wink) You earned the money somehow or other, wheeling and dealing. Also, a popular thing was to go down the back of Carnaby Street late at night and raid the dustbins.
Because in those days if anything showed the slightest sign of deterioration, or a button was missing, or there was the least thing wrong with it, they used to throw it out, so you could pick up the most dynamite things down there I This was just as the street was becoming popular.
Indeed, there were only about four shops along there that sold clothes of that nature, so it wasn't a tourist thing at that time.
Also, you could get some good suits made in Shepherd's Bush. There were good tailors there that would knock up a suit quickly and inexpensively, out of material (big grin) which you didn't ask how they could get so cheaply.
So you'd get dressed, go round to the Marquee Club and just get looney and listen to rhythm `n' bIues. Fundamentally it was a rhythm `n' blues period, which had just hit the underground in a big way.
I wasn't a hundred per cent into performing music at the time of the mods, but I'd been playing saxophone since about 13 years old, off and on.
The things I'd considered doing once I left school were either to continue being a painter, start working in an advertising agency or be a musician if I could possibly get that good.
Entrepreneur Kenneth Pitt had seen you at the Marquee Club around the time you were 18 and led the band called David Jones & the Lower Third.
What kind of group was the Lower Third?
I guess it wanted to be a rhythm `n' blues band.
We did a lot of stuff by John Lee Hooker, and we tried to adapt his stuff to the big beat never terribly successfully. But that was the thing; everybody was picking a blues artist as their own. Somebody had Muddy Waters, somebody had Sonny Boy Williamson. Ours was Hooker.
It also was the first band where I'd started writing songs.
I think the first song I ever wrote there might be others but this is the only one that sticks out was called `Can't Help Thinking About Me' (breaks up laughing).
That's an illuminating little piece, isn't it? It was about leaving home and moving up to London.
`The London Boys' was another one about being a mod, it was an anti-pill song; I wasn't particularly pro the thing after a bit.
14 Sep 2007
Even Mo' forgotten - Alan Kotz Story
Brian Kotz (Brian Betteridge of Back to Zero) interview by Alex M Franquet
- How did you become a mod?
- I had developed an interest in Mod through my teens. I was a fan of 1960's music, and I'm sure this had something to do with hearing music being played round the house when I was growing up by my brother, who is 13 years older than me.
I was aware that he had been a Mod and I had taken an interest in this.
- What kind of records did your brother left you at home. Do you remember some of those records? Was that mainly black music?
- Yes, from around 1963/4 onwards, my brother Alan's record collection consisted almost entirely of black American R&B/soul.
Here's a selection of the classics he bought at the time:
Soulful Dress - Sugar Pie DeSanto
You're My Remedy - Marvelettes
What's A Matter With You Baby - Mary Wells & Marvin Gaye
Dimples - John Lee Hooker
In Crowd - Ramsey Lewis
Shame Shame Shame - Jimmy Reed
Always Something There To Remind Me - Lou Johnson (the original)
Shop Around (EP) - Miracles
Get Out My Life Woman - Lee Dorsey.
The one non-R&B single he owned was "Sins of a Family" by P.F. Sloan, which was massive on the Mod scene - they recognised a soulful performance when they heard one.
Of course, he had more well-known stuff too, like 1-2-3 and Shotgun Wedding.
-What did you brother told you about the Stanford Hill Mod scene and Marc Bolan? Did he met Bolan?
-Although we moved from Stamford Hill to the suburbs when I was a baby, Alan still went to school further into town, so his social life continued to revolve round his former locality.
The main meeting centre was an amusement arcade known as the "Shtip", but they wouldn't stay in the area to socialize.
They had shops and clubs to move on to elsewhere. A lot of the early Mods had relatives in the "rag trade", so good suits etc were within their grasp, but they had their favourite shops.
Alan always bought his shoes at Rael, which eventually became Ravel.
He used to go and see loads of bands with his friends, but they didn't buy their records, preferring to buy original U.S. stuff; my analysis is that this is a reason that some of the best groups had little commercial success, because they were more of a live attraction.
His faves were Downliners sect, who he used to see every week at studio 51 off Charing Cross road, and Zoot Money's Big Roll Band.
He knew who Mark Feld (later to be Marc Bolan) was, and saw him around, but didn't know him personally, although he had friends who knew him.
Ironically, I met Bolan whenI was 14, (2 years before his death)at a TV Pop Quiz for teenagers that I took part in, but I didn't ask him any of the questions I'd have liked to, because I was too nervous and lost for words!
- Can you explain us some anecdote or funny story from the sixties that your brother told you?
- Well, Alan claims that the original reason that the early Mods started to take speed, was because after being up allnight at a club like the Flamingo, many of the guys played football in youth leagues on Sunday mornings.
They realised at some point that products like Dexedrine and Drinamyl could keep them awake right through the weekend, so as well helping them through the night, they could carry right on and play the football match.
They must have been fast-moving games!
- I think you know an interesting story about a New Musical Express article.
- Yes, in april '79, NME published the amazing "Young Mod's Forgotten Story", about the early Mods, as part of their Mod special.
Alan knew nearly everyone who was mentioned, and was annoyed that he wasn't; one guy who was written about was called Malcolm Chiswick. When he saw that name, he said, "Malcolm wasn't even a Mod, he just used to sit in the Wimpy Bar in Oxford Street all night when we went on somewhere else"!
- I think they hated a lot a certain band.
- One group that him and his friends DIDN'T like when they saw them was The Rolling stones at The Crawdaddy Club.
They walked out, because the group waved their hands when they played "Bye Bye Johnny", and they thought it was silly!
- What happened to the mod scene in that area?
- I think that one reason that whole period came to an end for the Stamford Hill Mods is because of the very individuality that set them apart at the beginning.
They wanted to get out of the area and move somewhere nicer, do their own thing and get on in their lives, like any working-class kids.
I intend to find out more about everything eventually, as not enough has been written about them yet.
- And your brother, could he imagine that mod would last forever, until today?
- I'm sure that my brother didn't stop once to think whether Mod would last, as he was too busy living it!
I suppose that I may have given it a bit more thought in '79 - after all, we were building on the previous scene.
I remember a lot of cynicism at the time, of people saying all the old crap about something coming along and replacing it, but of course that missed the point.
Mod has had, and continues to have, a lasting influence on so much beyond its own scene, and elements of it will be around forever, but I'm telling this to someone who already knows that!
Whether we knew that in '79 is another thing. I'm sure we'd have hoped so.
The Young Mod's Forgotten Story
In the beginning - or so the story goes - there are only three real mods, and one of these is flecking Lea Davis' brother. Mind you, it is Lea Davis himself who first puts this about in general currency, which means it is not necessary true, as it is known locally and wide that Lea Davis is more than somewhat fond of his brother, whose name is Wayne and who is said to have the best collection of Jimmy Witherspoon records in London.
Personally, I always consider that Lea Davis is a real mod, but he assures me this is not the case, so I reserve judgement and buy a collarless brown Pierre Cardin jacket in Harry Fentons and wear it on a Saturday afternoon idling expedition along Whitchapel Road, which is were I run into Charlie Steiger and Yonker Malcolm Chiswick out searching for this Ben E. King LP that is supposedly on sale in some shop in Mile End - this being around the time when Ben E. King LP's are as rare as albino negroes in this man's town, or even rarer.
Well, I stand there with Charlie Steiger and Malcolm Chiswick for some time, talking of this and that, until Charlie Steiger suggests that the three of us might just as agreeably carry our conversation to Tower Hill and at the same time amuse ourselves in the extraction of enjoyment out of the pariahs and prophets, nomads, seers, racing tipsters and other lusus naturae who regularly and often congregate there, such as Derrick and Pilgrim, Fascist Frankie, Moshe Bagels, Prince Honolulu, Big Jesus, Born Again, and many other wondrous and colorful characters, this being a long established favourite pastime of Charlie Steiger and Yonker Malcolm Chiswick, and indeed of many other citizens as well.
So here I am standing on Tower Hill in the company of Charlie Steiger and Yonker Malcolm Chiswick, discussing the relative merits of Shep and the Limelites, heckling Fascist Frankie, and joining the evangelist Born Again in a loud, lusy rendition of "Whilst I was sleeping somebody touched my soul", when who should come into view brushing an imaginary speck of dust from his mohair and doing the Continental Walk, but flecking Lennie Tyler.
Now Lennie Tyler is probably the most clothes conscious guy I ever meet in my whole life, although you wouldn't really be aware of it just to look at him, as he is conservative to the conservative guy all around.
Unlike most of the guys you see about in these times, Lennie Tyler shuns the sartorial fripperies of fashionable emporiums such as Conicks Young Esq. in the Kingsland Waist and Gaylords of Shaftesbury Avenue, preferring instead to cultivate business acquaintance with old-fashioned gents outfitters in the City and arcane tailors among Pentonville Road for his wardrobe, or at least he always claims.
Personally, I walk down Pentonville Road on many occasions, but I never see any tailors down there, arcane or otherwise.
Furthermore, Lennie Tyler is a very intense and temperamental character, much disposed to extended bouts of broody, sulky silence, even in gay, lively places like Tottenham Lido and the Royal and especially in the latter.
The general consensus of opinion is that Lennie Tyler is somewhat neurotic, and probably more that somewhat.
On this occasions of which I am speaking, he is dressed casually in a simple midnight blue mohair suit, a dazzling white Fred Perry jersey shirt and wearing narrow fitting black Chelsea shoes with a slight suggestion of a chisel point on his feet.
Now Lennie Tyler is an old friend of mine, and in fact I sometimes go around his house to listen to his Jack Jones records and ogle his younger sister, Lennie Tyler having a very pretty young sister, so I give him a big hello, and he stops and the following conversation ensues: "How is it going with you, Len?" I say to Lennie Tyler, although of course I do not really care on soul how it is going with him.
"It's not too often we see you down Tower Hill of a Saturday afternoon".
"So who flecking reckons himself in his new collarless brown cord Pierre Cardin jacket that he more than likely bought in Harry Fentons?" Lennie Tyler says, referring to me in the third person, such as is a common mannerism.
Who's a little mod boy, then?".
"But Len", I say, "You are also a mod".
"Listen son", Lennie Tyler says, "there are only three real mods, and one of these is flecking Lea Davis's brother".
I never get to personally meet Lea Davis's brother, although I do see him on one occasion, hanging out by the pinball tables in the Schtip on Stamford Hill and listening to Fats Domino records.
Schtip being more than somewhat yiddish word used to describe the prodigal waste of money, and with its rows upon rows of gleaming pinball machines, one arm bandits, and a juke box containing some 50 rhythm and blues records, the Schtip offering more than ample opportunity for Lea Davis's brother to do as much, in spite of the fact that Lea Davis's brother is not in the least bit yiddish at all.
Nevertheless, although I cannot honestly claim any acquaintanceship with Lea Davis's brother, I am on reasonably chatty terms with Lea Davis himself, and in fact one time recommend a hair lotion to him, Lea Davis being slightly obsessed with fears of premature baldness, and seeking my counsel on the subject.
Seeing as Lea Davis never shows any sign of premature baldness in all the time I know him, I assume that he takes my advice about the hair lotion.
Whatever, Lea Davis always gives me a large hello whenever we meet, and I am extremely careful to respond in a like manner.
Now Lea Davis is very modernistic in his outlook and dress, and is in fact the first person to turn up in Dalston's Chez Don club wearing a brown bri-nylon mackintosh, although he discards it the following week when Grocer Peter Bendon arrives wearing a raiment of identical design.
Furthermore, Lea Davis hangs around Wolverton Mountain, where the Courtney brothers tread warily, and where he keeps the company of some very dangerous parties indeed.
Some of these parties, such as Crazy Danny Rushton and Buster Boulter, are from Shoreditch, and several are from Hoxton, including Stanley Churchill and Big Sandra O'Sullivan, who even though a girl is at least as formidable a fighting proposition as any of her companions, especially when she starts scratching, and others are from Hackey Wick, London Fields and Haggerston, and none of these parties are any concession at any time.
Of all Lea Davis associates, however, there is one who achieves singular notoriety in this town, and this guy by the name Beardy Pegley.
Standing less than five feet tall in his high heel Chelsea Boots, Beardy Pegley is a brawny, red-complexioned youth with gingerish hair and beard, shaggy red eyebrows, heavily-freckled face and hands, bronze-green eyes, a full sensous mouth, and a all-round generally hirsute appearance.
He lives in turning off Victoria Park Road and is only slightly less well-respected in the district than the Krays, this being at the peak of the twins' East End rule. Around 1965, Beardy Pegley gets his mug in the national dailies when he leads a gang of mods to the amusement arcade in Mare Street, draws a John Roscoe on rockers autocrat Buttons Walsh, and shoots him three times in the chest, apparently as retribution for Buttons Walsh's superior winning ways with the female sex.
The upshot of this is that Buttons Walsh gets a free ride to Hackney Hospital, where he wakes up close to death, and Beardy Pegley is sent to prison to repent his evil ways.
Later, a fully recovered Buttons Walsh goes on to become commander in chief of the UK Hells Angels and ends up alongside Flann O'Brien, Damon Runyon and Anita Loos in Picador Books, who publish his autobiography Buttons in the 70's.
When I know him, Beardy Pegley is already fully embarked on his profligate and primrose path, though at this time he doesn't possess a gun, but gets by fine with a flick knife, a rubber cosh and the most exquisite collections of knuckle-dusters I ever see.
Moreover, Beardy Pegley is celebrated among the leading lights of the local modernist movement, and indeed is one of its most progressive and original element.
Unlike Lenny Tyler and Lea Davis, however, Beardy Pegley positively revels in his role as mod notability, and conducts himself in a manner that would even have put Dion DiMucci's lady love Donna in the shade.
