by Adam Buxton
Then, after the show, there he was, walking towards a little group of us standing in a backstage corridor with Jonathan Ross. Bowie spotted Ricky Gervais and Stephen Merchant, who had also been invited along. It was only a year since the first series of The Office had aired, but it had quickly become a mainstream success and Ricky and Stephen were well on the way to becoming full-blown celebrities. I’d met Ricky a couple of times at Jonathan’s house and I knew he was also a huge Bowie fan, so it was cool to see him meet his hero for the first time and have Bowie tell him that he thought The Office was great, but I left Maida Vale deflated.
As well as being an artist whose work I admired, David Bowie was someone I’d always thought of as a person who had a similar outlook on life to me, someone who found the same kinds of things interesting, someone whose taste in music I could trust and whose recommendations were worth exploring. In other words, I’d always thought of him as my friend, but then I had to stand by and watch as he declared his affection, not for me but another comedian. OK, so Ricky was at least as much of a fan as I was, and even back then he’d made a more lasting contribution to the world of comedy, but that didn’t make it any less galling.
‘Serves me right for taking the piss out of Zavid for so long,’ I thought.
After the first flush of unequivocal adoration, Bowie had become something of a comedy character for me, Joe and our friends. We enjoyed dissecting his less well-judged career moments, pronouncements and pontifications, often while doing an impression that relied on the gentle buzzing sound Bowie produced when he spoke words with an ‘s’ in them; for example, ‘zuperlatative’ – a pleasing Bowie variant of ‘superlative’ we’d heard him use in an interview. Over time this impression evolved into a single noise that was our shorthand for Bowie: ‘wuzza’. Instead of discussing the serious issues of the day, we whiled away many hours with symposiums of ‘wuzza, wuzza, wuzza’s. I don’t suppose any of that would have endeared us to Zavid, but I’ve always taken the piss out of people I love, and I really love David Bowie.
‘We’re going to have a free drawing class today,’ said our art teacher, walking over to the record player in the corner and setting the arm down. ‘Here’s some music to inspire you. It just came out last week.’ It was September 1980.
Sun shone through the big glass panels that ran down one side of the art room as the space filled with the sound of clicks, hisses, a rattle, someone counting in, then squalling electric guitar, a woman declaiming in a foreign language and a man who sounded nutty. I exchanged WTF? glances with other mystified ten-year-olds. This music was weird, but the second song was more conventional, and by the time they were chanting ‘Up the hill backwards, / It’ll be all right, ooooh’, I was sufficiently intrigued to ask the teacher who we were listening to.
I liked the name ‘Bowie’. It sounded strong, supple and elegant with the potential to unleash arrows. It was, well, bow-y.
William Mullins (aka Muggins or Bill Muggs) came back to school the following term with his brother’s copy of the Bowie compilation ChangesOneBowie and we listened to it on the common-room record player. Even as I was listening to ‘Space Oddity’ for the first time I was looking forward to hearing it again.
The cover of ChangesOneBowie is a black-and-white photograph of DB taken in 1976 by Tom Kelley, who took the famous nude calendar shots of Marilyn Monroe. It captures Bowie at his most conventionally handsome, yet disarmingly fey. His hair is swept back, his hand is up to his mouth as if he’s considering a work of art, and there’s a distant look in his eyes that says, ‘I’m thinking of complicated things in a more original and zensitive way than an ordinary person would.’ I stared at the cover of ChangesOneBowie and thought, ‘Mmm. Yes, please.’
A few weeks later Bill Muggs turned up with Hunky Dory and, though I was a bit confused by Bowie suddenly looking like somebody’s hippy mum on the cover, as soon as ‘Life on Mars’ came on with lyrics about cavemen and Mickey Mouse combining the esoteric and the accessible, I recognised it as the kind of powerfully dramatic, emotional and mysterious music I’d often heard playing in my head, playing in my heart even, but never out loud. Or maybe I’d just heard it on the radio and forgot.
Either way, I realised I was interested in David Bowie.
