Back Up

by Paul Colize

  But the label suited us, too. We were happy to be shunned by a society we rejected.

  Brian’s hospitality extended beyond a place to sleep. The kitchen was full of food, the fridge was full of beer and bottles of alcohol lined the shelves. A desk drawer in the study was stocked with grass, hash and pills. Everyone could help themselves.

  Brian was proud to have the same name as the founder of the Rolling Stones. He read Faulkner, claimed to know everything about English rock groups and gulped amphetamines. When he ran out of money, he would take more out of the bank. He was alarmingly stupid, but we played along.

  We knew we were trampling all over one of the fundamental principles of our philosophy, based on the renunciation of material goods, but we worked a compromise with our conscience: ours was a temporary situation, a short interval between acts. For me, the intermission lasted over a year.

  At first, my feeble English meant I was able to take Brian’s regular authoritarian outbursts without retaliating. Completely unannounced, he would start shouting and insist we tidy the place up, or order us to clean our rooms. More than once, his fits of temper led to the hurried departure of a housemate.

  In the basement, he had installed a sort of private club, with a well-stocked bar and soft lighting. In addition to state-of-the-art sound equipment and a two-track Grundig tape recorder, the room was scattered with musical instruments: a piano, six guitars and two saxes. At the back, a virtually unused Premier drum kit stood gathering dust.

  Brian couldn’t play a note on anything: he hoped to lure qualified musicians and hold improvised concerts.

  But beyond the recipients of his largesse, no one made a show of taking him seriously. His invitations were never accepted and the room was kept locked. No one was allowed inside.

  Lucy was the house’s only female. She lived on the second floor, in a room to herself, at the back, overlooking the garden. Handel’s Water Music floated out from under the door.

  Lucy was one of us. Before meeting her, I had never imagined a girl could be attracted to our way of life. She came from a small town in the north of England. After drifting across Europe for a couple of years, she had come back to Britain, and settled in at Brian’s.

  She was beautiful, but cared little for her looks. She had black hair, brown, almond-shaped eyes and dazzling white teeth. She found fun in everything, joked all day long and laughed out loud, like Dominique. Like him, she was a skilled manipulator. She kept Brian twisted around her little finger; he would do whatever she wanted.

  Lucy was no whore, but in exchange for a few pounds she would deliver a blow job, nothing more. The first time I went to see her, she whistled in admiration and said she’d have to charge double. Any man could seduce any woman he wanted, she said, provided he was hung like me and had a sense of humour.

  She would joke and act the fool to start with. Once, she squashed her face between her hands in an ugly grimace and asked ‘Do you fancy me now?’ She didn’t want us to think she was ‘on the game’. It was her way of letting herself off the hook and distancing herself from what she did. After these preliminaries, she would drink a mouthful of hot tea, to prodigious effect.

  On my twentieth birthday, she refused to take my money and asked me to stay with her afterwards. For the first time, I realised our dealings had taken a different turn.

  It took me three months to master the rudiments of English and begin to make myself understood. Little by little, I took part in the house conversations.

  Each day, the papers reported that Johnson had ordered fresh bombardments in Vietnam. The Vietnamese people were dying in a hail of napalm bombs.

  In the house, no one spoke much about the war. For them, the world revolved around music. The Swinging Sixties were at their height, and the wave of new British groups were the main topic of conversation. Not a day went by without some new group coming to the fore. They were all talented and creative, with bright futures guaranteed. The Beatles were the unchallenged leaders, now on their fourth album, while dozens of others lined up to take their crown.

  Everyone talked music all day long, with a passion bordering on hysteria. Some swore by none but The Rolling Stones, who had positioned themselves as the bad boys of rock, and the challengers to the nice, clean-cut Beatles. Others worshipped the Pretty Things, each member as ugly as the next, who tried to mark themselves out from the Rolling Stones by making more noise and behaving still more badly.

