After leaving the prison that day, I walked to the rehearsal rooms, where I told the band about meeting our old friend. Upon which Noel told me he’d read in the paper that Trampy Spike had been locked up for burning down an empty three-bedroom semi. It was the seventh house he had burnt down in a fortnight. Lying, fucking smelly tramp, I thought.
Before we finished that evening, Noel revealed he had some good news. We waited eagerly to hear what was coming. ‘We’re going on TV,’ he said. Oddly, Noel himself seemed only half-excited by his own announcement. I was worried at that. Surely this was a big thing for us?
‘Smart. What on?’ I asked.
‘Granada. It’s Red Nose Day and we’re gonna be supporting Alvin Stardust.’
This explained the half-hearted introduction. Alvin fuckin’ Stardust. Whoopee.
‘Isn’t that the silly cunt in the gold-glitter jacket?’ asked Bonehead.
‘He’s a fucking genius,’ said Noel, leaving the rest of surprised to say the least. Well, almost the rest of us.
‘Yeah, a legend,’ piped up Guigs and received a funny look from Noel, who was slowly learning to read him.
Anyway, fuck it. TV exposure could only be good, even if we were supporting Alvin Housedust. It seemed that Alvin was not Noel’s only unlikely musical influence. He also saw Abba as one of the greats.
I told Liam he might have to dress up as Pudsey, the little sick bear, and he stormed out of the room shouting, ‘It’s never gonna fuckin’ happen!’ We all roared with laughter.
We rolled up on the day in the Bonemobile to find that we were to use Alvin’s PA and drum kit, which saved a right load of mither. We were also told to mime the track, which would be a first. With spirits lifted, we made our way to the replica Rovers Return (we were at the Granada Studio Tour location, which had been opened to the paying public) and started on the bar. If we only had to mime, what was the harm?
‘Right, this is it. Everyone will be watching,’ Noel announced. He was trying to warm us up for the gig. ‘It doesn’t matter if it’s two hundred people in the crowd or two thousand. Just enjoy it.’
We burst onto stage, ready to be amazed. The steel roadside barriers were in place to control the baying mob of fundraisers and Granada staff. All 12 of them. Alvin was still in the back, applying a tub or two of wax to his fucking massive hair and getting ready to coo-ca-choo. Outside, Liam faced the crowd. As usual when nervous, Liam became defensive and was stood staring wildly at them. Even at this early stage he was perfecting his glare. Rather than a stadium of testosterone-filled males as an audience, though, he had members of the Salvation Army, St John’s school choir and a handful of technicians. They all looked nervously back at the aggressive singer with the long hair and face like a hooligan, all set to attack. I laughed, as I knew that Liam meant no harm. Not sure if the little girl who was crying at the front did, though.
The cameras began to record as the compère faced the crowd and began, in his big showbiz voice. ‘Let us now welcome Oasis who have just flown back to be with us from their tour… OASIS!’ He swept his arm around and stood facing us with a cheesy grin. A bead of sweat slowly rolled from his brow and down his forehead as he was met by silence. We all just stared at him.
‘We’ve just come from Burnage, dickhead. We ain’t on fuckin’ tour,’ snapped Liam.
The crowd erupted in laughter, from the school choir to the Sally Army, as we launched into ‘Take Me’ and Liam stared the compère down off the stage. We performed more than adequately and received as much a response as you’d expect from a mimed performance to a crowd full of kids and ambulance staff.
After rounding up BigUn and the rest of our decidedly dodgy entourage, we headed off back to the Bonemobile. Just as we reached it, a brand-new Cherokee jeep burst past us, narrowly missing Liam. ‘What the fuck you doing, dickhead?’ shouted Liam after the vehicle.
The jeep screeched to a stop at the security gates, where we clocked the driver was Simon Gregson, who plays Steve McDonald on Coronation Street. The window rolled down and a hand appeared from the side of the jeep, making the internationally recognisable up-and-down motion indicating that one might masturbate.
