Welcome to the Heady Heights
Page 26
The second article confirmed the retirement of Jamesie Campbell MP, following his recent knighthood in the Queen’s New Year’s honours list. He was ‘drawing back from public life’. Vince Hillcock, the orchestrator tying up all the loose ends, still earning his exorbitant hourly rate, Archie thought.
‘Fucken cunts,’ said Sledge. ‘Fuck ‘em aw, eh?’
‘Aye. Too right, son.’
Sledge took the food and reached into his pocket.
‘It’s fine, son. As I said, on me, just tae say thanks for everythin’.’
‘An’ this is on me … fae all ae us. Just tae say thanks … for everythin’.’ Sledge handed Archie a brown paper bag. There was a thick wad of notes in it. And most of them were fifties.
‘The fuck’s this, son? Ye’se rob a bloody bank, or what?’
‘We’ve been signed. By EMI. A three-album deal. They want a band like The Sex Pistols or The Buzzcocks, or The Damned. That’s your cut, Archie. We widnae be in this position if it wisnae for you, man.’
Archie felt tears welling. He couldn’t believe it. He had no idea they had been approached.
‘It’s ten grand, Archie. Away an’ have a good time, pal. Ye deserve it.’
They turned and strolled away; five gallus Glaswegian lads with the world at their feet. Archie couldn’t have been prouder had they been his own children.
‘Haw, Sledge,’ he shouted after them. ‘Where’s Marvin?’
‘He’s away doin’ a deal. He’s our new manager!’
‘Holy fuck … God help the music business!’
‘When I was a boy I was a Catholic. I paid the fine and got out.’
—Billy Connolly
July 1977
Archie Blunt went to Mass. To say sorry, but also to say goodbye for the final time. His relationship with Catholicism was tenuous at best, but this was a day for drawing a line under it. There had been too much guilt. Too much retrospection. Far too much looking over the shoulder, although that had been driven by a different emotion during these past six months. It was time to move on.
He walked from the chapel in glorious sunshine. The Dear Green Place of St Mungo was truly beautiful in sunshine. People smiled. They relaxed. They looked up, seeing the angels and gargoyles in the Victorian architecture that remained unnoticed when they were cowering against the wind and the rain. Even the soot stains glinted in summer. Connolly claimed there were only two seasons in Scotland: June and winter. But it was just a joke. A deferential way of looking at the country that was part self-preservation, part acceptance of the general lot of being Scottish.
Archie Blunt was choosing to leave that all behind. To follow a new course. One of forward-looking optimism. It was always inside him, waiting to get out, but his dream-state procrastination held him back from a better future.
With the van business expanding, Archie’s partnership with Jimmy Rowntree would soon see the addition of a shop unit. Jimmy was happiest being mobile. Archie craved the anchor of a base. It suited both and part of The High Five’s cash had allowed him to secure a new lease on Tollcross Road.
He walked up the slope of the Necropolis. An old couple approaching him may have assumed he was talking to himself, but he was saying farewell to another significant part of his past.
You know what, boy … ah think you’re gonna be just fine. Just fine, man!
‘Ah think ye might be right, Jim.’
Archie reached the plot. He sat on the grass and unwrapped his sandwich. The carved, beige masonry faced south-west. It was gleaming. It had one word on the stone: BLUNT. When the paperwork and the bureaucracy was finally concluded, his mother would rejoin his father here. Lying eternally on the peaceful, quiet upper quartile. Gazing out forever at the wondrous, ever-changing metropolis below them.