  For Chess, The Animals were the epitome of British rock, thanks to Alan Price’s high-voltage keyboards, and Eric Burden’s vocals, off-key but loud, passionate and wild. Manfred Mann was a favourite with quite a few. They were a professional outfit with a proper singer and a pretend drummer who held his sticks like he was beating eggs.

  Brian, true to his roots, thought The Kinks had true class because they wore red hunting jackets on stage. But he disapproved of The Who for smashing everything up during their concerts, and leaving the stage like a battlefield strewn with the shattered remains of drums, guitars and amps.

  It was during one of these discussions that I finally discovered the identity of Eric Clapton. After triumphing with the Yardbirds on ‘For Your Love’, he had gone back to the blues, with John Mayall’s Bluesbreakers.

  One thing was clear, whether we talked politics, sex or drugs, everything came back to rock’n’roll.

  That autumn, I heard news from Paris. There was a dark side to Floriane’s death, and I was wanted as a witness. One of my nicknames was known to the police, but they hadn’t managed to identify me. Roman and Jimbo were wanted, too. Last heard, they had set sail for South America.

  To cover my tracks, and at Lucy’s request, I shaved my beard. She said a beard was very uncool, no rock star wore one apart from the pseudo-intellectual Manfred Mann. Our relationship continued. I loved to fall asleep with her after making love. She was gentle and funny. She wrote me sweet notes, or things to make me laugh, and left them in my pockets for me to find throughout the day.

  Brian had no idea we were together. He would never have tolerated it, and would probably have thrown us out on the street.

  The news from Paris pushed me to get fresh identity papers. I had been given the address of a restaurant on the Clerkenwell Road. Clients would order the dish of the day and slip the waiter a password.

  I went there the next day. They could do me a better-than-real Canadian passport, but I’d have to wait several weeks and pay more money than I possessed.

  I was forced to look for work, and began cleaning windows. I bought the equipment I needed in a hardware store and went door-to-door in the neighbourhood.

  Hampstead was a prosperous area. I did my best to look willing and helpful. I explained that I was French, travelling around the world, and that I spoke only a few words of English. I soon established my clientele.

  The job suited me. No one wanted to talk, beyond a quick greeting or a few pleasantries about the weather. I was in no hurry, and applied myself to the task, never trying to up the pace, as my competitors did. I never fixed a price; people were free to pay what they liked. Some took advantage, and handed over a few coins, others were surprisingly generous.

  In September, one of my clients asked if I had heard of a group called the Rolling Stones. His son had a ticket for a show that night, but he was in bed with a high fever. I couldn’t believe my ears. I told him I was crazy about rock music. He clapped me on the back and gave me the ticket for free.

  I went back to Brian’s clutching the ticket to my heart and keeping a wary eye on the passers-by. I would have placed it in a bank vault if I could. After the concert, I kept the ticket stub until it crumbled to dust. I can still see it now – a small square of blue paper. ‘Friday September 24th Stalls J18. Eight shillings and sixpence’.

  I had never been to a concert. All I knew of rock music was what I heard on records or watched on television.

  The Stones had released their third British album, Out of Our Heads, that very day, and their red-h
ot single ‘Satisfaction’, which had been a hit in the US over the summer, had been released in Britain just a month before.

  The show was at the Finsbury Park Astoria. The Stones played twice, first at about 6:00p.m. and again at nine. My ticket was for the second session. I got there an hour early. I had drunk and smoked in preparation for the event.

  The hall was packed with people. Hundreds of girls screamed without a break. I supposed they would stop when The Stones came out on stage.

  When the curtain rose, the screams were twice as loud. I could hardly hear Keith Richards’ opening riff. My neighbour hollered the title in my ear: ‘She Said Yeah’. Girls began to cry and shake their heads. Some fainted, and were carried out on stretchers. People hammered the floor, waved their arms, clapped their hands.

  On stage, I couldn’t take my eyes off Mick Jagger. He was wild, obscene. His thick, blood-red lips shone fit to light up the room. He snaked his hips, tossed his hair into his eyes, turned his back on the audience, bent double, shook his backside, slid the mic between his legs.

