From his home in Germany, singer & songwriter Vincent Edwards has been looking back at his 1970’s chart pop singles. Recent posts have featured stories behind Right Back Where We Started From, Love Hit Me and Run for the Sun.
European audiences have been kind to Edwards with many re-releases of his records in Belgium, Italy and Germany.
Edwards was born and brought up in the seaside town of South Shields in the North East of England.
After hearing Sam Cooke on the radio, he knew what he wanted to do with his life and went for an audition at a youth club to be a singer.
I was in a band called The Invictors, who were a Shields band, and they evolved into The Answers where I played drums and was singer. We played a lot of soul and blues, our lead guitarist Tony Hill wrote the songs.
We learnt our trade working on American military bases in France, that was around ’63 to ’66. We played a lot around the UK including London and getting over to Paris, plus Shields of course.
We were living in London and recorded two records for Columbia records in the UK. Just a Fear was recorded at Central Studios in London, it was heavily played on the pirate stations in 1966.
The second single That’s What You’re Doing to Me, was recorded in a studio in Putney, South London. It’s a bit softer than the first and again it was played a lot on pirate radio.
We recorded both in three hours including the b sides. Our record producer was Jimmy Duncan, the brother of late singer Leslie Duncan.
Stockton born Leslie Duncan’s most notable work was during the 1970’s when she performed backing vocals or wrote songs for musicians including Elton John, Dusty Springfield, Scott Walker and Pink Floyd. The next post will look at the music career of Duncan more closely.
At the time we were managed by Tony Stratton-Smith who was also looking after The Kubers and Creation. As for promotion I can’t remember any TV then, that came later.
A former sports journalist, Tony Stratton-Smith is best known as founder of independent label Charisma Records in 1969. He released records by The Nice, Lindisfarne, Genesis, and Monty Python’s comedy albums.
Vincent Edwards.
Eventually we drifted apart but stayed good friends. Tony is living in south London playing in a band called Friction. Our bass player Bob Calder who became sound engineer for the musical Hair, sadly he’s passed away.
I’ve lost touch with Ron our second guitarist. I’m still writing and a track I wrote, Soul Train, you never know somebody might record it.
‘Just a Fear’ (link below) has been called a ‘bona fide freakbeat classic with incisive, driving raga-like fretwork from Tony Hill, it’s a dance floor stomper, pounding drums and frenetic finish with soulful vocals from Vincent Edwards’.
Over a steaming hot curry Vincent Edwards recalls his days back in South Shields nipping along Ocean Road to get fish and chips at Colmans.
Yes I really miss them, I was brought up nearby in Shortridge Street and used to play in the Marine Park and the beach.
Edwards featured in August 2020 talking about his music career and living in Germany. In the last post he added another story about his European chart single Run to the Sun.
In this post he talks about another European chart hit – Love Hit Me, and its extra life with British soul singer Maxine Nightingale.
I wrote the song in 1975 in London for my beautiful late wife Angel Uschi when we lived there. It was recorded and produced at Pye Studios in London.
Later I sent it over to Maxine Nightingale who I shared a stage within the musical Hair, she also sang my top UK hit Right Back Where We StartedFrom and done a great job. Again, she recorded a great version of Love Hit Me for release in America.
It was out in ’76 and charted all over Europe. There was a load of promo slots on TV shows in the UK and around Europe where I had hits in most countries as did darling Maxine.
In 1977, with a Top of the Pops appearance, Maxine took the song to #11 in the UK charts. It was also released in Ireland, Belgium, Germany, Canada, USA, Australia and New Zealand.
The video (link below) of the live TV appearance was a few years ago in Ostend, Belgium, I think it was number one at the time. Paul Young was also on the show, we had a few beers after.
Durham band Lowfeye deliver a mix of Stooges, Dusty Springfield and Velvet Underground – the deadly duo don’t write songs they make potions.
Their first album Pow oozed creative energy, new album Poor Little Rich Girl has fired up more toxic tunes – vocalist/songwriter Carol Nichol set’s the record straight…and hits play.
Basically, I’m a melody nut, the songs I write are usually written on acoustic guitar or piano and my melodies determine the style of music. The songs evolve from experimenting with sounds and different styles.
I then paint the story visually with words but being dyslexic I can’t always read my lyrics (laughs).
The arrangements are then brought together by Alan Rowland who is a self-taught multi-talented instrumentalist. Using basic equipment, the recordings and production are all done at our home.
We’ve created a really diverse DIY album featuring everything from dark folk, post punk, heavy pop, cinematic, to metal, psyche and garage rock.
