The Singer

by Cathi Unsworth

  Kevin looked up. Kevin noticed. Kevin heard Dunton scream: ‘Nigger lover! You’re fucking dead, Kevin Holme.’

  ‘Keep playing,’ shouted Lynton. ‘Don’t listen to him.’

  Kevin dragged his gaze away over to the bass player and nodded almost imperceptibly. He kept moving his arms up and down even as his stomach hit the floor, kept beating away at the skins as he watched with horror his next-door neighbour burrowing through the punks and freaks, his eyes wild with hatred and rage.

  By now, Stevie had clocked it too, had moved right to the front of the stage, yelling: ‘Fuck off out of it!’

  ‘Ooo! Ooo! Oooo!’ Dunton and his apes chanted back, drinks flying up in the air as they bulldozed their way through the crowd.

  ‘Dead, Kevin!’ Dunton repeated. ‘Dead, d’you hear me, you traitor!’

  ‘Fuck off!’ screamed Stevie. Lynton and Kevin exchanged nervous glances, but kept on playing like their lives depended on it. Perhaps at that moment they actually did.

  Dunton got right up to the lip of the stage, Barney and the brothers pushing people off him left and right. Terry and Barry were winnowing their way towards the knot of trouble, but by now they were also having to deal with outraged members of the audience thinking that they, too, were trying to start a fight. The whole area in front of the stage had become a teeming pit. From three minutes of sheer rapture, it looked like everything was about to go to hell.

  Then Vince leaned down from the stage and pushed his hand right in Dunton’s face. Long fingers crunched into his cheekbones, a palm pushed his noise back so sharply a bright pain brought tears into his eyes.

  ‘And ah see we have one here who does not believe!’ Vince roared into his mic.

  Dunton’s hands flailed in front of his face, trying to bat his assailant away. But Vince was much taller, his reach much longer, his grasp as rigid as iron. As the singer leapt down from the stage, Dunton felt a sickening crunch and blood spurted out of his newly broken conk. His legs threatened to buckle under him but already, Vince was propelling Dunton backwards and the crowd parted involuntarily to let them pass.

  Slow on the uptake, Barney Lee at last tried to swing for Vince but Stevie was right behind him, thwacking him round the back of his bony shaved head with the stock of his guitar.

  ‘Get them!’ he yelled across to Terry and Barry, motioning with his head to Malc and Martin Carver, who were having problems of their own with a couple of hefty punks. ‘I’ll deal with this shite.’

  But it was Vince who was really dealing with things. The crowd started to cheer as he continued to march Dunton backwards at the end of his arm, pouring scorn non-stop through his still-wired microphone while globs of blood and snot ran over his hand and his prey choked for breath.

  ‘We have a sinner in our midst! This snivelling worm at the end of my arm thinks that he is a man! We will show him his folly! The error of his ways!’

  Barney Lee weaved unsteadily around in front of Stevie, as if trying to focus. Stevie headbutted him and he dropped to the floor.

  Lynton and Kevin continued to play; luckily they knew their parts off by heart as what was unravelling before them was enough to break anyone’s concentration. Giving them the thumbs up, Stevie hauled himself back on stage for a better look.

  Vince’s mic lead was on a long cable, but it was about to run out as he neared the back of the hall. He thrust it into the hands of one of the Teds standing by the bar. But he didn’t let go of Dunton.

  Everything Dunton had imagined would happen this evening had been totally turned on its head. The little thug had not forgotten what Stevie Mullin had done to him at school and how he had then had the cheek to go on and take Kevin away from him. He had brooded all summer long on how stupid Kevin was to think that he, the all-seeing Dunton, wouldn’t realise what was going on. But all the same, he had bided his time, while building himself up with his dad’s Bullworker and extra judo classes. Much as he hated him, he didn’t underestimate Mullin. Tonight, however, he’d felt ready. Ready to rub Kevin’s nose in it for defying him. Ready to knock Stevie’s block off.

  He hadn’t reckoned on this. On this wild-eyed maniac with superhuman strength; where the fuck had he come from? Dunton couldn’t see where he was being pushed, could hardly stay upright, his only blessing was that he was too wired with adrenalin to actually feel the pain that would soon come crashing down around him.

