When I saw him again there was no hint whatsoever of any of this hubris around him. He just started to ramble on about his latest ideas, one of which was painting animals. Farm animals.
‘I’ve got a mate, down in Somerset, a farmer, and he’s all right with me using his animals,’ he said.
‘What for?’ I asked, genuinely baffled.
‘To paint on. I’ve found this completely harmless paint in all colours.’ I just looked at him. ‘Well, it’s like rural graffiti. If you live in the city you paint the side of a bus or a train and you see your tag all across town, don’t you? So if you’re from the countryside your options are limited. So you can paint the animals. Then you see your tags all over the fields.’
I thought this was improbable craziness. ‘Are you sure about this? What about the animal rights people?’ I ventured.
‘The animals aren’t going to know any different when they’re painted. It’s not like I’m killing them to eat,’ he replied.
I listened on. It was nuts and only something he would think of and then carry out. I knew by now that his ideas were never hyperbole. I also wondered who was going to understand it.
It was a short while later that pictures began to appear of cows with ‘Wild Style’ classic tags on them. The cows seemed fairly nonchalant about their new coat of colours as they meandered across clover meadows in deepest Somerset. The pigs had some work done on them and the sheep sported some incongruous efforts on their sides too. It was an odd juxtaposition that must have been best appreciated if you were on a country outing and got taken by surprise at the sight of a painted beast.
Predictably, animal rights people were outraged but, by all accounts, the local country folk loved it. Urban culture meets rural culture at long last!
Well, truth on the side of one is still the majority and that’s the template that Robin had set for himself. Taking the basic premise that free expression and free speech are the cornerstones of any democracy he had become a brilliant exemplar of that. Along the way he was becoming a people’s champion too. An everyman’s champion to the degree that some elements who had previously thought they owned him began to chastise him for becoming too popular. It was all grist to the mill and he could clearly see through it all and continue with his journey, which won’t stop. He’s too swift to get caught on details and mental trips. Never complain, never explain; do it clean. No allegiance, no betrayal. And on.
His friendship and his story were like a thread running through the web of my life. I was moving in my own direction. I was engaged to be married to Johanna and that would entail upping sticks and moving to Stockholm to settle down. It was a good place to have a couple of kids. Johanna and I could’ve stayed in Bristol but I decided otherwise.
Subsequently I started to wind things up. I was increasingly out of touch with Robin. I heard about him from friends and acquaintances.
I heard how he was going over to Chiapas, the southern state of Mexico where the Zapatistas had, and continue to have, a sustained people’s revolution. I heard that from some Easton boys I occasionally played football with, who themselves used to go over there and play with the locals and get educated on how to turn the streets of Easton into an Autonomous Zone.
The news that he was going to Chiapas delighted me as obviously his political sensibility was sharpening. I was jealous of him, I suppose. In the past I had trodden similar paths. But I was older than him and ultimately I relished his youth, his freedom. I was excited for him as well because I knew he had a singular path to tread. That is what makes life a truly unique experience. Each to his own.
Jesse had invited me up to London to see him for a while before I tied the knot. It was 2003. All the preparations for the wedding in Stockholm were set; I just had to get over there for the big day. I hadn’t been in touch with Robin recently; he was off my radar it seemed. I’d been busy studying and taking exams too.
It was early evening as I mooched up to Kentish Town, a warm spring evening. Birds were in full evensong, especially the blackbirds, perched on rooftops, serenading me as I approached Jesse´s door. I knocked and he answered but he didn’t let me in straight away.
‘Hey, aren’t you early?’ he said.
‘No, I don’t think so.’ We hadn’t really arranged a time.
‘Ah, I forgot to get some brews. Do you mind just going down the street and picking some up?’ he said, and he put some money in my hand.
‘Yeah, yeah, sure – no problem.’ As I reversed my tracks I thought he was being more finicky than usual about the time I’d arrived but I set off on the errand nonetheless.
