Shepperton Road at Junction with Newnorth Rd, Islington, London, late September, 1977.
Summer rain I can only compare to Glastonbury 1985 where I donned a bin bag and improvised a CND symbol to go on stage - ending the show by announcing that the outfit was available on my merch store at £7 - no laughs but several customers. Lawrence Corner trench coat was just about keeping me dry. An army surplus shop - which one night after a few too many wine gums led me to speculate: why does the army have such a huge surplus? Surely this would imply poor procurement. I generally stuck to the shirts - or got one in Clozo in Camden passage-as Bryan Ferry had a good GI look going at the time with tie tucked in. I did buy a tunic to complete the image. Alright I bought some lanyard too and put a whistle on the end. But no gas masks or ammunition boxes. Well only one of each.
I hope we resist the pressure and carry on cutting forces budgets until they are forced to wear discarded civilian surplus - a nice floral shirt from Primark deadstock. This would work out well all round as camouflage as most forces mainly appear to target civilians these days. The coat lasted years circulating among kin and friends - a surefire way of having a different outfit for each party although it did rather encourage single gender groups which was a shame as nightclubs then had a door policy which favoured females ( lower prices) banning large groups of males even if they were in pink trousers and black eye liner. If you arrived separately or in twos you were welcome so a modicum of acting talent - say a Bowie level of ability- demonstrated by ignoring friends in queue and you could reassemble within the Sundown or some other horrendous cavern with overpriced watered down carling and casual gang violence on draught. 1980 I arrived at said club with student friends to see Spandau Ballet and only I was given the nod by Steve on the door - did wonders for my ego but little for my long term relations with above.
I was walking like a punk Richard III to protect the precious cargo: Helden the German lyric version of Heroes. Already one such nugget had slipped through my fingers gifted to a friend - wonder if she still has it. Said friend had encouraged my writing so I adapted one of my short stories which had echoes of Powell and Pressburgers A Matter of life and Death/ Durenmatt's The Visit / An Inspector Calls and used Low as the soundtrack. As the play was put on at an all girls school, I got more female attention than in all my previous years combined which was a revelation as until then I thought playing for your college football team would have the ladies flocking - I blame George Best. Drama for me from now on please. Copies of the script reproduced in blue ink on a banding machine are available on request though the scent of teen angst is long faded. When I began to do theatre in a less naive way I used Helden as the playout for a production of Woyzeck - the earlier music was all Trans Europa Express by Kraftwerk in original German.
Obviously I thought this record a must have but can't work out why? And why choose German over French? I had studied the latter at school, started to watch French Films on late night BBC 2 not always for purely artistic motives as they approached female nudity in a very different way to Hammer horror - although of late the less pretentious nature of Vampire titles appear to hold up better. They have certainly influenced my view of the erotic far more than the Story of O. Within four years I would be in a lecture theatre with one of the stars of the genre Madeleine Smith listening to lectures on the faerie queen - yes I probably said to her - he don't mean Kenneth Williams.
Bowie had made Berlin cool to me with Low, the Weimar wierdness of the film of Cabaret still lingered and Lou Reed's album was still influential although I couldn't afford a copy which probably explains why I did not opt for both languages - I'm sure I desired them.
Best of all the record was wrapped in a Picture sleeve of Bowie looking supercool in leather jacket and side parting although the posed pout had echoes of Barbie's friend Ken. This paper portrait of wish fulfilment would be destroyed by the downpour if it were to soak through the heavy gaberdine So I hugged the disc closer, laughed at the elements and got inside the door. Downstairs to my brother's bedroom the scene of an ugly skirmish the year before when the clapping start of Carwash had begun to pale by the twentieth play. It was not intentional - if you pulled the overarm to one side the tonearm would repeat which meant you could get a shave or a wash in on a Saturday night before you hit the pub/party circuit. I was at Tech college by then and there was always a party although I still cannot believe we managed to get into some and am even more credulous we got out of others. You know the scene, if there were two parties in the same night you put your group bottle of bacardi on the sideboard, gave the place half hour or so then decided to split -draw lots to see who would retrieve it for the later do as by now a) you'd spent your wages and b) you might not get served in an offie this far from home. All clear in the big room, reach inside the coat - sleeve immaculate, record cracked in two. It appears I had valued the packaging over the contents - well take that as the moral of the story.
Heroes to me are the first responders, the carers, those who carry out acts of altruism not those who carry rifles, certainly not celebrity honours list twots. One of Bowie's great acts was to turn such a bauble down.
I praise the citizens who stand between the imbeciles who racially abuse immigrants. I think of the incompetent May's appalling statement:
if you're a citizen of the world you're a citizen of nowhere;
or everywhere,Theresa, as Bowie said and lived.
I have sat in parks quite a lot with my kids over the years and when I catch a glimpse of a parent from Poland or elsewhere pushing their lovely children on the swings I see a black and white photo of a world citizen - 60s brown plastic frame cats eye glasses, faux fur coat suggesting the day's brightness is a result of winter sunshine. She is smiling despite the harshness of her life, the everyday racism which impacts on her health, housing and hopes - happy to be in this country with the opportunities it presents for her children. The photo lights up my favourite room in the house, hanging just above the record player which even now reclines seductively Marlene Dietrich like longing to embrace Helden (at last mein affare)