  Vince pushed the flailing, flapping creature right out of the room and out of the door, right past the bouncer at the entrance and didn’t stop until they were standing by the top of the stairs.

  Then the singer dropped his preacher’s voice and said in a voice as cold as steel: ‘Don’t ever try to fuck with my band again. Or next time, I’ll really hurt you.’

  Then he let go of his hand and Dunton fell backwards down the stairs.

  Terry and Barry appeared in the doorway, the Brothers Grim in armlocks in front of them. They looked at Vince now with new eyes. Maybe the daft bugger had his uses after all.

  ‘Ta, mate,’ said Barry.

  ‘Yeah, you can go back to work now,’ added Terry.

  Vince smiled a twisted smile and watched Malc and Martin go toppling after their leader. Then he turned back into the room where the Ted still had hold of his mic and an incredulous expression all of his own.

  Vince snatched it back.

  ‘Brothers and sisters!’ he roared. ‘Ah have expelled the sinner from our midst!’ He opened his arms wide as if he had just witnessed a miracle. His right hand was smeared in Dunton’s blood.

  From the stage, Stevie cheered, cranked up the ‘Rumble’ riff in double speed as a salute to his conquering comrade. Lynton and Kevin both thought about Vince too. He had really stood up for them. He had fucked off Dunton without having to be told, and what’s more, he had taken the audience’s loyalty with him, when everything could so easily have gone the other way.

  From the wings, Don Dawson chuckled softly to himself, lighting another cigar with his gold Ronson lighter. He’d had his heart in his mouth for a moment when it looked like it were going to turn into a proper ruck, but the neat way that Smith had turned it round had impressed him. A live one all right, he ruminated. It reminded him of the Teddy Boy tours he’d witnessed in his youth, the Jerry Lee Lewis, Gene Vincent, Little Richard package put on by Don Arden – one of his business role models, who he hadn’t forgotten when he put his faith in punk. Gene Vincent, that were who lad reminded him of: all black hair and leather. Danger on two legs.

  His eyes travelled across the room and he drank in the admiration shining back at the singer from every face. He might be a nasty bastard, have that streak in him that went beyond the exuberance of youth, but what came with it was that rarest of commodities: star quality. The one thing that money couldn’t buy.

  Vince tried to make his way back through the crowd, but it was not to be. They hoisted him into the air and carried him back to the stage on their shoulders. He wiped their hair with the gore from Dunton’s broken nose, kneaded the rest of it into his own raven crown.

  First blood.

  Part Two

  12

  Head Over Heels

  April 1978

  ‘That’s it,’ said Donna, pursing her lips at her reflection in the mirror. ‘Before the night is out, Dave Vanian will be mine!’

  The results of two hours plastering and preening gazed back at her. Donna’s thick black hair had been crimped, sprayed, backcombed and bouffanted upwards into an enormous beehive shape so that she resembled the Bride of Frankenstein. Although Bride of Dracula was more what she was aiming for, Dracula himself being the equally raven-haired singer of The Damned. Tonight might be her last chance – it was the band’s farewell gig at the Rainbow and Donna had been loudly proclaiming how she was going to ensnare him all day long.

  As usual, Helen had been roped in, in the role of her dresser. She had to admit, she’d done a good job.

  Underneath the virtually vertical mane, Donna’s
face was as white as death, thanks to the powder and foundation she had half inched when Helen showed her the theatrical shop on South Molton Street that they used for college supplies. Along with the black liquid eyeliner and false eyelashes that batted back to her from the mirror. The purple and white Reflections eyeshadow, Rouge Noir blush and Black Cherry lipstick were all by Miners, swiped from Woolies on Portobello Road.

  They had first bumped into each other about a year and a half ago, down the 100 Club. Literally bumped into each other. Donna had emptied a pint of beer over Sylvana’s head, for absolutely no reason at all, then stood there smirking while her victim’s eyes filled up with tears. Helen, who had been more or less taking care of her very unworldly-wise American friend since the first day they’d met at the London College of Fashion, took charge of the situation. Using the technique that had so often subdued her brother, she’d grabbed Donna’s arm and twisted it up around her back till she was in agony. Then she’d asked: ‘What do you think you’re doing?’