Not only is the first guy I ever see wear hair lacquer and lipstick, but he is also the earliest on the scene with a pink tab-collar shirt, a grey crew neck jersey, knitted tie, scarlet suede jacket with matching leather collar, navy blue crombie overcoat, white half-mast flares and candy-stripe socks, as well as being the first mod to sing the praises of Laurel Aitken, James Brown, the Pretty Things, the Flamingo Club in Wardour Street, Lawrence Ferlinghetti and marijuana, insult Eden Kane in the Chez Don and is still the only guy I ever meet who owns a pair of bright emerald green fur booties all this circa 1962.
Now I am a guy that keeps pretty much his own counsel, and rarely talks to anyone at all, so even though I see Beardy Pegley around and about for some considerable while, and recognise him at that I do not feel any particular compunction to introduce myself, and besides I figure he shares a similar attitude, since we never get around the exchanging even the most perfunctory of nods, until one night I am sitting in Stamford Hill bowling-alley sipping a Pepsi-Cola and thinking about slightly less than nothing when Beardy Pegley comes over to where I am sitting, orders a coffee, and says to me like this:
"I hear you reckon Solomon Burke as being keen", says Beardy Pegley. "So do I".
Now, of course, I do no feel inclined to ask Beardy Pegley how he comes by this information of my feelings for Solomon Burke, as he will probably will probably think I want to know, so I merely nod my assent and say I think "Cry to me" is one of the best records I ever hear.
"Furthermore", I say, "I think Solomon Burke is the best rhythm and blues singer I have heard since Chuck Jackson". "You check Chuck Jackson?", Beardy Pegley exclaims.
"Have you heard "The breaking point" by any chance?".
"Yes", I say, "but I don't rate it nearly as high as "I don't wanna cry", which is currently my favourite record on Top Rank, although Ulysses Samuel Bonds' "Quarter to three" runs it a close second".
"I like New Orleans' best of his", Beardy Pegley says, "although "Not me" was pretty keen, too. You ever heard of The Pastel Six?".
"Of "Cinnamon Cinder" fame", I say. "How about The Desifinadoes?".
"You mean "Mister Dillon" on HMV", says Beardy Pegley. "Same label as "Imagination" by The Quotations".
"Bit too second-rate Marcels for my liking", I say. "How about proper rhythm and blues, Bo Diddley, Hank Ballard...."
"Little Walter, Jimmy McCraklin, Howling Wolf", Beardy Pegley says. "Tell me one more thing, do you know about Blue Beat?".
"I've got "Too much whisky" by Errol Dixon", I say, "and also "Gypsy Woman" by Derrick and Patsy, which is on this new Blue Beat label called Island.
But I don't really know much about it - I mean one of them are American hits or Record Mirror new releases or anything".
"Yeah", Beardy Pegley says, "I know. I've also got this record on Island: "King of Kings" by Jimmy Cliff. I don't know what it's all about, but it's great.
You know something", he adds. "Lea Davis is right about you, you're a clever little bastard, and too cocky for your own good, but you're an okay guy".
"I mean, you reckon Solomon Burke", Beardy Pegley says.
The maiden wave of modernist youth emerges out of the East End and Essex some time around 1960, as reaction in style against the coffee-bar cowboy definition of check shirts, striped drainpipe trousers, winklepicker shoes, Tony Curtis hair styles, Marino Marini records on the Durium label, and Old Compton Street in Soho.
In short, against all things that men like Jack Good and Tommy Steele hold dearest to their hearts - men like Jack Good and Tommy Steele representing total anathema to the emergent mod movement.
Precursors of the new look wear their hair short in the French style, back-combed, and with a centre parting.
They dress in severe, clerical shirts of simple design, with detachable stiff white collars, navy-blue or grey terylene trousers tapered to a baggy 14 inches sans turn-ups, black round-toed shoes, preferably with a patent leather tip, carry umbrellas and LP's of the soundtrack from On the Waterfront, smoke Sobranie cigarettes, and put their hands in their back pockets, Bette Davis style.
At first, these are very rare and wonderful people, such as you might see no more than a half a dozen, and probably not even that, on a Sunday morning saunter along Middlesex Street and Club Row markets, mods having an unsual prediction for Middlesex Street and Club Row markets, and later Berwick Street market in the West End.By late 1962, the ranks of the modernist has swelled considerably to embrace the greater element of stylish working class youth in London and the suburbs, some still at school, but the majority of them ensconced as City clerks; working in shipping and insurance offices for the most part, for reasons that are never entirely clear.
It is around this same time that the more marked and outrageous constituents generally associated with the movement come into clearer focus, including the wearing of anoraks, crombie overcoats and G-macs, paisley and polka-dot giraffe neck shirts and pink tab-collar ones, the baseball jerseys and the inevitable crew necks, Blue Beat hats and leather trilbys, suede jackets, suede ties, suede cardigans and suede shoes, brightly coloured pants worn at half mast to display scarlet socks to their fullest advantage, the obscure blues albums, Prince Buster singles, and modern French literature.
It is also the same time as the word mod replaces the earlier definition of modernist; and the pep pills become a way of life, of endless night.
And it is also the same time that The Beatles break into the hit parade with "Love me do".
Mod boys hate Beatle boys.
Mod boys hate Beatle boys almost as much as they hate Rockers, and they positively detest the Rolling Stones.
Mod boys hate The Beatles because John, Paul, George and Ringo replace themselves in mod girls's affections, and also because the group are from Liverpool, and therefore rate as provincial louts.
They detest The Rolling Stones because The Rolling Stones are dirty, undesirable, long-haired art school beatniks who rip off riffs from mod heroes such as Benny Spellman and Arthur Alexander, because Mick Jagger has a pair of lips that just begs a mod fist, and because Brian Jones looks like a woman, or even worse an aesthete, but most of all mods detest the Rolling Stones because the Stones are mirror images of themselves, but who seem to be doing something with their lives that the majority of mods wish they had thought of first.
On one memorable occasion a crowd of over one hundred mods on scooters arrive at the television studios of Ready, Steady, Go with the declared intention of sorting out the four Beatles, who are at the time recording a session inside, and it is only the quick-witted presence of a policeman on a white horse...
Sometimes, mod aggression is put to positive use, like when Sir Oswald Moseley attempts a comeback speech in the East End and sets up a meeting in Ridley Road market on the platform of Jewish landlordism and black vermin overunning the country, whereby a united front of local mods and taxi-drivers hound the former Cabinet minister a his attendant pusillanimous blackshirts from the streets, never to return henceforth.
(Thanks to Alex M Franquet for the typing )
11 Sep 2007
Fragments
Fragment 1 - Pete Meaden
1st Fontana session (1964). Pete Meaden decides to write songs. Persuades Who to change name to High Numbers. Thought Who was a "tacky, gimmicky name." Meaden gets unreleased R&B records from Scene Club d.j. Guy Stevens, steals music, writes his own lyrics. Pete learns to be a "relay" of the Mod scene; picking up new trends and dance moves from his vantage point on stage, then copying the best and getting the credit. High Numbers live mostly cover "growling R&B songs. Guitar feedback absent on High Numbers' record. Pete plays "weedy" jazz guitar on "Zoot Suit" showing how far he still had to go. Record did not break, selling "about 400 copies." Meaden misses the innovation in the band's sound. Mods, however, do get it finding The Who's "effeminate" Mod clothing combined with their aggressive sound an example of "the cult of the elegant, disciplined, well-to-do, sharply-dressed and sexually indeterminate and dangerously androgynous yobbo."
In replies Pete adds that Roger's older sister and her boyfriend were, in 1962, the only Mods he knew. Roger still dressed like Elvis. Older homosexuals were attracted to the young, well-dressed Mod boys while lesbians were attracted to the short-haired Mod girls. Pete also found the Mod girl look "extremely erotic." When an analyst suggested it was because they looked like boys, Pete dismissed the answer as "a little too obvious." His father's generation got the same thrill getting women out of their masculine army uniforms. By late 1964 Mod spread throughout London and the famous Mod-Rocker battles started. Some Mod boys went with Who manager Kit Lambert to Paris, tried out gay sex and came back more experienced in the world.
Fragment 2 - I Can't Explain
Pete and Nick's ex-girlfriend spend a weekend traveling around Brighton in late summer 1964; sleep together "platonically", did speed, shared a compartment on the milk train back to London. Basis for romantic images in Quadrophenia.
High Numbers fail audition at Decca. Would have passed if they had original material. Kit and Chris encourage Pete to come up with songs. Pete listens over and over to The Freewheelin' Bob Dylan and You Better Get It In Your Soul by Charlie Mingus. Searches for words about how the music made him feel but found "I can't explain." The phrase forms the basis of his second song. Records demo on "clunky old domestic tape recorder". Barney [Richard Barnes] compares it to Dylan with a hint of Mose Allison. Kit and Chris make contact with Kinks' producer Shel Talmy. Pete reconstructs song around "You Really Got Me" and changes words about music to love. Play tape for Shel at 2 'I's Club in Soho. Pete already wrote title "Anyway Anyhow Anywhere" on a piece of paper about listening to Charlie Parker. "I Can't Explain" recorded at Pye. Jimmy Page brought in as second guitar. Shel brings in replacement drummer; Keith tells him to 'scarper.' Shel brings in background singers to replace demo's harmonies ruined by Keith joining in. Shel gets good commercial sound. Page's "laughably weedy" guitar on the B-side cause Pete to not take him seriously for years.
Fragment 3 - Trapped
October 1964 - Kit and Chris gets Tuesday residency for band at Marquee Club in Soho. Took Who logo with arrow from Pete's notebooks. He adapted it from older Detours logo. Aubrey Dewar takes solo picture of Pete windmilling. Pete thinks he looks unattractive in photo. Graphic designer from Ealing makes the "Maximum R&B" poster. Central London covered with posters. Had out membership cards to "The 100 Faces" with free entry to club. No women got the card. Attendance 90% male. Pete looked forward to shows "beyond all measure." Pete then designing 'Pop Art' target t-shirts in his notebooks. R&B songs perfect medium for guitar feedback. Press begins to notice. Sexy blonde dances in front of group during all-nighter at Club Noreik. Sends letter to Pete; Pete brings her to flat, goes with her to Marquee date. Worries Mods will find her clothing uncool. Leaving her at bar while performing causes paranoid panic attack. Same thing happens at another show. Cannot deal with it and leaves without her. Feels "trapped" on stage, fearful partner will betray him during performance. Echo of mother's affair while father away performing.
In reply to my question, Pete says he was not on speed during the Marquee run, so it was not the source of any paranoia. Says he still feels "trapped" on stage today.
Buzz Buzz with the Fuzz
Well I was 27 when the 'mods' came, which was for the mods by 20 you were already too old, it was such a teenage cult and I do not know how I came in touch, I went first to the West End and I was aware at the scene clubs, a whole dance thing, a lot like the Ecstasy generation later.
So you suddenly saw an entirely different audience now?
Yes because what happened suddenly all these, and the age was like 15 to 17, with short hair and the Parkers, a whole lot of young kids, the girls had their hair short and looked like the boys, unisex, the first of the unisex things, and these clubs. A friend of mine ran a club called the Seam club, which Ronin Rahealey ran then, who had another club, Wardour Street and Hen Yard, Wardour Street they had the Flamingo. So already by the early sixties there was the beginnings of this whole new scene, which was the R n B, and the beginning everybody started at these clubs, so Lionel Blake ran the Scene Club, was the principal bouncer, he was later to go to Wormwood scrubs for running a disorderly house when people dropped their pep pills. And that was caused through me, and I will tell you what happened.
So you saw this new scene developing?
I saw this new scene developing, I had left drama school, I had done a bit of acting and I had started writing.
Right, you were living in the West End?
I was living in Earls Court, and I had become a night bird, I would sort of come into the West End at ten at night and leave at five, and sleep during the morning. I mean I was exploring these areas. So suddenly I came to this mod scene, and saw Wardour Street two-three o clock in the morning, hundreds of thousands of kids, and they were drifting into the dives, where in Wardour Muse, which is where the 2/3 famous dives were. And I noticed that they were all chewing gum and big dilated pupils, and started finding out and it was six pence a purple heart, that some of these kids were taking 80 or 90 a weekend, and having amphetamine psychosis, and brilliant dancing, because amphetamine is a perfect stimulant if you want to dance all night. And the clubs would end at five o clock in the evening, and these kids would have nowhere to go, all stoned out of their heads, and the dealers on Wardour Street, were young kids and other people, and also 'pills paradise' was up the road in Goodge Street with Greeks who were selling, and it was a huge big scene. And they were all going in the morning to the seaside, you'd see great gatherings at Waterloo, Liverpool Street, because nobody knew where to go, they all came from Illford and the suburbs, and suddenly huge amounts would end up at the seaside, which was the beginning of the mods and rockers thing. S o it was directly influenced from the amphetamine scene. So that was going quite nicely, and then I bumped into a boy there who was having horrors and bad scenes, and I went to his home and met his father, and he was badly addicted, and I was taping him. How I came to tape him is another story. 63 when this was happening it was the time of Christine Kealer and the Profumo. Now at that time I started smoking cannabis too. I will tell you the story too, because suddenly the Eldorado in Westbourne Grove, Kealer opened up first the cannabis thing, because she used to score the cannabis from in Westbourne Park road, the Eldorado Cafe because that had opened. I suddenly realised that we're in a vast big scene, why I was in the West End, because I was meeting the prostitutes who were involved in the Kealer case, that went to listen to the case, as I had so much free time I would go and queue in Marylebone to listen to Keeler. But this guy Terry Housego and I started smoking cannabis then, but I will tell you, called his MP, who was Ben Parkin, in Paddington, and we thought he said look, Ben Parkin had just made his name exposing Rachmanism, who became very famous because he was the first MP who brought Rachman's activities to parliament, which was an extension of Kealee, so then Parkin said to me, look I do not know anything about pep pills and drugs, there was an interview, I will raise questions in the Houses of Parliament, and then anyone who wants to know, I will give them your telephone number, because I was telling him what this boy's on, this kid's taking 90 pills, this boy his father had.
