As pleasant as this brief period was, I knew I had to get out and live in the real world. Get a job. My aim was to scrape together a boat fare to England. In 1968 I worked for a brilliant graphic designer in North Sydney named Allen. I jumped straight into the work with great gusto and moved into a tiny bedsit in Neutral Bay, down near the ferry wharf. A female graphic artist, Gerri, was employed in the studio and I was her assistant. I loved this job, and my one-room hovel overlooking the harbour. I dined on an odd assortment of canned food that I would cook up in a ghastly aluminium saucepan. But it felt good being so independent for the first time in my life.
There was a crazy man in the neighbourhood who always wore the same expensive brown hat, and had strange steely blue eyes that seemed to always be looking skywards. He talked very erratically to himself as he rode the Neutral Bay ferry.
Gerri and I made friends quickly and easily. We were both aware that the very talented man who was employing us was a hopeless alcoholic; he was drinking himself into an early grave. The way he ran his business was equally tragic; we’d often wait weeks to be paid. Just as we were ready to quit, he would reappear after another mysterious absence. I stayed there maybe six, seven months. I was on a mission and time was marching on. I had to find more stable employment.
I then worked as a graphic artist in a large photography firm in the city, and lied my way into a job as a trainee management exec for Myer department store. Both of these jobs were fairly mundane, but at Myer I did befriend a fellow trainee management executive, Grant, who I met up with again when I got to London. I was fired from Myer and was still desperately trying to scrape together the boat fare to England.
Somewhere at this time I had also stumbled into a vague and platonic relationship with a girl called Lois, who’d been the girlfriend of Ross, my best friend from school. For a very brief period, when Ross and I were trying to emulate Bob Dylan and Allen Ginsberg by living in our bug-infested Kings Cross garret, Lois became part of our fantasy world. Being both attractive and an intellectual, she became our golden prize.
We would hang out with Lois’s friends in the coffee houses around Kings Cross, and I’d fantasise about being a bohemian in one of Picasso’s paintings. I was just longing to get to Paris and London.
However, things took a couple of weird twists and turns. Lois became pregnant to Ross—and much to my chagrin, he disappeared. No one, his family included, had a clue where he’d gone. One day I received a postcard from him: he was in Graz, Austria, working as a street sweeper. His father was furious, and Lois was totally shattered; she consequently had an abortion and clung to me for support. It was very sad.
I grabbed a quick job, clerking for a couple of months in the taxation office. It was one of the more bizarre experiences of my short life. The tax office was located in the city, and I had never before experienced such a bunch of rogues and layabouts. I don’t remember any work ever actually being done. I only remember the drugs—amphetamines, and pharmaceuticals such as cough medicine, which contained opiates. I remember a bunch of fellow workers rifling through Mick Jagger’s private tax files. I can still see my fellow workers totally catatonic on a cocktail of drugs.
I got out of there as soon as I possibly could. I lost hundreds of dollars in a phone booth and thought it was the end of my life until, much to my elation, the money was returned. Clearly my luck was in so I headed down to the office of the steamship company posthaste.
I booked myself a one-way ticket on the Achille Lauro, a fine old Italian ship. Lois decided to come with me, in pursuit of Ross. It’s hard to describe to the uninitiated how incredibly romantic travelling by ship was. In 1967, you could sail to Europe in old-style luxury for a few hundred dollars.
I don’t think Lois and I even had anybody to see us off, but it felt so good sailing out through the Heads at dusk, to destinations unknown. We befriended a funny hippie guy called Robert, who still lives somewhere down on the NSW South Coast.
Immediately upon disembarking in Cape Town, it hit us that any preconceived image we had had about South Africa and its apartheid regime was way too moderate. I was impressed that Bobby went out of his way, all day long, to shove it up those really stupid white Afrikaners. If the top deck of the bus was ‘coloureds only’, then we would sit up there; if the signs said ‘coloureds only’ in the department store, then we would go there and hurl abuse at the little white piggies with their little piggie wives. A disgusting place.
The rest of the voyage now seems more like a romantic 1950s Technicolor movie than a real part of my life. Mealtimes on board were always a special treat; the Italian waiters dressed impeccably, in white gloves and royal blue uniforms. The food was always fabulous and served with so much finesse. We stopped at Dakar on the westernmost tip of Africa; it was like being on the expedition to find Doctor Livingstone (I presume). We also went to the Canary Islands, which became one of my all-time favourite destinations. The capital Tenerife is almost like a Spanish colony from last century, frozen in time. The locals even took siestas. If I never had to work again, I would buy a little villa there with shuttered windows and sit on a white cane chair at my front door and chat to all the locals strolling down the cobbled streets, heading for the fish market. The life!
The Achille Lauro arrived at Southampton on a still autumn night. I was almost out of my skin with excitement. Fortunately for me, Her Majesty’s Immigration Officer was good humoured and amiable.
‘How long do you plan to stay?’ he asked.
‘I’m not sure,’ I replied.
‘How much money do you have for your stay?’
‘Fifty quid.’