Up to that point all the strangers I’d been interested in were fictional – the Bionic Man, the Bionic Woman, the Invisible Man and the Man from Atlantis – not really superheroes, but enhanced humans that I thought I’d get on well with. Bowie was the first real person to join that list, and for the next few years we got on very well indeed.
CHAPTER 4
FIRST-CLASS BASTARD
Before I moved out of London, I seldom travelled by train. On the rare occasions I did, it never occurred to me to buy a first-class ticket. I was happy to sit in my standard-class seat, stare out of the window and enjoy the loud telephone conversations of twats.
In 2008 I moved out to Norfolk with my family and life as a semi-frequent train commuter began. I was doing a weekly radio show on BBC 6 Music with Joe at the time, so every Friday I’d cycle to Norwich, get on the train to Liverpool Street, stay at my in-laws’ place in West London on Friday night, cycle to the 6 Music studio in Great Portland Street on Saturday morning, talk bollocks with Joe from 10 a.m. till 1 p.m., then get the train from Liverpool Street back to Norwich. (‘That was an interesting routine you just outlined there, Buckles, thanks!’ You’re welcome.)
The more I took the train, the more I found myself wanting to do some important laptop work as I travelled: sorting and labelling 10,000 digital photographs of my children, reading YouTube comments for OK Go videos, editing footage of myself dressed as Gwen Stefani pointing at animated turds and saying, ‘Oooh, this my shit, this my shit’ – that kind of thing.
Sometimes I was able to get a four-person table seat to myself (an optimal scenario for my preferred workflow), but even then I was without plug sockets or Wi-Fi and had to contend with the sound of children watching wisecracking animated films without headphones, groups of boisterous men enjoying lager-powered sports bants and of course the loud telephone conversations of twats.
For a few months I experimented with the Quiet Carriage (or QC). This is a single train carriage in which prominently displayed signs make it clear that it’s an environment reserved for those who are not uplifted by percussion leakage from shitty headphones and do not enjoy listening to one side of someone else’s entirely unnecessary phone conversation. In my mind the QC was first class for standard-class travellers. Affordable paradise.
At busier times, however, affordable paradise went wrong, and the QC ended up being the most stressful of all the carriages. Any remaining seats were quickly snaffled by people who considered refraining from behaviour that might disturb others as risibly effete. I’m talking about Inconsiderate Shitbags (or IS), a community that sees no race, gender or class, such is their commitment to inclusivity and representation. Members of IS are just as likely to be self-important business berks and red-trousered toffs as they are truculent tinkers or boozed-up bootblacks.
For the IS, the quaint codes of the QC are there to be ignored at will. Sit in the Quiet Carriage during peak hours and you won’t have to wait long before some utter fucker thinks of some excuse for a phone call or just launches into a chat with a pal (both entirely antithetical to the spirit of the QC). When it becomes clear that there’s an IS member in the QC, heads begin to pop up, like angry meerkats, focusing all their disapproval on the culprit.
One evening, when the peace of a packed but luxuriously silent Quiet Carriage was torpedoed by a young man in a suit taking a phone call, I went full angry meerkat. Mine was one of six other heads that periscoped up and began scanning the carriage, first locating the offending IS operative, then looking around at the other meerkats as if to say, ‘Can we believe this guy and his phone call? This is the ONLY carriage in the whole train where you’re asked to be quiet and this guy isn’t giving a single hoot.’
I wai
ted for someone to say something, but of course no one did. At last the man finished his call, and once again the carriage was beautifully quiet. My shoulders began to relax and my breathing was starting to return to normal when the man started jabbing at his phone again before bringing it back up to his unbelievable fucking ear. I couldn’t take it. Someone had to speak for the meerkats.
Aiming for a tone that was relaxed, geezerish and non-crazy, I said, ‘Hey! Mate! It’s the Quiet Carriage, mate!’ The man continued to chat without even registering me and the other meerkats cringed. Feeling I had committed myself, I tried again, but this time when I called ‘Mate! Quiet Carriage!’ I pointed at one of the large ‘Quiet Carriage’ stickers on the windows, to demonstrate that my position was backed up by stickers.
