Month: November 2024

HAVE YOU HEARD THIS ONE? #8

/ Alikivi

How’s it gaan? After sharing stories first posted here in 2018 about the New Wave of British Heavy Metal there’s been a welcome spike in views from Poland, Slovakia and the Netherlands.

NWOBHM has always been popular since the first posts in 2017 which featured Fist, Raven, Mythra, Satan, Hollow Ground and Tygers of Pan Tang, plus stories from Impulse Studio big wig David Woods and producer Steve Thompson who brought the hammer down on seminal recordings on the Neat label. Also posted are stories from Durham’s Guardian Studio, although producer Terry Gavaghan has remained elusive. So far.

While new interviews are being lined up to take the site to the end of 2024, November has featured a compilation of stories from this year – and here’s another batch.

First up is a regular to the site, songwriter & vocalist Emma ‘Velvet Tones of Teesside’ Wilson. Emma first appeared back in 2019 talking about her influences in music…

‘Aretha Now’ and ‘Aretha Sings the Blues’ were both records that shaped my development as a singer. I used to sit for hours listening to the songs on vinyl’.

Emma kick started 2024 being pictured on the cover of Blues Matters magazine featuring her new album ‘Memphis Calling’ recorded in Sam Phillips studio, USA.

‘The studio breathes, it has an immense presence. The live room is awesome, beautifully designed. I let my emotions out on the recording’.

Full story >>> EMMA SINGS THE BLUES – with Emma ‘Velvet Tones of Teesside’ Wilson | ALIKIVI UK : NORTH EAST CULTURE

100 year old actress and entertainer Helen Russell sadly passed away this year. She will be missed. In May, Helen featured on the site looking back at the start of her career.

‘We didn’t have a phone in the house so I’d take calls on the local public telephone box outside to tell me where I was playing that night. Sometimes it meant getting a bus to Newcastle and then catching another to Stanley in County Durham, or Ashington in Northumberland, then heading back after 10pm – all the time humping my guitar and other equipment. I had no helpers.’

‘When guitar groups became popular in the ‘60s I had to stop dancing on stage because of all the leads and wires. That’s when I took up the guitar and later started writing my own songs.’

Full interview >>> TON UP for North East actress and entertainer Helen Russell  | ALIKIVI UK : NORTH EAST CULTURE

Another regular to the site is songwriter and former Neat records producer Steve Thompson, he got in touch in May.

‘I was 24 year old at the time and just quit a waged job to live on fresh air and follow a dream. I was either very brave, very stupid, or both. I quickly began knocking out songs and pitching them all over the place. I knew I needed some action or I was going to starve’.

‘One day I was at the dentist in Wallsend. I’d been called upstairs to the surgery when the receptionist called me back down. It was my publisher on the phone they tracked me down to tell me ‘Hurry Home just entered the charts at 63’. You could’ve knocked me down with a feather, that was the break I was looking for’.

‘From there on in incredible things happened it climbed the charts over a period of three months and peaked at 17. Here I am top 20, I had arrived! Then all sorts of things started to happen, the lyrics were printed in pop magazine Smash Hits, all the airplay on Radio One, name checks from DJ Mike Read on the Breakfast show, and of course Top of the Pops. All this was happening but I was still broke’.

Full interview >>> I WILL GO BACK– with songwriter & former Neat records producer Steve Thompson | ALIKIVI UK : NORTH EAST CULTURE

In February former entertainer Peter Embleton recalled his time in clubland.

‘I had a marvellous time working the North East, the greatest training ground for anyone, my job was to put on a show not just be a singer of songs’.

‘As well as all over the North East I worked in Australia and the cruise lines, I was voted male vocalist of the year twice in the ‘80s in the National Club Mirror awards’.

‘I look at some of the talent now and feel sorry that they never experienced the Saturday night atmosphere of say the King Street club in North Shields. The club full at 7pm, great musicians to play for you led by the inimitable Micky Watson, what a buzz.’