POOR LITTLE RICH GIRL
The title of the album is taken from the song of the same name. It’s a dig at the music world dominated by middle class artists, with lines like ‘And your daddy buys the world that I can’t feel, as you float in silver bubbles and your world is not a struggle, you’re not real’.
Being working class and juggling jobs to find free time to create independently as well as fund it, is a struggle, it’s very different to artists who go to Brit school and have money and privilege to pay others to create, produce, record and fund tours. It’s all manufactured.
They pay their way into the industry without actually creating anything themselves. Then we are banged over the head with songs with no meaning singing about sunshine and utopia.
GASOLINE
The album opens with Gasoline. A murder ballad I wrote in contrast to the typical run of the mill love songs. Their fate meets a dramatic end, swilled down with gasoline and blown to smithereens.
GUN
The track Gun was based on characters from TV series Peaky Blinders and one of the main cast from the show saw potential in the track, but as we are unknowns it wasn’t used.
EMILY’S TREE
Emily’s Tree the second murder ballad is about a haunting, a ghost of a child tormenting the killer. In this dark period folk track it draws you in but at the end of the track the landscape leads into the heavy track Raw which was written by Alan and features our friend Neil Tunstall on bass putting some heavy bass on with roaring backing vocals which work great.
VERTIGO
A Lowfeye album wouldn’t be complete without a post punk track and Vertigo is it. The tapestry of my life has the art and music of Bowie in everything so this track is about a feeling I had when he died.
I had a feeling of losing balance and looking down on the world with dread, thinking this isn’t real. A Bowie riff is played in the end of the song as a tribute.
STAY
Stay is a personal haunting ballad I wrote, with the loss of my father very young, the line I use ‘savage silence’ was written by my mother who wrote a poem after his death. Her poem was published under her maiden name Elsa Bunting, a distant relation to Basil Bunting the poet.
SNOWFLAKE GENERATION
A bit like Beautiful World the last song on previous album Pow, we close out with a critical song – Snow Flake Generation. It’s a criticism of the now, the 21st century snowflake in the times of political correctness.
A world that hammers out any opinions and free speech. A world where we are spoon-fed what the media want you to read and hear.
You had Richard Hell (Television/The Heartbreakers) singing about a Blank Generation well we are singing about a snowflake generation who think they have it so hard and get offended very easily, this begins to silence people from voicing their opinion and squashing healthy debate.
What I can see in the future is the music industry ticking boxes so not to offend anyone, and real DIY bands who have a voice, getting it hammered out on radio – yet they sell out their gigs.
So our track Snowflake Generation wasn’t going to be played on BBC Introducing, because you’re not allowed to swear and we do in this track. We were not prepared to take swearing out as it’s real and from the heart.
NORDIC TUNE
We are both into ‘60s and ‘70s music with the old analogue sounds and mellotron. I am also a big film lover of soundtracks from that period.
When we finished the album, I’d written the Ennio Morricone (The Good, the Bad & the Ugly, Once Upon a Time in America) style track Vaquero. It was picked up by a Swedish record label who wanted to publish it and sync it in the Warner Brothers Swedish drama, Partisan, in August 2020.
The track was featured heavily around the main actor Fare Fares and won best at Cannes – serious. We took the track off the running list for the album as its now signed to the Swedish label who manage it.
The drama has been played on TV screens across Europe, Australia, the Nordics and is going to America. They are hoping it comes to the UK.
NEXT UP FOR LOWFEYE
We have no plans of going out live as Lowfeye yet – but never say never. At the moment we are concentrating on soundtracks for Europe, as well as a third Lowfeye DIY album, it will be full of different styles of music both intimate and widescreen, also some very critical of the times we live in.
Lowfeye do it for the love of music, we are not in a box. For even one person to get what we are about is great for us and drives us on as independent DIY artists.
The album on CD is available from Lowfeye/Carol Nichol via Facebook or email cnichol66@btinternet.com at £7 including p&p.
In the fourth and final part part of an interview with Teesside based Thompson, he talks about MCA records, Pete Waterman and mainstream success.
SELL RECORDS, SHIFT UNITS
I was working in several different genres, but I still had a healthy grounding in rock. In 1981 I came up with a little slushy ballad which didn’t fit the NEAT stuff although I played it to Dave Wood and he said uh it’s ok.
So, I was determined my future lay elsewhere. Within six month it was a Top 20 hit for a band called Wavelength, it was Hurry Home and it was in the charts for three month.
