Watching the crowd go wild for one track in particular, Donna had been quick to release ‘Splintered’, possibly the most discordant track on the album and one that she’d previously not even thought of as a possible single. It had reached the low 30s in the actual charts and the press had not been slow to record their admiration for the one seemingly spontaneous political statement made by a band that some had seen up to that point as being fairly obtuse.
The times were changing and Mood Violet seemed to be capturing the encroaching harshness of a new era. By the time they’d returned to London, Margaret Thatcher had swept the floundering Labour government aside in the May General Election like a one-woman legion of Panzer tanks, promising to get tough on the recalcitrant unions and clean up the Labour-constructed ghetto. Once the iron bouffant was installed, it was important to show opposition to all she stood for, especially so far as the music press were concerned. Donna kept her sneaking admiration for the woman to herself and let her band get on with maiming her name in interviews.
With both cred and burgeoning popularity on their side, Mood Violet went straight back into the studio, delivering the Shapeshifter LP to more acclaim and even more sales in November of that year. No such thing as a ‘difficult third’, their sound had become more complex and deep with each new piece of equipment the boys could afford to buy to enhance it, still producing and engineering everything themselves.
Sylvana’s vocals soared and stretched to meet the challenge. Hormonal boys not only drooled over her now, they sought to divine the true meaning of her continually obscure offerings and she furthered the mystery by refusing to print the actual lyrics and leaving nearly all the interview-talking to Robin and Allie. Notoriously difficult to interview, she had become an enigma, a beautiful enigma.
The ‘Astra’ single had cracked through the barriers at number 19 in December 1979, ‘Dawnburst’ had followed it up to number 15 in January 1980. They actually would have made Top of the Pops then, if the entire band hadn’t been stricken with a particularly nasty bout of flu.
Then it all went quiet, for over half a year. By which time, Donna already had her flat in Holland Park, five more successful bands on her roster, a sideline career as a TV pundit and her own weekly column in Time Out where she shared the secrets of her glamorous, yet cutting-edge life.
In fact, the only thing that Donna was lacking in her life now was Ray. Their faltering relationship had finally imploded when she’d put the down-payment on her flat at the same time that one of Ray’s heros, Sid Vicious, had come to his sordid end. When she had been more interested in furnishings than his grief at such a loss, it had finally dawned on Ray that Donna’s great crusade to promote new bands was actually a sideshow to her greater ambition – the edification of herself.
It had been hard for Ray to digest that his beautiful other half had not been exactly what she seemed, even though he had been trying to deny her growing indifference to him for months. The end had not been pleasant and they avoided each other now as much as possible, but the truth was Donna didn’t have to rely on Ray any more. Nowadays, people came to her.
Vada’s roster were all her own signings. Bands that had come up from the suburbs, inspired by the possibilities offered by drum machines and synths and the dark romanticism woven so powerfully by Mood Violet. With her own distinctively vampish appearance itself a beacon for a new generation of bands, it was often said that Donna had pioneered her own genre.
Electro-erotica, some had called it. Glam-gothic others had said. Byronica was her personal favourite; but Donna liked the fact that however hard the press tried, they couldn’t completely label her.
So she hadn’t worried unduly that her biggest act were taking so long to cough up their much-anticipated fourth album. After all, they had built their own studios in some musician’s co-op up on Kensal Road, pitching in their earnings with no doubt a little help from Sylvana’s family. So it wasn’t costing her anything for them to dick around for seven months trying to make effects out of the sound of waves breaking, or spiders spinning webs, or whatever the fuck else grabbed their muse from week to week.
They had fairly regular meetings and she heard the new tracks when the band were finally finished with them, none of which was disappointing. If anything, the multi-layered sonics Robin was so obsessively fussing over were the sort of thing that would have him heralded as a genius by those male journalists who couldn’t bring themselves to admit their sole reason for going to see Mood Violet was actually the singer.