Is there something you thought was genuinely a problem?
I saw, I'd seen this boy who was having psychosis and going paranoid, kids were starting to get paranoiac, and seeing mice and spiders on the wall, and I suppose I was still an innocent and I was, I do not think I had started cannabis. I was a moralist, a friend of mine said to me, a psychotherapist who was sitting with Ronnie Laing, Sid Briskin said, because I had met Ronnie Laing then too, who had written his book, he said but you are a moralist. Ben Parkin MP brought up the first pep pill things in parliament. I got a call from Anne Sharpley who was a top investigative reporter on the Evening Standard, and did the royal tours and was a Beaverbrook protege, and I became a great friend of hers, and mentioned on her Desert Island Disks at that time 'needles and pins', but she said would you like to show me around the West End, so she was a tall lovely lady, and I said you can not come like that, come looking like this and I am going to take you on a tour of the dives. And I also had, which I had written as a prototype for my plays, a guy I met in 62/63, Johnny Colfer, who is an Irish guy, who not only smoked but was a heroin addict, not a heroin addict then, but was a pep pill addict, he'd take about 80/90 pep pills over the weekend, and chew his teeth, and talk, and when he talked he had a golden gift of the gab. I taped him, I got the tapes now on comedowns and his whole life, on pep pills. I've used them for a abortive book I wrote at the time called 'Living for Kicks', on youth cults, which Panther nearly published, but it was a hotch-botch of a book and liable reasons. but through him, so I introduced Anne Sharpley to him, and he was bubbling and we did a magnificent tour of Wardour Street late at night, where she went outside all the clubs and saw these thousands of young people, and saw the dealers passing the pills, and we went to the dives and that Monday was the heading of the front page of the Evening Standard, beginning of 1964, with a hand with pep pills, 'I See Soho's Pep Pill Craze', and it was the biggest story of the whole week, because the Queen Mothers' operation was the second. So by the Tuesday she had written the story of Johnny Colfer, the boy living on pep pills, the small sad world of, and pills paradise, and blew it open. But that Monday night the West End was deserted, there was not a sixteen year old, though the cops were not busy Monday, Tuesday. Suddenly there were questions in parliament the thousands of pounds the Evening Standard paid for the investigation, which of course I was given free meals and about fifty pounds for. But of course from then onwards I was rung up by Michael Hamlyn of the Sunday Times.
Oh were you in this article?
No, I was the stringer.
Didn't think so?
Yeah because I did not take any drugs, I mean I was a pure moralist, exposing, I was one of the biggest exposes of the time in the press.
That's quite ironic really considering the sort of career path you went to afterwards?
I was implementation, if you see the 1964 Misuse of Drugs Act, I actually when it hit me later and I looked at the Act and I thought 'Oh God I was one of the most important pinnacle in helping to bring forth that which rebounded on my friends.' So there was a terrific hue and cry, it was like the first big drug...Before that when I went with Terry Housego, this guy, to the Hews of the World offices, to see a journalist there, Derek, and look at their cuttings library, he said no, no, we're not interested in a story on mods and pep pills he said because look at the cuttings file, come with me, the only people who take pep pills are housewives in the Rhonda Valley, which the cutting were at that early stage, there weren't any youth associated with pep pills, Because it was not a craze, it all came from Welling Garden City 'Welcome' in Essex, a big factory was stolen, I do not know who was making a fortune.
Well it was a craze apparent?
Yes, it was coming.
The big criminal gains that were letting it happen?
Yes, but suddenly once I had exposed them, in that whole week, and I did quickly take down to the dives all sorts of.
It's probably just as well your name wasn't in the paper?
Exactly, except in the South African papers, I gave an interview that I had questions raised in the Houses of Parliament, I'd seen these kids in terrible, I was like equivalent to a Christian crusader. Though I also was interested in the underground dives, I suppose too, because I was sexually turned on by some of the people there, and had some erotic experiences, which were low life. I suppose coming from this pure prim background I needed to rebel in every way possible, so I suppose it would be inevitable, I decided I did not like pep pills myself, but I loved the dancing in the mod clubs and I loved the R&B and when you went down to the dives in Wardour Muse late at night at that period, it was the best period for dancing you ever saw, by the lesbians, fish dancing and of course all the R&B, all the Otis Redding, My Guy and all that bring memories of me of that period all night, the most primitive, erotic dancing. it was at night in these clubs would come out all these transvestites, all dressed up, and the knives and the lunatics, and everybody. The whole idea of these dives to seven in the morning was you'd dance, and the music, because R&B was in its heyday. what happened in these clubs with the music and these pills, was that all these groups started and I remember going at five o clock one evening to my friend, Lionel ran the Scene Club, to watch the. I forget the name now, who did 'Soot Zoot Suit' and 'I am a Mod' and later the Who, the High Nights with Peter Medin, and I went to the first ever performance at five o clock with our man doing Pete Townsend and his guitar, they had just come, they were going to play there, I mean I met Brian Jones there who is a friend of Lionel Blake, I would go to Brian Jones' flat.
Is this Lionel Blake still around?
I have not seen him in years, he was a South African and a bouncer, but I'll tell you through Lionel I met Paul who big groups who played there, and Georgie Fame, I'd go with him, but I ended up doing him harm. The outcome of my hue and cry in the press which I did took ground, different journalists dressed up to show them, it was a big thing then it spread everywhere, is that the clubs were raided. And a lot of police, and people dropped their pills and my friend Lionel was done for running a disorderly house and got twelve months in prison for it. And I went to visit him and gave an 'affidavit', and I felt terribly ashamed that in my zeal I had caused a bit of trouble for people and destroyed a lot of fun and but I do know that there was a lot of dangerous things going on, but people were young, people were having the horrors, but I was aware that as long as it kept down in the underground, or undergrowth it was all right. But suddenly it was all these ordinary young working class and middle class kids, and at twenty they were too old to be mods, it was essentially a youth thing.
You began to talk about Christine Keeler, the Eldorado, and cannabis, just tell me that?
That was among my spring of journalism and my low life thing, which I have tapes, which I'd showed to Dr. Eustace Chesser in his Harley Street rooms. My other interests besides, I suddenly got obsessive about drugs, because I did not know, but the other thing was sex. So the Keeler thing encompassed both. So I'd read a quote from Roger Gelbert in the New Statesmen on a play he'd written that 'male and female are beach heads of the vast unexplored territory.' So I had a big old grundig in 63 and I lived in Bayswater, and I decided because of the Keeler business, and because I met Julie Gulliver who was the last girlfriend of Steven ward, and I knew some of the prostitutes who had been involved in the Keeler thing. And I lived almost in the area. I went and did three interviews with prostitutes. one was a call-girl who lived in Chelsea Cloisters, and I talked to her in between clients, who would come to her room and cry, and tell her that they were sick of being an accountant, they lived with their mother, and one was a lesbian, who had been beaten in torture chambers, who had been abused terribly as a child and sold her virginity four or five times and had lesbian relationships. And the third one was a street girl from the Chinese street, Chinatown, Gerrard Street, who went with the Chinese waiters and 'Duhai' means business in Chinese, 'come to my loom', and take all her expenses off the Chinese waiters. She was a girl who had been abused by her parents in Cardiff, and the father had gone to prison for sleeping with her for five years. I had this extraordinary low life things which I was going to call 'Living for Kicks'. I was going to write my Genet type work, I would be the man who has seen the low life, of seedy London. And I could open the doors to people who did not know of this life for various reasons. So the Kealer thing was the first coming in the open of cannabis, because we were then aware and also the most important thing because of the Keeler thing and all that, in the mod clubs was coming the first use of 'spliff', of 'draw', because many of the mods liked the West Indian culture. I used to know mods who would shave their hair off and wear berets and talk with west Indian accents. So that was the first, besides pep pills, there was a big coming together of weed, draw, there's a whole lot of names.
Why you seem to be saying something, the expose of Keeler and all that had something to do with the growth of the use of cannabis?
Might well have done, the connection, the whole of 63 was Scandal 63, who is the man in the mask, who wore no clothes? Christine Keeler used to go off from Stephen Wards trial in the case and smoke cannabis, or sleeping and smoking cannabis with the Minister of War I think and the Russian Defence attaché and John Edgecombe. The whole Keeler thing broke of course because of this West Indian, John Edgecombe, who I have met through Howard Marks, who was Christine Keeler's boyfriend who used to score at the Eldorado and smoke, And then he got angry and jealous and other things of the news at Baker Street and came there with a gun, and got shot - he got seven years for that - but that opened all the rest of Stephen Wards thing, I mean that was the beginning of it which unleashed and of course Keeler and Mandy Rice Davis were involved with Rachmanism. And Rachman lived in the Grove. Also at that time I became interested in Rachmanism because of my other reporting things in 64 was exposing the housing conditions of the West Indian immigrants, the Irish people and Rachman were shoving them, whole families into one room at a high price, with one toilet, there were whole estates, I remember before the 63 elections.
Did the smoking cannabis bit around Keeler, did that get publicity as well at that time?
I think there was.
Was that part of the scandal?
Well I would have to research it, but it did, the Edgecombe and Lucky Gordon are still around the Grove. The cannabis thing was very big first among the West Indian community, in the dives with white women who went with them, but it was not open to a general public, because there were lots of people in the early sixties it was starting to go.
Why it drifted at that point? You think it's 63, you began to see these kids who were either used to chew pills and were now smoking dope or had been doing both?
Yes, what happened I can explain it from my own experiences. I was 27. Two things, I first wanted to smoke cannabis, and I had some middle class friends and some gay friends doing it who lived in Holland Park, and oh I must try this and I came with my big Grundig tape recorder and it was 63 and I was going to record the experience and it was a great disappointment, not only didn't I get high, but all I got were these two Jewish girls giggling in a corner who were rather droll. It was very disappointing because I what I would capture on tape was an amazing drug experience of cannabis people are talking about which I wanted to try. Only a little later in the West End in Oxford Street did I meet one of the Irish, because throughout 63 I also hung around in an all night dive in Queensway, and I met this Irish labourer guy also hanged around the West End, and this guy said 'would you like a spliff?' Now he rolled it up two o clock in the morning in Oxford Street, we walked along and we smoked it. And for the first time I suppose I got high on it. Now what you did then was you stayed up all night at the club, the big thing is the West Indians were becoming very big on the mod scene, and the saying was 'nice, man, nice' if you were stoned. So I think with the mods and the pep pills was the beginning for me and lots of people of coming into contact with grass or weed.
Because the mods began to get into black music?
Yes, and all the Otis. And suddenly there was all the West Indian culture, it was part. By the early sixties, 63, there was a beginning of a cannabis culture, which was very linked I suppose more with the mod culture and with the West End and the artists, art students, and the people who went to some coffee bars.
So how is it regarded again, it does not seem to me from a historical view, well it was no part of my life, but it still was not anything political or anything like that around at that time. That's from a later period, it began to get associated with the anti-war movement, students and all that?
Very non-political.
So this was just another way to get smashed basically at that time?
Yes, it was a way of getting high and throughout the mid-sixties of course, also what happened another thing in 63, besides the Keeler thing, I come back to because that was the liberating thing of the sixties. Because soon after that came a Carnaby Street, a 'swinging London'. So I am forgetting that the mod period was also 'I was Lord Kitcheners Vallet', the wearing of the uniforms, and the coming of Mick Jagger and The Beatles in 63. So how much was Keeler, how mush was The Beatles is hard to say but I mean 63 I often think was a defining moment - 67 was the next and a great defining moment for youth culture - in fact almost as big as 67 because it was the coming of the whole British - it happened here rather than in America, like 67 was with the Stones and The Beatles and The Yard Birds and Georgie Fame and all those and they were playing live at the clubs where the kids were. so it was a tremendous, though I was much older, the participant observer, I was fascinated because this was the first. the Elvis Presley in 57 was all right but it was not linked with any drug thing, with alcohol might be.
So how did things develop for you and your involvement in the scene, okay we are into the mid-sixties, you wrote this play didn't you?
Yes well I ended up in 64 writing a play, a one act play called 'Buzz Buzz' and the mods and pep pills with some of the tapes and with the lovely lingo 'watcha watcha Sammy Lee', 'How's it?'. What I met in the West End was what I call the mod cons - a group of five/six really nice guys, who were kids, who were hustlers, or they were on the street, the 'kicksters' I called them. They were the first kids I met who were living for kicks, that would outwit everyone, making life hustle, dealing drugs, had a marvellous lingo, the first sort of, I got a play 'Love Play' and Love Play is written in hippie language. 'I cut out, did you?', 'I split the scene, did you?' So in the early part the rhythmic speech.
Have you still got a copy of this?
I've got copies I'll show you. Buzz Buzz won me an Arts Council and the Star Certificate in Taunby Hall, National Association Youth and Jewish Drama Festival won star certificate. it was the first time, because it was ideal at youth clubs, I had sixteen/seventeen year olds to play the mods. So I wrote this play, and then I went, I'd had enough of the West End or because it's like a vice, in 64 I went to the docks and I caught a ship and went for four and a half months to Australia.
This is a part of an interview of Lee Harris – done by Harry Shapiro in 1998. No mistakes were corrected … the interview can be found in its entirety here : http://www.leeharris.co.uk/LeeHarris/History/ShapiroInterview.htm ... well, remember - just say NO !
