Wanted But At Large On Tour October-December 1979

Wanted But At Large On Tour October-December 1979

My release from HMP Pentonville in September 1979 fell, as bad luck and worse judgement would have it, on the same day as a fellow junkie I'd been knocking about with inside, and we caught the the old Piccadilly Line Oxo Cube direct from Holloway Road to the front line at Piccadilly Circus. It being not yet nine in the morning, thus no-one having yet collected a prescription that day, we didn't linger in the old Subway 4, then labelled: 'Haymarket & Jermyn Street' and which now comes up in The Trocadero complex, where the action would be later, but headed straight for Hall's Chemists in Shaftesbury Avenue. In the doorway we found —not Marianne Faithful or Eric Clapton, though we could have done at that time — but an old emaciated junkie from the Channel Islands called Robin Le Page, who had been in the 'Ville with us for a fortnight a month or so earlier, having been collared for some unpaid fines. I scored a couple of Physeptone ampoules, not lingering to inject/ingest them in the underground station toilets, but jumping straight back on the Piccadilly Line to Barons Court, where Rat Scabies was living at the time with my mate Kenny Anderson, Kenny's partner Carol, and Rat's soon to be partner Viv. [I am delighted to report that over forty years later, both couples are still together.] I met Kenny when he was roadieing for my friends' Arturo Bassick & Dave Allen's band Pinpoint, but he had recently, or was just about to, defect to work for The Damned. I went to their bathroom and took my 'drug of choice', as it's known in treatment circles, whilst they had a line of speed for breakfast, not unusual in such circles in those days, after which I learned that said Pinpoint were rehearsing that day at Alaska Studios in Waterloo, so off I went to seek out my dear old mucker Arthur (Arturo), who would put me up, at least for the night, having recently made an upwardly mobile move down the District Line from his former run-down garret above the Beggars' Banquet record shop and record company offices in Earl's Court, to Turnham Green and a comparatively palatial ground floor bedsit in Marlborough Crescent, Bedford Park.

Things rapidly went from not too good to bloody dreadful again in my life. I was very soon apprehended shoplifting again, but got bail to stay at my father's flat in Wimbledon. However, I had to sign on daily at Wimbledon Police Station in order to retain the bail. The following Sunday, Rat Scabies invited me out for a drink with two quite classy American girls in Belsize Park. We went out and had a few, then went back to their lovely house. I got on ok with my potential partner, but I don't think I was famous enough for her, so after a good and a late night she put me up in their spare room. She was kind enough to lend me an alarm clock, that being the only way back then, apart from a BT landline alarm call, to get up in the morning, because I was due to report to the police in Wimbledon at 9am. Sadly, and truly, the alarm never went off. When I looked at my watch at 9.30am, knowing it would take me an hour to get there, I realised that there was probably already a warrant out for me, and that it was, to use a bit of villainous vernacular, all on top.

I am quite good at 'thinking on my feet', admittedly at various times bloody stupid thoughts, but this one was as near as I was going to get to a master plan. The night before I had been remanded to HMP Brixton on the 18th June previous, prior to being sentenced, I had played the last night of a Damned tour at the Locarno in Bristol, which was the tour on which they were supported by The Ruts. I had got on very well with all The Ruts, and that night in Bristol I had done a brief rock 'n' roll set with Dave Ruffy from The Ruts on drums and Shanne Bradley from The Nipple Erectors, who had come down with The Damned, on bass. The second week I was in Brixton, Babylon's Burning hit the charts and was banging out of every transistor radio on the wing. The Ruts were now, in early October, a few dates into their first UK headline tour as a proper big band. I didn't know where they were playing that night, but wherever it was, it would be out of town, plus I had an inkling they might even be pleased to see me.