When I returned he was much more welcoming and beckoned me inside. I walked his long hallway to the living room, and as I rounded the corner I was taken aback. There were two geezers standing there, one short, one tall, with pillowcases on their heads. ‘What?!’ I said.
‘Ta Daah!’ The two figures ripped the pillowcases off and it was Jack and Kes, the firefighter. I was quick to embrace them as they welcomed me and out of the corner of my eye I noticed some movement through the French doors out on the patio. Someone was coming in from the garden. It was Robin and he entered the room with a rolled-up print in his hand.
‘Hey, what’s up? How are you?!’ I exclaimed and I was genuinely surprised to see him. Jesse must have got in touch with him. How nice. How cool. How good to see him, and of course the others too. It hadn’t crossed my mind why Jesse wouldn’t let me in straight off when I arrived. Now I realized the surprise he had planned for me.
Beers were cracked, the boys were boisterous, stories related, friends berated and a few others showed up to join the party. An impromptu surprise stag party for little old me. It was an honour and a privilege to be amongst these friends.
Robin took me aside and gave me the rolled-up poster. ‘Wedding present,’ he said.
‘Aw, thanks,’ I replied as I took it. All the boys looked on as I unrolled it. It was a red background with the stencil of Queen Victoria, full of pomp, mace in hand, sitting astride the face of a nubile young lady dressed in stockings and suspenders. The boys in unison were full of cries of, ‘Woah!’, ‘Yeah!’, ‘Nice one’.
‘Ah, fuck, that’s great, man,’ I said to Robin who was standing by. ‘It’s one of my favourites! I see this one all the time up by the Kingsdown steps,’ I continued. I could see he knew exactly where I meant even though this image must have gone up a hundred times and more in many different locations. He could see I genuinely liked it.
I was so pleased to see him and flattered to be given one of his pieces. My heart was in my throat. We looked at each other for maybe a moment too long. I said, ‘What should I do with it?’
‘Stick it up in your toilet, or something.’ he said, and we fell back to the beers and the boys. It was getting ever more raucous.
The drink, even though there had been plenty of it, was running out so we had to do a beer run. It was late by now so one of us had to rush to the off-licence. I elected to go myself and stepped out onto the dark streets and moved off in the direction of the main drag up ahead. I had a chance to take in the occasion and its significance and to absorb the surprise. My steps were light as I tripped along under the trees, full of a beer-glow. It made me feel good that this collection of blokes were happy to wing me onwards to the woman of my choice. I went back quite far with them and it counted for something, and the fact that Robin was there made it all the better. He seemed to be getting on pretty well with them all.
When I got back, laden down with ale, I was met with cheers. The place seemed to be in uproar. I stood in the living room while Jesse took the beers for the fridge. Robin was in the centre of a little ring of animated lads saying he would take on the hardest man there in an arm-wrestling competition. Most of the boys looked on, dumbfounded. He was West Country, deliberately stirring it. Kes, who was the hardest – and looked it – was getting riled and took him up on the provocative offer.
Robin was winding up the whole party just for th
e fun of it. The ring tightened and battle commenced to roars of support and good humour. They locked fists at the table and the game was under way. Robin put all he had into it and so did Kes and the game went on for some time before Kes finally got Robin’s arm down flat. ‘Fuck,’ Robin uttered while the spectators rejoiced. Game over. This silliness set the scene for even more revelry, as the ice was now well and truly broken.
I was being grabbed and lectured, and given some righteous ‘matey’ wisdom from all present bar Robin, who wouldn’t presume to have any such wisdom to impart. More ale was cracked open and supped into the small hours.
Jesse, who was by now DJ Shadow’s manager, interrupted the conversation to show Shadow’s latest video. It was a fast-paced trip to the track ‘Mashin’ On The Motorway’. We all agreed it was good, apart from Robin. At this point Jesse took his moment to ask Robin if he would consider doing some art for Shadow. Shadow was good, we all knew that, and he was at the top of his game. The question hung in the air for a while. All eyes were on Robin. After some consideration he said, ‘I’d rather cut off my right arm than be involved with that.’
