Oasis: The Truth

by Tony McCarroll

  Normally, Kathleen, the daughter of one of my mother’s friends, would babysit, and after a bagful of harassment from me and my two younger brothers she would let us stay up late to watch Match of the Day; we couldn’t wait to take the piss out of Jimmy Hill’s chinny-beard-and-pullover combo. It seems that she couldn’t make it that week, but she had arranged for her younger brother to stand in. Mum and Dad headed out as the new babysitter was hurried through the door. My dad shouted that the babysitter’s name was Jimmy the Butt. Jimmy the Butt? I was thinking that maybe Jimmy the Butt should consider a name change if he wanted to further his career in babysitting when the living room door opened to reveal…the fucking Cat Killer! He casually entered the room, an assassin’s ease about him. I’m a dead man, I thought. My throat immediately dried as I tried to squeak a warning to my parents that I was about to be murdered. Nothing came out. The only sound was the slam of the front door as my parents left. This sound perfectly masked the noise of the small fart I omitted as I sat in my skin-tight Muppet Show pyjamas, staring up at the gigantic man. He moved towards me ominously, but then gave me a big, lunatic smile. ‘We need to talk,’ he said.

  And talk we did. The first part of the conversation had me stuttering an apology for hitting him on the head with a golf ball. Jimmy laughed it off. We then talked about anything and everything. He explained that he wasn’t a psychopath and had never killed a cat, which reassured three very wide-eyed young brothers. ‘Just a tramp,’ he added. Jokingly.

  And then he had me and my brothers in awe all night with his tales of chivalry and adventure. Well, if adventure involved fighting at United away games and chivalry came in the shape of fingering the local schoolgirls. He also explained how he had been attacked the previous year outside a boozer. Jimmy had argued with a couple of lads over something or nothing. They had lain in wait for him and then repeatedly stabbed him in the head. After they had finished, though, Jimmy had set about each of them. Although hampered by the blood pouring from his head wounds, like a blind bear he managed to pulverise each of his assailants before staggering off and collapsing. After days of surgery, the doctors decided the only way Jimmy would survive was if they inserted two metal plates at the front of his skull. This was groundbreaking surgery at the time and in a matter of months a new, stronger Jimmy was released back on to the streets of Levenshulme.

  He immediately tracked down the gang responsible for the stabbing and although he had already hospitalised them once, felt it fair that he repeat the process. This time, though, he used his newly acquired weapon. The news of Jimmy hammering this gang by sitting on them and crashing his heavy metal-plated head into their faces soon spread across Manchester and a new name was being whispered on the streets: Jimmy the Butt. ‘He’s like the Six Million Dollar Man,’ we laughed the following day. In our eyes, technology had rebuilt Jimmy the Butt and now he had superhuman capabilities. Fuckin’ hell, he’d actually achieved one of my childhood ambitions. Jimmy taught us a few things over the next few years. Although he was a solitary figure, he never affiliated himself with one gang or another, but he taught us the meaning of loyalty and friendship. Once you were on Jimmy’s side he would treat you like his own flesh and blood. First sign of any mither and Jimmy would be in. His steel skull would flail around, destroying everything in its path. ‘If they are willing to fight then I think they’re fair game,’ he told us.

  That was the reason for his fortnightly football excursion; it was the perfect tonic for Jimmy. He would release everything, with no guilt, on his day away and the streets of Levenshulme felt that bit safer for a couple of weeks after. It wasn’t for kudos or notoriety that Jimmy fought. Firstly, it came from a strong belief in right and wrong; and secondly, because of ‘a buzzing in me head that goes away after I’ve kicked off’. This noise had started after he had been stabbed. His hearing was slowly deteriorating as well. It was not that he was disrespectful when others gave their opinion. He just knew that the way he thought had always been different to the way other people thought. He had learnt that arguing his point inevitably led to a fight, so had taken to saying what he had to, when he had to, which was not very often.

  Jimmy continued to babysit for us and over the next couple of years I’d grow to admire him. Away from group pressures, he was a completely different character and would open up and be vocal. He also encouraged me to dedicate more and more of my time to the drums. ‘It’s a way out,’ he would say. ‘Don’t want to waste your time on the streets.’