‘Yes of course there were poor nights when it didn’t all go according to plan, but hey the good times by far outweighed the bad times. I feel lucky to have experienced the golden age of clubland, there were some brilliant acts and musicians’.

Full interview >>> GOLDEN AGE OF CLUBLAND with entertainer, Peter Embleton. | ALIKIVI UK : NORTH EAST CULTURE

Got a story to add to the site? Just get in touch >>>

Contact | ALIKIVI UK : NORTH EAST CULTURE

Full list of hundreds of interviews >>>

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Alikivi   November 2024

HAVE YOU HEARD THIS ONE? #7

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How’s the stats so far this year? Numbers from the UK and USA with regular hits from the European block of Spain, Italy and Germany plus a sudden spike from Ireland.

So, it’s big thanks to readers taking the total views over 410,000 since knocking out the first post in February 2017 which was an interview with one of the original New Wave of British Heavy Metal bands Mythra.

This post features another batch of North East stories from this year with links to the full interviews at the end. First up are Hartlepool based VaingloriousUK who got in touch in July.

‘We began seeking out, tidying up and uploading historic – and sometimes hysterical – video footage of music associated with the North East. The VainGloriousUK channel currently has up to 170 videos uploaded’.

‘One of these was the appearance of Brian Johnson’s first group Geordie. Recently we learned that our copy appears to be the only one still in existence when we were contacted about it being used in a forthcoming documentary about Brian’.

‘Most musicians are flattered that we care so much about their music, some are a bit wary about how their historical musical legacy may now be viewed – what you thought was important at 16 is not the same when you are 66!’

Full interview >  NORTH EAST MUSIC & VIDEO with Hartlepool based VainGloriousUK | ALIKIVI UK : NORTH EAST CULTURE

North Tyneside Actor & Theatre Producer Alison Stanley got in touch and talked about her latest project ‘Tits Up’.

‘A couple of years ago a young friend of mine was diagnosed with breast cancer, people think it’s older people who develop this disease, so I wanted to raise awareness of this’.

‘Last year I found a lump and experienced the process of going to the breast clinic. Fortunately, my lump wasn’t anything of concern but it did make me think’.

‘Even though I was fine I began questioning my own mortality and spent nights wondering what would happen if I had cancer? What would’ve happened to my son who is autistic?’

‘I went along to Live Well with Cancer in North Shields where the ladies were kind enough to share their stories with me.’

Full interview >  TITS UP – New play from Alison Stanley | ALIKIVI UK : NORTH EAST CULTURE

In June we had a severe Heed Case – musicians Newts Newton (ex Angelic Upstarts guitarist) and Si Cadelik (Northumbrian Psych rock bassist) filled yer in about their new album.

‘The new album explores gaslighting, narcissism and entitlement. All three elements feature heavily in populism and identity politics. Social media allows this to flourish, elbowing aside balance, objectivity and critical thinking. This emboldens extremists and those who seek to radicalise people with their brand of hateful rhetoric’.

‘Rather than tackle the causes of problems, the trend is to scapegoat. This should be a worry and concern for everyone, not just two people in a band. One day, that scapegoat might be you!’

‘We’ve been involved in music since our late teens, so that’s approximately 40 years and counting. In some ways it feels like forever, in others, like only yesterday’.

Full interview > HEED CASE release debut album ‘All the Rage’ | ALIKIVI UK : NORTH EAST CULTURE

In July playwright Tom Kelly talked about writing a number of musicals including the work of Tyne Dock born author Catherine Cookson.

‘Tom & Catherine had its premier at South Shields Customs House, it was really exciting. All the team were really nervous on the opening night but when the overture began, we all felt it was going to be a success. And it was. It had a ‘sold out’ run. A measure of its success was that me mam wanted to go every night! And she was not a theatre-goer. She loved ‘Tom & Catherine.’

‘The play was first produced in 1999, and again 2001. In 2006 there was an outdoor performance at Bents Park, South Shields in which Jade Thirlwall (Little Mix) appeared, and most recently in 2019’.