It suddenly went very, very quiet.
‘What the fuck is it with you?’ I said under my breath. He didn’t retract the remark, he didn’t say anything, but suddenly, somehow, everybody started to laugh. It was such an extreme thing to come out with under the circumstances it could only be his humour. The boys looked around at each other and nodded, all thinking the same thing: ‘This kid is a fucking maverick.’
Things quietened down thereafter and people started to ebb away, back to their lives. Robin sloped off in due course. I didn’t watch him go. I knew he knew that I was on my path and he’d always liked Johanna. That was all we needed to know. To be going where you should be going.
CHAPTER NINE
ON THE ROAD
It was perhaps a year later, as an interesting postscript to this little episode, that I was passing through London from Stockholm, on my way to Bristol via Paddington Station. Jesse had wanted to hook up, but I had no time to visit him so we arranged to meet at the train terminal. I stood, my back to the wall, outside W. H. Smiths, such was the throng of people making their way in the evening rush. I loved the station; it was beautiful – one of Brunel’s finest.
I’d been arriving at and leaving London through its portals for decades. Observing its rush was a favourite past time of mine but these days it was heavy with armed coppers strapped with machine guns ambling the concourse with pained expressions etched on their faces. Out of this mess came the familiar face of Jesse, sporting a pea coat, all buttoned up and carrying a cardboard poster roll. His smile shone through the crowd and we embraced. We retired to the quietest spot for a cup of tea while the crowds milled around us. The din still made it necessary to raise our voice. ‘This is for you,’ he said, sipping his tea, and he handed me the poster roll.
‘Yeah, what is it?’ I asked.
‘Take it out, have a look.’
So I did just that. There was an image of a young boy in a Zorro-type mask and cape, both his arms hanging down, with vinyl records in each hand. I looked at Jesse for an explanation. ‘It’s something Robin helped with; it’s the cover for Shadow’s latest: “The Outsider”.’
He went on to explain that he had come to quite a fruitful arrangement with Robin artistically. I’m not sure if it was Jesse’s persistence or Robin’s contrariness that led to the collaboration, probably a mix of both. I thanked Jesse for it; it was generous and thoughtful of him.
‘It’s nothing’ he replied. ‘It wouldn’t have happened without you, mate,’ he said.
So I took myself off to Stockholm and married my Swedish sweetheart. However, there was a denouement between Robin and me that I had not foreseen. After our wedding I had some unfinished business to attend to, so I returned to Bristol to tidy up some loose ends. Johanna was pregnant so I wanted to get things sorted quickly, such was my desire to be back in her arms. I also needed to ride the Harley over to Sweden, so I booked a ferry from Newcastle to Gothenburg, Sweden’s west coast port, from where I could race north to the capital.
During this brief return to Bristol I asked my friend Fabbie if he wanted me to do the door for him one last time at one of his club nights, ‘Espionage’, which happened to be held on an old ship tethered and anchored down in Bristol’s docks. It would be a good way to say goodbye to some of the local faces that would duly show up to such a legendary club night.
This old ship, The Thekla, had a Banksy piece on it. A grimacing grim reaper, replete with sickle, sitting in a boat, painted onto the midship. It was a typical off–the–wall, malevolent abstraction that succeeded in twisting your mind while producing a grin at the same time. Imagining Robin stealing out in the dead of night on a rowing boat holding a lantern in one hand in the depths of a Bristol fog spoke volumes about his commitment and daring. This piece can still be seen and was respectfully kept despite a complete refurbishment of the vessel some years back.
Anyhow, the night was fun as people rolled on board and the choice music enticed the crowd to dance with wild abandon, as was always the case at ‘Espionage’ nights. The clock was approaching 1 a.m. and I was pretty well oiled at this point, celebrating the success of my recent wedding and life changes. Most people who were going to show for the night had already arrived and a few were beginning to leave. Then a trio of shadowy forms waltzed up the gangplank and approached the door.