‘We’ll see who’s the wanker in a minute,’ said Liam, and jogged towards the jeep. There was a look of panic on the actor’s face as he spotted the lank-haired hoodlum getting ever nearer. With a frantic wave of his badge and a nervous smile, ‘McDonald’ sat revving his engine as Liam closed in. Still the barrier was not raised. The security guard waited until Liam was just upon the vehicle before he pressed the button to release the barrier and Simon Gregson screamed off into the night. The guard was beside himself with glee by this stage and gave Liam a wink before he burst into laughter, already watching the replay on his little TV screen. He waved us in and we all gathered round and watched a fine piece of method acting by Mr Gregson.
Despite agreeing to play with Alvin Stardust, our performance was not broadcast. We were devastated. Our big opportunity had been stolen from us by some musical philistine who simply did not recognise just how brilliant we were. If somebody at Granada can dust down the old tapes, I’d love to see that performance. In the bar afterwards, the feedback we got from our showing was positive but there were also a few questions from the same security guard we had been laughing with earlier, regarding somebody breaking into The Kabin on Coronation Street in an attempt to steal cigarettes. The culprit hadn’t taken the time to consider the fact it was not a real shop and security had followed the discarded (and empty) packets of stage fags back towards to our van. You couldn’t write it. I stared at BigUn, who looked back indignantly. (We’d thought it odd that he and the rest of our entourage hadn’t been around when we’d been performing earlier.) As usual, all present denied any involvement whatsoever.
Strangeways had finally driven me insane, so I had agreed to valet cars for BigUn, which meant that me and Liam would be working with each other as well as playing in a band together. At one point, the whole group worked for BigUn and we were all grateful as this helped pay for rehearsal time and equipment. I know there were times when BigUn lost money on jobs but he took the hit and he still paid us. My first day working for him took me to Prestbury, Cheshire, just south of Manchester. It was a very affluent area and home to many of the local football players and soap stars. After very carefully cleaning the car of Keith Curle, the captain of Manchester City, I returned to the van, my work done. BigUn and Liam were waiting. Before we left Prestbury, though, BigUn handed Liam an invoice and told him to drop it off at a large house that he pointed out. As Liam crunched his way up the gravel driveway, we sat outside in the van. BigUn had that look about him.
‘What you up to?’ I asked him.
‘Just watch,’ he replied. ‘It’s not an invoice, it’s a fuckin’ love letter.’ BigUn had written ‘I think I love you Curly. I’m gonna make you mine’ on a piece of card and had stuffed it in the envelope. He thought this was funny. All that was left now was for Liam to innocently deliver it. Liam rang the bell to the large house and stood moving from foot to foot as he awaited an answer. Slowly the door opened and out stepped Mark Hughes, the Manchester United and Wales football player. His tight curly dark hair was instantly recognisable. The gel on his perm glistened in the afternoon sunlight as he greeted Liam.
Liam’s blue blood left him unsure as what to say, so he simply handed the supposed invoice to him. Hughes opened it and then read the contents as Liam stood waiting. He quickly looked up and spotted us pissing ourselves in the van at the end of his driveway.
Fair play, Mark Hughes laughed and he turned the card to show Liam what was written on it. Liam read the card in horror and then began to stammer that he had no feelings whatsoever for Mark Hughes and how there was nothing wrong with curly hair.
‘I think your friends are taking the piss,’ said Hughesy with a laugh, and nodded in our direction. With this, BigUn hopped out and loped over, chuckling. After a brief chat, BigUn returned and we headed off back to Levenshulme. That mee
ting would prove to be an important one for BigUn, as through Mark Hughes’s introduction he would become the valeter for Manchester United Football Club, which in turn kept the band in work.
A few days later, we headed off to Abraham Moss studios in Cheetham Hill to complete our first demo as a five-piece. We recorded ‘Colour my Life’ and ‘Take Me’ but it was a shambolic session, as became evident when we slipped the tape into the van’s cassette player on the way home. City Life reviewed the demo in their Christmas issue, though the reviewer wrote that he was not too excited by the band. Thanks for that.
We each fired the demo around people we knew in the city. Noel told his contacts he was not even on the demo, as if he was ashamed. Not the greatest sales technique to use, I remarked to him. He then told us he had given the demo out to the smaller local radio stations, who agreed to give it some airtime. When he said ‘smaller local radio stations’, he actually meant hospital radio. I suppose that isn’t the greatest demograph to target, as most of the listeners couldn’t even get out of their beds to buy a fucking record.