A Little Mutual Admiration Society
Once again it is difficult to unravel the original elements that went into what was to become the « Swinging London » style. For one thing it all happened fairly fast, but most important is the way that in pop slang a word, in this case ‘mod’, changes its meaning to accommodate a rapidly changing situation.
Initially for instance ‘mod’ meant a very small group of young working-class boys who, at the height of the trad boom, formed a small totally committed little mutual admiration society devoted to clothes.
There was no sense amongst the first Mods of using clothes as a form of aggression as the Teds had. They didn’t want to fight or screw or smash anything. They were true dandies, interested in creating works of art – themselves. There had of course been dandies before but they’d always been upper-class dandies.
Now Macmillan’s affluence had helped create working-class dandies-dedicated followers of fashion.
There was admittedly a strong homosexual element involved – but it was not so much overt homosexuality as narcissistic. Girls were irrelevant. The little Mods used each other as looking glasses. They were as cool as ice-cubes.
The originals Mods had their clothes made, hunting down tailors and shoe-makers prepared to bend to their fantasies or, if they did admit something mass-produced they either modified it, took it out of context or insisted on certain stringent qualifications – their jeans, for instance, had to be American.
But the main thing about the first Mods was that they were true purists. Clothes were their only interest, but at the same time, in that they were the forerunners of a general trend, they carried with them their own destruction. As the ‘mod’ thing spread it lost its purity. For the next generation of Mods, those who picked up the ‘mod’ thing around 1963, clothes, while still their central preoccupation, weren’t enough. They needed music (Rhythm and Blues), transport (scooters) and drugs (pep pills).
What’s more they needed fashion ready-made. They hadn’t the time or the fanaticism to invent new styles, and this is where Carnaby Street came in.
John Stephen, a Scotsman, had opened his first shop for men in London in 1957, only a year after Quant’s first Bazaar. He’d done well but had attracted little general attention outside rather specialist circles. The point was that throughout the late 50s and early 60s any male fashion beyond John Michael’s discreet splendour or Cecil Gee’s continental ‘casual’ look tended to cater almost exclusively for butch trade.
I have for instance in my files a catalogue advertising an avant-garde men’s shop of the very early 60s which illustrates its collection in story form. The tale is simple. A young man called Ted is picked up by a lean mature film director called Lance en route to the South of France. Their relationship is underplayed, but their clothes are described in almost pornographic detail. ‘Ted’, reads one extract, ‘is open to all offers so make your bids now for this season’s slant on denim.’ Finally wearing ‘Tickling slax; slim cut thigh huggers at £3 9s 6d’, Ted decides to extend his holiday with Lance by accompanying him to Rome… ‘so take care Nero – they’re on their way’ is the sign-off line.
The growth of shops of this kind meant that when the ‘mod’ thing happened very little adjustment was necessary. Shepherd’s Bush, the main launching-pad for the blast-off stage in the Mod explosion, discovered Stephen and put Carnaby Street on the map. In no time at all Soho at week-ends was full of Mods piled up to the eyebrows, dressed like kaleidoscopes, and bouncing in and out of cellar clubs like yoyos.
George Melly – Revolt Into Style --- To be continued
4 Sep 2007
Various pictures by Terry Spencer
1964 'Mods' on scooters, Upper Richmond Road
For a serious 'mod' in the Sixties, the must-have fashion accessory was the scooter. The models to own were the Italian-made Vespa or Lambretta. This photo was taken in a year that saw running battles between mods and rockers. Many of these occurred in seaside towns near London such as Clacton, Margate and Brighton. Terry Spencer photographed this group of mods as they turned from Upper Richmond Road.
1965 Mods' try on Beatle boots at Annello and David, Drury Lane
n the 1960s, Anello & Davide designed a boot for pop group The Beatles. The 'Beatle Boot', with its Cuban heel and distinct style, became a fashion icon of the time. Queues of mods formed outside the Drury Lane shop to buy the essential footwear. Anello and Davide's reputation for high-quality handmade Italian shoes was already strong. Many of their designs were theatrical, including Dorothy's red slippers from The Wizard of Oz.
1969 'Mods', Borehamwood
In the North London suburb of Borehamwood, this gang of youths display the latest 'mod' style. The mod culture demanded that fashions constantly changed, so successive age groups developed their own look that differed from the early 1960s original. These youths have moved into the direction of 'hard mods', who rejected the finery of other mods and the hippies. The photo hints at Black style influences as well as the developing skinhead trend, particularly with the cropped hairstyles of both the girls and boys. There were distinct variations in dress between mods from different areas of London.
all photographs © Terrence Spencer
(source museum of London)
Hard Nut Mods (Jamie Rave speaks Charlie Steel a mod from Pimlico, thanx to Uppers.org and the old police cells museum)
The Sawdust Caesar's of 1964
Jamie Rave has a chat with Charlie Steel, a mod from Pimlico who was present at some of the festivities that fateful weekend
It’s the time of the season when a lot of young citizens thoughts turn to weekends away in the company of their mates, impressing each other with their gleaming Italian chariots, strutting about in peacock suits, looking for a suitably adorned partner to pussyfoot with and take in a change of scenery. These days the occasions are usually termed "Mod rallies" and are held in many countries throughout the appropriate seasons, from Germany to Sweden, France to England, Australia to Japan. Veritable cultural exchanges that owe very little to the original weekend excursions of yesteryear that gave us the term "Sawdust Caesar’s".
I wish it could be 1964 again...
Rallies! A quaint word that evokes images of jump-suited, turbo-charged nutters flying around a forest in Finland. Except the sort of rallies I’m thinking of usually consist of some young hipsters congregating in a seaside town showing off their blue mohair threads and occasionally dancing to a mooonster Mod sound in one of the specially-selected-for-their-Mod-friendly-bouncer type clubs.
Apparently our history lesson begins in 1964. Although the term ‘rallies’ was not heard of then (and the lucky sods didn’t have to put up with the word ‘retro’ either) large groups of youths made their way to resorts like Brighton, Hastings, Margate and Clacton. All snooty little seaside towns with a rabid judiciary and an endless supply of reasons to endorse euthanasia.
Convoys of Lambrettas, Vespas, Triumphs and assorted oily motorcycles scuttled their way to the coast with the intentions of having an ice cream and to make a sandcastle, sorry; to pose, dance, take a few pills and hopefully get laid. Oh, yeah, and apparently have a bit of aggro!
It’s better by ‘bretta
In 1964 a £20 down-payment meant you could drive away a new Vespa or Lambretta. With a kickstart that didn’t break your leg, minimum grease, a polish of those smooth lines and your hipsters stayed as crisp and your DB’s as clean as when picked out of the wardrobe. Besides the sensible extras for your scooter like luggage racks and panniers the Mods found they could also act as an extension of their peacock nature by decking them out in fog-lamps, Jaguar mascots, pennants, all-sorts of chrome accessories, and, quite befitting for the Mods vanity obsessed mind, their reflection in a dozen mirrors.
These elegantly contoured Italian stallions got you out of Hicksville and into the land of bright lights, coffee bars, and girlfriends. Not to mention the coast and it’s piers, crashing seas and salty seafront parades. They weren’t fast, but bloody nippy for the city, and whilst go-faster goodies were available, the Mods preferred their speed in the form of Drinamyl and Purple Hearts.
The quiffed and the coiffed
Legend has it that Mod types set about leather clad motorcyclists and kicked the dinner out of them (and vice versa) in between enjoying a frothy coffee and the odd dance on the pier. These gatherings of the quiffed and coiffed resulted in plenty of overtime for the police and casualty departments not to mention a promising career in fiction for the flock of journalists - who were often not even present - who managed to create a whole new meaning to the term "weekend breaks". Mods may have been the epitome of style and cool and having a nice bookshelf is one thing, but you had to be able to throw a punch.
"Let he among you who is without sin cast the first stone" said some long haired hippy type. He must have said it on Brighton beach in 1964 ‘cos the pebbles were certainly flying that day!
I spoke to a sensible chap who was present at some of the festivities that fateful weekend. Charlie Steel, a Mod from Pimlico, who’s now something of a south coast property developer, and asked him to recall a few of the more light-hearted recreational activities they engaged in whilst on a weekend away.
"Well yeah, we were up for adapting the rockers wardrobe and often made them wear deckchairs, when you managed to grab hold of one another fave was checking if his leather jacket was waterproof - while he’s still in it - all that was par for the course, tit for tat like, they’d kick us, we’d return the favour, oh yeah, we didn’t bung him in the sea, there’s enough effluent bobbing up and down our coastline, once we came across some hiding in the aquarium and as it was way past the sharks feeding time..., well, being animal lovers we obliged."
So the media was right, it was just a gang of thugs popping down the coast on a weekend for a mass fight? "I was joking Mr Rave. That stuff did happen, but I was interested in more than chasing some greaser about. Of course aggro kicked off, we weren’t going to turn our backs on somebody having a pop at us. Aggro plays a major part of life for kids then as now, but we were older, the main point of going away was to have a chuckle with your mates, we never dreamed that when we went to the seaside we’d end up decking rockers and getting charged by the police, the whole thing was sent way out of control by the press. For us it was just a weekend away from London, actually some of the south coast disco’s were really good."
So how did the idea of groups of Mods going away for a weekend come about? "As far as me and my mates were concerned, we used this old boy barbers in Wardour Street, Antonio’s; he knew his way round a head of hair, and we got what we wanted, which was quite an achievement then, 5 bob for a smart French crew, incidentally, at the same time, my bird was paying 25 bob for a cut at Vidal Sassoon, as he’d take the money off you he’d look you in the eye and say "anyting fora de weekend sir?" We just laughed and occasionally had some johnnies off him, even though he was a catholic he did his bit to stop unwanted pregnancies! Then in the cafe’s... actually, I think the first time we really discussed it was in Heaven and Hell, in Old Compton Street -they did the best cappuccino there- it was like, yeah that’s a great idea, why don’t we pissoff for the weekend? Head for the coast on our scooters, catch a last bit of summer sun, and maybe get rid of some of these bloody johnnies we’d accumulated from Antonio."
So with all the newspaper stories and the general mood of the public towards Mods, didn’t you have a problem finding somewhere to stay for the weekend? "Not at all, this was September ‘63, nobody, least of all us, had an inkling of what was to come. And Danny Golding had an aunt who ran a B&B in Brighton, in the beginning there were a few others besides our crew, just 6 of us were going down, then it grew and come our first weekend there about 20 ended up going, all on scooters, some of the lads took their birds, we couldn’t all stay at Danny’s aunt’s place, she sorted them with a rooming house further up the coast road near Hove."
"It was in ‘64 that loads of day-tripper Mods started to arrive, and those that stayed over usually ended up on a beach."
So what was the catalyst that tempted kids to visit the seaside en masse? London sounds as though it was a pure buzz at that time, with stuff happening all over club, gig, clothes and Mod wise, wasn’t it difficult to tear yourself away from that for a weekend in the country? "Why not take a break to the seaside, a break from those hectic weekends at home? Loads of people did it, our parents did it, when we were old enough to go on our own we did.. We ate whelks and ice-cream and pissed about on the pier. It was a different buzz to the smoke. To be honest we downed so many pills and were full on so often that going away was a welcome break, not that I want to sound old before my time. Even getting there was a chuckle.
We saw rockers there that first weekend, but apart from a few sneers and the occasional banter it was nothing, we were busy poncing about on the beach, the sound of the waves rolling up and the taste, the smell of that salt air filling your lungs, lovely! It was the first time most of us had done anything like that since we were kids, and then it was with our parents, now we could do what we wanted, go where we wanted, and have it all on our own terms.
It was real easy to pull down there, we knew all the latest sounds from the Scene, Discotheque, Last Chance, the local Mods thought we were well way out, which, compared to them I suppose we were. Some of their crew were well handy in a ruck, their club was called the Brighton Scooters."
So tell us something about your mates, we get the impression there were ‘gangs’ of Mods in different areas. "Yeah, that’s true, there were the Ealing, the Croydon, the Stamford Hill, the Ilford, the Tottenham, get the picture? Every area of London had a crew, there were the Cockney Scooter Club, who were from all over East London and Essex and even a few lads from Lambeth sided with them and a crew called the Streatham Scooters, some of them got on, some of them didn’t, I was from Pimlico, but my stomping ground was around Soho, my firm were from all over, I suppose our allegiances were a bit difficult to define, like, our lads may live in Chelsea, Brixton, Leyton or wherever but our work and main club haunts were Soho so that’s where our allegiances lay.
We were up for aggro, it wasn’t the prime mover in our lives, but we got a lot of grief and you had to make a stand. Pete and Ade ended up with The Firm, a group of hard-nut Mods who rarely paid when they went out, but that was to ponced up west end clubs. They started in the days of the Flamingo, they’d do stuff like take all the chairs and tables from the front of a cafe in Soho when they left, just put them in the back of a van! Then when they did a bit of vandalism it was quite arty, like cementing a Hoover to a bath, or burning down the Speakeasy, you had to understand how it worked, like, all the posers who went to that place really pissed us off, so they got some petrol, added calcium carbide, which when you throw it on water forms acetylene, that was great, watching the posers coming out, tears streaming, watching the fire engines, the police, The Firm thought the prices were bad. I must admit, I fancied myself as a bit of a gangster but luckily didn’t get that involved in it, when we were out and about, only a few times at the coast, and we got involved in aggro with some rockers, we were quite vicious, make no mistake, the lines were drawn, them and us you know, it became kind of like of a war, only for a while."