I straightened myself up and then I thought I recognized the silhouette of the middle figure of the group. To my great surprise it was Robin, flanked by a brace of lads, one of whom went by the name of Mookie, a local street artist and a talent with a reputation of his own who worked citywide.
‘Fuck!’ said Robin. ‘What are you doing here? Aren’t you supposed to be married?!’
It was good to see him, really good, and we fell into a loose conversation about recent happenings. He briefly introduced me to his acquaintances while I explained why I was back in town, albeit for a short stay. We didn’t mention the last time we had seen each other at my drunken stag party and I, as usual, didn’t ask him too many questions on obvious subjects. I’d learnt that, with him, too much enquiring was counter–productive to friendship.
‘Hey, you want to come out with us later?’ he asked.
‘Yeah, definitely,’ I replied.
This seemed like an exciting proposition. I was hyped–up to see him and I felt pretty unruly and boisterous, especially as I was soon heading back to my new obligations. The moon was high that night, the sky clear, and a ring or haze of light encircled the moon, a result of refracted light through ice crystals high above, or something like that. Anyway, the heavens shone down in their glory and I was more than up for a spring night of merrymaking and mayhem. There was a clear feeling that the night was just about to begin and energy rang through me like a blast. In due course Robin hopped up the stairs again, along with his mates. I said goodbye to Fabbie and some others and we walked off the old ship and into the night.
There was something new on my ring finger that was unusual for me. It was itchy but I was getting used to it. A ‘claddagh’ ring with a heart-shaped ruby. It winked at me in the starry light coming into the back of the car.
We were all in some old vehicle by now; there were five of us and I was sat in the back seat squashed between two – Robin and Mookie sat in the front, chatting in a hushed manner with occasional bursts of laughter. We were cruising through the City en route to Montpelier where Robin said we were ‘gonna stop for a moment’. I think it was up on a one way road and the City was quiet as dust. One of them took off for a while and we sat in the frost, silent, and waited. Stuck in the car you heard all the creaks of any movement. A scatter of MDMA pills with a bird pattern appeared. I was familiar with this drug from my California days in the early ’80s, but not so recently. I took one and it was quiet again, our breath visible in the chill. It wasn’t too long before my body acknowledged this new inter
loper being absorbed into my system and anticipatory zips of energy were travelling up my spine. I hadn’t eaten in hours, of course, and now I was wide awake. This was going to be a cool night, all the omens spoke of it. I couldn’t think of a better way to say goodbye to old England than this unfolding adventure.
If you’ve ever been through the neighbourhood of Montpelier in Bristol you’ll be familiar with its terraced buildings that stagger down a steep hill, so garden walls can be very tall from the back end. I was counting my breaths for some reason when I was made to look up sharply. A fox was right in front, but above us, on a wall, eyes glowing bright, and its retinas reflecting our car lights. ‘Look, look,’ I said and we all turned to admire the wild city creature who was staring at us inquisitively.
It seemed to hold us in its thrall for some time before it started and loped down to the road from the wall and skulked off up the street, occasionally pausing on the brow of our hill to turn its head again to look at us, quietly, calmly, before trotting off a few yards and then looking round again. It did that until it disappeared from our sight and we had all been silent in watching its departure. He was definitely our ally. No doubt.
Mookie came back all of a sudden and broke the spell. He jumped into the front seat along with a very large holdall. It was clinking and clanking away and he opened it up to reveal an array of painting materials, predominantly spray-cans. He was showing off his wares, which met with Robin’s approval. Mookie was especially enamoured with a German brand of spray paint, which he declared the best around presently and started to explain why as we crept off up the hill in the dark, car tyres crackling on the gravel in the road.
We put on some sounds, spliffed up and had a few beers as the journey got underway to a riveting collection of cross-wire conversations from front seat to back. We coasted south, down into Somerset, the fields and hills I knew so well, looming up at me and passing us by. It was like a farewell serenade to me and I lapped it up.
Seven Years with Banksy Page 8