At roughly the same time the Tygers put out Paris by Air which was a minor hit, so I had some credibility on both sides of the coin. My publishing was with Neon and I had a hit with Sheena Easton on her Madness, Money and Music album which went Top 20.
Celine Dion also recorded the Sheena Easton song in French. It was a hit single in Canada going Gold. The album sold 400,000 units in Canada and 700,000 units in France.
Lorraine Crosby
One day I got a call from a management company who said they had just signed a young guy who wanted to come and work with me on some tracks. ‘No mate, I’m not into that’.
They said, ‘we’ll pay you’ and quick as a flash I said ‘cool, send him round this afternoon’. The young guy was Stu Emerson.
I told Stu I was looking for a good female vocalist and he introduced me to Lorraine Crosby who went on to sing with Meatloaf on one of his hit singles. I recorded loads of tracks with Lorraine.
She recorded all the backing vocals on some stuff I was recording with a guy called Pete Adshead. Pete’s management company had sent him up from London to work with me in Whitley Bay.
When the stuff started to get released Pete changed his name to Baby Ford. I had a couple of hits with him in the style of Acid House and one of them Chiki Chiki Ah Ah earned a BBC ban. I’m very proud of that.
HOLLYWOOD NEED SOMETHING SNAPPY
On quitting NEAT Records as producer I had a shed load of releases as a writer.In the early ‘80s I was signed to MCA Music as a songwriter.
One day I got a call from my mentor there, Pete Waterman. Pete said there was a big-shot movie producer in town, and I was urgently needed in London to meet up with him.
So the next day I flew down and arrived in Pete’s office around midday. Pete introduced me to an American guy who’s name now escapes me. He was one of the producers of the movie Jaws 3D which was nearing completion.
Anyway, this guy treated me to the story of his wonderful new movie and told me all it needs is a killer song. Apparently it’s a ‘boy meets girl, boy loses girl, boy gets girl’ theme.
Except in this case there are no boys and girls involved, the lovers in question are dolphins. He says they have Barbara Streisand lined up to sing this yet to be written song.
Pete has put me in the frame to write the lyrics and makes his office available to conduct my work. Pete and the American guy went off to lunch saying they will check my progress on their return.
As they were leaving the American called back over his shoulder ‘Hey kid, gimme a lurve song for two dolphins’.
Alone in the office I slid the cassette into the machine. Shit!! How on earth could I turn this orchestral pomp into a song. Still I had been charged with the task, so I had to try. I spent the next two hours racking my brain and writing one liners and drawing doodles.
SINK OR SWIM
The guys arrived back and the American says ‘OK kid, whaddyah got?’ I said ‘not much’ and passed over the piece of paper and waited to be well and truly spanked.
Pete – ever the bullshitter, went into overdrive. ‘What did I tell you about my boy, F***ing brilliant, just look at this, sink or swim, I will follow him, that’s a killer line’.
It was just about the only line but Pete was leaving no room for contradiction. He was already on the phone booking a studio for that evening.
Then he dashed out of the office and grabbed another MCA staff writer who had a good singing voice. This hapless guy was named Simon Jeffries and he was going to have to sing this crap.
Like me, Simon was not going to say no to the guy responsible for signing his yearly salary cheque – a publisher’s advance.
I was therefore obliged to spend the rest of the day making words fit to soaring violins and trumpets. The pain of this was nothing compared to the recording session that evening. I think we nearly killed the poor vocalist.
Unsurprisingly, I never heard another thing about my entry into the world of movie themes and as it happens, I never saw Simon again either.
In the third part of Steve Thompson’s story he is working at Impulse studio/NEAT records and recording with Tygers of Pan Tang.
FIRST OUT THE BLOCKS
They had no sophistication then but I guess they made up for that with raw energy. I was looking at this from a songwriter’s perspective and suggested they shorten intro’s and reduce repetition of dead wood and get to the hooks quicker.
I mixed the tracks and worked on the drum sound and a few other bits and pieces, we got it ready and the A side of their first single was Don’t Touch Me There. We put it out and it started to really sell.
MCA got interested so they picked it up, re-released it and went on to do their first album.
I was also signed to MCA in their stable of writers and my mentor was Pete Waterman, he was crackers. It was Pete who suggested the Tygers should do Love Potion No 9 as a single. Great idea.
At that time I was sharing a rented flat in Whitley Bay with the band, it’s a sitcom waiting to be written. Bizarrely the original Tygers vocalist Jess Cox and his replacement Jon Deverill both lived at the flat. Lead guitarist John Sykes lived there as well.