Full interview > WALKING MY STREETS – New Poetry and Prose collection from Jarrow born Tom Kelly. | ALIKIVI UK : NORTH EAST CULTURE

Got a story to add to the site? Just get in touch .

Contact | ALIKIVI UK : NORTH EAST CULTURE

Full list of hundreds of interviews >

About | ALIKIVI UK : NORTH EAST CULTURE

Alikivi   November 2024 

HAVE YOU HEARD THIS ONE? #6

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Following on from the last post here’s another batch of North East stories this time featuring music, books, TV, boxing and the police. First up is former White Heat & Loud Guitars frontman Bob Smeaton.

‘If you asked me to list what gave me the biggest buzz I would say playing live top of the list, writing songs in second and recording in third. One thing I did learn is that playing songs live and recording them in a studio are two different animals’.

‘I love performing in front of an audience and felt that I was a much better frontman than I was a singer, so studio work for me back in the early days was not always an enjoyable experience. Also, the vocals were always done last, so the rest of the band were able to relax and the pressure was on me to deliver’.

‘What did I do after White Heat and Loud Guitars split? I pretty much stopped performing gigs as my career went down a different path’.

Full interview > ANOTHER JOURNEY UP THE RIVER – New album from ex White Heat frontman Bob Smeaton | ALIKIVI UK : NORTH EAST CULTURE

In August award-winning author & freelance journalist Terry Wilkinson talked about his new book…

‘At midnight on 3 May 1941, the factory and Head Office of Wilkinson’s Mineral Water Manufacturers in North Shields was hit by a single German bomb. It went through the roof, descending through all three floors, taking all the heavy bottling machinery and chemicals down to the basement – which was in use as a public air raid shelter. 107 died, 43 of which were children. Whole families were wiped out.’

‘Nothing is known of the identity of the plane which dropped the bomb – type, squadron, mission etc – as German records were mostly destroyed in the closing stages of the war’.

‘I wanted to write a story that answered all these questions and create a fictional alternative. Having said that, nobody could say with any conviction this is not what happened’.

Full interview > STORIES OF WAR – with award-winning author & freelance journalist Terry Wilkinson | ALIKIVI UK : NORTH EAST CULTURE

Also in August former boxer Terry Patterson remembers his time boxing in the North East…

‘Over the years I fought a few Sunderland lads. Derek Nelson was a classy boxer who turned pro. I fought two ABA finalists in Gordon Pedro Philips and Willie Neil. I fought Pedro in the North Eastern Counties final but lost. Both lads were well schooled’.

‘Willie Neil’s coach asked if I’d fight him because his opponent hadn’t turned up. I weighed in at 10st 6lbs (welterweight), he was heavier than me by 6lbs. I knew his reputation for knocking people out. £50 was slipped into my hand for taking the fight’.

‘Willie could bang a bit – so could I – but he had me down three times during our bout. We set about each other unleashing all hell for three fierce rounds. I had him going at one point after landing a good left hook but the bell sounded and my chance to finish him had gone’.

‘Gordon and Willie are still good to this day – it’s been 36 years since we shared a ring but I see them at boxing dinners and club reunions’.

Full interview > KNOCKOUT with former boxer Terry Patterson | ALIKIVI UK : NORTH EAST CULTURE

Former police detective & writer Arthur McKenzie talked about his work…

‘There was a police section house near Newcastle’s Exhibition Park, in it was a bait room, just a pokey little room with a table to play cards on. If you’re on night shift you’d take sandwiches and a flask of tea in. That’s where you gathered around 1am where the events of the night would unfold’.

‘You would get advice on how to deal with someone, it was a good place to sort things out like the older cops would tell you how to deal with a death, how to deliver a death message to the unfortunate family. It was a sort of meeting of minds over a game of cards. Aye the bait room was a good place to vent your spleen so to speak’.

‘So, I went away and wrote about the bait room. Tom Hadaway (writer for episodes When the Boat Comes In) read the play and was laughing at it ‘Yeah, you know how to write dialogue son’. He gave me pointers, when I finished it landed on two desks. One was the BBC in Manchester where it ended up on the Saturday Night Theatre radio show, which was a big thing’.