  He had a friend who ran a football team and one spring evening in 1983, he brought me down to meet him. The friend’s name was Vinny, and he was the polar opposite to Jimmy. Where Jimmy was a standalone guy, Vinny was probably the best-known man in the area. This was due to his larger-than-life personality, which was not constrained by normal social pressures. If Vinny had something to say, it got said. From the boys at the match to the men about town, everyone knew Vinny. That included the police and the priests. Jimmy and Vinny made quite a double act. Vinny, the staunch City fan and willing to let everyone around know it. Jimmy, the quiet United fan, but heaven help anyone who challenged him. The team that Vinny ran was called the Northern Rebels. They had started a junior side and I was desperate to play. They trained on Greenbank playing fields, which was – conveniently – at the bottom of our street. One evening, we lined up against the outside brick wall of the changing room ready to undergo trials. There were about twenty local boys there, of all shape and sizes. The head coach sauntered over and started pointing and laughing at the group, singling out inadequacies as a way of determining which ones had the strongest character. You had to be tough in Levenshulme. His way of weeding out the less socially skilled or confident was brutal but effective, though he would probably be jailed for it nowadays. Next to me was a quiet lad who I recognised as he lived across the road from the local baths. He was a touch overweight, which led to some direct ribbing from the coach. I could clearly see that the insults were starting to have an effect on the poor lad and so I whispered, ‘Tell him he’s got big ears.’

  The kid looked back with shock in his eyes; he seemed a touch unsure of my advice. He had a large mop of black hair shaped into the most enormous flick I had ever seen. There was an air of innocence about him. I can understand why he was unsure, but I knew that if he defended himself the coach would respect him for it and all would be well. I nodded at him and raised my eyebrows. ‘Trust me. Just do it,’ I urged. He turned and faced the head coach.

  Suddenly he screamed at the top of his voice, his face exploding with rage. ‘Shut your stupid fuckin’ face, you ugly, jug-eared cunt!’

  I nearly choked. I thought he had been a bit fuckin’ harsh – and I was the one who had told him to do it. The head coach looked proper angry at the venom of those words. What the fuck must he be thinking? We quickly found out that he was thinking of kicking the kid’s head in, as he stormed over with a vicious snarl on his face. The rest of the group went deathly silent. The poor kid was in for a right beating, so I moved myself between the oncoming coach and the little fella next to me.

  ‘Don’t go near him.’ I squeaked. ‘It was you that started it.’ My words of protest didn’t seem to register with the approaching coach. Something else did, though: Jimmy the Butt’s booming voice

  ‘Go near that kid and I’ll put the fucking head on yer,’ he informed him.

  The coach came to an abrupt halt and stood glaring at me and the kid behind me. I nodded my appreciation towards Jimmy, who had spotted the commotion and made his way over. As usual, Jimmy defended the weak or vulnerable. One saying that Jimmy used a lot has always stayed with me: ‘Right is right, even if everyone is against it; and wrong is wrong, even if everyone is for it.’ I suppose these words gave you a good idea of just how Jimmy’s mind worked.

  After saving both mine and the kid’s bacon, Jimmy then turned to me and in no uncertain terms very loudly told me never to get involved in anyone else’s business like that again. ‘But you did well
,’ he whispered, with a smile.

  I then took it too far by trying to add about ‘right being right, even if…’ but Jimmy quietened me down by threatening to hide my Muppet Show pyjamas the next time he babysat. I was 13 years old and knew I shouldn’t be sporting Kermit and Fozzy Bear across my chest. A shame that Auntie Dina in County Offaly didn’t see things the same way. So, in front of the whole group, I went redder than a Royal Mail postbox. If Jimmy had threatened to beat me, then at least that threat would have given me some credibility among the rest of the team. To have my pyjamas outed in public was quite different. Seeing my crimson shade, the whole group began rolling about with laughter and, with everyone now relaxed, there followed a successful trial both for the fat little kid and me.

  At the end of the trials, the kid came and thanked me for sticking up for him. ‘Not a problem,’ I told him.

