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Martin Hopson (Drums) |
Mickey Ross (Guitar) |
Chris Fleetwood (Guitar)
Martin ????? (Bass) |
Bob Noble (Vocals)
We did start by using
covers, as we didn’t have any of our own material. I remember
doing songs by the Box Tops, Joe Cocker, and even a Beatles
cover. We started writing soon after we formed and soon had a
complete ‘set’. All five of us had different
influences ranging from the Beatles, Eagles, the Who, Roxy Music
and Tamla Motown.
We didn’t set out to
be a punk band, it just happened that our songs were considered
to be in the ‘punk mould’. I personally though of our songs,
that they were pure '‘pop” and if you heard them I think that as
a punk aficionado, you would agree with me.
I can’t remember all of the
bands that we supported, but I remember supporting The
Adverts, Chelsea, Cockney Rejects, the Cortinas, XTC, Lurkers and the Members. We always seemed to go down well, which
surprised me to a certain extent because as I said earlier, I
considered us more of a pop song type band. As for the spitting,
it did happen, but I didn’t like it, and unlike Monica Lewinski,
I did get my clothes cleaned as soon as possible.
We played the
London Roxy Club. Our manager at the
time went to the club and secured the gig, but somewhere our
manager and Kevin St John got their lines crossed. We turned up
to play and St John went bloody potty, screaming that he could
not put on an unknown band on a Saturday night (which was
understandable). He relented, when he saw how many people had
come with us, I don’t think he wanted a riot on his hands.
The more I think
of it we did not support XTC that night, I know that the
Cortinas were officially the support and I clearly remember one
of the Cortinas and the keyboard player of the main band in deep
conversation. I remember thinking at the time that here were two
so called punks, talking in a very arty farty way, and were
actually acting out being punks, which in the case of many of
the main stream punk acts that we played with was pretty much
the case.
One incident
stands out it was so
funny; one of our friends (who was far from being a punk) came
to see us at the Roxy. Well he like everyone else outside the
punk scène though that all punks dressed in black bin liners, so
he thought that he would as well. The problem was that he had
had a few drinks and went into the gents and returned with a
black bin liner on, and nothing else, and to top it off he went
up to a girl and asked her if she wanted to dance. The look on
her face, and just about everyone else who saw him was just
amazing, but the best of all was seeing him at the bar, and St
John face looking at him.
For the best part
I liked most bands, But there were a few that I thought were
bloody awful, Sham 69 comes to mind as a band that lived up to
their name. I once saw the Vibrators, who I felt at the time
were miming, and consequently never had anymore time for them.
Our splitting up was a strange affair.
We were playing at
a punk concert at ‘Bones’ club in Reading, when we were
approached by one of the owners of ‘Beggars Banquet’ records. He
told us that he had seen us a few times and that he wanted to
sign us. As you can imagine, it was what we all wanted or so I
thought. The next day two of the members quit, saying that they
could not handle the thought of being famous, and did not want
to sign a record deal. I decided at that time that I would not
want to continue with just the three of us left, so myself and
the drummer started looking for a new guitarist and bass player.
What happened next is another story and another band.
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