These weekends away became notorious, could you explain for the novice, what happened? "Well, in the space of 6 months of our first scooter trips to Brighton came that Easter weekend, the one where it all went off in Clacton, we were in Brighton at the time, but then surprisingly it didn’t really happen like they said it did, some mates of ours went there, and a lot of others besides, but we’d already booked up with Danny’s aunt and she’d arranged the Hove B&B so we didn’t want to piss her about you know? It was funny how it went, although there would be Mods at most of the coastal towns on a holiday weekend, it was kind of organised in word-of-mouth way, you just knew where everyone was going, I was going steady at the time and, a few of us who were that touch older, decided to miss Clacton. On the Monday we saw the papers, it was mainly about Clacton, where some of our firm had gone, the Daily Mirror had this "Wild ones invade seaside town" headline, comparing it to that Brando movie in which some outlaw bikers take over a town for the weekend. Something that I remember well was how Danny flew into a rage about that headline, he was really pissed off that Mods were being called "Wild Ones", I mean it was alright for the rockers, but how demeaning, comparing us to some poxy scruff.
Somehow all the hysteria was like the Twilight Zone, quite unreal you know? It was the coldest Easter weekend in Clacton since 1884, when we spoke to Stevie, Sawn-off and Mitch afterwards they told us how there were hardly any holidaymakers there, the shops shut early, Stevie, Johnny, and a load of other Mods from London got kicked out of a cafe and had a punch-up with some rockers, who were locals, some kids jumped the turnstile to get on the pier for free, so here was the town refusing to serve food or drink to anyone over 14 or under 25, what do you do when you’re cold and hungry? Hit back! That was it really, then the Monday papers carried the story of riots between Mods and rockers, some of the Cockney scooter club left on the Sunday and word had already spread around the street and it was on the news, so come Monday loads of Mods and rockers from all over went to Clacton, not us though!"
I told Charlie of some of my own research I’d done via archives. I found a piece in a Clacton paper where a council spokesman estimated damage at £500, ten times less than many newspapers were reporting, and he added the press had grossly exaggerated the whole incident and "there was nothing like gang warfare - Clacton was not ransacked". I asked him what he felt when hearing something like that. "Well, I saw a lot of crap in the papers, just like now, they don’t always print the truth, which isn’t surprising. I suppose that hearing something like that now, 33 years after the event, makes me a bit angry. I mean the whole history of Mod was changed after that, life was still good but we had a lot more crap to put up with."
So the aggro that came out of those coastal excursions, it was a real negative thing for Mod? "Definitely, the publicity was very much a defining moment, all of a sudden the beach fights and the crap that started to spring up around Carnaby Street started to drag the Mod thing down, there we were surrounded by a lot of pratts jumping up and down in tacky clothes shouting out they were Mods, they didn’t know anything about the Mod ethos, they just bought some clothes and got a haircut, it was fashionable, much the same way you must feel about it now, I understand all things Mod have become somewhat fashionable again. Although it was still exciting for years after that, the boundaries were blurred, Mod became fairly mainstream, the media and business started to dictate what they wanted to market as Mod, luckily there were still enough creative kids on the edge, not going with the flow, you saw that a couple of years later in bands like The Eyes with their purple parkas and The Creation, what they were doing, playing with pop-art imagery, wearing lary clothes and making feedback, was not at all new, they just played with it in different ways, it was progression and they exaggerated the thing. But I did used to wander how much more creative energy the Mod thing could have produced if it wasn’t tarnished with the fighting." The damage was done. The media expected and desired violence at Bank holidays. At the next Bank holiday, Margate, the police used dogs and horses to keep the Mods and rockers moving up and down the beach.
Mod Squad to the coppers: Didn’t work did it copper?
That Clacton weekend saw 44 arrests, 37 of whom were accused of using threatening words and behaviour, a catch-all the police use when they pick someone out of a crowd, and only one with assault. Yeah, like Mods really committed offences against the law of the land.
Mod Squad to the media: What pitched battle Mr Editor?
That same weekend cars killed 90 people, caused grievous bodily harm to 400 others. Without taking into account the medical or personal loss, the damage to cars and property was over £100,000. It received a helluva lot less coverage than a few kids breaking windows and being violent to deckchairs. The Daily Mirrors reporter was not even in Clacton on that Sunday, Wax lyrical Mr Reporter.
Coppers & Media to the Mod Squad: "What disparity in your treatment Mr Mod?"
So what was important to you at that time Charlie? "Most important to me was my mates, being Mod was important to me. We had a crew, all the stuff we did together, the clubs, the whole scene, the music, the R&B, the soul and some of the jazz, it was real exciting, I’m starting to remember that! We’d spend money on gear and having a real good time out, buying the latest records, even the occasional book! When this stuff with the coast runs started being purely an excuse for a punch-up we let it go. I also really enjoyed the scooters, I wasn’t averse to Vespa or Lambretta, I liked ‘em both, I guess I had my last bike the longest, that was an SX200 with a Supertune set-up, but before I didn’t hang on to them for more than a few months, we’d swap ‘em or trade ‘em in, once I had a GS with coppered panels and all the foglamps were yellowed out, like on the continent, no other accessories on that one, no mirrors, when the panels started going green I swapped it for a GT, that was all mirrored up, but I think Vespa’s looked better with all the accessories, Lambrettas looked better with just a few pieces on.
They were well handy for buzzing around the west end on, gadding about to the clubs and coffee bars, but there were real problems with them getting nicked, some people seemed to spend their waking hours stealing and selling scooters."
If you weren’t going to the coast for a weekend, what clubs did you visit, how did you get your pills and stuff? "London and clubland, most of us popped a few pills, you could get pills nearly anywhere, from people on the street, in the cafes you’d buy a cup of tea either ’with or without’, you’d get some hemp from the spades in Tiles or wherever. It was easy to get hold of drugs, and being Mods, we took loads of them, there wasn’t even a drug squad around until 1967. Sometimes we’d even be checking out the birds!
Saturday morning we’d mosey on down to Carnaby Street or Portobello, The Scene was supposed to shut at 3 on Sunday morning, it didn’t always, if it did we hopped it to the Flamingo or Discotheque and come chuck out time it was off to get a fresh shirt in Petticoat Lane, intersperse that with a bit of pie and mash and the occasional dolly bird and bob’s your uncle. D’you get the picture?"
I reckon I do Charlie. I thanked Charlie for his time and he went off to his quite luxurious house in Hastings.
© Jamie Rave 1997 - 2007
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additional pictures from 18 may 1964 :
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London : Max The Mod
I was born in 1947 in London and Moved to Atlanta, Georgia, USA in 1976. I spent several years of my miss-spent youth hanging around pubs and clubs and got to see some of the greatest performers of all time. I played professionally during 1966 and early 1967 before starting a real career in Advertising for a decent wage of £10 a week! Max The Mod
It all started on December 21, 1963. I went to St. Mary's ballroom in Putney to see the Rolling Stones.I distinctly remember the Detours as the support band and being amazed at how loud they played! John and Pete were both playing Epiphone guitars, and Roger played some harmonica.
Pete had a tab collar that went right up to his chin. They played an opening and a closing set. This was a double event for me since not only did I become initiated to new music, I also saw Mods for the first time! During 1964 I heard reports of The Who and saw the Marquee posters across London, but never ventured to see them until late March 1965. I was totally in awe as I recognized three players immediately. I saw the band on nine occasions during the course of the year. I hope my personal experience helps you relive the most important period of the band, "The Who London 1965."
THE MOD YEARS
As far as the British Public were concerned there was no such thing as "mod" until the Easter of 1964. A major riot in the south coast resort town of Clacton announced the arrival of a new cult.
Nobody can pinpoint the arrival of the first mods since, for the most part they were invisible other than to themselves however the first so called "modernists" had appeared by 1962.
The abolishment of National Service (conscription) and a low school leaving age contributed to the rapid growth of the youth market in post war England. This new youth society produced young wage earners who were able for the first time to get rid of their parent's influence and create a whole new scene for themselves.
Mod has always been considered more of a lifestyle than a clothes fashion but the wardrobe was essential. The early mods sought out and wore the sort of clean looking fashions that were more popular in Europe. We are talking "mens wear" here since "mod" was primarily a male cult. Suits made from mohair and Italian knotted silk ties were items "de rigeur" and the clothing was often so finely tailored that outsiders were unable to recognise the subtleness. This in itself was a subversity and allowed mods to flourish in the mainstream and work normal office jobs unlike the punks and new romantics of recent years.
All cults have leaders and followers and mod was no exception, there were Faces and Tickets. The Faces were the originators of the fashion styles and the Tickets were followers who ended up wearing the accepted uniform of mod, i.e. Parka coats, mod hats, Fred Perry shirts etc.
Unlike their teenage counterparts, mods were not interested in the new "Merseybeat" music from Liverpool. Mods were interested in contemporary dance music from the U.S.A. such as soul and Motown with a touch of blue beat or ska. There were specialist shops and stalls in the street markets that catered to this new music market.
An automobile was out of reach for most British teenagers in the early 1960's.The generally accepted method of transportation was the motor scooter as it was (and still is) practical and affordable to get around London, which was the Mod mecca. In the early 1960's the pubs would close at 11pm, public transportation shut down and there was not much to do. There were however, a few mod hangouts and "all-nighter" clubs. Scooter transportation helped the mods get around with "speed" being provided chemically by "Purple Hearts"and "French Blues".
These were the mods that invaded Clacton in 1964. These were the Vespa driving, pill popping horders that became to be recognised as "the mods" when in fact they were no more than soldiers in uniform rather than the "faces" who had set the styles. In the Who's Quadraphonia, Jimmy is a journeyman mod. In another era he could have just as easily been a high street Punk or a New Romantic.
THE MARQUEE
In 1965, the Marquee Club was the premier venue in London. Music was featured up to seven nights a week, and there were occasional afternoon sessions on Saturdays. There were normally two bands playing per night and each played two 45-minute sets.
I saw The Who on six occasions during the year, including November and December dates. On these latter dates, The Who played a one-hour set. The procedure went something like this: The support band played a 45 minute set and the headliners played their first set, whereupon the support band went in for their final set, followed by the headliners again. Everything was usually over around 11:00pm, in time to catch the last bus home! The Marquee Club was not "licensed" which meant that alcoholic refreshment had to be obtained in-between sets. I used to go the "Ship" just up the street and Roger and Keith were regulars!
On one occasion in April 1965 there was a taping for a radio Luxembourg radio show. I'd seen several of these tapings before and the featured band normally "mimed"to music. You can rest assured that this was not going to happen at The Who's session. In fact, they never even played "I Can't Explain" during the month of April as they probably wanted to appear as "purists" to their peers in London. I remember hearing a playback of "Daddy Rolling Stone" at the taping which was yet unreleased.
The support bands tended to vary, but often it was the "Mark Leeman Five" and on one occasion it was "Jimmy James and the Vagabonds" who joined The Who on stage for an encore of "Please Please Please".
I distinctly remember the occasion when Pete first used his VOX A.C.100 on stage. It literally self-destructed during the second number and real ozone started to smoke from the back. Pete nonchalantly disconnected the head and chucked the smoking missile in the direction of the band room and proceeded to set up his old stack while the rest of the band kept playing. In keeping with tradition, the show must go on!
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The Clacton Giggle
Roving mobs of cold, bored teenagers swarmed over Clacton's pier, smashing windows, overturning cars, stealing liquor. Pistol in hand, one youth used a big storefront window for target practice. When a local type admonished the rioters, he was tossed over a 20-ft. bridge. Clacton police called for reinforcements from a neighboring town, fought pitched battles with the teenagers, many of whom were armed with ax handles and furniture legs. Finally the bobbies restored order: over 60 youths were arrested on charges ranging from burglary to assault.
Wild Ones. The Clacton riot climaxed a longtime rivalry between the sartorially splendid Mods and the hot-rodding Rockers. One British sociologist claims that their hostility is based on class. The Mods are artisans and office workers, he claims, and look down on the Rockers, who tend to be scruffy worker types. As a London Mod explains the feud, "The Rockers are just interested in their cycles. This isolates them. Mods are more aware, fast moving, hip. With us, it's like a club. If you wear the right clothes, you're accepted."
The Rockers have no desire to be accepted. At truck stops outside London, they sit by the hour rolling cigarettes and jabbering intently about motorcycles. Only when a covey of new cyclists roars into the parking lot do they look up to see "who's got a new bike." Though they all look like Marlon Brando in The Wild One, they worry about their reputation as troublemakers, claim gravely: "That film did us a lot of harm." The Rockers do not conceal their disdain for the Mods. "The money we spend tripping around and going places, they spend on clothes," sniffs one. For a Rocker, clothes are strictly functional. "People don't seem to realize that a leather jacket is the warmest thing to wear when riding."
A Mod, by contrast, would rather go naked than don a leather jacket. Mod styles tend toward pastels and velvet, collarless polo shirts with horizontal stripes, and ankle-high "plimsoles" (sneakers) with thick white rubber soles. Mod girls wear no jewelry and no makeup save brown eye shadow and false eyelashes. Hairdos are short; flat shoes are In. Skirts vary from ankle-length to midcalf.
The fashion Mecca for Mods is Soho's Carnaby Street, where a string of shops offers pink denim shirts, crimson leather vests and blazing red tartan pants for ultra-slicks. Most of the shops are owned by a young entrepreneur named John Stephen, who has wholeheartedly embraced Detroit's idea of planned obsolescence. Pants are pegged one month, bell-bottomed the next. "To the person who keeps up," says one of Stephen's clerks, "style can change every week. But some suits are in style for months."
Top Faces. London's top Mod hangout is an ill-lit, black-walled club called The Scene, which boasts 7,000 members; at least 600 can be found dancing there to phonograph music every night. Mods change dances even faster than they change trouser-widths. The "Shake" and the "Bird" are both passe, and only the Rockers would be caught doing the Twist. The current dance craze is some thing called the "Face Twist," which has a tricky hand and heel movement that resembles a cross between a hula dance and a High Noon gun draw. While the Mods are still loyal to the Beatles, they have resurrected Bill Haley, one of the originators of rock 'n' roll, as their idol. "The pop papers said that Bill Haley would never come back," says one Mod. "It just proves they were wrong."