  ‘My name is Paul McGuigan, but people call me Guigs,’ he replied, offering his hand. Guigs, pronounced as ‘Gwigs’, was the first member of the future Oasis I met. Although short in stature, he had a wide pair of shoulders from which he would hang thick Starsky and Hutch-style cardigans. He seemed like a good kid. Guigs lived on Barlow Road, Levenshulme, a stone’s throw from the local baths. This was less than a hundred yards from where I lived. Unlike most of the local Irish youth, though, Guigs was Protestant, so he attended Burnage High School. I guess that’s why our paths did not cross earlier. After a couple of practice games our friendship grew and we were soon spending time listening to music in the shape of Joy Division and A Certain Ratio. His bedroom became our main place of musical enlightenment.

  We went to watch both Manchester City and United in an attempt to form a sporting allegiance. This helped Guigs integrate himself into the Levenshulme mob that I had grown up with. He was a friendly and unassuming young fella, always ready to listen and offer good advice. Some might say he was a lonely lad who relied heavily on those around him. I didn’t feel that Guigs’s neediness was an issue, though. We all need someone sometimes.

  Guigs was always interested in what other people were up to, and he took particular note of my drumming. I had now been banging those skins for some seven years. Guigs would sit in my bedroom and watch as I practised roll after roll. He was always trying something new, something different; I called it the Mr Benn syndrome. One day he would be a cricketer, the next day a boxer, and I guess in that mode he sort of just carried on until in later years he became a scooter boy, then a practising Rastafarian. If a notion crossed his path, then Guigs would have a go. He had a strong character, though, and would try harder than anyone else when he had a new project, even if he didn’t actually possess a talent for it. That attitude would serve him well when he met Bonehead a few years later.

  We also started boxing around this time. Another constant in my life. The old dole office on Chapel Street had finished its days as a nursery and had been reborn as Levenshulme ABC. The whole of Oasis, bar – not surprisingly – Bonehead, would pass through this gym. It was always full and you had to make sure you arrived early if you wanted to train. A family of six brothers, all ex-professional boxers, ran it. The first time Guigs and me went along, it was a dark November evening. Outside, there were two people arguing. They noticed us and lowered their voices, but we could still hear the anger. As we passed, the taller one smiled at us. ‘All right, boys?’ he asked, in a flat northern accent. He was 6ft plus, with strong shoulders and long, powerful arms. His hair was blond and cropped close to his head. His friend was slightly shorter, with dark hair, also cropped. After we were inducted into the gym, we sat on a long bench in the changing rooms. I slowly pulled the horsehair from the ripped boxing gloves I had been given on my arrival.

  ‘Oi!’ I sat up, startled.

  ‘What are you doing to those gloves?’ asked the large blond-haired fella from outside, who had just entered the room.

  ‘Nothing,’ I stammered. ‘Sorry.’

  ‘They don’t come fucking free, you know,’ he said, as he pulled the gloves from my grasp and slapped me over the head with them, playfully. ‘I’ve been told to look after you little fuckers, so listen up. No fucking about in the gym. No fucking about in the changing rooms. No fucking about anywhere. Simply no fucking about. Understand?’

  Understood. We all nodded our heads as we looked up from our positions on the bench. There was definitely something intimidating about the man.

  ‘Who the fuck is that?’ someone asked, after the blond man headed off to spar with his friend. ‘He’s a policeman. My brother told me,’ came the reply.

  I later found out that this wasn’t strictly true. The only connection to the police force was in the shape of a desk sergeant who had a football scout’s nose for criminal talent. He was convinced the blond fella had serious potential. He presented both of the boys to one of the brothers with a request that they be given a purpose in life and something constructive to do. But the name stuck and we would always refer to him as the Policeman.

  My old drum kit was a roll away from total capitulation. I realised I needed a job to fund a replacement, so on a winter’s day in 1984 I walked down Stockport Road in Levenshulme, stopping at each shop to ask for work. There was no joy at the bakers or the candlestick makers, but the butcher was a good fella and asked if I could be up and ready for work at five the next morning. After my time on the farm in Ireland, I considered this a lie-in. I was offered the job and with it the means to earn enough to get myself a proper drum kit. I was ecstatic. The butcher shop was called Needham’s and had been trading since the turn of the century. Good times were ahead. And cheap sausages.

