her Dansette record player. It was The Freewheelin’ Bob Dylan. I had never bothered with acoustic music, unless played by black musicians. The only folk music I was aware of was by the likes of Wally Whyton and the King Brothers on the radio show Family Favourites. Bob Dylan was so radical. I was quite stunned.
‘Listen to his words,’ she said. I still listen to them today.
She told me I could be like my heroes and that if I practised, worked hard and, above all, dedicated myself to being a musician I could make it a career. She pointed that neither Bob Dylan nor Eric Clapton had ever seen the inside of a university, and that the old USA blues players that I worshipped were lucky to get any schooling at all. I really listened to her. Academically, I was way behind, but in learning about life I was taking a huge step forward.
I spent a lot of time at school with Liz Rees, and rumours were rampant, particularly as my French was not improving. Liz was a bohemian free spirit, just the person a young lad of fifteen years of age should stay away from. I was infatuated, of course: she did exactly as she pleased and didn’t give a damn about authority.
Something had to give and, halfway through my fifth year, it did. I was called for a meeting with headmaster Gerald Banks. I expected a loud barrage of abuse, but he was very cool and professional. Mr Banks was a good man, and I now see how he turned out to be more of an influence than I realised. Miss Rees was not mentioned by name, but we both knew what the talk was about. He was astute enough to realise and could see that I was a very grown-up fifteen-year-old. I knew what I wanted and I think he knew I would get it. I had no fears about the future, exam results were of no real interest to me and I certainly didn’t give a toss about other people’s perception of my relationships.
As the summer of 1967 approached it was obvious that my French exams were never going to happen. Liz even rang me at my home telling me to stay away from the oral examination, given that I couldn’t really speak a word of French.
There were rumours that Liz been asked to leave at the end of the year or that she might have been sacked. I think she would have resigned long before they could have fired her. I went to her flat to be greeted by a bloke of about 22. She introduced me to him, he was in a band from Birmingham called the Ugly’s. She had met him at a gig that weekend. Liz Rees was with a man, I was mortified, but didn’t really know why. Now I know, of course, that I was jealous. She was spending time with him and not me. She could sense my distress, smiled and put her arm around me. He made us all some coffee.
After a few days sulking, I went to see her again but her housemate Eileen Marner told me that she was gone for good. I must have looked terrible because Eileen was extra nice and told me I needed to get over her. Liz had been my guru and I as a young boy I was totally smitten. Her outlook on the importance of enjoying life and take-it-while-you-can attitude struck a chord deep within me. She said that I could do it. She was right, wasn’t she? Thanks, Liz, wherever you may be.
I did glimpse her briefly once more, years later. It was the early summer of 1974 and I was on my way to play with Wild Turkey at the Marquee Club. I waited for a tube, dressed in my four-inch, wooden-heeled platform boots – black-and-white stars and stripes all over the leather – orange-and-yellow loon pants with twelve-inch flared hems, a psychedelic tie-dye shirt, accessorised with long necklaces, rings and my hair long and very curly. I also had a long, off-white Afghan coat – well, it was 1974. I spotted an attractive woman in her thirties, reading a book. She smiled back at me and as the train pulled out, she mouthed, ‘Bernard?’ Liz! But she was gone, and I have never seen or heard anything of her since. I thought again about those long discussions we had – not for the last time.
After that brief summer of love, the guitar always came first. I was dumped by girls many times, but I never gave it a second thought. In any case, I struggled with girls my own age, having discovered older women. A lot of the venues the Originals played had female managers who would ask the guys to ‘send that young one that plays the guitar for the cash’. The band would giggle as I would often be met by a buxom, mid-thirties stunner in seamed stockings, black underwear and high heels. The rest of the Originals would be waiting for my reaction.
I vividly remember a lunchtime bowling alley gig in Bedford; the manager was a miserable old sod of about 40, but his more than attractive wife was the lady with the money. She was a wonderful tease, running her hands along her legs, smiling at me, saying how young I was to play so well, flattering me and watching my reaction. Giggling and flirting outrageously, she gave me a sexy look and put the two ten-pound notes in her very considerable cleavage. She added that if I could retrieve the cash without using my hands she would add another five-pound note. I played along, burying my head in her bosom and using my teeth to get the notes. I was young, naive and, of course, enjoyed the whole thing very much. She told me she was bored in Bedford since moving from London where she had been an exotic dancer, whatever that meant.
‘Check these out,’ she said. ‘I was a bit of a catch when I was younger.’
She passed me a few photos of her naked or wearing very little. I was shocked, really, holding full-frontal pics with the very lady in them standing next to me. Her husband arrived at that point. He grabbed the pics from my hands, threw them in the corner and told me to fuck off. She laughed and gave me a cheeky wave. I had the gig money though, safely in the back pocket of my Levi’s. The band asked whether I’d gotten the £25. The extra fiver had been a ruse.
4.
I finally left school in 1967, without any qualifications, but also without any misgivings. I did feel a little sorry for myself though and found myself kicking my heels around the town. School done, Liz Rees gone – I supposed I’d have to go to work, then.
To my folks’ relief I found a job, at a ladies’ hairdressing salon in Bletchley, about ten miles from Buckingham. I commuted on my scooter, on which I had painted bright coloured flowers – 1967 was, after all, the year of the hippie and of having flowers in your hair (or painted on your Vespa). My treasured Hofner guitar was similarly adorned. What a sight I must have been, a long-haired kid zooming down the A421 Buckingham to Bletchley road every morning. I got a lot of stick for it but all I cared about was making enough money to buy a Fender Strat and eventually, in my dream of dreams, using that Strat to earn me enough money to buy a white MGA sports car.
The reality of my first proper job soon hit home. Adam of York was in Brooklands Road and the owner was a small bald man, certainly not Adam, but maybe he had come from York. His wife was a first-class battleaxe, a Margaret Thatcher lookalike who called her husband ‘Mr Derek’, and I disliked her from the start, though she was fascinating. She was prim, very self-assured and loudly northern, but affected a posh speaking voice, accented by her heavy Lancashire twang: ‘Madam’s ’air lewks loovly – very classy ’air,’ she would say. ‘That’ll be two-poun’ ten, please, lady.’
‘Mrs Derek’ seemed incredibly old but was probably only forty. She was a tyrant and treated all the staff like shit. She obviously believed that she owned people if she paid their wages. I heard ‘I pay the wages around ’ere!’ many times. I should thank the sad old bird, really, because she cemented my desire to be my own boss.
I washed around fifty heads a week. My hands were in and out of hot and cold water every day, sores and splits began to appear and they even bled. I applied tins of Atrixo cream, but the pain was still excruciating. The final straw for me came with Mrs Derek’s point-blank refusal to let me watch Chelsea and Spurs in the FA cup final of 1967. This was the only live football game of the year. I snuck out of the salon at three in the afternoon and watched a bit of it in a local TV shop, before moving next door, to the Jim Marshall music shop but my northern ogre knew where to find me.
‘Get