Playlist
That gallus mid-seventies vibe was lovingly recreated using the following:
Theme from The Rockford Files
Mike Post
(Written by Mike Post and Pete Carpenter)
Available on MGM Records, 1975
‘Wake Up Little Susie’
The Everly Brothers
(Written by Felice and Boudleaux Bryant)
Available on Cadence Records, 1957
‘Sweet Nothings’
Brenda Lee
(Written by Ronnie Self)
Available on Decca Records, 1959
‘Summer Wind’
Frank Sinatra
(Written by Heinz Meier and Johnny Mercer)
Available on Capitol Records, 1965
‘Here Comes the Sun’
The Beatles
(Written by George Harrison)
Available on Apple Records, 1969
All the Young Dudes’
Mott The Hoople
(Written by David Bowie)
Available on Columbia Records, 1972
‘Just Dropped In (To See What Condition My Condition Was In)’
Kenny Rogers & The First Edition
(Written by Mickey Newbury)
Available on Reprise Records, 1968
‘I’m Not in Love’
10CC
(Written by Eric Stewart and Graham Gouldman)
Available on Mercury Records, 1975
‘I Think I Love You’
The Partridge Family
(Written by Tony Romeo)
Available on Bell Records, 1970
‘Sugar Baby Love’
The Rubettes
(Written by Wayne Bickerton and Tony Waddington)
Available on Polydor Records, 1974
‘Hot Love’
T. Rex
(Written by Marc Bolan)
Available on Fly Records, 1971
‘These Boots Are Made for Walkin’’
Nancy Sinatra
(Written by Lee Hazlewood)
Available on Reprise Records, 1966
‘To Sir with Love’
Lulu
(Written by Don Black, Mark London, Mike Leander)
Available on Epic Records, 1967
‘Silly Love Songs’
Wings
(Written by Paul and Linda McCartney)
Available on MPL Communications, 1976
‘Afternoon Delight’
Starland Vocal Band
(Written by Bill Danoff)
Available on RCA Records, 1976
‘Folsom Prison Blues’
Johnny Cash
(Written by Johnny Cash)
Available on Sun Records, 1955
‘Last Train to Clarksville’
The Monkees
(Written by Tommy Boyce and Bobby Hart)
Available on Colgems Records, 1966
‘Oh Lori’
Alessi
(Written by Billy and Bobby Alessi)
Available on A&M Records, 1976
‘The Year of Decision’
The Three Degrees
(Written by Kenneth Gamble and Leon Huff)
Available on Philadelphia International, 1973
‘Golden Years’
David Bowie
(Written by David Bowie)
Available on RCA Records, 1975
‘The Faith Healer’
The Sensational Alex Harvey Band
(Written by Alex Harvey and Hugh McKenna)
Available on Vertigo Records, 1973
‘Stuck in the Middle with You’
Stealers Wheel
(Written by Gerry Rafferty, Joe Egan)
Available on A&M Records, 1973
‘Anarchy in the UK’
Sex Pistols
(Written by Matlock, Lydon, Cook, Jones)
Available on Virgin Records, 1976
‘No Fun’
The Stooges
(Written by Alexander, Asheton, Asheton, Pop)
Available on Elektra Records, 1969
‘Right Back where We Started From’
Maxine Nightingale
(Written by Pierre Tubbs and J. Vincent Edwards)
>
Available on United Artists Records, 1975
Acknowledgements
Elaine, Nathan and Nadia.
To all the dudes I’ve thanked before. Once again, I’m totally in your debt.
Much love and gratitude to Karen Sullivan and West Camel, for their patience and forbearance. Kevin Toner for Shettleston vibes. John Carnochan for the police procedures, and to James Semple for introducing me to methylene blue.
Thanks to David Stirling, Robin Johnston, Graham Nolan and Robert Hodgens for the short film clip. And especially to Chris McQueer for the narration. I wish I had a fraction of his talent.
The character of Bobby (or Boaby, as he was then…) Souness originally began life as a month-long collaborative story on Twitter. It developed beyond that first story into something special with incredibly talented guest contributors keeping it fresh.
Thanks to everyone who directly contributed to those tales, but particularly Paul Thomson and Hugh Mulholland.
This book is also dedicated to Billy Connolly: Genius, and Knight of the Glaswegian Realm.
Bobby Souness will return, when the author considers it safe for him to do so.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
David F. Ross was born in Glasgow in 1964. His debut novel, The Last Days of Disco, was long-listed for the Best First Novel Award by the Author’s Club of London. National Theatre Scotland acquired dramatic rights for the book in 2015. He has written pieces for Nutmeg and Razur Cuts magazines, and in December 2018 was chosen to contribute a poem commemorating the 16th anniversary of the death of Joe Strummer for the publication Ashes to Activists.
Follow David on Twitter @dfr10 and visit his website: http://www.davidfross.co.uk.
Copyright
Orenda Books
16 Carson Road
West Dulwich
London SE21 8HU
www.orendabooks.co.uk
First published in the United Kingdom in 2019 by Orenda Books
Copyright © David F. Ross, 2019
David F. Ross has asserted his moral right to be identified as the author of this work in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act, 1988.
All Rights Reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced in any form or by any means without the written permission of the publishers.
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.
ISBN 978–1–912374–61–8
eISBN 978–1–912374–62–5