I don't think I had a penny in my pocket, but I jumped the tube to Victoria, thinking wherever The Ruts were on, there would probably be a coach from Victoria Coach Station going there at some point. However, there was no point finding out where until I had some coach fare. So, on alighting from the tube at Victoria, I made straight for Woolworth's, it being nearer than, for example, Peter Jones at Sloane Square, where it's true there would have been some more upmarket shoplifting opportunities. Good old Woolly's yielded up a brace of Black & Decker drills relatively effortlessly, which I promptly offloaded to an Evening News and Standard vendor at one of the station entrances. Yes, London had two evening papers just then, which was what the vendors shouted — not: 'Extra, extra, read all about it!' but: 'NEWS and STANdard, NEWS and STANdard!' Anyway, the nice chappy gave me a tenner each for them, so we were in business. Next stop, WH Smith's on the station to look at the gig listings in the back of the Melody Maker — without buying a copy, of course — and ascertaining that The Ruts were on that night at the University of Nottingham. There was a coach leaving for Nottingham in a couple of hours and  the score I'd obtained for the drills covered the one way coach fare and left some rifle range for a bit of scran. The only niggling doubt was: what if I got there and all they said was: 'Pus! What the fuck are you doing here?' 

I can't recall how I got to or found the campus but, believe it or not kids, once upon a time we could get to and find places without mobile telephones, using such old-fashioned skills as asking people the way. I had to persuade the security to show me the dressing room when I got there, but it wasn't too difficult. When I walked in Manna, The Ruts' roadie, was sitting there alone minding the dressing room, as the boys had either gone back to the hotel or for dinner. I walked in and he duly said: 'Pus! What the fuck are you doing here?' When the band came back with their, and later to be my, manger Andy Dayman, they duly said: 'Pus! What the fuck are you doing here?', but they followed it immediately with: 'Great to see you - do you wanna introduce us?' So I did, and watched their set with Manna from the wings, all the while wondering how it was going to go down when I explained the situation, and asked if I could come back to the hotel and sleep on one of their bedroom floors. However, all was more than well, as when they came off stage they went into a little huddle in the dressing room and then Ruffy, who although Andy was the manager, was often the spokesman and who is an amazing diplomat, not only asked if I'd like to compère and support them on the rest of the tour, which was only a few dates in, but then said they would give me a fiver a night and that most nights there was an odd number of road crew, meaning that I could have a spare bed in one of the twin rooms. Compared to Damned tours, this was like being offered a season in Las Vegas!

I won't bore you with the tour details, as it's all beautifully documented in Roland Link's book on The Ruts, Love In Vain. One gig I do particularly remember though was at The Kinema In Dunfermline, where Segsy sprained his knee jumping from the PA onto the stage. The next morning this was causing him some grief so we took a stroll into town after breakfast, and luckily found, would you believe a surgical appliance shop, I kid you not. Better still, not only did Segs obtain the necessary support bandage, but there was an old-fashioned gentleman's outfitters next door, which had a smashing olive green Trilby hat in the window, which I could both just afford, and was a perfect fit. The postscript to this little tale is that about twenty-seven years later, I was in a local pub in Plymouth, where I live, and got chatting to a Scotsman whilst having a cigarette together in the garden, an expedition we're now used to, but which was still offensive to smokers then. He had on a cool T-shirt advertising an American punk band from Texas, whose name escapes me. I remarked on it, and he replied that they were even better live, so I queried if he'd seen them  in Texas. He replied no, he'd seen them at the previous year's Rebellion, the annual punk festival held in Blackpool, which started in '96. Casually, I mentioned that I'd played at the first Rebellion, which was actually called Holidays In The Sun, and held in Morecambe. Logically, he asked: 'Who are you then?' When I told him him, he jumped and shouted: 'NO!!! I saw you at The Kinema in Dunfermline with The Ruts. You wait till I ring my mates at home and tell them!' which he promptly did. I'll leave the Grin & Bear It tour there, except to say it was a breath of air after The Damned tours, journeys from gig to gig being happy times of exchanging jokes, getting stoned and reading, something I'd never have been able to do with The Damned as one of them would always either set the book on fire, throw it out of the minibus window or, tear the end pages out and do one of those things to them. There were some high jinks with The Ruts — not one but two minibuses ended up in flames, but it was the buses, not me in flames, and it was a welcome change. The tour ended gleefully — I use the word selectively as The Ruts fan club, which I later ran, was called the Glee Club — at Tiffany's in Edinburgh on bonfire night. Andy Dayman treated the band to a flight back to London the next day, whilst him, Manna, and the two brothers, Long Bob and Long Chris who crewed for them, and I went back in the tour minibus. Fuck me, it was a long drive! There'd been a not inconsiderable after party the night before, we hadn't had a hotel as the lads had gone straight to the airport, and I remember Long Bob being so hungover driving he had to pull over and be sick in a couple of lay-bys.

