CIA Op 1
No the real threat to democracy in the western world
CIA Op 2
Not ...oh my God
Both
- Ken Livingstone
So ended my first ever punchline at my debut Skints gig after a 7 day intense rehearsal period - although I had been quite a fan having followed them round the cesspits of Catford /Lewisham -ah the early circuit: Karno's cabaret at The Blackhorse in Catford where I thought the pool players were gonna stab me and use my femur as a cue. Seven Stars in Deptford where the set was padded out by Steve doing a great version of I Wanna See The Bright Lights Tonight just before the showgirl barmaids leapt up onto the beer counter to flash their frillies - an attempt at glamour as incongruous as the glittery curtain drawn over the vomit stained walls.
My best memory of that night in The Oxford Arms (not the Camden Palace it was called which rather dates it) was forgetting to get paid. Funny that as years later my main memory of some gigs was getting paid - the Mean fiddler made you wait like a brickie outside of the office while they counted tenners into a wee brown envelope - forelock tug tanks sir any chance of next week? But that's rock and roll for ya - cheat the acts and use the word man a lot so they think you're on their side.
What was I - two years out of college where I'd been paid to study by the state done some portering/ library work to keep me in food while I struggled to get that vital Equity card via fringe theatre company. I had given myself until I was 30 to have a crack at Acting/ writing etc although I played some chords and wrote songs I never regarded myself as musical. Then worked as a casual civil servant at OPCS which I still have a friend from but no card...applied for teaching course and offered interview at Reading and Bulmershe college as an English/ Drama teacher what a loss to the teaching profession those years were...
I had tentatively performed some dire poetry/ inuslted the audience at a Republic gig (Sarah Jane Morris lead singer) and mates' Stax Bodene gigs dressed in rubber underpants wearing a bald wig (speaking in a cross between Alexei sayle and Keith allen) and had some sketches written for a double act which never reached beyond the rehearsal stage - one of these was a Tom Waits version of Eliot's The Wasteland. When Mark Bryant and I did a slot we just did Small Change by the aforementioned singer then I got asked in person (didn't have a phone no landline, no mobile eh!) to dep for Steve's partner John Ivens who had landed an ASM gig with Actors Touring Company. Such a gig meant he would get his Equity card; here was my chance to get mine. Luckily Steve had not witnessed my debacles and even luckier there survives no footage of these happenings unlike a comic starting out now who would be showered with tweets and flipping mobile phone photos.
Gig was incredible I think Magritte the Mind Reading Rat was on (Andy Cunningham) I recall plenty of my family turning up and realising this was far more enjoyable for them than the Portugues radio play recently brought to The Old Tiger's Head in Lee Greenwhich featured me declaiming the immortal line
He wasn't as bent as that last time I saw him
So one down, thousand odd to go could be quite a run of posts here...panic not details of all gigs are not all as significant
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