Modland's heroes are called "faces."
Top faces right now are Patrick Kerr and Theresa Confrey, a young couple that demonstrates new dances on a popular TV record show, Ready, Steady, Go. When they got married last month, Patrick, ever aware of his sartorial responsibilities, wore a curly-brimmed grey bowler, velvet-collared thigh-length jacket and a grey velvet waistcoat. The bride wore a "skinny strapless evening gown." "We don't really like to fight," explained one Mod after the Clacton giggle. "Our clothes cost too much."
Source : Time US 10th April 1964
2 Sep 2007
MANCHESTER : THE TWISTED WHEEL - Roger Eagle - the godfather of British soul (thanx to Paul Welsby and The New Breed)
Roger later found fame running Eric's club in Liverpool in the days of the city's post-punk explosion, and later helped numerous Manchester musicians on their way (Mick Hucknall being but one). Over the years he developed a more eclectic taste in music but Roger never lost enthusiasm for his first love, Black American music from the 50s and 60s.
The New Breed carried out this interview at Roger's home in North Wales in February 1999 and because of his poor health, decided to conduct the interview in stages over a period of time. This is a complete transcript of the first interview, because sadly we didn't make a second as Roger's health progressively worsened over the months. This is Roger Eagle's last interview. At the time we never expected it to be a Tribute.
TNB : When and how did you first become interested in Soul and R&B music?
RE : Well I was originally a Rock'n'Roll kid until I heard Ray Charles. The 'In Person' and 'Live At Newport' LPs from around 1958/59 really converted me. Rock'n'Roll died in 1958. Ray Charles was the first to see the possibilities of mixing different types of musics. He mixed R&B, Rock'n'Roll and even country. There were other acts at the time that were a great influence. Fats Domino, a lot of the R&B releases on London Records. Gary US Bond's 'New Orleans'. Arthur Alexander. LaVern Baker. Chuck Willis' 'The Sultan of Stroll' that was a very, very important LP. I love Chuck Willis.
How did you pursue your interest in this (at the time) very obscure music?
There were various coffee bars in Manchester, like The Cona Coffee Bar (in Tib Lane near Albert Square) where you could take in your own records to play. You would take your own in and also listen to other people's and pick it up from there. There were a few like minded people around and you would bump into them or meet them in places like The Town Hall pub.
As for getting hold of the records, you could get hold of some but it wasn't long before I was importing records directly from the States. I must thank two guys - Roger Fairhurst and Mike Bocock who taught me how to import records from the States. I was getting hold of records from the US even before they had been released there! Tracks like 'You Don't Know Like I Know' by Sam and Dave. I was the first person to play that record in Britain. It even got to such a stage that I was involved in writing sleeve notes on a Bobby Bland LP for Duke Records in the US.
How did you first become involved with the Twisted Wheel?
Before I got the job at The Twisted Wheel, my only DJ experience was taping tracks on one of these reel-to-reel recorders and taking them along to parties to play. One day I received a parcel from the US that contained all of the Chuck Berry and Bo Diddley back catalogue LPs. I took them down to The Left Wing Coffee Bar, just to have a look at them. I was approached by the Abadi Brothers who said 'we're buying this place and turning into a night club - do you know anything about R&B?' so I said 'Yes' and they offered me the DJ job there and then.
To be honest, the Abadis didn't really have an appreciation for the type of music that was popular at the club. They just saw it as a way to get the numbers coming through the door. Only once did they insist that I played a pop record. I argued against it but to prove a point I played it and emptied the dance floor. After that they never interefered again on the music side.
I wasn't a particularly high profile DJ. I didn't have the ambition and I certainly didn't have the patter. I was happy playing the music that I loved. I would play six or seven hours solid singlehandedly - with just an hour or so's break for the band - for £3 a night. I was happy playing the music that I loved but with hindsight I would have appreciated a little more money.
Seven hours of record playing is a long time and there weren't that many Soul and R&B records available at the time so I had to mix in Rock'n'Roll tracks to fill out the time. In fact Carl Perkins was a particular favourite amongst The Wheel crowd. He even played live at the club. In the very early days, when the club first started, we relied very much on word of mouth recommendations. We had the likes of Roger and Mike and their mates from Bolton, we had people coming over from Liverpool and all over the place. I guess it was the start of the whole scene where people are willing to travel to hear the music that they want to hear.
The Wheel was a big scene in the North West, how much did you know about what was happening in other parts of the country?
The only other club anywhere that was playing anything like what I was playing at The Wheel was The Scene Club in London. I used to get on well with Guy Stevens and we used to exchange records. Like I said, I was getting hold of some records before their release even in the States, things like Stax and so on. We weren't conciously trying to create a movement or anything like that. We just liked to have a club that played the right kind of music.
Obviously the music that you played and crowds that you attracted were very much part of Mod culture. Did you class yourself as a Mod? Did that side of things appeal to you?
No, not really. You could say that I tipped my hat towards the things that were happening. But it was the music that came first and was paramount above everything else to me. Of course I dressed in the styles of the day. I was smart but I wasn't at the sharp end style-wise. My money went on vinyl and importing new records. I left the clothes obsession to the kids coming to the club.
Did you set out to make The Wheel a Mod club?
No, as I said before, it just grew and happened. You knew what was going on though. The punters were generally sharp but some were way ahead. I couldn't keep up with them ! I got respect through the records that I was playing. That to me was enough.
Although many people often forget it, The Wheel did have a bit of a reputation for the quality of live acts that played there, many of which were White kids influenced by the kind of music that you were playing.
Yes, we had the lot. I used to be friendly with Steve Winwood. He would come round to my place and listen to records when The Spencer Davis Group played the club. Georgie Fame did some good things - very King Pleasure influenced. The important thing is to take the influence and then add a twist and take it on further. It's important to remember that there is a big big difference between Club Groups and Pop Groups. Eric Clapton was a good friend at that time. I remember one Sunday morning after he had played at the club, he brought a good-looking young Mod girl round to my place and she got completely pissed off because all he wanted to do was listen to Freddy King records.
In 1965, the 'original' Twisted Wheel in Brazennose Street closed down and a 'second' Wheel opened in Whitworth Street. Legend has it that the original crowd didn't move on to the new club. Is that true?
No, that's not true. The music policy at the new club was just the same. I moved over with the club, I spent roughly two years at the first Wheel and a year at the second, roughly.
During 1966, you left The Wheel. Why?
Well, I left because they wouldn't pay me a decent wage. After three years hard graft for maybe £3 a night I asked for a fiver and they said they couldn't afford it. I was also getting bored with the music and there were a lot of pills going on. Kids were in trouble with the pills and all they wanted was that kind of fast tempo soul dance. So, I was very restricted with what I could play and I thought 'I'm not getting paid enough money to do this - I ain't going to do it no more'. So I left and immediately got paid a decent wage by Debbie Fogel at The Blue Note Club. I got a fiver a night for four nights, besides doing other things.
I was able to play the kind of music that I liked. The range of music. Whereas the pill freaks only wanted the same dance beat - which is what makes it so boring. Its okay you know there were some decent sounds but they made it so boring. You're trying to talk to kids who are off their heads all night on pills and its really hard. And the Abadis didn't want to pay me what I felt I was worth.
So you just completely disassociated from them ?
Gone. Yeah. I was a black music fanatic and I had respect for what I was dealing with - I don't think they did.
And then you started the Staxx club. Was that after the Blue Note?
Yeah, briefly. It was at the The Three Coins in Fountain Street. The music policy was similar. It was R'n'B and Soul. But you see I was trying to play funk. Early funk. In fact, 'Funky Broadway' by Dyke & The Blazers was probably the last record I played at The Wheel. It was just starting to change and they didn't want it. They didn't want it to change. It just split. I was progressing to funk, very early funk but they didn't want to go with it.
So when you started the Staxx Club, presumably you were pulling in a different audience to the one that you had had at The Wheel?
I don't know really. They were just people around town. Pill freaks that just popped in and out. You can't look at it with hindsight, at the time it wasn't 'oh we're going to start a movement!' . It was just the place to be. It was the place for The In Crowd...for a while.
And then you moved completely at a tangent to the Magic Village Club?
I just started getting into rock. It was a completely different track. Things like Captain Beefheart, John Mayall, The Nice and so on.
That's just about taken us through your 'Soul Years' but there's just one last question. It's about a story that's become almost an urban myth - and we wondered whether you could clear it up once and for all. It's about the time that The Rolling Stones came down to The Wheel after playing a gig in Manchester...
Yeah. I'll tell you exactly what happened. The Stones came down to the club and they were standing in the coffee bar having a cup of coffee. The kids were standing round them - just looking at them. Not talking to them - just looking. And I played all of the original tracks off their first album, which had just come out....'I'm A King Bee' by Slim Harpo, 'Walkin' The Dog' by Rufus Thomas, Arthur Alexander... They knew exactly what I was doing... I played them in exactly the same order as the LP. It was just me saying..there's a North/South thing. I'm a Southerner by birth - but a Northerner by emotion. I prefer the North. I'm not saying I don't like Southerners, but they tend to be so temporary down there. To me if something's solid then its worth looking after. Whereas they're into it and out of it. Which is really not the Northern style.
I actually got on OK with The Stones. Brian Jones bought a copy of R&B Scene [Roger's own magazine fom the early/mid-60's] from me when I was in London. Mick Jaggger once bummed a cig off me. That sums up The Stones for me. But joking aside, I'm one of the DJ's that publicised the music, but when when The Stones went to The States they got Howlin' Wolf onto primetime national televison. Fucking Hell. That's the thing to do. I admire them for doing that.
I'd be playing tunes in the club and those guys would be listening. You know Rod Stewart and those guys. Pete Stringfellow used to come over and write down the name of every tune that I played. I didn't really know what was going on. I wasn't sharp enough business-wise to realise what I had going. I'm not bitter about it because I am absolutely totally committed to the music. It means so much to me.
I recently met this black American guy who came over to see me. He's at University in The States and he's doing a thesis on Northern British Appreciation of Black American Music. He'd been to see everybody on the Northern Scene...all the Northern DJ's and so on they all said 'go and see Roger Eagle - he started it all'. Eventually he turned up here with a camera and I blew his head off completely. I started playing him tunes...he went away with a cassette - with what you would probably think are fairly obvious tunes on it. His mind was completely wrecked. This guy's in his 40's, maybe 50's and he's a serious man ....and he's never heard Ray Charles! I said, if you want to talk about Northern Soul there's plenty of people better placed than I am to tell you ...but if you want the history about white Northern English appreciation of Black American music you talk to me! I'll straighten it out for you. I did.
I said: this is where it started in the 50's. When it was exciting. I don't want to know about white artists ripping off black artists ...that's bollocks. Everybody covered everyone else! Nat King Cole - one of the most successful black entertainers of all time - he would cover white show tunes, pop tunes, blues tunes - across all boundaries. He didn't care. Ray Charles was one of the first black artists to see the possibilities. I said to this guy 'have you ever heard "I'm Moving On" by Ray Charles? As far as I know it's one of the first cases of a black artist covering a Country & Western song - a Hank Snow tune'. I had to put it on tape...he'd never heard it. I love the train rhythm through the track building up towards the end. As far as I'm concerned a tune this strong ought to be played. I bet you've heard it so many times without really clocking just how strong a track it is. It's a head record. Atlantic were starting to experiment with different instrumentation. Moving away from the basic drum, bass, guitar, sax and piano. They put a distorted pedal steel guitar on it. It's one of my all time favourite records.
Ray Charles is the only artist I've never managed to meet. I was at the Free Trade Hall and he walked right past me. His bodyguards - New Yorkers in pork pie hats and shades - said 'Yeah you can talk to Ray..... in London. Make an appointment son'. I said 'No I want to talk to him here.....'. It's a shame. It was about '63/'64 he had a huge, huge band.....but he'd lost it by then. You know I talk to people about Ray Charles and they immediately think 'Take These Chains From My Heart' and they say 'Ray Charles??'. He was a genius.
This interview was originally published in issue 2 of the Mod 'lifestyle' fanzine The New Breed.
click here for original source
LONDON : THE SCENE CLUB and THE GOLDHAWK (source Blue Dot, friends of the Scotch of St James, thanx to Dave Edwards and Scene 64)
The Scene Club in Ham Yard, Soho was thought of by many as Mod Central. It wasn't a hugely popularised place filled to bursting with people, but more of an underground club where only the top mods hung out, and the whole mod style was created. The club's decor didn't match the smart cut of their clothes, being a bizarre dingy basement catacomb where the walls were padded and the floor was littered with cushions, but it was ideal for the pilled lifestyle they led, where you were buzzing into the early hours of the morning and needed a club that stayed open as late as 5am on a Sunday. The Goldhawk may have been a club for drinkers, but the Scene was deffinately designed for pills.
"The Scene was really where it was at, but there were only about fifteen people down there every night. It was a focal point for the mod movement. I don't think anyone who was a mod outside Soho realised the fashions and dances all began there." Pete Townshend
THE GOLDHAWK
It's been said that the outside of The Goldhawk Road social club in Shepherds Bush resembled a women's institute private residence with five steps leading up to a big oak door and billboards each side of a little patch of grass at the front advertising upcoming bands like The Birds and The Who. Inside the place was quite unlike the women's institute though, a pretty rough venue where brawls happened almost nightly and the music was playing so loud that it was impossible to get the bouncer to hear you knocking on the door if you arrived a bit late... unless you happened to be Roger Daltrey who once threw a fit at being locked out on a night he was playing there and bashed the door open with his fist.