So there I was, back in London, caught between the most devilish of rocks and a deep blue sea that was proper rough — viz I still had nowhere to live, no record deal, and was still on the run. I could either steal, with a touch of begging and borrowing thrown in, for as long as it lasted, or blag my way back onto the imminent Damned tour. I chose the latter as a way of at least stalling the inevitable. Off we jolly well went, and straight away it was back to hell on earth — being made to lie in the 'Pus Pit' of the van i.e. the sliding door well for miles on end, and being generally abused on a daily basis before it even started from the fans. The only redeeming feature was That Algy Ward, the most juvenile and vicious bully of all of them, had left and been replaced on bass by Paul Gray, formerly of Eddie & The Hot Rods, who I'm pleased to see is back playing with The Damned once again. Aside from being a blinding bassist, Paul is an old school rock 'n' roll gentlemen, not averse to the odd spot of hell raising, but a thoroughly decent chap. After a few days of said hell on earth, we pitched up in Brighton on 28th November, which was a Wednesday, to play the Top Rank Suite. I had never been so pleased in all my days to see anyone, as I was to see my old manager and dear friend David Scott burst into the dressing room with his chum, and partner in a car front, Phil Church, and their mate Johnny Nokes after the show. David and Phil had done a bit of promoting a couple of years before, running gigs at Hastings Pier Ballroom, and it was at one of their shows that I had first supported The Damned in July 1977. They had had a few but they still had authority and, to put it bluntly, The Damned were suddenly a whole lot less lairy. We had the Thursday off and the next show was at the Rainbow in Finsbury Park on the Friday. Dear David, when I detailed the hell on earth situation, said why not come back with him and stay in Brighton for a couple of nights, and then he'd drive me up to London on the Friday. Whoop, whoop, things were looking up, and within half an hour, we were safely ensconced in an after hours villains' watering hole locally, the gob was drying on my clothes, and the drink was flowing.

Now, when I first met David Scott in 1975, he was a millionaire with a country pile just outside Burgess Hill, but by then divorce had cost him very dearly and he had had to downgrade to an airy Victorian upstairs flat not far from Brighton town centre. I don't recall what we did on the Thursday; I imagine we got stoned, went out on the lash, and went for something to eat, as standard. Anyway, Johnny Nokes, whilst a semi-successful armed robber, having just done an eight and a five year prison sentence in relatively quick succession, had also downgraded, in terms of criminal activity, and was now doing the same as me for a living, namely hoisting. He was staying in David's flat, which they affectionately termed The West Wing, with his girlfriend, with whom he also 'went out to work'. Both Johnny and David were thus quite down on their luck, for them, and David wasn't even running a motor. This was compared to when I first met him four years earlier, when every time he'd come up from his home town of Brighton to his old stamping ground and my home town of Wimbledon, it would be with a different gang of interesting villains, lunatics, musicians, or sometimes all three, in a different motor — the two that stood out were a canary yellow 5.3 litre Ford Mustang, and a white Rolls Royce like John Lennon's, but minus the flower power insignia.