‘The other was the script reader for David Puttnam (producer Chariots of Fire, Local Hero, Midnight Express) who hated it at first but won her round in the end. She said she couldn’t do anything with it but put me in touch with an agent who was looking for writers for a tv show called The Bill. That’s where the writing started’.

Full interview > COP ON THE TYNE – in conversation with ex police detective & writer Arthur McKenzie | ALIKIVI UK : NORTH EAST CULTURE

TV actor & musician Michael McNally got in touch and talked about his time in ground breaking BBC TV drama The Cops…

‘I’d watched the first two series and it was my favourite programme on TV. When I started watching it, I thought it was a fly on the wall documentary it took me 10 minutes before I realised it was a drama. I was totally hooked’.

‘One of my first scenes was I was sat in a police van at 11pm on a Friday night on Bolton High Street. The general public were walking up and down the street they knew nothing of this, it wasn’t a closed set like on some programmes and we had to go and arrest someone’.

‘Two actors were having a fight then we got the message to go, so on with the blue flashing lights, we pulled up and jumped out of the van. Some people were trying to defend the actors and some were encouraging us to get in there and sort it out’.

‘We didn’t know where the cameras were we just heard someone say stop. We got back in the van, re-set and done the scene about four or five times’.

‘Same happened when responding to a fight in a bar, we had to pull people out and the general public in the bar didn’t know what was going on. There was an element of choreography for the fight, we didn’t want anyone to get hurt’.

‘After that first night the cast got together afterwards for some pub grub and a karaoke. Most of us were unknown actors so mixed in with the general public without any hassle. Every member of the cast got up and sang, mine was Should I Stay or Should I Go by The Clash – it was a really good night’.

Full interview > THE COPS with TV actor & musician Michael McNally | ALIKIVI UK : NORTH EAST CULTURE

Got a story to add to the site? Just get in touch.

Full list of hundreds of interviews >

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Alikivi   November 2024

HAVE YOU HEARD THIS ONE? #5

/ Alikivi

Since starting in February 2017 hundreds of stories have been posted on this site. The last few months has seen a mix from the navy, radio, folk singers and a magician. Here’s a taste.

First up is Tyneside comedian & magician Robert Reed…

‘Being an outcast gave me more time to focus on myself, to perfect my act. I’m glad I never fitted in at school, cos this has worked out well for me in the long run’.

‘A person to take me under his wing was a teacher called Mr Obee at St Joseph’s. Every break time we would talk about magic and jokes, he would loan me magic books, then he would show me a different trick each time which I would perform for the other kids’.

‘His motto was ‘work hard and be nice’ which I’ve always followed. It was helpful propaganda about putting the hard work in. He told me that every hour you aren’t working on your dream someone else out there is’.

‘I stopped sleeping 8 hours a day and cut it to 6 so I could get extra hours at work. It became all about maximising the time I could work it out. I became obsessed with it, it’s the most important thing in my life – I want to be entertaining people’.

Full interview > READ ALL ABOUT IT – in conversation with Tyneside comedian & magician Robert Reed | ALIKIVI UK : NORTH EAST CULTURE

Northumberland Radio presenter Keith Newman talked about his passion for music…

‘The show not only gives me the chance to play the music I love but to meet my heroes. The one that got me really nervous was with Marky Ramone. I first saw the Ramones in 1980 at Newcastle City Hall and bought the t-shirt from the gig which I never took off’.

‘Next day I was going to a corner shop to get me ma’s tabs – yep we could in those days – and I could see a coach outside. As I got near it pulled away. I went in the shop and the assistant said ‘eeh see those lads on your t-shirt – they’ve just been in here. They were Americans asking for milk and cookies’. I couldn’t believe it I ran outside but the coach was away up the street’.

‘For years I wondered if it really was them so when I talked to Marky I asked him about it and he told me Johnny Ramone had OCD and after every gig he had to have milk and cookies’.