The finished tapes were finally handed over in July 1980. Straight afterwards, Allie and Helen got married in Chelsea Town Hall. Donna wasn’t invited, but the service was for family only and the couple eschewed her offer to throw them a party afterwards, preferring instead to bugger off for a week in the Outer Hebrides, which all sounded very boring. Still, Helen’s business continued to flourish, Donna continued to get her free samples and they genuinely seemed to get happier and happier, those two.
Of Sylvana and Robin, Donna wasn’t quite so sure.
Which was why, as she announced her good news that morning, she wasn’t so surprised to see that, of the three pairs of eyes pointing her way, only Allie’s seemed to be registering any form of delight.
‘You’re joking?’ the genial guitarist suggested.
Donna shook her head with a smile. ‘Would I do such a thing to you?’ she said.
But Robin didn’t look anything like happy. The permanent scowl that seemed to haunt his features these days only deepened with the news. ‘So, we’ve got to put on a show for the kiddies now, have we?’ he sneered.
Sylvana’s gaze didn’t rise from the floor. She was getting skinnier and skinnier, her hair longer and longer, so that a rose-red cloud now obscured most of her face.
‘Hey, c’mon, Robin, think off all those bastids back home who’ll be watchin’,’ Allie chivvied his friend along, as he always did. ‘Think about the expressions on their faces, eh? I think it’s great.’
‘Aye, perhaps we can hire a Punch ’n’ Judy show to go with it, eh?’ Robin responded.
Allie looked crestfallen. He muttered under his breath, something Donna couldn’t quite catch.
Sylvana looked up then, peered through her curtain of hair. ‘I think that’s really great, thanks, Donna,’ she said, not altogether coherently.
‘Sylvana.’ Donna studied her New Wave goddess closely. ‘I think it’s time you paid a trip to the salon. There’s a great new one opened on Kensington Church Street. I checked it out last weekend and they said they’d always have a spot free for you. Let me take you there this afternoon, while the boys sort out what they need for the television.’
She flashed a glance at Robin, her eyes narrowing. Daring him to say anything else out of order. Black talons tapped on the hard surface of her desk. This time it was his turn to look at the floor.
‘Good idea,’ said Allie, a mite too enthusiastically. ‘Let’s go and get on wi’ the bloke’s stuff, Robin, let these girls do what they do best, eh?’
Robin was clearly unhappy with the idea, but he left without making any more comments. When he had finally shut the door, casting a hostile glance behind him, Donna went over to sit next to Sylvana on the sofa.
That was when the smell of brandy hit her. The eyes behind the curtain were unfocused, swimming. The beautiful engima was completely out of it.
Donna was shocked. From what she had seen, Sylvana was never a big drinker. Something must have happened to cause this. Judging by what had already gone on here this morning, something pretty bad.
Donna always felt awkward showing sympathy for anyone, but she realised she was going to have to go gently here. ‘Is everything all right with you two?’ she asked her, placing her hand on an arm that was stick thin.
Sylvana swayed a little bit, trying to focus on Donna’s concerned gaze. ‘Yeah, sure, honey, why sh-shouldn’t they be?’ she slurred.
Fucking hell, thought Donna, the state of her. ‘Well, Ro
bin didn’t seem his usual chipper self this morning, did he?’ She tried to keep her tone light. ‘Do you know what’s up with him? You lot should be really happy right now – the album’s finished, the advance orders are amazing, you’ve got Top of the Pops this Thursday, for Christ’s sake – things are going really well for you.’
Sylvana shrugged, the motion of a beached octopus taking its last breath.
‘D-don’t worry, Donna. He’s just a bit…y’know…precious about the record. He gets kinda nervous before a new release. But I’m happy. Really I am.’
This listless act didn’t cut any ice with the frost maiden herself. Donna tried another tack. She snapped her fingers in front of Sylvana’s nose and watched her suddenly flinch. ‘Then why, if everything’s so perfect, honey, do you stink like a tramp?’
The fear that bloomed in those green eyes was real enough to see. Sylvana started to shake. ‘I couldn’t sleep so good, that’s all,’
she whispered. ‘A bit of brandy’s the only thing that knocks me out.’