Sometimes Quiet Carriage stickers seem only to prohibit the use of mobiles, but these stickers also included symbols prohibiting noisy headphones and talking people, making it as clear as possible that ‘quiet’ didn’t mean whatever kind of ‘quiet’ happened to suit you at that moment; it meant actual silence, like in a library or an exam room or a nice relaxing crypt.
This time, the man registered me. He glanced at the sticker, nodded and continued his conversation. I sank into my seat. I wasn’t prepared to make a scene.
You’ve got to lighten up, Buckles, I told myself. There’s more important stuff out there to go angry meerkat on. But then another voice – one that sounded a lot like my dad – chimed in: ‘Moments like these aren’t merely some bourgeois pursuit of order. For those who aspire to a society in which we harmoniously coexist, the Quiet Carriage is a proving ground, and if you’re too cowardly to challenge phone-call man then I hope you like chaos, because that’s what you’re going to get.’
* * *
RAMBLE
The thing is, I don’t mind a bit of chaos, but Dad really hated the stuff. On The Adam and Joe Show in the late Nineties we asked him to review the techno track ‘Higher State of Consciousness’ by American DJ Josh Wink, and upon hearing its electronic shrieks and squeals, my dad seemed genuinely worried, likening the noises to dark wheeling systems in a universe coming apart. ‘It’s chaos!’ he kept saying. ‘Chaos.’ But if you’ve liberated concentration camps and never tried ecstasy, techno is probably always going to be a tough sell.
* * *
Whatever my thoughts on chaos in the QC, I was too cowardly for a confrontation, so there was only one thing for it.
Whenever I took the train on weekends the conductor would regularly announce that passengers could upgrade from standard to first class for £7.50. I never took any notice of these announcements until one weekend when there was a big football match on in Norwich, and the train from London was rammed. Like many others I found myself without a seat, standing in the corridor outside the toilet, trying to digest a stomach full of impotent rage. The ticket collector pushed his way through, mumbling apology-style bollocks about the lack of seats, and when he came to me, I said it: ‘Could I have an upgrade, please?’
A minute later the doors to first class slid open and I stumbled out of the corridor scrum into paradise. It was busy, but there were free seats, and it was cool and quiet, with a more relaxing colour scheme. I found a single seat by the window with my own power socket below the table. I opened my laptop and my little Wi-Fi radar locked in satisfyingly (that will be a useful line if I ever write robot porn).
The Wi-Fi was free.
My first-class upgrade also entitled me to free water, free tea or coffee, free crisps and free biscuits in the buffet car. I loaded up. The crunchy yet moist apple-flavoured biscuits were extraordinary and I returned for more, flashing my first-class upgrade like a detective flashing his badge at a DELICIOUS crime scene.
It was the greatest journey of my life.
The Rubicon had been crossed. As long as I could afford it, I would never return to standard class.
Nowadays I travel via Cambridge to King’s Cross, which is closer to where I tend to record podcasts and do gigs for members of the liberal elite. The first-class situation on that route is not great, perhaps due to the relatively short journey times. The first-class compartment from Norwich to Cambridge currently sits just seven people and there are no free drinks – not even water – no snacks and certainly no fucking apple biscuits. But it’s seldom busy and it’s always quiet. Well, not quite always …
For the last year or so the train from King’s Cross to Cambridge has run late more than half the time, which means I end up missing the connection to Norwich and have to wait around in Cambridge station for another hour. I like to use this time to have a run-in with a member of staff at WH Smith’s before taking the next available, much busier train. This happened a few weeks ago and by the time I finally boarded the Norwich train I was desperate to sink into my favourite first-class seat (a single one at the back by the driver’s door). To my dismay I found it was already occupied by a young person with a couple of non-first-class-looking plastic shopping bags. They were engaged in a loud mobile phone call and everyone else in the unusually busy carriage was obliged to listen.
