In my Tribe
I’d known Dave for over a decade, we’d first met when hanging out with a group of ‘like-minded’ souls in West-London, shortly after I’d decided that, I also wanted what ‘they’ had/wanted.
Before social media intruded into the anonymity of self-help groups, their very nature was enshrined by the principal of, ‘I can say I was there, but you can’t tell people I was’.
It was rare that you’d know your other ‘fellows’ surnames, introductions at meetings always being made with first names only so a lot of people were awarded, either a prefix or suffix to their christian name for purposes of ‘identification’ and/or gossip.
“Have you seen Dave recently?”
“Which one, Disco Dave, Cosmic Dave or rocknroll Dave?”
Many of the founding members of the ‘tribe’ had names added to their own that might not pass muster these days, but as far as I know, Page 3 Julie had no issues with being referred to as such. ‘Not very well Michelle’ however, might be less pleased of late.
‘Relapse Simon’ may well have earned a rebranding by now as well.
These days, the struggle of people in early days of recovery and even those further down the line, is often ‘shared’ across various platforms, in much the same way as people share photos of their dinner. This is, of course a personal choice and for obvious reasons, I’m often interested in observing people’s resurrections, from despair to wherever it is they’re going next.
I would like to point out however, that I couldn’t be less interested if I tried, in what you’re having for dinner. ‘Nor do I want to play that online game or know what my ‘spirit-animal’ is. Or read those ‘spiritual’ quotes, or join that page about the local plumbing business, or estate agents. I have absolutely no desire to see what you look like with a pair of rabbit’s ears or other mammalian features ‘filtered’ onto your face, or with pretend glasses, or what some social media app wants to show me what I’ll look like when I’m older than I already am, thank you very fucking much. Oh, and if you’re a ‘fella over the age of 25 and you’re on Snapchat or Tik Tok, you’re probably a nonce, ok?
I don’t wish to read about that twat of an ex-partner who you’re now, not going to let see the children you spawned together, because you caught them sending dickpics/titty-pics or photos of their dinner, to a random stranger etc. I’m also unlikely to ‘like’ your page about *checks invites on FB*
1. Time for cheese
2. Your family’s Linen business
3. The local fish and chip shop
4. The ‘famous’ Everton FC.
5. Extreme Running UK
6. Holiday homes to rent in Scarborough.
7. Liam Gallagher fans page.
8. Get healthy in Chelsea.
9. Anything to do with Christianity/Islam or other religious stuff.
Or obviously anything at all that has fat, bald, red-faced racist idiots waving the flag of St George, while pretending to be a modern-day version of the Knights Templar, or other such embarrassing nationalist, Nigel Farage loving, ‘patriot’ pages.
I probably also won’t like your shit indie bands page either, ‘cos I’m a bitter, middle-aged man who’s own musical endeavours are about to be completely ignored again. by many of the gatekeepers of the modern music industry, because, I’m too old apparently.
Or something.
Now, where was I?
Oh yeah, Rocknroll Dave, I phoned him.
Dave is up for it, we’d been sharing a stage together since I’d first proposed to him that ‘we’ could put a band together, consisting entirely of recovering musicians and apply to play at the forthcoming world convention for people who drink bottled water a lot.
“That’s a big gig man, they had ZZ-Top at the last one.”
“Then I think it’s about time, they let the youngsters have a go, don’t you mate?”
Before any of you point out, that to consider myself a youngster, even years ago, at the time when I was hatching my cunning plan to knock three bearded old people off the ‘top’ of the bottled water brigade’s entertainment charts, is a bit of a misnomer, I refer you to the.
“Oh, to be 17 forever” section in one of the previous chapters you’ve already read.
At that particular stage of proceedings, while my liver may have well felt like it was a built during the industrial age, the rest of me, felt as shiny and brand-new as a hipsters MacBook and my emotional capacity was only slightly more developed than a toddler.
Anyway, for all sorts of reasons, the audience demographic of an ex-purse snatchers and bottle-jockeys convention, meant that many of the potential audience were probably of the age that watching a band of 30-something musicians, would be a bit like taking your mum/dad to watch Oasis, they’d probably like it but,
‘they’re not as good as The Clash’, or something like that.
And also, true, obviously.
Dave and I rounded up the troops, as is usually the case in most bands, we went through a few line-up changes before settling into our groove and learning a few Clash songs, as well as the sort of stuff both we and our potential audience would be able to shake their collective jewellery and Zimmer-frames along to.