So, I would go off to Impulse studio in the mornings and John would stay in the house playing guitar constantly.
FOR THE RECORD
When I’d come back from the studio he’d still be playing. He was a really friendly guy and he’d ask what I’d been doing that day and sometimes I’d have rough mixes and play him stuff.
That particular day Tygers bass player Rocky Laws was there, and I played them Paris by Air and Rocky loved it, the song stayed with him a few years.
Coming up to start recording their fourth album The Cage, there’d been a few changes in the Tygers camp and that made a big dent in the song writing team. Jon Deverill was already in, and Fred Purser from Penetration was brought in to replace John Sykes.
The band were looking for some songs and Rocky suggested we should do the track I’d played to them a few year ago called Paris By Air. OK I said I’ll re-write the lyric as it was originally for a female.
I also played a brand new song called Lonely at the Top to their managers. It was unfinished and I played it on acoustic guitar, stamping my feet and vocally trying to make noise that indicated how it would become a loud rock song.
They asked me to make a full demo and I did. It was also selected for the album.
I also asked the Tygers management if anyone wants to come along to my new gaff in Tynemouth for co-writes. Jon Deverill said yes so we knocked off a few tunes. Letter to L.A. was put together using a Casio synthesiser played through a fuzzbox.
That song was just prior to them going into the studio so it really was down to the wire with unfinished lyrics.
DEADLINES
They were in the studio when I got a call from Jon Deverill, he said in his lovely little Welsh accent ‘I’m having a bit difficulty with these lyrics’. I said ‘ok what you got’.
Well, it turned out he didn’t have much at all. I said I’ll put some lyrics together, how long you got ?
‘Oh well, we’re having a little break then I’m going in the studio to sing it in 20 minutes’. So phoning in a second verse in double quick time was challenging.
The Cage was a success but sadly the band broke up. I don’t know why, maybe some of the guys thought we had been a touch too much in the commercial arena.
OLD FRIENDS, NEW SONGS
After that I started working with Jon Deverill on a solo album. To begin with I was using a little porta studio but decided to go large with an eight track demo studio in my new house in Whitley Bay.
I met up with John Sykes again when we used his studio to record the album. He had this huge place in the middle of a housing estate in Blackpool, where he was originally from.
So, when we were there he popped in and met everyone. I co-wrote all the songs on that album with Jon Deverill.
TOKYO CALLING
WhenJohn Sykes was touring Japan with Whitesnake we got a call from him saying the Tygers are huge in Japan why not get out here and tour.
Well at the same time we were about to get a record deal from Music for Nations, so we decided to make this the fifth Tygers album, rather than a Deverill solo album.
Because it was going to be a Tygers album we needed another Tyger to validate the band, who wants to see a band with no original members ?
So original drummer Brian Dick came back in, there was Jon, and on guitar was a guy brought in called Neil Sheppard. I was asked to play keyboards.
I didn’t tour with them but we did a live TV rock show called ECT, Gary Moore and Robin George were also on – I was heavily disguised.
In the second part of an interview with Teesside based songwriter & producer Steve Thompson, he talks about his time as in-house producer at Impulse studio/NEAT records and crossing swords with Northern metal maniacs Raven, Venom & Tygers of Pan Tang.
Raven
METAL CITY
The basic idea at Impulse was to have an in-house producer. Some places just had an engineer but I would be on hand to help in song construction, production and putting product out on vinyl and releasing it.
There was quite a scene with muso’s getting together in some bars on the North East coast of England. Part of the scene was a club called Mingles in Whitley Bay. This was the place I checked out Raven, they were due in Impulse studio so I wanted to get a feel of what they were about. I’ll never forget the first time I met bassist John Gallagher.
I was standing at the back of the room with my back against the wall watching the band on stage, which must have only been six inches high. John took his bass and pointed it at me like a javelin, he raced toward me and only stopped right at my throat. I didn’t flinch. He gave me a wink as though to say, yeah you’ll do for us.
CRASH, BANG & DON’T FORGET THE WALLOP
Producing their album was an intense but rewarding experience. When I agreed to produce the album it was only on a three-day week basis. I figured I would need time out to recover from the sessions.
I’ve heard these guys described as ‘athletic rock’, and that’s just about right.
In fact they were so energetic that I was obliged to gaffa tape the headphones to their heads otherwise they were just bouncing off as their heads where banging ten to the dozen as they recorded.
When I first heard them I thought yeah this is heavy as hell, not what I’m writing at the moment but it was constructed, well thought out and clever with a huge sound for a three piece.