‘I see,’ Donna tapped her patent leather toe on the black vinyl floor. ‘Well, in that case, let’s go and have some lunch before we hit the hairdressers. You need feeding up, girl. You don’t look like you’ve had anything decent inside you for months.’
While Sylvana was being shorn and styled by the lovely Louis, French friseur extraordinaire, Donna marched down Church Street and across the main road into Kensington Market. A couple of vague imitations of herself nudged each other as she stomped her way in, but Donna had no time for their sort today. They could stick their autograph books up their arses. She was too busy chastising herself for not paying enough attention to the inner workings of her band. She could not have Sylvana swaying across the Top of the Pops stage like a clump of bloody seaweed.
Helen, having a quiet afternoon reading iD, looked surprised to see her.
‘I need a word,’ Donna announced, cutting straight to it with not so much as a preliminary ‘how are you?’ ‘Could you put the curtain up for a minute?’
Helen frowned, folded up her magazine slowly and put it down on the table. ‘What’s wrong?’ she asked.
Donna put her hands on her hips. ‘Our mutual friend. The Quiet American.’
Donna didn’t normally talk in code. With an inward sigh, Helen stepped out from behind her till, put the chain across the entrance to her space with the BACK IN TEN MINUTES sign on it and pulled the heavy velvet curtains across the doorway.
‘Helen, I’m worried.’ Donna spoke in a whisper, terrified of being overheard. ‘She came in for a meeting this morning, an important meeting, out of her head and reeking of brandy. I could scarcely get a word out of her, so I took her down the greasy spoon and filled her full of coffee and chips, but she’s still not altogether there.’
‘Then where is she?’ Helen asked.
‘Over the road, in The Cruellest Cut. I’m getting Louis to do her hair.’ Donna spoke impatiently. ‘I’ve only got about twenty minutes before I’d better get back to her, I’m too scared to let her wander off by herself. But I need to ask you – what’s going on with her and Robin?’
Helen inhaled slowly. She had been harbouring enough worries of her own about Sylvana over the past year, but the last person she wanted to share them with was bloody insensitive Donna.
‘I’m not entirely sure,’ she hedged. ‘We don’t see them half as much as we used to as a couple, and I can’t remember the last time I saw her on her own…’
‘Well, you wouldn’t see that much of her, would you, there’s hardly anything left to see,’ Donna started, then reined herself in. ‘Look, sorry, Helen, I don’t mean to sound out of order, I’m pissed off with myself to tell you the truth. I haven’t seen much of them while they’ve been making this record either, and I just assumed they’d been happily getting on with it. But this morning, there was something wrong with both of them – he was in a filthy mood and I’ve told you what she was like…’ She stopped and looked Helen straight in the eye. ‘Have they been having rows, do you think? Only she told me that the reason she was still pissed at ten o’clock in the morning was that she can’t get to sleep without a bottle of brandy these days.’
Helen winced at this, raked her hand through her short, spiky hair. ‘Like I said, Donna, I’m not sure, but…’ Her hazel eyes were pained. ‘But yeah,’ she finally said. ‘Yeah, I think they have been.’
So good at keeping her own secrets, Donna was an expert at divining others. She nodded thoughtfully. Obviously, whatever Helen did know, she didn’t want to share. She had always been protective of Sylvana, not to mention suspicious of herself. What Donna was going to have to do now was find a more tactful way to get Helen onside without causing any unnecessary interband friction.
‘Well, look,’ she said, ‘we’ll keep this between you and me, but I think we should keep more of an eye out for her in future. I know you’ve only just had your wedding and everything…’
She saw Helen’s eyes narrow then.
‘And I know the hours you work and what they put in at that studio,’ she hastily added. ‘But why don’t you suggest you have a girl’s night out – or a girl’s night in, whatever you think’s best. Try and find out what’s been going on. Because I’m afraid to say it, but I think she needs your help.’
