‘My dad’s lock-up,’ said Toby, ‘is packed to the rafters with the lost treasure of the Incas. My dad’s minding it for the Pope.’
‘So we can’t use your dad’s lock up?’ I said.
And Toby shook his head. ‘No,’ he said. ‘And that’s that.’
‘Then it will have to be my dad’s allotment shed. We can’t bring it all into my house. My mum would go spare.’
And so it all went down to my daddy’s allotment shed, a bit at a time, in Mr Ishmael’s limo. With one of us standing guard over the pile while the other unloaded at the other end. I, I recall, did all the unloading. But it proved to be a good idea, as it happened, the right place for it. My daddy rarely visited that shed, which was in fact three sheds knocked together. My father had had the work done because he intended to set up these three sheds as a West London venue. Once the damp had been taken care of, and a green baize carpet laid, my father had opened this venue - The Divine Trinity, as he rather grandly named it - and awaited the arrival of posh people who wanted to hire it out. It never proved particularly popular, though he hosted a couple of World Line Dance Championships there and a Congress of Wandering Bishops, but that was about it.
My father, being at times philosophical, put this down to competition. Competition that came in the form of The Magnificent Four, a venue also on the allotment constructed of four sheds knocked together and owned by a young gentleman named Doveston, who later bought out all the other allotment holders and turned the allotments into a tobacco plantation. He also put on a rock festival there in nineteen sixty-seven. Brentstock, it was called, and we almost played at that.
So, The Divine Trinity was currently vacant but for one or two folk singers who were living rough there. Toby and I ousted these and moved in the equipment.
And it did prove to be a good idea. Once all was inside there was just enough room for The Sumerian Kynges to squeeze in also. And so we could use the place as a rehearsal room.
Thinking back, as I must do if I am to set the record straight about all that went before and then came to pass, which would lead in turn to what was to come and how things would ultimately turn out, I can say, with hand on heart and one foot in the wardrobe, that I had some of the happiest times of my life rehearsing in The Divine Trinity. I pretty much took up residence at The Divine Trinity.
We were just starting out then. Young and eager and carefree. Life was ours for the taking.
And that tick-tock-ticking of history’s clock could not be heard for our laughter.
Oh yes, we were happy then. Though not so happy after we had played our first gig.
Let me tell you all about that.
Because it was quite an experience.
11
It was nearing Christmas, in the year of sixty-three.
The nights had all drawn in and it was chilly.
The snow lay deep and all around,
And tramping o’er the frozen ground
There came a postman by the name of Billy.
I liked Billy the postman. He was a great improvement on the previous postman, who had yet to recuperate from the dose of rabies from which he was suffering.
There had been some unpleasantness. My brother had been arrested and questions had been asked regarding the whereabouts of several thousands of pounds’ worth of brand-new musical equipment. These questions had not been satisfactorily answered, and when the finger of accusation came to point with an unrelenting pointyness towards my brother, who was presently receiving medication, board and lodging at St Bernard’s Lunatic Asylum, I felt that I did not want to confuse things by owning up myself. And my brother was himself beyond caring at this time, for he growled at me through the bars of the special padded room where he spent much of his time, ‘I’m a tiger - what would I want with a Marshall stack? Tell them, Tyler, I beg you.’
He was clearly beyond my help.
And I had rehearsing to do.
I had not been invited to reattend school classes after the summer holidays. I had apparently outstayed my welcome at Southcross Road Secondary School. The headmaster had invited me into his office on the first day of the new term to put his and the school’s position to me in a manner that I could understand.
‘Taylor,’ he said to me as he ushered me into the visitors’ chair, which stood, with three inches cut from its legs, before his desk.
‘Tyler,’ I corrected him.
‘Tyler,’ said the headmaster. ‘Yes, that’s as good an occupation as any for a lad such as yourself.’
‘My name is Tyler, sir,’ said I.
‘Then how apt,’ said he. ‘And good luck with it, too.’
And then he asked me to sign a special form. Which was for my own good and merely a formality. ‘Just a sort of release form,’ he said, ‘to release you from the shackles of education and let you loose on the world, as it were. And how is your brother getting along?’
‘They had to give him some sleeping tablets,’ I said, ‘because he woke up again.’
‘The world we live in today,’ said the headmaster. And he passed me his pen. ‘Just sign it at the bottom there,’ he said. ‘You don’t need to read it. You can read, I suppose? We did manage to instil that into you, I hope.’
I nodded and that pen hovered.
‘Sign it, boy,’ the head now shouted, ‘or I’ll give you six of the best.’
And so I signed his form and was discharged instantly from school. And I had to hand him my satchel and my cap. Even though they were mine and my mother had paid for them herself. And then I was escorted to the school gate and sent away with a flea in my ear.
And the school nurse put that flea there.
And I never did know why she did. Nor did I ever know why I’d been expelled from school. And probably I will never know.
Nor probably ever care.
And I did walk free from that school upon that day, I can tell you that. It was always a strange feeling to walk the streets during term time - if, say, you had to go to the dentist, or help your mum shopping, or some other important reason that stopped you going into school. But to walk out of the school and know that you were never going back, that was really odd.