You know some studio work is psychology, getting the best out of people. For instance the harder I pushed Raven the better the output was. Some people you have to be gentler with and try not to make a mistake.
Most of the time humour was what worked best. They have since said one of the things they remember about our time in the studio was how much they laughed.
THROW THE KITCHEN SINK AT IT MAN
We experimented a bit, we decided we wanted a marching sound to bring in the Rock Until You Drop track so we mic’d up the toilet floor next to the studio and went in there and marched. It wasn’t right though.
I took a coffee break to ponder the problem and then it struck me. The disposable plastic coffee cups had just that crunch factor we needed. We spread a hundred or so and stomped on them.
We then did several takes but had to keep replenishing the cups. In the end we used the entire supply of three thousand.
Venom
SEDUCED BY THE DEVIL
I remember being in the studio when our tape op was a young guy called Conrad. It was his job to fetch and carry, make coffee, thread the tapes onto the machines, make tape copies and cassettes. Conrad fitted in well. He was a good tape op and got on well with everyone. He was always going on about his own band.
It seemed they saved up for about three months until they could afford enough pyrotechnics to blow up half a city, then had to save up to do another show.
Conrad said very little about the music, it was mostly about the explosions. Nearly forgot to mention, Conrad’s band was called Venom. And what about the time I gave Venom the Devil (laughs).
The Devil is a nick name for a musical interlude called the Tritone. And it’s heavily discordant if you crank the volume up, basically the sound of The Devil.
I remember in the studio I loaned them my bass and Conrad played it through a Marshall stack and a fuzz box. Apparently, the loan of that bass gave birth to Black Metal. I’m responsible. Sorry.
They were very unrefined but had absolutely bags of enthusiasm, but that was the last thing I recorded there. I never took a production royalty, just said ‘There’s the tapes lad’s, I’m off’.
Eventually I sold Conrad that bass – a Gibson EB3. I said ‘I have no use for it now but you must take care of it’. Next I saw it had an upside down effigy of Christ nailed to it and holes drilled through it.
Some years later I asked him did he still have it, he replied ‘It died in L.A.’
Tygers of Pan Tang
A BIG TIDE AT TYGER BAY
One of the earlier times in Impulse, Dave Woods – NEAT label owner – came in and said there’s a band out there making a big noise why not get them in and sell a few records?
So in came Tygers of Pan Tang to cut three tracks. Incidentally it was to be the third single I’d produced for NEAT – the first two releases were not heavy metal.
We recorded their first single Don’t Touch Me There, now we know it was the start of what is known as the New Wave of British Heavy Metal (NWOBHM), and the tide was coming in that very evening (laughs).
Anyway we put it out and it started to really sell. MCA got interested so they picked it up, re-released it and went on to do their first album. Our paths parted then, but sometime later I was looking for somewhere to live, and the Tygers had a spare room for me to move into.
Next up read Making Tracks #3, where Steve talks about song writing & recording with Tygers of Pan Tang.
Teesside based songwriter & producer Steve Thompson has had a hell of a career in the music biz, from producing heavy metal bands Venom, Raven and Tygers of Pan Tang, to mainstream artists Sheena Easton, Elkie Brooks and Celine Dion recording his songs, plus working with Pete Waterman, Gus Dudgeon, and The Hollies.
Here he talks about his early influences and forming Bullfrog.
A BIT OF BULLY
Records I was fond of in the ‘60s were The Beach Boys. Brian Wilsons skill in making records was unbelievable. I used to listen to the radio and they were so far away like gods playing this music.
But the thing that got me into playing guitar was seeing everyday guys around town playing guitars, just ordinary people.
Like all kids in my town, I went straight from school into Consett Steel Works. With three other steelworkers we formed a band called Bullfrog and served two apprenticeships.
One of them by day working in the steelworks, the other by night playing the pubs and clubs of North East England. That was my first stab at the music industry.
Bullfrog supported a lot of bands like Vinegar Joe and Edgar Broughton. On October 10th 1974 I got a call from our manager to say there was a gig going that night supporting Wishbone Ashat Newcastle’s Odeon Cinema and could I get the band together.
When the call came in I had been dying my cream-coloured platform boots, I fancied green. But because I was in a rush, I turned out on stage that night with one green boot and the other still cream.
Steve (in blue) in Bullfrog.
I’VE GOT A PLAN, MAN
When Bullfrog were in Island Studios in London our first producer was Roger Bain, he also produced Black Sabbath.
I was introduced to his friend and record producer, Gus Dudgeon of Elton John fame, later on I did a lot of work as a songwriter with Dudgeon.