‘Yeah, I’m on the train. I’m in first class. I’m probably about to get moved cos I haven’t got a first-class ticket. Well, they never really check. I did it the other day and I was just sat in first class all the way and they never checked! Yeah. I know. No, we’re waiting for the train to leave. My battery’s low. I don’t have my charger. No, she said that was her charger. I found that one on the floor, but it wasn’t my charger. I haven’t got a charger now …’ This was followed by several more minutes of urgent charger chat, then finally: ‘All right, bye, then.’
Ah, luxurious first-class peace. But no, moments later: ‘Hi, yeah, it’s me. No, I’m on the train, just waiting for it to go. No, my battery’s low. I know, I don’t have my charger. No, she said that was her charger. There was a charger on the floor, but it wasn’t my charger. No, she said that was her charger. I haven’t got a charger now etc., etc., etc.
‘This cannot stand,’ I thought. I need to speak for the meerkats. Chaos cannot reign. This is not a class thing. This is not a privilege thing. This is not even a ‘you’re in my favourite seat’ thing. This is a quiet thing. A consideration thing. I’m on the proving ground, and it’s time to step up.
When the second call finally ended I found myself standing up and approaching the young person. Trying hard to eliminate any trace of irritation from my voice I said: ‘Excuse me, just to say, I’ve got no problem with you being in first class with a standard-class ticket, seriously, go for your life, but part of the reason we’re in first class is that we just want some quiet so we can work. So please – don’t make any more phone calls.’
‘Oh yeah, I wasn’t going to make any more calls,’ replied the young person airily.
‘Oh, thanks very much,’ I said and returned my seat. It was all very civil and straightforward. ‘What a great result,’ I thought.
I luxuriated in the gratitude and admiration I knew my fellow first-class meerkats must be feeling. ‘Finally!’ I imagined them thinking. ‘Someone who isn’t trying to humiliate another person on the basis of status but who has the guts to strike a blow for order and harmonious coexistence.’ Then, before we’d even pulled out of the station, the young person got up and left the first-class carriage.
The doors slid shut and my triumphal bubble popped. I had a strong urge to call the young person back. ‘Hey! Young Person, who I definitely would have challenged even if you’d been a giant angry-looking football supporter, I wasn’t trying to get rid of you! I only wanted you to keep the noise down! Hey, look, if you want to sit in first class, that’s cool with me! I like sticking it to The Man sometimes, too! Bloody Man! You should be aware, there is an on-the-spot fine for sitting in first class with a standard-class ticket on this route, but hey, if it comes to that, I’ll pay! I’m one of the good guys! Young Person! Come back …’ but it was too late.
An oppressive silence engulfed our shabby cubicle of privilege.
Order had been restored. First-class ticket holders only.
Another phone rang. The first-class ticket holder sat across the aisle from me scrambled to answer it, shooting me a nervous glance as they did so. They mumbled in hushed tones for a few seconds and concluded the call hastily. They had learned their lesson. The hot heat of shame burned my hairy cheeks and spread to my ears. When did I become such a cunt? Was it back in the Quiet Carriage, or was I always a first-class bastard?
CHAPTER 5
1981
It was during my third year at boarding school that I discovered the power of drama. If I was in a class that I really struggled with – maths or French, for example – I would quietly hyperventilate until I started to feel faint, whereupon I would ask to be excused for a lie down in ‘The San’ (the sanatorium: a mini dormitory where the school nurse tended to ailing children). Later, when my friends saw me looking perky at lunch and accused me of being ‘a skiver’ I would tell them truthfully, ‘I really was feeling faint.’
As for the school’s ‘legitimate’ drama productions, I tried to get myself in as many as possible, as it seemed like the most magnificent scam. Of course, I cared deeply about the craft, but I also loved the fact that rehearsals often meant you got to miss lessons, avoid sport, go to bed later than everyone else and generally get away with murder.
Nineteen-eighty-one was the year I got the lead in the school play, The Thwarting of Baron Bolligrew by Robert Bolt. Throughout production on Bolligrew I received so much attention and praise, I started to believe that I might be one of the most special people that had ever lived, a suspicion that was borne out when I was awarded the Acting Prize (one of the school’s most prestigious honours) for my explosively powerful portrayal of the Baron.