And as for that flea—
Well, I shook it out before it could lay any eggs and I stamped it into the pavement. And I walked tall, because I was no longer a schoolboy.
I was a man.
And so I went down to the local public house for a beer.
But the landlord threw me straight out again because I was underage. So I went down to Cider Island, that little area beside the weir where all the winos spent their days, and I shared cider with them until I was dizzy and sick.
And then I stumbled home, to receive a really epic hammering from my father.
Those were the days, eh?
But now it was nearly Christmas. The snow lay on the ground deep and crisp and even and The Sumerian Kynges had their first professional gig. Professional in that our audience would be paying to get in to see us, even if we weren’t actually to be paid for performing. And as the representative from the new nightclub that was employing us told us, we were ‘showcasing’ ourselves. Great things were expected. And so we were all young and eager and carefree.
And life was ours for the taking.
Our first gig was to be played at the opening of a nightclub in Ealing Broadway, just down the alleyway steps opposite the Underground Station. It was called The Green Carnation Club and we were top of the bill.
I still have one of the posters. Somewhat crumbling about the edges now, but still bright with pre-psychedelic mimeograph red, upon a background of brown.
Below us, second from top of the bill, was Venus Envy.
A male pre-op-transexual band. Who were already pretty famous. I had read all about them in a copy of Teenage She-Male Today magazine that had been popped through our letter box by Billy the postman, who had a sense of fun that I never fully understood.
Venus Envy featured ‘Jimbos’, whi
ch were, apparently, the male equivalent of Bimbos. I learned a lot from that magazine and it was a real pleasure to boast about what I knew to the other guys in the band.
Especially Neil, who always seemed to know so much about everything. He confessed, in fact he fairly gushed, that he knew absolutely nothing about Jimbos, and eyed me rather strangely.
But I had heard that Venus Envy were pretty good, and they were especially interesting to me because of the Aleister Crowley connection. I had read much about Aleister Crowley, England’s last great magician. The self-styled Beast of the Apocalypse, whose number is 666, Crowley probably wrote more on the subject of occult magic than any other person. Oh, and my dad met him once. Honest.
But I digress. Apparently Venus Envy’s lead singer, Vain Glory, was a member of the Ordo Templi Orientii and all the band’s song titles had been derived from the titles Crowley had given the various murals he painted on the interior walls of his Abbey of Thelema in Cefalu, Sicily. I treasure the memory of those names:
Egyptian Aztecs Arriving from Norway
The Long-Legged Lesbians
Morbid Hermaphrodite from Basutoland
Japanese Devil-Boy Insulting Visitors
Pregnant Swiss Artists Holding Crocodile
They were really meaningful titles for songs and there would have been no point in writing such songs unless those songs had meaningful lyrics to go with their meaningful titles.
Ours were really really meaningful. And I will give you a sample, shortly.
So, on this crisp December night, with the snow laying all around and about and little flakes of it drifting down towards the allotments, which looked particularly beautiful in what moonlight there was to be had, I stood in the doorway of The Divine Trinity, a hand-rolled cigarette travelling up to my mouth and then down again, and watched the arrival of Toby in our van.
Yes, that’s just what I said. A van! Toby had got us a van. And although strictly he wasn’t old enough to be driving it, he explained to anyone who demanded explanation that he was driving through necessity rather than choice and so they should leave it at that.
He had acquired the van from Leo Felix, the local used-car salesman (who, even then, referred to his cars as ‘previously-owned vehicles’) with a sum of money composed of our shared savings.
It was an old-time Bedford van with sliding doors, so you could ride along with the doors open and your leg hanging out, looking cool. And but for the fact that it drank petrol and oil in equal quantities due to some essential piece of engine being unincluded in the price, and the fact that the exhaust pipe was somewhat peppered with holes and dispensed a thick, black, foggy sort of a smoke cloud into the rear of the van to the great distress of anyone unlucky enough to be sitting therein, it was a cracking van!
The suspension was a little ‘stiff’ and the tyres, which lacked for any discernible tread, also lacked for inner tubes and had been filled with sand by Leo, who assured Toby that all tyres would be similarly filled in the years to come as pneumatic tyres were nothing but a passing fad.
So, it made for an interesting ride.
We didn’t have to load up the full monty of equipment. We couldn’t have anyway - it would not all have fitted into the Bedford. The Green Carnation owned to a house PA and Venus Envy were prepared to let us use their amps and speakers, which was jolly decent of them. They even sent one of their roadies to help us load up at the allotment. Jolly decent, I thought.
And they had let us be top of the bill, even though they were already quite famous. More than just jolly decent, I decided. Really, really decent pre-op trannies.
I was so looking forward to the gig.
I was nervous, of course, with the old butterflies in the stomach. But I wasn’t going to let on to the other guys. I would put a brave face on it and set an example. After all, I was the lead singer.
The snow was falling most heavily by the time we had loaded up. And frankly I wasn’t that impressed by Venus Envy’s roadie, who spent most of his time attending to his nails and brushing away imaginary smuts from his white satin trousers. He was very flattering about our stage clothes, though, so I suppose I shouldn’t be too harsh on him.
