Where were you born, tell me about
your early life and childhood.
I was born and bred in Brighton. When
my father came out of the RAF, they gave
hima prefab, a prefabricated building,
which is like a single storey unit, and
that was on Whitehawk Way. I know
Whitehawk has always had its reputation
but when I was born and growing up
there, it wasn’t like that. We progressed
from there to what was regarded as
probably one of the premier council
flats, which was in Sylvan Hall, up in
Whitehawk Road there. You’ll see the
block and that was quite a leap up back
then.
I grew up there, until my dad, who along
with his brother, started up their own car
dealers. They climbed their way up the
ladder until dad got to the point where he
said, “Okay, it’s time to move from here
now. We’re going to buy our first house
and it’s wrong to stay in this council
place when there’s someone else who
needs it now that we’re doing well.” So,
he was literally a self-made man and my
uncle, they came up in the world and the
first house which he owned and I lived
in was in Poplar Close up in Surrenden
Road.
I worked for my dad in the garages. I
was a petrol pump attendant and grease
monkey in the workshop. I’d left school
when I was 14 because you could
then you see. I had no interest in it. All
I wanted to do was either be in music,
play football or play with girls. They were
the only three things that interested me.
So this is when you entered the world
of music?
I formed a band at school with my best
mate, a boy called Peter, and that was
the beginning of my career in music. That
band was called The Urchins and we
were out there gigging in youth clubs..
We used to play locally. The band went
through many changes over its years.
Peter left and did something else and
different members came in. You know,
the musicianship got better and better.
I was the drummer. I was self-taught on
the drums and the band did very, very
well. We were quite a prominent band
down here in that 60s period. We came
second in the Melody Maker big contest
at the Dome and we played in local clubs
here. We were resident at the Starlight
Rooms and the Pop Inn, those sorts of
venues. Then as the band progressed
even more - I’m now about 16 - we were
given a residency in London in a club
called the Bag o’ Nails, which is in Kingly
Street, parallel to Carnaby Street and this
is in 1966-67. If you look its history up
you will see this was “the club”. This was
where Jimi Hendrix was discovered, this
is where McCartney met Linda.
The club was owned by the Gunnel
Agency, who we had signed to, and
also Georgie Fame who was a famous
keyboard artist or player and they owned
the club. I was in there every night
until about three or four o’clock in the
morning, and our audience was made up
of The Beatles, The Rolling Stones, The
Small Faces, The Kinks, and The Walker
Brothers. Everybody that was somebody
in the business, they were the audience
every night. So, as a 16 year old kid, I
was playing to the likes of these people.
It was quite incredible when I stop and
think about it.
So, there were lots
of people in caftans and the beads and
the love power and Carnaby Street was
buzzing and I was literally there in the
middle of all this. I think how privileged I
was to be part of that whole scene, you
know, to witness what I witnessed.
So, did you move around a lot in those
days or just based at the club?
We would be on the road a lot. Through
the Gunnel Agency we used to get
offered to back different artists and I
remember one day they came and said,
“We’ve got this young guy and he really
needs a backing band to go out on his
tour, a guy called David Essex.” And we
said, “No, no… we’ve listened to him and
he’s not really our cup of tea.” This was
because we were quite a soul band. We
used to play to all the mods, we were a
mod band really but, we had a sax and
a brass section and everything but we
used to play all the soul music and that
was our cup of tea.
The next job that came up was a strange
one, they said, “Well, there’s this guy,
you probably know of him, Adam Faith.
His band has now gone, the Roulettes,
and he’s looking for a new band.” And
we thought, “Well, again, that’s not
really us.” But, anyway, we went for the
audition, which was at the Ram Jam
Club in Brixton, and he turned up and, of
course, I knew who he was because as
I kid I used to watch him on television in
those early rock shows, Six Five Special
and all these sort of shows on black and
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