  Donna had then apologised profusely, helped Helen mop Sylvana down in the bogs. That should have been that, but Sylvana, who genuinely believed it had all been an accident, had had to go and mention that they were fashion students. And that clever Helen was doing theatrical costuming. Donna had stuck fast to them for the rest of the evening. When she’d seen where they lived, there had been no getting rid of her.

  Admittedly, Donna’s sense of style was strong and her instinct uncanny. She often boasted about her rubberwear from Sex and the Seditionaries T-shirts that she’d taken while still in her school uniform, but as soon as she saw too many other people wearing the same, she would ditch them and move on. When she saw Helen’s pattern-cutting blocks, the corsets she had been required to make for coursework and her first experiments in millinery – a black velvet top hat – she had been entranced. Helen loved the Victorians, and Victoriana was where Donna saw herself headed next – thanks to the influence of Dave. She had begged, wheedled and cajoled Helen into helping her fashion her own outfits, and tonight’s really was some kind of triumph.

  It was constructed from half a lace Victorian dress and a Fifties net petticoat – that was Donna’s way of saying up yours to the rival Teds. Helen had shown Donna how to dye the two things black by dissolving big, inky tablets into in a huge iron pot over the stove, a process that took about two days. Which, of course, had to be done in the students’ flat, Donna’s mum ‘would have killed’ her if she’d tried it at home. Then Helen had tailored the two garments together with a corset acting as the waistband. Winched inside, Donna looked breathtaking. Fishnet tights and a pair of black stilettos completed this vision of glamour gothique.

  Yet even as she posed in front of the mirror, Helen could see the sideways glances Donna cast at Sylvana, who sat at her feet, painting her own eyeshadow on with painstaking slowness. Donna looked at Sylvana the way a cat looks at a mouse.

  Donna had Sylvana totally hooked on her every word and style dictum. Gone was the thick thatch of brown hair she had come to London with; in its place a razor cut, dyed ruby red with the colours Donna decanted from her day job, hairdressing on the King’s Road.

  Good with her hands, was Donna.

  It made Sylvana look ethereally pretty, that haircut. She would never have got away with it at home, in New Jersey, where her textile magnate parents kept her as cosseted as they possibly could. She had only been allowed to come to London as part of her training, so she would know more about the business of fashion when it was her time to take the helm. And only then because one of her uncles had this mansion flat in South Kensington, just round the corner from all the museums. Her parents had spent time there before, they knew the place was respectable. The uncle himself was hardly ever around; he was always flying off around the world, making even more money, something the family were obviously extremely good at. They had only seen him twice in all the time they’d been here.

  Helen had watched Donna taking all these details in. Once the full magnitude of Sylvana’s richness had sunk in, Donna had made every effort to be her best friend, showing her all the hippest hangouts, taking her to all the best gigs. And at the same time, gradually moving in to the spare room. Helen had tried to subtly hint that perhaps she might be trying to take advantage, but as Sylvana kept saying, poor Donna was from a deprived background. Her parents lived in that dreadful new tower block near Portobello Road, the Tower of Terror the tabloids called it. Everyone knew it was a dump, used by anyone who fancied it as a public toilet and shooting gallery, glue-sniffers and skagheads roaming the stairwells at all hours. Sylvana said she shuddered to think of poor Donna going back there late at night. Or even in the daytime.

  ‘You look incredible, doll,’ Sylvana said to Donna’s reflection. ‘How could he ever resist?’

  ‘He couldn’t,’ agreed Helen, who had been ready for about an hour already. ‘Although, if you do want him to notice you, we’d better get our arses down there before the gig finishes…’

  They travelled down to Finsbury Park on the Piccadilly line. Most people looked away from them as they got on the carriage, as if they’d just stepped out of 1666 with a big sign saying: ‘Unclean’ around their necks and someone ringing a bell in front of them. Donna liked it when they looked away. It showed a healthy fear. But then there would always be one who would want to start something, and sure enough when they got to the stop for Holborn, some starched suit with his briefcase thought it was about time he passed comment. ‘Disgraceful,’ he pronounced, running his eyes up and down the three of them.