We had guitarists that were ‘in’ then not ‘in’, due to blown eardrums. Another guitarist that came to one rehearsal but thought being in a ‘recovery’ band was naff and is very sadly now dead, killed by his own addictions. Bassists that were sober, then not so. Drummers who could drum, drummers who couldn’t, at least not in the same time-signature to the songs the rest of us were playing. We had personality clashes, musical differences, cancelled rehearsals, gigs where nobody turned up, gigs in front of an audience that had absolutely no interest in what we were playing and even a gig in front of a room of ‘special-needs’ severely disabled people who had the best time ever. We were called The Should Be Dead’s and we actually played a gig for an audience of recovering addicts at The Dead Sea, I wish I’d made a poster!
An honourable mention therefore to the following who stayed committed to the cause, week in week out as we rehearsed and got our collective chops together in time to play at the retired menace to themselves/society convention, in Barcelona in August 2009.
Paul G (RIP) For letting us rehearse for peanuts at his studio.
Herman S, for assisting in that.
Chula G. Drums
Jason P. Bass
Anna H. Guitar
Bess C. Vocals
Johanna A. Vocals
And everyone else who got involved along the way to help make it happen.
Also, a very personal and heartfelt cosmic shoutout to ‘Aussie Luke and Earl S, (RIP) both of whom were briefly in our ranks, both of whom are now probably playing some highly evolved, tricky chord sequences that only very gifted musicians can play, in the great gig in the sky.
Dave and I, were obviously also onstage that night doing our own, slightly less toxic version of Mick and ‘Keefs ‘glimmer twins.’
We got to Spain, no sign of ZZ-Top anywhere, we opened with Sweet Jane, we closed with Gimmie Shelter. We played The Seeker, LA Woman, Piece of my Heart, Psycho-Killer, Wild Horses, Brass in Pocket, Molly’s Chambers, 7 Nation Army, Like a Rolling Stone, London Calling, and Heroes. I had my own, ‘Jarvis Cocker at Glastonbury ’95 moment with a storming version of Common People too. If memory serves, we got people in the audience, up and dancing, some of them, for possibly the first time since they’d done the brown acid at Woodstock.
We demolished the back-stage rider of bottled water too, it’s only rocknroll, but we all definitely liked it, liked it, yes, we did.
Chapter 25.
Senior Service.
Another ‘recovery’ adage, is the expression, ‘service keeps you clean’ by which ‘we’ mean that if after a lifetime spent ‘taking’ from others, due to your predisposition to ingest dangerous drugs. ‘We’ therefore, strongly advise that doing whatever you can, to help keep the (steel) wheels of recovering going, might prove to be beneficial to all concerned.
Whether that translates into making the tea at a meeting, putting out the chairs, looking after the pennies collected at meetings (and trying to not ‘borrow’ them until your dole-money gets paid) sharing your own experiences in a room full of others, or indeed being in a ‘recovery’ band and entertaining the troops. One of the potential fringe-benefits to such behaviour, is that for some of ‘us’ it allows the development of commitment to the cause and also, in certain situations, is actually quite good ‘training’ for some of the other circumstances you might find yourself in, back in the ‘real’ world. It’s a bit like an ex-smackhead’s, life-skills scheme.
It’s also handy, if, while holding the group, treasury commitment, you decide to have a big fucking use-up, because you’ll have a few quid to score with, until things end up the same way they always do/did and you come crawling back, promising to return the money, but never actually doing so. (Allegedly)
All of which, from the peculiar notion that ‘my’ band could replace the million-selling Texan, bearded, car crash boogie of ZZ Top as the ‘people’s choice’ for sober entertainment, to the minefield of musical differences, conflicting personalities, gigs in empty rooms and occasional moments when all the (street) hassle and general arse-ache of being in a band, seems worth it, meant that being in a ‘naff’ recovery band, was for me at least, the perfect apprenticeship for being in a ‘real’ one.
Rocknroll Dave was up for it and, in keeping with the ongoing stars aligning theme, was also available on the dates that everyone else was, which is useful if you’re going to rehearse before trying to record an album from scratch with a new band.
It was now time to find a bass player, which if you know any bass-players, you’ll understand, is often the difficult bit. I also found a flautist, because if you’re going to record in the studio owned by the drummer from Jethro Tull, it would be rude to not bring one of them along too. Besides, it’s good to have some oestrogen in the mix, it helps curtail the ceaseless ‘knob-banter’ that boys with musical instruments seem to be unable to avoid, unless the flute player is called Lilly, in which case it makes all that stuff worse. Not because the boys stepped up the juvenile jokes, more because she was better at it than them and could swear more enthusiastically than the rest of us put together. And she could also sing and play that flute of hers too.
*cue childish euphemisms about playing her flute. *
“A man asked Satan...
"How can I become the best guitarist in the world?" Satan answered, "Give me your soul." The man was bewildered. "What if I gave you a pound instead?" Satan smiled. "Then I'll make you the best bass player in the world."