She let that one hang in the air for a moment, gave her something to chew on. ‘Now then, I’d better get back to her. But if you want to talk some more, in private of course, please just give me a ring. And I’m sorry to lay this on you and then run, but believe me, I don’t want to see her getting into this kind of state.’
‘Of course.’ Helen looked like she was about to say something more, then thought better of it. Instead, she turned and pulled back the curtains; took down the chain, a tight frown creasing her forehead.
‘Thanks for telling me this, Donna,’ she said sincerely as they stood in the doorway. ‘I’ll be in touch as soon as I can.’
‘Thanks,’ Donna nodded. ‘Take care of yourself. And more to the point, take care of her that needs it.’
Even after she’d got the sobered and perfectly styled Sylvana back to her flat in one piece, Donna couldn’t rest. She tried to hang around a bit and get something more out of her singer, but it was futile. Sylvana now had a late afternoon hangover, which made her even more pathetic than the drink did. She asked Donna if she knew how to make chicken soup, but when the answer came that she knew how to take the lid off a tin of Campbell’s, Sylvana waved her away, saying that in that case, she’d better lie down and sleep the rest of it off.
Two days before they went on show to the world, Donna’s once pliable little princess was coming off the rails and she didn’t like it one bit. Helen had been precious little help, so she decided what she needed now wasn’t some dimwit friend but the advice of a professional.
Back in her office, she called Tony Stevens. The man who’d inspired her in the first place, that night up in Ray’s bedroom, was now a virtually self-made millionaire. He had kept his parsimonious instincts intact, mind, establishing his office in the perpetually unglamorous Shepherd’s Bush, not an area Donna cared to visit, even if it was only five minutes down the road.
Still, Donna admired Tony greatly, more than anyone else she’d ever met in the music business. But more than that, she understood him in a way few other people did.
Donna’s dad was a small-time criminal, too addicted to the bottle to be anything but petty. He had driven vans for people occasionally, but his main line of work was holding and fencing. Since she was tiny, even in the days before the Tower, when they lived in a two-up, two-down off Goldbourne Road, Donna could remember strange men coming in and out of their home at odd hours of the day and night.
The first time it had happened, she’d been terrified. She’d woken to find a big, shaven-headed brute heaving away at something underneath her bed. She’d screamed the house down, thinking it was a monster, until her mum had come to whisk her out of the room, turning to swea
r at her father, cuddling her and telling her everything was OK with a fag still hanging out of her mouth.
After that, she had had to get used to the traffic of pasty-looking men calling at all hours, commandeering the kitchen to play cards and drink whisky late into the night, leaving their cardboard boxes under the bed, in the wardrobe, all over the house. Sometimes it had its benefits – she’d had a Tiny Tears, a Slinky, and pair of rollerskates before anyone else she knew. Her mother’s range of kitchen gadgets were the envy of the estate and, on the rare occasions she ever got taken anywhere other than the pub, she had a wardrobe of fancy evening dresses and fur coats to wear.
The first time Donna had met Tone, there was something about him that immediately took her back to the circle of men in the kitchen. Something about the way he carried himself, the way he spoke, the way he smoked a cigarette pinched between his fingers and thumb, pointed towards his palm. Only there was nothing petty about Tone, she realised that too. He didn’t come with the cheap aftershave and blue tattoos, the haunted eyes and ragged, oiled-back hair of her dad’s associates. Because Tone came from criminal royalty. His dad had done business with the Richardsons.
It wasn’t something he told people, of course. Tone was the white sheep of the family, determined to make a legitimate business out of something he really cared about, even if his first release had been bankrolled by the old man. It was something Donna had found out about herself, one of the few times her wally of a brother had come up with the goods on anything. She had stashed it away in the ‘useful’ drawer in her mind, although she’d never had to use it. Tone had liked her from the start.
At first, she had read his interest slightly wrongly. There had been one night when Ray was out of town, on the road with The Damned, of all people, who hadn’t actually split up for long at all. Tone had invited her to watch one of his bands and had taken her to a club afterwards.
The Singer Page 21