Coming back to the Friday morning of the Rainbow gig, John and his girlfriend and I woke before David, about 11am. They'd been sleeping on the living room floor, and I on the settee. After a quick cup of splosh and a wash, John announced that he and his girlfriend, who I assumed were coming to London with us, as John loved loud music, drinking and ligging — had to pop out to the bank. Not being entirely stupid, I averred that this meant they were popping out 'to do a bit of work.' About midday, David got up and enquired where they were. I told him what John had said, he raised his eyebrows, we exchanged looks, he sighed, and we sat down to wait. At about 3pm, John and partner never having reappeared and knowing John's 'previous', as one might say, David said to me very slowly, as one would address a child: 'Julian, did John say he was going to the bank, or going to DO the bank?' Come 5pm, with still a no-show from John, David made a couple of calls and got hold of both a motor and the money to fill it up with fuel. It later turned out John had indeed been captured, albeit not for anything very serious, though anything's serious if you're on licence, as John was. Off David and I went to London, getting our kicks on the A23, as you might say. I've got a few kicks on that road, as it goes. Come 7pm, we're in vaguely the right vicinity of North London, but more than a bit lost, not to mention a bit stressed after all the carry-on, and of course there's no London A-Z in the borrowed motor. David, being David, instinctively chose a second-hand car lot to ask the way. It was late but there was still a light on in the office, or portakabin that served as one. Fella comes out the office, walks over to the car, David winds the window down. David says; 'Excuse me, we seem to have lost Finsbury Park.' Fellow looks at him, says: 'Fuck me — David Scott!' They shook hands, he gave us directions and, as we drove away, David explained the guy was an old colleague from his teenage days, when he was dealing cars for his dad in the showrooms on Warren Street, and that this guy too had just finished a long prison sentence.

The actual gig at the Rainbow is also to be found elsewhere in the annals of punk history, so I won't go into much detail. Suffice to say the audience were not only more vicious to me than usual, but generally full of beans all round, which culminated in them tearing the seats up and throwing them on stage. [Why the venue left them in for a Damned show, God knows!] As it happened, it was while The Damned were on, so I was at no risk of serious injury and thought it was bloody brilliant — proper rock 'n' roll, just like Bill Haley, a quarter of a century earlier. After the gig, I think David dropped me at Arthur's in Chiswick or somewhere, and he went home to Brighton. When I turned up for the next gig after that a couple of days later, Captain Sensible said they didn't require my services any more, as I was always too out of it. All I can say is, I can't have been that out of it, or I'd never have remembered all this — and, believe me, I didn't make it up — plus anyone, with or without a drug habit, would have needed some kind of carapace to endure what I did. Anyway, it was getting more and more wintry and quite repetitive, so I wasn't entirely heartbroken. I think I have only ever done two more Damned gigs: the first was at Barrowlands in Glasgow, with the seminal Ruts DC, only a week or so after Malcolm Owen's death, when the atmosphere was amazing, and the Holidays In The Sun festival mentioned earlier.

I only did one more Auntie Pus gig that year, and that was supporting The Ruts at the Top Rank in Cardiff on the 16th December, which was with my band The Men From Uncle featuring Dick Taylor from the Pretty Things, and my old school chum Robin Bibi on lead guitars, Arturo Bassick himself on eponymous basic bass, and his ex-Lurkers colleague Esso on drums. Although, funnily enough, they are both once again in different incarnations of The Lurkers, at the time neither of them was, and it was an ongoing joke that they were 'ex-Lurkers for life'. It was a blinding gig, The Ruts were on fire, and we went down great because it was with a full band, and a bloody good one at that. We went down in Dick's trusty Jean Machine van, which he drove for a day job, and all that ruined the evening was that someone vandalised it and smashed the windscreen, and Dick had to punch a hole in it to drive back up the motorway to London. It was blowing a freezing gale too, but Arthur and I managed to get invited back to The Ruts' hotel to have a drink, kip on the floor, and get a lift home in their bus the following day. I have always felt guilty about this, but probably not guilty enough.