There are many such jibes aimed at our four-stringed friends, just as many, if not more for drummers and perhaps the most accurate of all such musical, evidence-based gags is,
“How many lead singers does it take to change a lightbulb?
One, he holds the lightbulb while the rest of the world revolves around him.”
Not that I’d know of course, if I needed a lightbulb changing, I’d get the drummer to do it, it might stop him making that fucking racket for a few minutes at least.
The ‘bottom-end rumble-monkey’, (this is obviously a description thought up by one such ‘monkey’) I asked first, initially agreed then changed his mind, for reasons that are as important as they are also, not. He suggested I ask a friend of his who ‘might’ be up for it, he was a brilliant player and had some recent experience with dealing with someone as annoying as me, a description which, if nothing else allows me to mention Van-Morrison in the same sentence as myself. The funds we had to work with, would be enough to cover the very reasonable expenses/wages already agreed with Matty, Jon and Dave, whether or not I’d have enough to cover the equally remarkable talents of a bassist who’d played with Adele, as well as Northern Irelands most celebrated miserable twat, well if you don’t ask you don’t get eh?
I asked, gave him the back story and the rough demos, sent him the dates and technical specs for the studio and awaited his reply.
His reply was theoretically a yes, but he wanted to know who was engineering and producing the sessions. A very reasonable question which of course I had no answer to because in true ‘me’ style, I hadn’t actually thought that bit through. He suggested that he might know someone who would be perfect for the job, whose CV included a few sessions with the Rolling Stones and assisting/engineering with my old chum, the shorter of the two Gallagher brothers.
That person was of course himself and obviously, this was therefore, an offer I could not refuse, I now had a budget, a band, a studio, a producer/engineer and of course, the other important bit, some songs.
*point of interest*
Musical history is definitely (maybe) littered with people who forgot about that last bit, or who have completely surrounded themselves over the latter years of their career, with the ‘type’ of person who has forgotten how to say, “That’s shite mate”. Which may or may not describe either of the two Gallagher brothers, depending on what satisfies your own musical ears of course.
*Note to self. *
You didn’t want that support slot when Oasis reform anyway did you?
For someone who’d been as well-versed in ‘almost’ throwing his life away as I had previously, it was a pleasant surprise to discover that Matty had not dispatched the old Monkeyman demos into the ‘could have been a contender but it’s going in the bin now’ recycling centre of history. By which I mean, he still had various CD’s with the old songs on. Coupled with the ideas I’d been constructing while on tour with Peter and the ‘Libs, with all the enthusiasm of a juvenile chimp (on speed) brandishing a hammer and nails, I reckoned we had enough material to start rehearsing.
Because I’m so ‘modern’ and in touch with technology, the initial ‘rehearsals’ were just Matty and I, on WhatsApp as we both tried to remember the chord sequences for the old songs, I’d/we’d written over ten years previously.
As for the new songs I’d written?
Some people can write songs some can sing, some people can sing and play guitar/piano/whatever, some can even *sing and play drums. *
*By which I mean Karen Carpenter, not Phil Collins*
Some people can do all of that stuff, Prince/Paul McCartney/Stevie Wonder/P.J. Harvey, and Ed Sheeran.
*One of these people cheats ‘cos they use a little box that does it all for you. *
Some people are wonderful lyricists as well as being able to do all the difficult stuff I’ve just mentioned, they are as rare as a full house at the Etihad stadium, but they do exist.
*Some* people can accidentally hack out interesting chord sequences and occasionally string-together some accompanying words that are a bit ‘better’ than say, rhyming ‘pool with skool’ and they can do this without knowing the name of a single chord they’ve used because actually, that’s often not as important as ‘some’ people who can play guitar standing on their head, while furiously ‘shredding’, would have you believe.
Unless of course you want to be a ‘proper’ musician and join in at jam-sessions in provincial pubs, or round the campfire at a festival and other such awful behaviour. Or try and make a living as a musician obviously.
Or be able to explain to the rest of your band exactly what the fuck that chord is you’re playing and why are you using a capo and so on and so forth.
I realise that the intricacies of much of what I’ve just written, might be lost on anyone reading this who’s not spent enough time around people stupid enough to attempt something as daft as being in a band, but unfortunately, it is an affliction I have always suffered with in the pursuit of trying to ‘join-in’ or perhaps simply find my ‘tribe’.
I would also like to say to Phil Collins and Ed Sheeran that I admire your success and think it’s wonderful that your work has made so many people happy over the years.
Meanwhile, back in the real world, it was time to book a rehearsal studio and get things started.
