“Good evening, sir. North Yorkshire Police, PC Smith speaking. Is that the owner? I have fourteen Cubans in custody, do they belong to you?”
Now, I’m not a huge fan of ‘world music’, worthy though it may be, and it ranks alongside my likes somewhere in between losing my keys (which I do all the time) and meeting a spider in the bath – when I’m in it. Sorry, but it all seems a bit twiddly diddly and, for me, a lot of music is about identifying a time, emotion or place in your life and I can’t relate to a village in Africa or an Eastern European wedding dance. Much less plantation owners and slavery although I did work for Barfly for five years.
Anyhoo … I’d booked a Cuban troupe complete with famous ‘Son’ singer (‘Son’ is Cuban dance music) and duly they arrived at the back of Stonebow House, fourteen of them squished in to a van, noses pressed up against windows, perched on guitars and amps. And the bongos, well, I don’t like to guess where they were.
Soundcheck, such as it was without a common language, was over in ten minutes and with the shops still open our new friends from Havana hurried in to town. Quite quickly.
It’s not unusual for acts to return after the venue has opened for business but I was getting very concerned with fifteen minutes to go before showtime when the office phone rang. A constable explained his predicament, and with that phone call the maracas brigade got a bit more unattractive.
“Good evening, sir … There’s been a bit of a shopping spree, but without the paying bit. And the thing is, none of them speak a word of English. The shops concerned just want their property back and we really don’t want to try and process all this lot. Can we release them back to you as long as they definitely perform tonight and leave town tomorrow?”
Talk about getting run out of Dodge.
Our Caribbean queens and kings were delivered back to the venue, the subsequent gig proceeding without incident and I actually quite enjoyed the night despite myself. The fee was a measly £200 (no wonder they needed to top up although you can’t eat a watch) but I also paid for the accommodation. The hotel reported next day that the chambermaid found their rooms full of empty radio, perfume and souvenir boxes. Seems they popped out again after breakfast as well.
Now then, where was I in the timeline. 1994? I’d love to say we got off to an interesting start in January but other than Urban Species draping the PA in jungle net and me getting tinnitus (ringing insistently as always and whilst I type this) courtesy a Fender Double Twin on New Year’s Night as Michelle and I manned the bar and the kitchen between us still serving homemade lasagne and garlic bread until closing time. Y’see, every penny counted, oh yes it did, and our motto, so little known amongst today’s young guns, was ‘the man at the bar waving a five pound note is the most important person alive.’
In February we got the first of many visits from Earthwood, fronted by a greased-up 6’6” bloke wearing a loin cloth and holding a lamp to his face. There was a lot of scaffolding, as I recall, and a lot of shouty metal and girls going hmmmmm. It was also when we got our first visit from reggae legend Desmond Dekker whose Tour Manager required fish and chips and a bottle of champagne. Desmond was gob-smackingly fantastic, then mid-fifties but every bit a legend and performer crouched over with his lop-sided smile and, despite being fully clad in black leather, owning that stage for two hours in face-melting heat. It is still up there as one of my gigs of the decade as three hundred skinheads skanked, drained us of Red Stripe, laughed and smiled and made the walls run and the ceilings drip. The Israelites, 007, It Mek, truly golden memories.
Followed four days later by Oasis on Sunday lunchtime, but not THAT Oasis. For the record it was a York boy/girl keyboard duo who hung a sheet at the back of the stage and battled bravely to no applause. It was a long time before I would see so many keyboards on the Fibbers stage and to the last black note they all sounded like a Casio.
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