The whole process of studio and song writing really intrigued me so I knew where I was headed. I wrote a few songs put them out and a guy called Dave Wood heard about me and found a slot at Impulse Studio in Wallsend.
Next up read Making Tracks #2, when Steve is producer at Impulse Studio in Wallsend, home to New Wave of British Heavy Metal label NEAT records, and crosses swords with metal maniacs Raven, Venom & Tygers of Pan Tang.
Teesside based songwriter & producer Steve Thompson is planning an audio and video presentation of stories from his time as house producer at Neat records.
‘I’ll also add some studio out-takes and unreleased tracks’ said Steve.
In 1977 Thompson became house producer at Impulse Recording Studios in Wallsend and helped set up Neat Records earning him the title ‘Godfather of North East New Wave of British Heavy Metal’.
The first couple of releases at Neat were pop records, but with the Tygers of Pan Tang, Neat led the charge for the New Wave of British Heavy Metal (NWOBHM)- North East Division.
Before leaving Neat, Thompson also produced Raven and Venom. The North East trio became arguably the most influential bands of that period, especially in the USA. Metallica in particular recognising the influence the three North East bands had on them.
Steve recalled the Raven album sessions… ‘Producing the Raven album was intense and rewarding. I’ve heard them described as ‘athletic rock’ and that’s just about right cos as they were recording I had to gaffa tape the headphones to their heads as they were just bouncing off their heads as they were banging ten to the dozen!’
Venom drummer Tony Bray said ‘When our first producer Steve Thompson heard us crashing through ‘In League with Satan’ he had the understanding that he was able to record something original and ground breaking. We didn’t, but that’s a good producer’.
What will we expect from the show Steve ?
‘This is an depth presentation of my time at the coal face of heavy metal. I want to paint a picture of what it was like to be there when these historic events happened. There are some interesting aspects to the story, some hilarious and some outrageous. This is a rock and roll story so beware if you’re easily offended’.
Thompson went on to write songs recorded by mainstream artists Sheena Easton, Elkie Brooks, Celine Dion and Wavelength who appeared on Top of the Pops with Hurry Home. The single peaked at number 17 after three month in the UK Singles chart.
In these covid times how will we be able to see the show ?
‘When lockdown eases I will present this story at a venue with reduced capacity. We’re also installing a state of the art camera and streaming system. You will be able to book tickets for the venue (limited numbers) or book a ticket for the live stream. More news will be released when I have it’.
Here in the North East the Tyneside Bloc has given up a load of music stories from bands including Venom, Fist, Satan, White Heat, Angelic Upstarts, plus Tygers of Pan Tang.
Since forming in the coastal town of Whitley Bay in 1978, the Tygers have released a number of studio albums with their latest Ritual in 2019. The present line up of Robb Weir, Gav Gray, Jack Meille, Craig Ellis and new guitarist Francesco Marris have chipped in with up to date news and stories from the Tyger camp.
Former members including Jon Deverill, Fred Purser, Dean Robertson, Glenn Howes, Micky McCrystal and more have told their side of the story. John Sykes must have lost my number.
The blog has also featured interviews with original members Robb Weir, Richard ‘Rocky’ Laws and now, Brian Dick. After extensive gigging around Europe, plus live shows in Japan, and playing on six studio albums, Brian called it a day in 1987, here he remembers where it all started.
DELIVERING THE GOODS
By the time I’d saved enough money to purchase my first drum kit, for several years I’d been harbouring the idea of being in a band. I attended gigs at Newcastle City Hall on an almost weekly basis since I was 11 year old, all financed by paper rounds.
I would soak up anything and everything from Zeppelin to Leonard Cohen, always mesmerised by the drummer. I only ever played along to records, with my Russian hi-fi speakers inches from my ears – luckily I had very tolerant neighbours.
TYGER BAY
During A levels I used to go to Newcastle Poly most Friday nights, there would be name bands playing almost every week. This is where I met Rocky Laws who had a Heavy Metal DJ slot upstairs, turns out he played bass and lived round the corner in Whitley Bay. We got together in his parents garage with his mate Robb Weir. Rocky came up with the band name, Tygers of Pan Tang, he lifted it from Sci-Fi novel Stormbringer by Michael Moorcock. And so it began.
RATS IN THE CELLAR
First gig was in a pub cellar in Durham City, we were a four piece then with singer Mark Butcher. It was a memorable gig as only one person attended and I cut a rat in two putting my bass drum back in its case. Songs included Ted Nugent cover Cat Scratch Fever, Rush’s Bastille Day and Motorhead. We regularly played pubs including The Golden Eagle in Blyth and some working men’s clubs.