Full interview >  HEY HO LETS GO RADIO – in conversation with radio presenter Keith Newman | ALIKIVI UK : NORTH EAST CULTURE

Another story came from Tyneside based Karen Taylor who remembers her time in the Royal Navy…

’The Falklands war was on when I was based at HMS Vernon in Portsmouth in 1982. I remember when the first ship was hit on 4th May. We were in a disco and everybody was up dancing when the music suddenly stopped and an announcement was made’.

‘I knew one of the chef’s whose ship was one of the first hit and sunk. He told me afterwards they were getting in the lifeboat and someone shouted ‘that’s typical, it was a really good scran tonight’. The Navy use humour to get out of any situation’.

‘The fact of not knowing who was alive or dead brought on a lot of mental health problems after that war. It must have been really scary what they went through’.

Full interview > IN THE NAVY – in conversation with former WREN Karen Taylor | ALIKIVI UK : NORTH EAST CULTURE

This from Wearside folk song collector Eileen Richardson…

‘The first song I found was The Old Wife’s Lament to the Keel Men of the Wear and it was all around historical events about the keel men and it was written in dialect. That set me on the road to researching the history that went with the song’.

‘There a lot of songs about death and tragedy, mining disasters and shipwrecks but there are songs that tell light hearted stories. The Durham Militia pokes fun at things, it’s like the 1800s version of Dad’s Army, with lyrics like ‘You’ll march away like heroes – just to make the lasses stare’ and suggesting that the only battles they will fight will be in the pub’.

Full interview > FOLK GATHERING in conversation with Wearside folk song collector Eileen Richardson | ALIKIVI UK : NORTH EAST CULTURE

Tyneside songwriter Rosie Anderson dropped in to tell a few stories. Here’s one…

‘I can’t just decide to sit down and write a song – some people do and I applaud them for the discipline but I have to wait until they come’.

‘When I was a kid I lived at Chapel House Estate in the west end of Newcastle. One night me, my mother and a friend went for a walk. This woman came out of her house in her dressing gown, she wasn’t in control of herself, didn’t know what time or day it was. I had never seen that behaviour in an adult before. Now I believe she was having a nervous breakdown’.

‘That always stayed in my head and another one was about 30 years ago I went on a blind date in Newcastle with this very nice bloke. He said I need to tell you something before we go any further… ‘When I was working in Canada I had a nervous breakdown in the car park of a Burger King’. It was hard to concentrate on anything else after that’.

‘But I remembered those incidents and those people are lodged in my heart for their own traumas. They gave me the song’.

Full interview >  LISTEN TO YOUR HEART in conversation with Tyneside songwriter Rosie Anderson | ALIKIVI UK : NORTH EAST CULTURE

Tyneside storyteller & folk singer Tony Wilson talked being a professional musician and how far it’s taken him…

‘Around 2009 I got an email. The message was ‘would you like to tell stories in Argentina?’ I wasn’t sure it was kosher at first but I received a phone call a few weeks later confirming it was. I was given contacts of previous storytellers who recommended it’.

‘Me and my wife went out and ended up over the years going to about 15 countries for six weeks at a time. They were international schools where the kids had already learnt English but mostly from American cartoon shows and they wanted them to hear colloquial language, more English. With my accent, I knew I would have to speak a bit slower – and there’s nothing worse than a posh Geordie!’

‘To accompany the lessons it was helpful to use British sign language or borrow a guitar. I always took a banjo with me as it was such a different instrument for them to hear. Once the banjo was broken en-route but we found the only banjo repairman in Bogota in Colombia’.

‘We’ve been to Uruguay, China, South Korea, all over – loved it. Sometimes I look back and think how did that happen – you’ve got to seize every opportunity’.

Full interview > BANJO IN BOGOTA – in conversation with Tyneside storyteller & folk musician Tony Wilson | ALIKIVI UK : NORTH EAST CULTURE

Got a story to add to the site? Just get in touch.

Full list of hundreds of interviews >

About | ALIKIVI UK : NORTH EAST CULTURE

Alikivi   November 2024