  ‘Beg your pardon?’ Donna shouted back. Lounging in her seat, her fishnet legs crossed in front of her with one ankle idly twitching from left to right, she was the picture of sullen disdain.

  The man cleared his throat. He had a salt-and-pepper moustache and sticking out ears, pale, watery eyes, and an ordered neatness to him that suggested he had once been in the military. With his pinstripe suit and black Macintosh, shining shoes and briefcase, bowler hat and brolly, he couldn’t have been more the proper city gent than Donna could have been the epitome of degeneracy.

  ‘I said you are disgraceful!’ snapped the man, his face colouring vividly. ‘You look like nothing but whores!’

  Donna merely raised one painted eyebrow. ‘Looks like you would know,’ she said.

  ‘Well, I…’ the man blustered for a second, looked round the carriage for support. Everyone else was busy minding their own business, deep in a book, the Evening Standard, fast asleep or catching flies. Everyone was looking anywhere but at the three punk girls and him.

  And the punk girl with black hair was looking at him bold as brass, bold as a brass indeed with her lurid lipstick and insolent eyes.

  ‘I won’t lower myself,’ he said aloud and pinged open his own briefcase, from which to extract the Financial Times he had already given a thorough going over once today. Ruffling the pages loudly and clearing his throat, he emulated the other passengers’ studied indifference all too late.

  Donna laughed herself into hysterics, Sylvana giggling along nervously. Helen wondered when this kind of behaviour would start getting really dangerous. Helen had had enough of Donna. But Sylvana was still totally in awe of her. Sylvana still had an awful lot to learn.

  At the door of the Rainbow Theatre converged a scene out of the city gent’s worst nightmare, a Night of the Living Dead on Seven Sisters Road, all come to dance on The Damned’s premature grave. It wasn’t just Donna who had been captivated by Dave’s vampire chic, but, as her rolling eyes struggled to take in the line of potential love rivals, there didn’t appear to be anyone here who looked a patch on her. Swaggering in her stilettos, a trail of glances like glittering daggers followed in her wake. It gave even more of a swing to her step.

  It was a cold night for the time of year, but none of the trio felt it. A legacy of the minus zero New Jersey winters, Sylvana had brought an array of fur coats over from the States. While lesser punks made do with the fake leopardskin they could
find from the second-hand shops and markets, Sylvana, Donna and Helen were warmly wrapped up in real mink and silver fox.

  Inside the venue, these were quickly dispensed to the cloakroom as the temperature shot up in the humid throng of bodies, all waiting to light punk’s funeral pyre. Brian James had announced in February that he wanted to leave the band, who had already lost their founding drummer Rat Scabies, and it seemed better to burn the thing to the ground in one last act of defiance than let things meander on with stick-on members plastering over their legacy.

  The girls had already missed most of the support, not that this particularly bothered them. They’d already seen Johnny Moped too many times at other people’s gigs and Prof and the Profettes were just The Damned’s roadie and their new drummer, Jon Moss.

  The final entertainment before the main event came in the underwhelming form of The Soft Boys, a bunch of Cambridge fops who sounded a bit too much to Helen’s ears like her brother’s hideous Pink Floyd records than anything genuinely punk. She was about to offer to go to the bar when Donna cut in, as if reading her mind.

  ‘Ugh, I can’t stand these lot. I met that singer once, down the Roxy or the 100 Club or somewhere – Jesus, he was fucking boring. I’ll get the beers in, so I don’t have to look at him.’

  Helen and Sylvana idled their way down the side of the seats, closer to the front of the stage, to an angle where they thought they would be able to see The Damned better. Whether it was the dullness of the Soft Boys, or just the fact that things seemed to be running late, time passed awfully slowly, and every time they thought they had a good spot, they seemed to get pushed out of it by a crowd that was getting restless.

  ‘What is she doing now?’ wondered Helen crossly. The Soft Boys had been droning on for about ten minutes and there was still no sign of Donna or their drinks. It was getting really late now – approaching ten o’clock – and at the rate she was going the bar would soon be shut too.