After releasing their first single ‘Don’t Touch Me There’ on Neat records, MCA picked up the band and re-released the record earning them a record deal and releasing their debut album, Wild Cat.
TYGERS ON 45
We had previously been to Impulse Studio in Wallsend to record demos. So to record ‘a record’ was very exciting. I remember Cronos from Venom was the junior staff member. I would imagine it was all done and dusted in the same day. It all led to record and publishing contracts, national gigs, giving up the day job as a Computer operator at Tyne and Wear Council, plus our first ever trips abroad. Brilliant.
PENNIES FROM READING
We played Reading Festival twice, 1980 and 1982. The first was very nerve-wracking. We were onstage during the daytime and you could see the cans and coins coming towards you. The second was much better. We played in the dark as we were the penultimate band of the day before Iron Maiden. It was much easier than playing a pub where audiences are on top of you.
Several years ago I heard a BBC recording of the 1982 appearance on Radio 6 and was quite taken aback – it was bloody good. Definitely a career highlight.
THE CAGE TOUR
My ticket from 3rd September 1982. I paid £3 to watch the Tygers and openers Tytan at Newcastle Mayfair.
Can remember the Mayfair gig for three reasons – I got the bus to town in true rock star style, my then girlfriend was accidently knocked out after the gig resulting in several hours in A&E, and my Dad came to see us for the first time. He was still very disappointed I’d left my secure job but following the Mayfair gig could see why.
ROCKY ROADS
Any road stories ? Three that came to mind, but there is many, many, more. Loads of drug and drink fuelled tales that will remain untold to protect the guilty and their subsequent families. There were also many jolly japes like when a plastic fork was dipped in dog shit before an unnamed member ate his Chinese takeaway.
The time when our manager had to leave early doors for London’s King’s Cross train station and was barricaded in his bedroom with several rooms worth of furniture. Then Trevor Sewell (North East guitarist) was depping for us in Barcelona and forgot his guitar, he came on playing a broom.
My ticket from 7th November 1983 I paid £3.50 to watch Accept and openers Sargeant. This gig was rescheduled for 27th January ’84.
I was in a great band called Sargeant, still in touch with Stevie Lamb (guitar). We opened for Accept on that tour and I remember Tony Liddle (vocals) at the Hammersmith Odeon. He had eaten too close to gig time, puked on stage, shouted ‘rock an’ roll’ and the stalls rose to their feet.
ALL ABOUT THE SONG
It’s been many years since I last listened to the back catalogue and with little thought two songs come immediately to mind, Life of Crime and Stormlands, both b-sides, both recorded in 5 minutes with no real production. My favourite album is Spellbound by a country mile, fave tracks are Gangland and Hellbound – when performed live the bpm is on overdrive!
FINAL COUNTDOWN
Tygers came to a natural end for me around Autumn ’87 following a final run of gigs across mainland Europe.
THOUGHTS FOR TODAY
I was due my new teeth in Turkey this month and am the beneficiary of free prescriptions for the over 60’s ! Out here on Exmoor National Park in West Somerset where I’ve lived for 20 year, me and my partner share our cottage, outbuildings and land with several animals. My daughters and grandchildren live in the North-East so I’m a regular visitor, or rather was until covid.
Until lockdown I was active on the local pub gig ‘scene’, an enjoyable hobby with good craic.
Part four of an interview with Brian Rapkin (Brian Bond), he recalls when Punishment of Luxury decided to call it a day and brings the story up to date with what they are doing now.
With Punilux, after the first tour of Europe we had second album syndrome – songs we were demoing in early 1980 were very different, which was fine, but also they were not as strong as those on Laughing Academy. Song lyrics in general weren’t so clear and effective – I was writing a few good bits here and there but also some obscure, self-indulgent stuff. Creatively it was like a cul-de-sac.
COMPANY COLLAPSE
Before our second European tour in August 1980 UA ceased as a record company. EMI took over and then dropped us, so we were in a bad place. Our A&R man Tim had left EMI so we had no-one to fight our corner.
To EMI we were a band with no hit singles. No album bands any more, no nurturing of talent over a three year period. Thatcher was in. Monetary mindset – instant success or the sack.
Did EMI spurn the new material because some of the songs were anti-war? Who knows? At an EMI farewell party, Cliff the head man shook hands and wished us luck. I said “Good luck to you too.” He said “Why?”