So we weren’t even at the starting line with the rest of the bands out there. The demo was the trade’s standard way of getting yourself heard. I remembered reading that one particular A & R department would receive 300 unsolicited demos a week. There were five A & R departments in that corporation. That’s 1,500 demos a week. There were six other corporations in the industry. That’s 10,000 demos a week. Five hundred thousand demos a year. The whole UK music industry would sign, at most, 200 acts in a year. Out of those, you might get 20 acts who ‘made it’: got on stage or in the press; released a record or toured the country. Out of those 20, on average 10 of them will recoup the money that the record company had spent on them in the first place. The remaining 10 should earn enough to effectively retire. But every now and then an act would really hit the big time. And that was what we were aiming for.
We had rehearsed the arse out of the songs we had. We had recorded them and fired them out there. We had played the local venues. We had harassed any local contacts. It was time to try further afield. We had managed to book ourselves a spot at Dartford University for 19 April 1992. ‘Let’s see how the students like us,’ said Noel.
We pulled up in the van to be greeted by a right firm. ‘Thought this was a fuckin’ student gaff?’ Bonehead asked Noel. The audience was made up of really pissed students interspersed with what could only be described as angry football hooligans who had been poked with hot sharp sticks. The feeling of impending violence was already in the air. We played our set. The crowd were throwing insults and beer at Liam. Liam was goading them as he paced the front of the stage, arms by his sides chin in the air as if welcoming them onstage. Noel looked edgy, but I was pumped up and ready for it. Anyone who came within an inch of my kit was getting the drummer’s punch. Liam kept on winding up the crowd, pointing at the spitting and frothing lunatics who tried to shout back over the wall of sound. I knew I could rely on Liam in a punch-up, and did so on many occasions. Anyone who came on the stage throwing them around was fair game and this was a rule we took seriously. We had always had that edge. I suppose that exalting the virtues of cocaine and alcohol and cigarettes as a band would attract some wrong uns, and fuck me it did, but we always held firm. (When I say ‘we’, I don’t mean Guigs, who would adopt his hedgehog position as we defended our ground.) We finished the set and hurried off stage to be met by the promoter.
‘We can’t pay you for tonight,’ he mumbled.
‘You fuckin’ can and you fuckin’ will,’ exploded Liam.
Noel stepped in now, as Liam was on edge from the performance and looked liable to boot off. ‘Why can’t you pay us?’ he asked quietly.
The promoter looked at us, already prepared for the inevitable outrage, and began. ‘Well, for starters, one of your group has stolen the charity money box from the bar.’ He looked at us, waiting for a guilty look or twitch. All he got was comedy silence, as we all looked round at each other, eyebrows raised.
Liam then asked, aggressively, ‘Who stole the money? Did you see? Do you have proof?’ The promoter shook his head. The rest of the entourage gave resounding noises of downright indignation at this, as Liam continued. ‘Don’t go fuckin’ hurling accusations unless you can prove it.’
With this sudden turn in the mood, the now sweating promoter quickly backtracked and said, ‘We don’t have any money to pay you. It’s as simple as that.’
‘You should have just said so,’ laughed Liam, and then jumped at the promoter, taking a wild swing. The promoter back-pedalled and threw himself behind the gathering masses, who stood in anticipation of fireworks. I noticed that the crowd was mainly the football hooligan element from inside and they were simply waiting for the opportunity to arise. Liam squared up to them and I was tensing myself, getting ready to go. I weighed up the front of the crowd as I tried to pick my first. Anybody who was screaming never caught my eye. There was one ginger lad in a brown cord shirt, though, who was standing motionless, his eyes fixed on Liam. He had that excited smile the real bad bastards have. You could see his mind whirring, waiting for the right moment. He was the danger.
Noel suddenly piped up in an attempt to control the situation. ‘No need for any of this.’