  They played about ten songs, and finished with’ Satisfaction’, the summit, the apotheosis. The fans raced to the stage door, hoping to catch them before they left the building.

  I stayed in my seat, knocked out, exhausted, amazed, terrorised.

  I waited until the last people had left the hall. I wanted to drink it all in, down to the last fraction of a second. I knew nothing would ever be the same again.

  When the cleaners appeared, I was still prostrate, and rapt. They asked me what I was doing.

  The fog cleared.

  A strong reek of urine hit my nostrils. Some of the girls had screamed so hard they peed in their pants. The floor was wet. The smell made me retch.

  Later, I became accustomed to the stench. Finally, I took it as a sign of a great rock concert.

  36: I LIKE YOU

  On Tuesday, September the twenty-first, Dominique made his way along the corridor and began his usual routine. After the made-up Vaudeville-esque exchange outside the door, he entered the room.

  He greeted X Midi, placed the remote in his hand, chose his name for the day and received no response.

  He began the massage, and sensed a slight tremor in the man’s arms and legs.

  He watched his face.

  A few drops of sweat beaded X Midi’s forehead, and his lips trembled slightly. His eyes seemed unusually bright. He was focusing all his attention on the television screen, and seemed to be experiencing some degree of inner excitement.

  The TV was showing a report about U2. The Irish group were playing next day at the Stade Roi Baudouin, in Brussels. The show had sold out over a year before and the concert would be played to a packed house. The group’s fans were burning with excitement, and the musicians’ imminent arrival had set the Belgian capital alight.

  The report retraced preparations for the group’s ‘360° Tour’. There were clips of U2 on stage, performing ‘Get On Your Boots’, a track from their latest album.

  Dominique continued the massage as if he noticed nothing. After a few minutes he straightened up, casually.

  ‘I’ve drunk too much coffee, Barnaby. Just popping to the little boys’ room. Now you stay right there, I’ll be back in a second.’

  He made sure the remote was firmly wedged in X Midi’s hand. Before leaving the room, he switched to a telesales channel, then closed the door behind him, went a short distance down the corridor and stood waiting.

  He stopped a nurse who was heading for the room.

  ‘Would you mind coming back later? I’m conducting a small experiment!’

  He waited a few minutes more, then returned.

  The TV was back on the report about the rock group, and the volume had increased.

  He walked to the centre of the room and froze in mock astonishment, hands on hips.

  After a few minutes, the man shifted his gaze from the screen and stared straight into Dominique’s eyes.

  He blinked, and tears trickled down his cheeks.

  Dominique knew what he was seeing. These were not tears of sorrow. X Midi was laughing fit to bust.

  He bent over the man and dabbed his eyes with a tissue.

  ‘You know what, Barnaby? I like you.’

  37: HOPE I DIE BEFORE I GET OLD

  His face was a picture, with his huge round eyes and fake surprise. I like him a lot, too. He eases my discomfort and makes me laugh. He talks to me like a normal person. People coming into the room often think I can’t hear, because I don’t speak. They address me like a child, using simple words.

  More than half a century since the lady in the record shop made her dark prediction, and rock is still alive. In better shape than ever, in fact. Those Irish guys made a powerful noise.

  Rubber Soul was released at Christmastime. The press hailed it as the Beatles’ most complex and accomplished album to date. But I was disappointed. The beat was softer and some of the lyrics were a drag. It heralded a profound change: a portion of the rock world was softening and starting to take itself seriously.

  Sonny arrived in the first days of 1966, on a freezing winter morning, as I was leaving for work. I opened the door. He emerged from out of the fog enveloping the street, like a vision.

  I never knew if it was his nickname, or whether he really was called Sonny, but it was the name everyone used.

  Sonny came from nowhere. He told me he’d come straight from Buenos Aires, where he had spent the last two years. Subsequently, I noticed his story changed depending on who he was talking to, and the circumstances.