LEAVIN’ AIN’T EASY
When we got back from Europe in August, spirits were low. Self-belief had taken a battering. We were at an impasse and it seemed time to part ways, so I left. It was a difficult divorce, but it was also interesting to write different keyboard-based ideas, in a piano room in Newcastle Polytechnic every day, demoing songs at Spectro Arts Workshop, who gave me a grant for recording. These songs, like Spots on the Sun, were the basis for forming a new project in Punching Holes, this was late ’80 and ‘81.
STAGE RETURN
Memorable gigs for Punching Holes was the first and best gig, at the Cooperage, Newcastle on Chinese New Year, 5th February 1981. With Norman out of the Big G on sticks, Tim Jones from Neon on guitar, Sid Smith the performance artist on bass and Steve Cowgill the jazzman on keys. it was pure adrenalin, very exciting.
We started to collaborate again as Punilux in 1983, recording in Waterloo, but despite some great songs like Doubting Thomas and a Brixton gig, my involvement was too peripheral and didn’t work that well.
EARNING A CRUST
I had to do theatre work for survival, so a 24-year gap followed when we lost contact and got on with our lives. In 2019 I was a freebie actor for half a day with Northumbria Police in Northumberland Street, being secretly filmed improvising as a man in his 60’s with early onset dementia, asking passers-by for help – it found its way onto Facebook (5.7k likes) and YouTube with the tag-line ‘The heart-breaking video that has police officers in tears. Grab your hankies, it’s emotional’.
The 1980s were a testing time but the old line-up got back and still lives on. In 2007 we reunited in The Green Mandolin, Gateshead to play for Jimmy’s birthday.
Then in 2008 we started gigging again. We got a great write-up in The Guardian by Dave Simpson, which Nev mentioned in his excellent blog. The team spirit was in good shape. We recorded ‘5’ at Blast Studios, Byker.
At our Punilux gigs since 2008 we haven’t done any songs from the 1980 writing period. The high-impact material comprises songs from 1977-79, and some from the ‘5’ EP (2011).
RECORDS & TAPES
In autumn 2019 with Punishment of Luxury I did gigs in Middlesbrough, Leeds and Trillians, Newcastle to promote Puppet Life, a 5 CD box set of all live and recorded material on the Cherry Red label.
Last year, it was the turn of Punching Holes, with a vinyl album out on ZX records – The Ghosts of Pilgrim Street, from the lost tapes of their 1980/81 songs engineered at Spectro Arts workshop in Pilgrim Street, Newcastle, by the electronic maestro Ian Boddy.
It’s a historic album, as there’s no band as such any more, but we’re still all in touch. The gorgeous gatefold cover was by Richard Sharpe, who was in Holes during ‘82 and now runs ZX records in Essex.
Last year also saw the recording of Here We Are, a song for lockdown, in Mark ‘Biz’ Taylor’s back yard in North Shields with him on bass and effects, as seagulls screeched overhead. Tim Jones, ex-Neon and ex-Holes, mixed and mastered the music files in Penrith.
It was entered for the King Lear Prizes, for 70+ writers and it was a nice surprise to be ‘highly commended’ by a music panel led by Julian Lloyd Weber. A written piece The Diviner, based on my dad as a soldier in wartime Sicily, was also lucky enough to get highly commended in the short story category of the same competition.
In 2018 my partner Kathi and I performed Angels Wings by request at our son’s wedding in Bangkok. Kathi was lead singer and co-writer in Punching Holes during 1988-89 with debonair drummer Richie Donnison and quirky keyboardist Jeff Horsman adding their own potent brand of virtuosic creativity.
Angels Wings was a revamp of a Holes song, Gone Loco, from ‘81 and was featured in a Tyne Tees TV video just after the band had finally split for good. She sang it beautifully on the video and at the wedding, and folks seemed to like it.
Live at Trillians, Newcastle 2019.
IN THE NOW
There’s now a Punilux website and a Punching Holes website, and Punishment of Luxury continues on the roller-coaster of life. Sadly in early 2020 we tragically lost our close friend and colleague, the inspired artistic visionary Simon Underhill, who with Neil Defty did brilliant visuals and projections at our gigs all over the UK. His images, like a mass of yellow rubber gloves twitching in unison, were always a feast for the eyes and a delight for audiences.
Jimmy and I get together when possible, Steve is still going strong and Nev now lives and writes in Hampshire – we’re all still in close contact, writing and sending each other songs, or playing each other songs on zoom, so we’re raring to go again with some brand-new material.
ALIKIVI UK : NORTH EAST MUSIC & CULTURE 