As ‘one’ gets older, it’s not uncommon to begin to lose certain faculties, or parts thereof as our youthful elasticity morphs into a saggier, state of affairs. A lot of us spend as much time as we get older, trying to avoid the effects of gravity as we once did, trying to swerve reality. If you are of the musical persuasion, or indeed someone who enjoys spending a lot of time with such unfortunates, it’s likely that you’ll lose some of your hearing, whether by being stupid enough to stick your head in the bass bin at a Motorhead gig (I know someone who did that) or simply by continually rehearsing at a volume better suited to dismantling large buildings, than actually allowing the singer to hear him/herself over the din the proper musicians are making.
Of course, the simple solution to this issue would be to “Turn that fucking guitar down so I can hear myself for fucks sake.” Or indeed ask everyone to play at a level better suited to the small room you’re in, as opposed to the stadium ‘some’ of them seem to think they’re in.
Sadly, applying this level of joined-up thinking is wasted on most musicians and anyway, it’s much more fun when your ears start bleeding.
We stopped for a lunchbreak, first day of rehearsals,
“I’m off to the shop anybody want anything?”
“It’s half-past two mate.”
And so on.
Five days later, somewhere in amongst the cacophonous din, the mountain of discarded Red Bull cans, cheap sandwich packets, broken guitar strings and drumsticks, wrapped up in the unique aroma only found in such habitats, we just might have ten songs, and I feel we might be ready to go to Doghouse and press ‘record’. Which is just as well because we’re due there later that day.
Oh, and I’d lost my voice obviously.
Half-past fucking two indeed.
We escaped to the very big house in the country, cars full of instruments, people, most of Mark Neary’s bedroom/studio equipment, more cheap sandwiches, coffee, Red bull, and other assorted detritus that would keep us all fed and watered as we began to make the *greatest debut album by a middle-aged man* of all time. By which I mean, there’s no point going into all this if you’re simply aiming to do cheap facsimile of, Be Here Now**, is there? An album which at time of release was called by Q magazine, ‘Cocaine set to music’ and clearly not something I wanted to aim for at all. Besides there’s more than enough bands doing that already.
**8,000,000+ sales fact fans.
I’ve never watched the Harry Potter films but I think I’m right in saying that at some point there’s a scene where all the assembled new trainee wizards are greeted by the headmaster or whatever it is someone like that is called. They probably had some sort of ‘magic-matron’ to care for their health and well-being, a wand-waving version of Hattie Jacques. I’d also imagine that whoever is in charge of such things, has probably got years of experience in the mildly satanic art of turning people into frogs or whatever it is they do in Harry Potter films, and they must also surely have a beard?
Naturally, I was hoping to be greeted by my old mate ‘Liz Taylor, perhaps with Audrey Hepburn as her sidekick, I was of course not met by either of them, so had to settle for John Bonhams favourite drummer, slightly pissed in a pair of shorts, keen to see if I had, as requested brought the brown envelope of cash required to prize open his own version of Hogwarts. I had, and in the time, it takes to say. ‘Expecto patronum’ (Look it up muggles.) we had the gear unloaded.
Within minutes, we had the sleeping arrangements sorted, I got the single room/captains’ quarters, because I’m a cunt and the captain. Everyone else found a bed in the upstairs dorm bit and because we’re gentlemen we screened off a section for Lilly. Those of a ‘geek’ disposition were soon inspecting the technical aspects of the studio control room, those that drank had cold stuff to drink, those that smoked, were having a smoke and those who did neither of those things anymore were standing by the bank of the river, having a word with whoever or whatever it is that has seen fit to oversee all this, trying not to cry because.
Cue flute and acoustic guitar.
“Higher ground, out in the country, new ideas for tired lives, groups of strangers, sit and shiver, filthy stories about dirty lives, is that my tribe?”
Which is the first line to the first song on *possibly* the greatest debut album by a middle-aged man ever.
*Definitely/Maybe the greatest*
We just had to actually make it of course, a task that would begin under the expert tutelage of Mark Neary and perhaps some of my own input, informed little more than, ‘I’ve been waiting for this moment for 30 years as I’ve sucked up aspects of everything I’ve ever experienced in preparation.’
And some chord sequences that I didn’t know the name of.
I went to bed early, trying to not be too concerned with the lack of enthusiasm my vocal chords were demonstrating, we had a few days before there was any real need for them, aside from asking Mark stupid questions about stuff I had absolutely no idea about, ‘what does this button do? etc. I pondered just how many situations genuinely gave people the opportunity to really experience a ‘waited all my life for this’ moment, I’m sure there are plenty and they come in all sorts of ways, to all sorts of people but as I drifted off, I could hear the sound of laughter coming from those who were still awake outside my window, and fully appreciated, that this was mine and we were good to go.