  He was small, thin and wore his hair short, with a neat parting down one side. He was bursting with energy, and always primed with some truly astonishing piece of news. He was Brian’s childhood friend. He knew everyone in London, and played harmonica like a god.

  He moved into my room, closely followed by fifteen suitcases.

  We were polar opposites in appearance and temperament. He was always nervy and alert; I was completely laid-back. He never stopped talking; I was taciturn. He got up every morning in the best of spirits and took a wholly positive approach to life, while I treated everything with scorn and suspicion. Yet we became the best friends in the world.

  At any hour of the day or night, he would take his harmonica from his pocket, encase it in his cupped hands and make it laugh or cry. I couldn’t believe my ears. As if his own emotions were breathing life into the simple block of wood. I was astounded at his talent. I would stop what I was doing and listen, dumbfounded.

  Sonny was a mod. London’s youthful ‘in crowd’ was divided into two distinct, rival clans, the mods and rockers. People said you were a mod, or a rocker, or you were nothing. I failed to understand the difference in their thinking and music. Their antagonism left me baffled.

  According to Sonny, mods were citizens of the world who looked to the future. They were optimistic and cool. A mod never smiled in public. Shepherd’s Bush, in West London, was their rallying point.

  The rockers were just an unhealthy throwback to the Teds of the Fifties, he said. Before they cleaned up their image, the Beatles had been proper Teds, picking fights and throwing punches on the slightest provocation. They had been banned from pubs across Liverpool. Lennon, the supposed poet of the proletariat, had been the most quarrelsome of the four.

  The uninitiated, like me, distinguished mods from rockers by their appearance. The mods wore tailored, Italian suits. They would change outfits several times a day and rode around town on customised Vespa scooters. Their movement was the springboard for the Carnaby Street phenomenon, named for the street that became the epicentre of London’s fashion scene and counter-culture in the early Sixties.

  Rockers styled their hair in huge quiffs slicked with Gomina grease. They wore jeans and black leather jackets decorated with studs or chains. They rode big, British motorcycles – Triumphs, Nortons or BSAs – and gathered on the margins of the larger cities.

  Mods and rockers formed two fanatical groups.
The mods thought the rockers were thugs, the rockers said the mods were effeminate poofters.

  Their dreaded fights had become a holy war. When they weren’t working, they gathered at seaside resorts and engaged in veritable pitched battles.

  Sonny never went out without his fishhook, cosh and flick knife. He concealed them in the lining of his military parka, which he wore to protect his smart suits.

  When I showed him my record collection, he refused even to look at it. I had no albums by The Who, I didn’t know the Small Faces or Georgie Fame. I should stop listening to studio recordings and discover real, authentic rock.

  I told him about the powerful impression The Stones concert had made on me. He seemed more surprised. He was determined to perfect my musical education. He had contacts in town. He would make me see music from a different point of view.

  London swarmed with clubs. The most popular for rock fans were the Marquee and the Crawdaddy. Rhythm’n’blues fans gathered at the Ealing Club, in a basement under the station. The stage was under the street, which was set with glass paving stones to let in the light. Musicians played with their feet in puddles of water, and pedestrians walking overhead. Dozens of other places brightened the London night: the Adlib Club, the Scotch, Sybilla’s, the Flamingo, the Red Lion, the Bag O’Nails, the Speakeasy, the Revolution, and more still. I’ve forgotten their names. Each started out different, but they were all the same in the end.

  The first place Sonny took me to was the Marquee on Wardour Street, in the heart of Soho. The Stones had played their first shows there, before taking up a residency at the Crawdaddy. The Marquee was run in fine style by a guy named Harold, a jazz and blues freak who had ridden the first wave of new British rock bands.

  Sonny knew him well: several times, he had stood in for a well-known harmonica player by the name of Cyril Davies, who had died of leukaemia the previous year. I didn’t ask how he had managed this feat, having just come back from two years in Argentina.