Membership was five shillings which you gave to admissions officer Kenny Spratling in return for a blue card which carried your name and membership number on the top and a long list of the rules and regulations on the inside. The card admitted you to the bar which mainly served out halves and bitters in a mod world where pills were the real scene. It was easier to go down the stairs to the small soft drinks bar which held only four or five tables.
To get to the dancefloor surronded by big sofas you had to pass through a door frame hung with Chinese plastic drapes that seperated it from the soft drinks bar. The usual ettiquette was to slip your hand between the drapes and slide onto the floor, but Mods with aspirations of being one of the Faces jammed their hands firmly in their pockets, fixed a scowl on their faces and stormed through with a mass of multicoloured drapes streaming from their shoulders. The music there, besides live bands, consisted of the likes of John Lee Hooker, and all present on the dance floor were expected to know the right dance steps that went with certain top records.
The Goldhawk was one of the best places for live bands on Friday and Saturday nights, supporting London's premiere bands, but unlike the clubs up west it slung everyone out at 11pm. That just meant that at 11 you headed for the other clubs right out round Wardour Street. But it was worth going to a club that closed so early if you got to see bands such as Screaming Lord Such and the Savages, The Undertakers, The Who, The Herd, The Birds, and Johnny Kidd and the Pirates.
On Friday nights the club was mainly filled with lads because most of the girls who frequented The Goldhawk worked on Saturdays. But Friday night was usually Who night and during the gaps between their sets lead guitarist Pete Townshend would usually be found heading straight for the dancefloor trying out the new steps as they were given birth by the local Mods and having them perfected by the time he was back on stage.
LONDON : THE FLAMINGO CLUB (source Mick Hall)
The Flamingo Jazz Club which operated out of a dingy basement in London's Wardor Street Soho in the late 1950s and the first half of the 1960s, has become legendary amongst cultural buffs of that city and was recently featured in the BBC2 documentary Soul Britannia, which looked at the history of Soul music in the United Kingdom. The Club is also a sweet memory of those of us who when teenagers spent our weekend's in its sweaty bowel's. Although if one reads the odd article on the Flamingo Club that appears these days, one may get the impression it was a Mod club,* which whilst half true is far from the actual story. It is true the more adventurous Mod's who inhabited London's West End back then, gradually became regulars at the club and by 1963 the music played within the Flamingo was entirely within the Mod tradition, but this is a chicken or egg conundrum as the claim could equally be made that the Flamingo was a major influence on the music that became inherent within Mod culture rather than the other way around. No, the Flamingo was much more than a club where members of the youth cult known as Mod's hanged out, it was the precursor of the ethnic melting pot London was to become and this was reflected in the sounds played within the club. Indeed ask any old Mingolian why their anti racist roots are so firm; and it is a fact few who were Mingo regulars ended up as racists, they would not reply with the names of the great men and women of the civil rights and anti racist movement, nor from having been racially abused themselves but because for a short period of time their roots lay within that grubby Wardor Street basement lovingly known to us all as, 'the Mingo'.
There were two main Soho clubs in the 1960s that could be exclusively called Mod hangouts, The Scene in Ham Yard and the Discotheque in Lower Wardor Street. In both of these clubs the sounds were American R@B with a touch of Jazz and West Indian Bluebeat. Whilst today's media may go on about how UK bands like the Who, Kinks and the Small Faces provided the soundtrack for the Mod scene, I don't recall ever hearing any of the music of these bands being played within any of the West End Mod hangouts, although Millie Small, Prince Buster, James Brown, Chuck Berry, Jimmy Smith, Bo Didley and Cannonball Adderley were regularly blasted out, bouncing off the ceiling and out into the street. However for many of us Mods, neither of these clubs were a touch on the Mingo, the Scene was elitist, look at me am I not a face, an edgy place with a certain violence lurking beneath the surface, which often erupted outside in HamYard . Whilst the Disc as it was known was more of a rough and ready joint, it had old mattresses along one wall, more welcoming that the Scene; and for me it provided a taster of what was to come, whilst the music was Black, the cliental of both the Scene and Disc were almost exclusively white.
Just up the road from the Disc was the Flamingo Jazz Club, around the door of which grouped throughout the night its then cliental having come up for a breather. Mainly newly arrived West Indian immigrants, plus a sprinkling of black GIs based at the US air bases scattered across the south of England and East Anglia, plus a lesser number of white jazz cats. Us young Mods, who thought back then that we were at the fore of the UK street fashion scene and as hip as hell with our Ben Sherman shirts, mohair suits and blue beat hats, would get a fair bit or ribbing and a little abuse when we walked past the Mingo from the black guys hanging around its stairwell. Most of us Mod's were then in our mid teens, whilst the Mingo regulars then were somewhat older, early to late twenties. We gave as good as we got although occasionally one of the black guys would chance his arm and half heartedly attempt to roll one of us, on the odd occasion when some blocked up kid new to the scene would hand his cash over whilst in a drugged daze, one of the other brothers would more often than not put a stop to it and return his cash, after deducting a shilling or two as a lesson for the youngsters gullibility.
Before I go on what you have to understand is Britain was far from the multi racial society it is today and most Mods lived in parts of London or the Home Counties which had few black faces; the more so in the New Towns and estates of the south east of England, like Welling Garden City, Hemel Hamstead, Basildon, South Ockendon-Belhus etc, which had been built to take up the housing slack brought about by the bombing of London during WW2 and the determination of the post war Labour Government to at least attempt to build homes fit for heros, and replace the wretched slums that surrounded most big cities in the UK. Thus all these Black guys on the street in Wardor St were something completely new and in truth somewhat intimidating for most of us, or would have been if we were not so young, naive and adventurous in search of a good time [stoned-out too]
Given time many of us began to wonder what it was like down in the Mingo basement; and as tales of fantastic live music down below began to seep along the street, not least that a young organist and his band named Georgie Fame and the Blue Flames were bringing the house down at weekends, the more adventurous of us decided to give it a go. Dube's [purple hearts]downed we ventured forth, through the crowd hanging at the entrance we went with trepidation, down the stairs to the door where John Gunnell, one of the two brothers who ran the Mingo took your cash, half a quid, normally paid with a ten bob note and then you were in. On entering you were hit by a wall of cheap perfume and roll on deodorant, smoke, sweat and dancing bodies, all accompanied by a throbbing R@B soundtrack. As you pushed your way to the front there were three rows of old cinema seats in front of which there was a small stage for the band to perform on, with Hammond Organ, drums and amplifiers set up. To the left on a raised platform, there was a coffee bar type area from where you could oversee the stage and the rest of the club, a foot or so below and from which you could view the band and check out the girls dancing before you [attempted to] make a move.
John Gunnell always introduced the bands, he is heard doing so on the live album Georgie Fame, Rhythm and Blues Live at the Flamingo, which captures the moment perfectly. Whilst Mr Fame was undoubtedly the star within the stable of Mingo artists,** [most of whom the Gunnell Brothers also managed] we all had our own particular favorites, and I like most Mingolians would diligently get the Melody Maker every Thursday to see who was doing the Saturday Allnighter -12 midnight to 6-am, and in case we had any energy left, the Sunday afternoon 3 to 6 pm slot. My heart used to sink if it was John Mayall, not because he had a crap band, far from it, but he was so self indulgent, a Blues purists who saw himself as a middle class intellectual in the jazz club habitue mold, back then he failed to understand to us mods, black music was not an intellectual thing, but was there to lift our spirits and move us emotionally, to take us beyond our lives as factory fodder or to lighten our days at school, where we were be educated to become the cart horses of capital and with a big stick at that.. So if Mayall was playing the Sunday slot it was a nono, as most of us would be done in from the all-nighter and suffering a vicious come down, so John singing about struggling up another bloody hill was going to do us no good at all.
With the influx of us young Mod's and our coming together with the black brothers, the Mingo had moved beyond a jazz club atmosphere and John was the wrong band for the club the Mingo had become.. The whirling thump of the Hammond organ and horns is what we wanted, with a singer who punched a whole in our souls, we wanted to be lifted not driven down into our boots. Having said this Chris Farlowe who was one of my favorites got by without a horn section, but he did have Albert Lee on guitar and Dave Greenslande on organ and for some reason, when ever other singers came down to the club it was with Chris and the Thunderbird they more often than not sat in. Remember things were different back then, whilst of course there were many late night drinking clubs in the West end, an allnighter that had live music was very rare. Only Ronnie Scott's [old club] in Gerard Street, which was directly opposite the Mingo springs to mind. There was Ken Colyer's Studio 51 which used to have an all-nighter now and again, but it was full of middle class trad-jazzers and was an acquired taste to say the least and for me the atmosphere was a kin to an average students bar of the age, although in truth back then I had never been in a collage let alone a students bar. Thus many musicians who had been gigging around London and the home counties would turn up in their early hours to sit in and blow their horns, Eric Burdon and saxophonist Dick Hecksal Smith were the two I remember most, at his best, long before he became a born again American, Burdon was a wonderful singer. I saw him and Farlowe on more than one occasion bring the house down, not least when dueting with Stormy Monday Blues, just magnificent. Rod the Mod's mentor Long John Baldry also sat in from time to time, often he was simply on the pull. As to did Jimi Hendrix, just the once mind, fresh off the plane from the US. I also remember Chris Barber the Trad jazz guy often turning up in the small hours to blow his trombone which surprisingly turned out to be a treat.
The first band I saw was Ronnie Jones and the Knight-Timers, Ronnie was one of those GI's I mentioned above accept he stepped out of the audience onto the bandstand to sing with a sweet soulful voice, Ronnie due to commitments went his own way to be replaced in the Knightimers by Herbie Goings, another American GI or so we all presumed, an R@B belter in the mould of Wilson Picket and I tell you Herb could really shake the Mingo down. Whilst he was to be followed somewhat later by yet another American 'ex serviceman,' Geno Washington who teamed up with an outfit called the Ram Jam Band, a real showman but voice wise he never came up to Herbie who had a great voice and a songbook of black music that covered the previous two decades and more, thus he often had the club in the palm of his hand.
Then their was the guy who I thought had the best name ever for a band, Zoot Money and his Big Roll Band and boy did he let the good times roll. Zoot was a bundle of energy with a smile like a cheshire cat, who owed a lot to the show band style of Fats Domino, with a touch of the rock and roll exuberance of Little Richard thrown in and he went down a storm with most Mods, especially in the suburban halls which ringed London and which most of us frequented during the week. But some how the black guys never took to him in the same way as they did Mr Fame, who for some reason they saw as one of their own as too did we Mod affectionardios who frequented the Mingo. Maybe it had something to do with having black guys like Speedy on the Congas or Eddie Thornton on the Trumpet; or that Georgies voice was just right for Bluebeat which took the guys back home. In truth I doubt the Mingo would have become the club it was if Georgie had not graced its stage, he like all great musician had pure style. Whilst on that small stage, Georgie, the Blue Flames and the crowd became as one. If you have only seen Georgie on TV shows like Top of The Pops, it is easy to understand why you might not feel he is anything special, but catch him in a small room, with the right band and the man is pure class; and still is at times to this day. But there is another reason why people like me owe him a debt, he was a working class lad from Wigan, coming from much the same background as most of us mods. Thus his love for blues, pop, soul, jazz, indeed most musical forms, encouraged those of us who admired his music to follow in his foot steps with our very own Sound Venture and in the process many of us acquired wide musical taste.
It was this unity that I aforementioned which instilled in all who went down the Mingo a rejection of the infantile and nonsensical nature of racism, for we had been part of a celebration as a black and white crowd which rejoiced in black music played by white and black musicians, and we were never going to become pawns in any racist politicians hands for we had been as one. What we learnt down in that dark basement room was not to fear difference but to embrace and rejoice in them, test them and if its fine, go with the flow. We learnt to look outside our own sphere of influences, whether in music or life in general; and not to always simply go with the majority.
Of course it is impossible to write about the Mingo without mentioning what fueled it, for back then as today no all-nighter could survive without its punters being on just a little more than thresh air and the odd can of larger, no matter how good the sounds. Amphetamines, Dubes, purple hearts, blues whatever one wished to call the speed of the day was the power source, at least for us Mod's, that and the music. In the early days they came from being 'liberated' by people who worked for French Kline and Smith the major pharmaceutical manufacturer, having been passed down the line until small time pushers did the deal on the street. Different pushers had their shop fronts south off Shaftsbury Avenue, much as I presume they have about the West-end today, one in the doorway of Revels shoe shop in Wardor St, another on the corner at the T junction where Gerald St met Wardor St, etc etc. The Dubes were as easy to get up West back then as Coke is today, it was only when demand outreached supply that bent doctors, breaking into chemist ships and counterfeiting french blues came into play and by then the Mingo had died a death as many of its best musician's and punters went in search of flower power or a more steady source of income.
* 1960's fashion trend, popular amongst working class youngsters.
**although after his first hit record I don't think he played the mingo anymore, certainly not after late 1964-65, no matter as the rest of the bands who gigged there where equally good.
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HARD MODS (source John Waters, thanx to The New Breed and Modculture)
With regard to the Mod scene back in the sixties, to my way of thinking there were two distinct types of Mod within the London area. The first was the familiar scooter boys which has become the generally accepted face of sixties Modernism. However, there was another type of Mod back in those days.
These were the members of the many Mod 'firms'. These were members of street gangs each with their own manor e.g. The Highbury mob, the Archway, Somers Town, Elephant and Castle, Mile End etc. These gangs consisted of anything of between 50 to a couple of hundred in strength at any one time.
Turfs were strictly patrolled and borders laid down. Gang members intruding on other's turf risked a severe beating if caught. Gang members were meticulous in their dress, the order of the day being the mohair suit, velvet collar overcoats and as often as not a 'blue beat' hat. Each manor had its own caff's, snooker halls and sometimes dance hall or club.