But, as I say, the snow was falling heavily and the moon was gone, so it was damnedly cold when we set out for that gig. But we were young, and eager and carefree and life was ours for the taking. So the fact that we had to push the van to get it started and Neil fell down and took the left knee out of his jumpsuit and Toby laughed at this and Neil hit him and there was some talk about abandoning the gig and indeed music as a career choice before we had even left the allotments did not bode particularly well for the coming gig.
But that was nothing, and I repeat nothing, in comparison to what was yet to come.
I am not going to waste the reader’s time, or patience, with any more of that ‘if I’d known then what I know now’ kind of toot - you’ve had quite enough of such stuff.
But if I had known, then I would at least have known who to kill and why.
But let me waste no more words at all here.
This is how it happened.
12
Mr Ishmael was awaiting us at the club.
He was in his limo, and as we arrived he signalled the chauffeur to wind down his window so that he could speak to us.
‘What are you doing here?’ were the words that he chose to employ.
‘We’re top of the bill,’ I said, with joy in my voice. ‘But you arranged this, surely.’
Mr Ishmael shook his head and I noticed for the first time that his aftershave smelled like violets. ‘I never booked you,’ he said, rather fiercely. ‘I’m only here because I received a special invite to the club’s opening.’
‘Oh,’ I said, as it seemed appropriate.
‘Well, as you are here, I trust that you will be putting on a memorable performance.’
‘You’re damn tootin’,’ I said, as I had recently heard this phrase and now seemed the golden opportunity to use it. ‘We’re top of the bill - surely you’ve noticed the posters.’
Mr Ishmael shook his head once more, wafting further violet fragrance at my person. ‘I haven’t seen any such posters,’ he said. ‘But go on in now - you’re beginning to look like a snowman.’
And I was, as now the snow was falling fast.
We struggled to hump our gear from the van to the club. And Venus Envy’s roadie didn’t help with this humping at all. He just took off for the bar and we never saw him again.
Now, there is something about humping gear out of a van. Something exciting, something almost mystical. You’re right there, if you know what I mean. And I knew what I meant. And I knew that the other guys in the band would know this, too. It was a camaraderie thing. We were all in this magical thing together.
‘You don’t mind doing this all by yourself, do you?’ said Toby to me. ‘Neil and I want to have a few words with Mr Ishmael.’
‘But—’ said I.
‘There’s something mystical about humping the gear, don’t you think?’ said Toby.
So I humped the gear by myself.
And I must have made a really good job of it, because once in a while I’d peer across at Mr Ishmael’s parked limo and see Toby and Neil and Mr Ishmael quaffing champagne and laughing together. And if one of them caught my eye, they’d grin very broadly and raise their glass and give me the old thumbs-up.
Nice chaps.
But I do have to say that I didn’t think much of The Green Carnation. It was a regular dump. It looked like a derelict building. The door was hanging off its hinges and the electricity appeared to be supplied by a mobile generator.
I cast a dubious eye over these insalubrious surroundings and one of the members of Venus Envy caught me at it.
‘Chic, isn’t it?’ said the he/she. A very thin one, scarcely taller than a dwarf. ‘Post-holocaust chic, it’s called. You wouldn’t believe how much it cost to make it look like this.’
I agreed that I probably wouldn?
??t, then asked where exactly the stage might be.
‘You’re standing on it,’ this Glen/Glenda said. ‘It’s an entirely new concept in concert staging. A “level-header”, it’s called, level with the audience. One day all stages will be like this.’
But I did not agree that they would.
I continued with my humping. And when done, and somewhat breathless, I asked the Venus Envy she-male where exactly the bar was, so I could avail myself of a beer.
‘We don’t have a bar, as such,’ the man-woman told me. ‘If you want a beer you’ll have to go to the pub next door. I think our roadie is in there already. You can buy him a pint for helping you to shift your gear.’
I settled for a glass of water. Or would have done, if there’d been any. So I sighed and shrugged and went off to the toilet. And then the obvious struck me and I went out to Mr Ishmael’s limo, to share in the champagne.
Only to find that Neil and Toby and Mr Ishmael were now entering the club. As they’d run right out of champagne.
‘This is rough,’ said Neil. ‘And when I say rough, I mean it. Let’s make like a ****** and get out of this ruddy hole.’
There was a moment of silence then.
Followed by a longer one, and then a longer one still.
The moon, briefly out, went behind a cloud and a dog howled in the distance.
‘Never,’ said Toby, finding his voice, ‘never, ever say anything as evil and revolting as that again.’
And I agreed with Toby. ‘That was rough,’ I said.
‘Sorry,’ said Neil. ‘I thought I was amongst manly men who would be prepared to share a joke about a ******. But apparently not. Which says so much, doesn’t it?’ And Neil went off to tune his drums. For he was the drummer that week.
I looked at myself and then at Toby and then at Neil.
‘Why did I think,’ I asked Toby, ‘that there were more than just the three of us in this band?’