His arms were outstretched and he raised his eyebrows and cocked his head to one side. Now was not the time for reasoning, I thought. We were clearly outnumbered, but we gave some out anyway which made the crowd back off in surprise – that was how we were. Away day. I banjoed the ginger in the brown shirt as he made a beeline for Liam. The crowd’s initial shock at the fact we had kicked off had now passed, and they had visibly increased in anger and confidence. Slowly, they began to head in our direction. We turned and made a dash for the fire exit, slamming the door shut behind us and holding the bar in place as Bonehead fumbled with the keys for the van. After letting go of the bar we ran and threw ourselves head first into the back of the van. Bonehead feebly revved the failing engine and we were away. The group from inside had tried to cut us off. Each turn around the campus brought a new group of vigilantes armed with a ‘dangerous’ assortment of mops and rakes. We laughed at the unfortunate choice of weapons. With the final swerve of the van out of the campus, a stolen money box rolled from under a bench and noisily spilt its contents across the metal floor.
‘Dickheads,’ said Noel.
I wasn’t sure if he meant them or us. We laughed, when maybe we shouldn’t have. The next time it would happen there would be close to two hundred people chasing us, and they would be throwing bricks instead.
By the spring of 1992 we were stationed at the training quarters of Manchester United FC, driving around in Mercedes, Porsches and Beamers that were worth hundreds of thousands. BigUn hadn’t even fuckin’ insured us. We were a disaster waiting to happen. But Liam didn’t like waiting.
I was holding my sides, as the laughter had reached the point where it hurt. I was not much help to Liam, who sat in the front of the van next to me, looking proper unhappy. He had just shown me how he had used wire wool to clean the wheel arches of Paul Ince’s brand-new Mercedes. It was a right mess. A fucking disaster of monumental proportions. I couldn’t believe what he had done. He’s a fuckin’ madman, I thought.
‘What the fuck made you clean it with that?’ I asked, perplexed.
‘I was trying to get the shitty tar off them. Wanted to do a good job,’ came back a depressed reply.
He’d got the fuckin’ tar off them all right. And the paint. And the primer. There were even curled shards of car metal pointing out of the wire wool that he was still gripping.
I was happy. I mean really fuckin’ proper, ecstatic happy. We had finally made it! We were in The Manchester Evening News. Penny Anderson had submitted a positive article about us, with a photograph to boot. We were Mancunian famous.
I’d come home from work to find a stack of the newspapers sitting in the hallway, ready to be posted across the Irish Sea. The Evening News was the main
barometer of any success for my mum and she had that look that mothers get when you have done something to make them proud. She ruffled my growing curly locks like I was a six-year-old again and hugged me. For all the attention and bullshit back-slapping that was to come, this was a moment that I would treasure forever.
Me and Bonehead were laughing. It was the summer of 1992 and we were in The Boardwalk and readying ourselves. That day, we were off to BBC Radio’s studios on Oxford Road, Manchester, to record for In Session. It was a big day for us. It had been sorted out by a friend of Louise, which had left Noel in a deadly certain mood. ‘Just be nice. No swearing or kicking off,’ he politely advised us. Noel told us that his missus Louise had pulled a few strings and there would be murders if we took the piss. He was deadly serious, though, and went off to ring Louise and confirm he had relayed the news to us.
‘Liam’s gonna cause murders on the radio,’ I said, with a laugh.
‘Nah he’ll be as quiet as a mouse,’ replied Bonehead.
‘How much?’ I asked, hand already out. Bonehead shook.
Noel and Liam duly arrived, followed by an out-of-breath Guigs, who had been running as he was late. We had an hour or so in the rehearsal room. The show we’d been asked to appear on was Hit the North, hosted by Mark Radcliffe and Marc Riley. As Mr Radcliffe was holidaying, they had asked Peter Hook to help out that evening. Bad decision. One of The List. After Tony Wilson, I thought The List was gonna bite us on the arse again. We walked the short distance from The Boardwalk to Oxford Road studios, set up our equipment and got ready for our first public broadcast. We fired out ‘Take Me’, to polite applause from the hosts. Noel and Liam were asked for a quick question and answer session and agreed. Peter Hook started with a welcoming opening question, but Liam wasn’t interested and ignored it.
‘What the fuck are you doing wearing leather trousers?’ he asked instead.
Oasis: The Truth Page 7