  I was there every morning before going to school and every evening after I had finished. I thought nothing of picking up entrails and bollocks, brains and eyeballs, which seemed to impress the butcher. One freezing cold morning, I was emptying a bucket out back, my breath visible in the air, when I spotted a body lying motionless next to the tunnel that led to Levenshulme train station. Fuck me, it’s a dead man, I thought. Ever since the Moss Side riots, local drug wars had been raging and I expected this to be a tracksuit-clad casualty. I cautiously made my way over and the first thing that hit me was the pungent smell of urine-soaked clothing. In front of me was a tramp lying motionless on the ground. Horrified, I fled back to the shop to raise the alarm. The head butcher immediately ran over to examine the dead body, only to find that the tramp was still breathing. ‘It’s Trampy Spike,’ he told me. ‘He’s a local celebrity.’

  A local celebrity. I was learning to like my life full of characters. Nowadays, Trampy Spike would probably be followed around by a film crew from some cable channel. That morning they would have captured some strange footage. It transpired that a culmination of morning dew and urine, mixed with the sub-zero temperatures, had left the celebrity tramp frozen solid to the cobbles. He could not move an inch. Someone fetched a bucket of hot water and we slowly poured it round him, watching in amazement as he came back to life. After we provided the Lazarus-like vagrant with a hot cup of sweet tea, he revived sufficiently enough to tell me his name was Spike, adding as far as he was concerned he owed me his life. He swore that he would repay me somehow. Without wishing to sound heartless, this promise didn’t fill me with excitement. After all, the only possessions he had were his piss-soaked clothes and a rusty wheelbarrow. In due course, though, I would find out that life’s gifts can come in many different guises.

  My eagerness to work had left me with a few quid in my pocket for the first time in my life. Although the majority of it would be banked in my attempt to get a new drum kit, what remained went on cider and weed that would be consumed in the park at the weekend. I guess this was typical of the era we grew up in and happened in parks countrywide. It was Thatcher’s Britain and rebellion seemed right. As Greenbank and Chapel Street parks were right next door to the boxing gym, me and Guigs decided to move our drinking parties to Errwood Park in South Levenshulme. This, we thought, would give us some privacy and also stop any of the boxing
brothers spotting us. After training all week, we felt it was a weekend reward. They (quite rightly) looked on it as a total waste of all the previous week’s work. I guess one thing that the gym taught me was to respect your body and yourself, something that could only be brought about through self-discipline – which, in itself, was a great attribute to have.

  Errwood Park was as typical a city park as any, founded by the Victorians – though the pomp and circumstance of their day was now nowhere to be seen. The bandstand still stood, although it was now dilapidated and played host to the local glue-sniffers rather than any brass band. The bowling huts were still in good condition, as were the bowling greens themselves. Both were maintained by members of the bowling club who, if their beloved lawns were invaded, would exit the hut in a military formation and attempt to capture and punish any unlucky teenager. At night, the swings and roundabouts moonlighted as lounge bars and shabeens for the local teenagers intent on inebriation. Running through the middle of the park was the boundary between Levenshulme and Burnage. This was a point of conflict long before we had arrived.

  After a quiet first weekend in the park, we arrived the following Friday evening with carrier bags full of grog from the local off-licence; the only identification required in those days was a picture of the Queen on a crumpled bank note. After an hour or so, a firm of about 15 arrived in the park. Darkness had arrived, and with no one else around they made their way towards us. They were fronted by two skinheads, both wearing sheepskin coats and both named Peter. They were referred to as the Two Peters. Said a lot about the group, I guess. They then made us an offer we could not refuse.

  ‘You’ve got a sixty-second start. Get out of the park and get home. If we catch you before you reach home, we’ll put you in hospital. Do you understand, you Paddy bastards?’

  The group was a couple of years older than us and we were at an age when that really made a difference. This statement of intent was not good news to us, as we were of mostly Irish descent. I looked at Guigs, who was terrified by the prospect of a beating. He was also upset at being labelled ‘Irish’. He had recently taken to wearing a small Union Jack badge and in vain tried to point it out to the gang. They weren’t having it. We had seen this mob beat two young men under similar circumstances, leaving one in the Manchester Royal Infirmary. It was no fucking joke. These boys carried and were not afraid to put their tools to use. They also had the use of vehicles, which could make an escape difficult. It’s funny to think how prevalent such prejudices were, even two decades ago – and even that they still persist today in places. But these were the days when the IRA were conducting their most ferocious campaigns ever on the mainland and everybody seemed a little bit nervous and defensive.