I lived in Upper Holloway and therefore was a member of the Archway mob. One of the smaller gangs numbering around eighty to a hundred. We congregated in two or three local cafes and pubs and our main enemy was the Highbury and Mars (Finsbury Park) gangs.
There were many and sometimes violent skirmishes but the odd thing was that on occasions the mobs would align with each other to take on other gangs. I remember one instance that sprang to mind when both gangs combined to 'visit' the rocker enclave at Alexandra Palace.
Members of these gangs would not be seen dead on a scooter there preferred mode of transport being a car. Like most other Mods at the time we were fans of Motown, Soul and the Who, Faces etc. We frequented the pubs of the East End and clubs of the West End. Although we visited many clubs such as the Flamingo, Scene, Whisky and Marquee we tended to stick to one particular club. In our case it was the Discoteque and regarded this as 'home' turf. Again on the annual visits to the coast we would often meet up with other firms and head off, in our case, to Brighton.
My own particular memories of that era are mainly concerning music as an ardent follower of Soul music. Solomon Burke at the Flamingo; robes, crown and all being joined on stage by Dusty Springfield belting out 'Everybody Needs Somebody'. The Who at St.Josephs Church Hall, Archway just after they hit the charts with 'I Can't Explain' and having a few 'sherberts' in The Cat next door with Moon. Friday and Saturday nights up West. First a few pints down the East End at The Green Man or Blind Beggar then off to the Coffee An in a cellar down the bottom of Wardour St. Then up to The Discoteque to dance the night away to some of the greatest music ever to make it on to vinyl. Early next morning meeting up at the all night cafe 'El Passant' on the Strand (what a great juke box). Heady days ! People often find it hard to understand the reverence that the sixties are held in by many. In these days of clubs on every corner, high tech, computer aided music etc everything is pretty much en-passe. The thing about the sixties was that everything was so new. The clothes, music, clubs etc and for the first time we had some money in our pockets to indulge.
I do not live in the past by any means and there is much to be said for the present day but it will never match the absolute excitement of the sixties.
LONDON : FLAMINGO CLUB and SOHO (source John Firth)
MOD memories (source Kristan Deconinck, UK)
A couple of groups mock-charging along an esplanade, with only the occasional physical injury was, and still is, far less dangerous than any hooliganism you see today.
I recall walking along a riverbank one day and coming across a huge muddy puddle. I couldn't escape because the river was on one side and a high hedge on the other.
Two rockers were on the other side of the puddle and when one of them started wading through the mud towards me, I inevitably throught he was going to beat me up.
Instead, he simply lifted me up and carried me across the mud so I wouldn't get my smart "mod" clothes dirty.
Another myth regards the music. REAL mods weren't into the Who - who looked like mods but played beat music. No, REAL mods were into the original R&B standards which had been copied copiously by all British groups.
A real mod, as opposed to a poseur, would never have been seen carrying an ordinary beat record (although we did allow ourselves to enjoy groups such as the Yardbirds, who had a certain cred-value at the time).
NOTTINGHAM and Midlands (source Steve, Vaughan , James McCarthy, BBC)
I was around mid to late 60s and have many memories of Dungeon, Boat Clubs (Brit in particular),Beachcomber, going to all nighters - Mojo in Sheffield and Twisted Wheel in Manchester, Nightowl in Leicester. I think I remember Randy but these guys are on Vespas and there was also a crowd that had Lambrettas. Names I recall - Fat Pat, Click, Radio, Ben, Andy, Mad Colin (ex-rocker),Gray Whalley, Blonde John, Dave Madgwick, Dave Mace and others. I remember going to fight rockers in Skeggy and Yarmouth. There was even more vicious warfare between Mods from other cities I remember a right rumble through the centre of nottingham when mods from Peterborough came en-masse - a 50 seater coach I guess. I still listen to the soul sounds we listened and danced to back then. Keep me posted if any developments on this topic e.g. reunions or whatever.
(Steve)
I wonder if anyone remembers 'The Belvedere' This was a late night coffee bar just round the corner from the Beachcomber.You assended a creaky flight of stairs into a dimly lit room, bought coffee made with evaporated milk and played the table football machine. Another endearing memory I have is that of an enterprising guy doing a roaring trade selling dresses to girls comming and going from the Beachcomber from the back of a gown van parked up on the wasteground opposite
(Vaughan)
Nottingham had a great mod scene in the sixties. Who remembers soul all dayers at the Dungeon, Geno at the Boat and Jimmy Cliff at the Union?
(James McCarthy)
LONDON : THE SCENE CLUB and SOHO ( by Geoff Green, thanx to Alice Fowkes and Chris H)
It had previously been a jazz club, but by 1963 it had become a club for mods, mainly playing records, but also featuring live groups.
I believe it was, in part at least, owned by Ronan O'Rahilly, who started Radio Caroline. Guy Stevens of Sue Records was the first DJ (I think).
I first went in 1963 with a group of my friends. I was a mod (of sorts, I was an apprentice and didn't have a lot of money), but the main reason we went was that the advert in the Record Mirror spoke of records played by artistes including Chuck Berry, Bo Diddley, Jimmy Reed, Howling Wolf, Jerry Lee Lewis and others.
I can't remember if they used the term "Maximum R&B" first, or if this was originated by the Who later.
At this time the Merseybeat boom was getting under way, beat groups were beginning to feature cover versions of rhythm and blues songs, and we wanted to hear the originals.
Chuck Berry's records had been issued in this country, but when Chess moved from London to the Pye group, his singles had been deleted. So when there was terrific interest in his material nothing was available.
I remember my first visit, the music seemed incredible.
All the great rhythm and blues records, plus good rock'n'roll stuff, plus the current Phil Spector hits like Da Doo Ron Ron and Zippadee Doo Dah (hope that is spelt right). I had never been to a club before, only to local dance halls, like the Tottenham Royal, where there was not the same atmosphere. And there were all these guys wearing the clothes I wanted and was having difficulty affording.
You went down a staircase, paid your money, had your hand stamped (just like the Dome) and went into a rectangular room. As I recall the DJ was in a little box to the right of the entrance, but it was flush to the wall. In the right hand corner opposite the DJ was a bar, that only sold soft drinks (I remember cola that was made from powder and water, really horrible).
A bit further to the left of the entrance was a passage to the cloakroom. Along the far wall to the left were booths, I think the first few times I went there you couldn't see what was going on, but later they were opened up, I think this happened after a raid for drugs. And I think on the right hand wall between the bar and DJ booth were benches.
The rest was a dance floor (I seem to remember a pillar or two, but again I could be wrong). People stood around or danced. A lot of the time it was a case of being seen at the right place.
I went a few more times, but became a regular in 1964. This was in the later part of the summer, I'd met a girl, and we were always going out to places to hear music and dance. So we went to the Scene, and the music was less rhythm and bluesy, more what we'd call soul, but it was still called rhythm and blues by us.
Also popular that summer were old rock'n'roll records by people like Bill Haley, Carl Perkins, etc. Remember this was the time of the mods and rockers riots, grossly exaggerated by the papers. But those records had the right beat for the dances of the time, the Block, and later the Bang, Also that time I remember the Miracles I Like It Like That, and the Supremes When The Lovelight Shines In His Eyes. I remember I wore an off white jacket with patch pockets (very fashionable then) and thought I was really cool. I also had a sort of crewcut, it was the summer of the American look, levis with little turnips and desert boots.
Shortly after that I joined (instead of using vouchers from the Record Mirror), as did my mates and girlfriend. It was a guinea (£1 5p). That seemed a lot of money in those pre inflation days to an apprentice. Monday nights were free to members, and Tuesday (the best weekday night) was one shilling (5p). The all nighter on Saturday was 5 shillings (25p), but I couldn't go to them with my girlfriend, her parents would have gone mad.We regularly went Tuesdays, and often Mondays.
When the Who started appearing at the Marquee in Wardour Street we would often go to the Scene in the break between their appearances, for about 3/4 of an hour.
The music by then was what I would describe as classic soul, Motown, Chess, Major Lance, Impressions, Gene Chandler, plus tracks like Boom Boom and Dimples by John Lee Hooker, and Jimmy Reed classics. Also Ska (or Bluebeat as it was known) was played, but not great amounts, records like Madness by Prince Buster and Carolina by the Folks Brothers. Also Jamaica Ska, I can't remember who sang it but it was a minor hit in the USA on the Atlantic label. Incidentally when I danced with my girlfriend we often jived, this was quite common then.
I remember that Night Train by James Brown was a regular play (it had just been issued on the Sue label), and people formed a chain and weaved in and out of the dancers. It was led by an attractive blonde who looked like Dusty Springfield, one of my mates fancied her. Organ instrumenta ls were highly popular, people like Jimmy Smith and Jimmy McGriff. Quite a lot of jazzy sounding stuff was played as well plus almost anything issued by the British Sue label. I wish there were playlists available.
One Tuesday night an American TV were filming, I'd love to see that now.
In February 1965 my girlfriend packed me in for one of my mates, this broke up our crowd. A couple of the others had girlfriends and were drifting away anyway. At that point I was pretty down and started to go to all nighters there with one of my mates.
I would meet him at about a quarter to midnight in Piccadilly Circus underground station, outside the gents toilets believe it or not, I must have been extremely naïve in those days about that sort of thing. We'd then go straight to the Scene, pay our money and go in to hear the music. It was exciting and the music was brilliant. It was the time
all the classics were coming out, Respect (Otis), In The Midnight Hour, Nothing Can Stop Me, I Can't Help Myself, etc. I am sure you could name those records. Now to a certain extent they seem a bit hackneyed, we have all heard them so much.
But they were new then and so so exciting. Just like if you hear a Northern or R&B track you have never heard before. I'd hear one of my faves and be out on the floor straight away.
As well as soul and R&B tracks, some pop stuff was played. GTO by Ronnie & The Daytonas (a sort of surfing sound, but I think actually made in somewhere like South Carolina); Yeh Yeh, Georgie Fame; Jewel Atkins' Birds & The Bees; Righteous Bros Hung On You (a great track IMHO, better than Loving Feeling); the Vogues You're The One, quite a good pop record, but written by Petula Clark, the DJ (by now an attractive blonde lady) must have liked it; and just before the end Lightning Strikes (Lou Christie) and Barbara Ann (Beach Boys).
Also she like to play Tallahassee Lassie (Freddie Cannon); Summertime Blues (Eddie Cochran) and Lewis Boogie (Jerry Lee Lewis).
At the same time bluesy stuff was still played; as was an EP made by the Animals for Decca (presumably a demo tape) featuring Boom Boom and Dimples (I am certain not the versions they did for Parlophone). There was a version of Mohair Sam but it was not Charlie Rich, it had different more amusing lyrics; and also a different version of Leaving Here, not Eddie Holland or the Birds. Somethings just stick in your mind.
During the all nighters we would go out for a walk to get some air and go to the milk machine in Berwick Street. I remember we were once accosted by a lady of the night who offered her services for 30 shillings (£1 50p). Needless to say we turned her kind offer down, music was more important, plus I think she made us a bit nervous.
Many of the records played were imports, so we heard many good records long before they were issued in the UK. I started going out with a girl (who eventually became my wife) in January 1966 and I took her there a few times, but there was another drugs raid, it re-opened but it wasn't the same. We stopped going in about March or April
1966. It later became the King Creole club but I know nothing of that.
It had a major effect on my musical taste, and I still look for some tracks I remember and have never found. When you're young you are inclined to take everything for granted, and that's how we were. It was good and I am glad I went there, I wouldn't be the person I am today if I hadn't gone there."
London : Beardy Pegley
In early 1963, Buttons was the leader of a gang of east end Teddy Boys. They were based around Dalston and haunted both the Locarno and the three late night cafe's nearby. They were hard and sharp dressed. Drapes, Beetle Crushers, Bootlace Ties and the duck's arse/tony curtis hair cuts were the order of the day. The Teds were getting a bit pissed off with the plethora of young mods on their territory, so Buttons sanctioned a few beatings. Les told me that the word soon spread through the East End that mods were getting a regular hiding in Dalston. Sooner or later the Pegley brothers, the generally accepted faces of the Stepney Green mod crew heard about it. Although Dalston was well out of their patch, the elder, Beardy, decided to do womething about it. On the night concerned he asked for volunteers. Twenty or so Stepney and Canning Town mods met up and made the journey across London to seek revenge...
The last part of the story comes from Buttons himself. Les was there but he didnt see the final confrontation.
"It was a normal wednesday, the Teddy Boy crew were all out and hanging around the haunt in Dalston. The mod fights had reached their peak. A few mod youngsters had been cornered earlier in the evening and my boys were on a high. At about 10 o'clock a couple of cars and a dozen scooters pulled into the car park. It was obvious that they wanted trouble, they were mob handed and looked like they were tooled up. I thought I could deal with the situation. I walked out in front of my boys. They were ready, but I thought we would see what they wanted before the situation blew up. Their leader came round the corner. He was about 6 foot, dressed in a leather coat. Sharp, but I knew I could take him. He looked like a queer... As I walked towards him he stood foursquare, hands out, shouting at me to come on. I started to run, pulling my tool from my jacket, momentum giving me the edge. When I was about 20 yards from him he simply flicked back his leather trenchcoat and pulled out a hidden sawn-off shotgun. He laughed, pointed it at my legs and pulled the trigger..."
(source Eddie Piller)
London : Bo Diddley at The Flamingo (source Styxbroox)
It is summer 1963.
I was up early, it was a beautiful day, but I was as mad as hell. I'd had an argument with my girlfriend the night before; I was seventeen and just didn't understand women. She was sixteen and quite obviously didn't understand men. Well young men a