He chuckled politely.
‘You’re a really funny chap,’ he said, and stamped my passport for twelve months.
Lois and I scurried onto the first train we could find, heading for London. Ross, who knew we were on our way, was now living in Fulham in a rather large flat with a few very yuppie Londoners (yuppies before their time, that is). The reception was a little strange. I had by this time slept with Lois, but Ross, I think, believed that he and Lois would automatically renew their relationship.
Consequently, it was all too complicated and Lois and I went on a search for alternative accommodation, ASAP. Still, I felt elated at simply being in London. Then there was the light—if you know London, the soft and beautiful light strikes you immediately, the way it bathes the courtyards in a sort of black and white halftone wash.
Anyway, we found a place in a house on Anson Road, Kilburn. Our landlords were Joe Panzer and his wife. It was just one big room; a piece of latticework separated the bed from the stove. I’m sure many of you who have lived in London know the exact set-up—the shared bathroom and toilet down the hall, and if you can’t feed the gas meter, well, I guess you freeze to death!
Lois at this time was a fairly strict vegetarian; because we were relatively poor we stuck with the lifestyle. I look back with great nostalgia on those times in Kilburn. Joe Panzer and his wife were a lovely old Golders Green couple, almost surrogate parents to Lois and me. If I couldn’t pay the rent because I’d spent too much money in the music shop, it was never a problem. If we asked to have something fixed, that was never a problem either.
We had so many blissful times, hitchhiking up to Oxford, Cambridge or Stratford-upon-Avon.
I don’t know what was in the water, but Lois and I made wonderful friends everywhere we went. Lois was working at the British Museum and was fast acquiring an Oxford accent; this, combined with her good looks, endeared her to everybody.
Yet our social circle was becoming strange and strained. In those days, rock music was the music of the common man. I was half acceptable, because at least I was intelligent enough to emulate Dylan’s style of songwriting. But I was also into Jimi Hendrix and The Kinks and The Who. I couldn’t stand the academic snobs we met, who really didn’t have a decent knowledge of contemporary music.
Lois started to date academic professorial-type boyfriends because we were supposed to be a liberated hippie couple, into giving each other space and freedom. Besides, we had had a strange beginning with Ross.
This is probably where I became a more level-headed and sceptical hippie. I’d get jealous because that is my nature, and it very slowly started eating away at our relationship. I did, however, discover the cathartic powers of songwriting, and learned how I could exorcise my demons with words and music.
I went out looking for work. The most absurd job I applied for was a trainee executive gig at one of Europe’s most prestigious merchant banks. For the second time in my short life, I used my fancy boarding school background to great advantage—without having to actually validate my education. I lied about matriculating, wore an immaculate suit, and I got the job. I was actually fired after a short time, but they paid me out handsomely, giving me enough funds to live for some time. I was determined to become a top graphic designer or illustrator; that was my real goal.
I got a job as a designer of a monthly radio communications magazine for the Radio Society of Great Britain. This was much like a real Fawlty Towers. It really was that loopy. There was Chris, the John Cleese-like boss; Dave, the skinhead Cockney mail boy; Elly, the cross-eyed Spanish accountant. Seriously. And there were a couple of other characters, including an old lady who had survived London during the Blitz and Anna, a German woman who’d been in the Hitler Youth when she was fourteen. (Anna explained to me that to be a Hitler Youth girl was no different to being a Girl Guide; in fact, in Germany in 1936, the Hitler Youth was the Girl Guides.)
I worked there for two very happy years. I designed the magazine each month, laid it out and cut out and pasted up strips of type and photos. It was such a cushy job that I was also able to attend St Martin-in-the-Fields Art School two nights a week, go and see several amazing gigs each weekend, and place ads in the Melody Maker looking for musicians to form bands.
All my memories of this time are warm and fuzzy. I loved London. I didn’t even mind dragging myself out of bed each morning and dashing across the icy cold floor to pump coins into the gas meter. Then I rode the bus to Central London each morning; the Radio Society was located close to Tottenham Court Road. The downside was that after a while, I began to feel like a wage slave.
Elly, the Spanish accountant, was considerably older than me, having grown up under Franco, the terrible Spanish dictator. Not only was she ultra conservative in her attitude but she was obsessed with what I thought of as stupid Catholic morals. As you might have noticed by now, I had gone to great lengths to be the antithesis (or antichrist if you prefer) to Elly. I wasn’t just a proud hippie, I was belligerent, too. However, as human experiments go, over a longish period, Elly and I became the best of friends. She cried when we finally parted ways some years later. We are conditioned to believe that all the nationalities are different and opposing tribes. We are indoctrinated to believe that there needs to be this imaginary delineation, thereby justifying wars and killing.
I remember her disdain for my long hair from the first day we met. I was thinking: ‘Oh yeah, you Spanish fascist, you wanna take me on!’ Yet when we scratched away at the surface, we found we were able to communicate emotionally; she became like a big sister figure to me. Ultimately, we grew into soul mates.
Dave the mail boy, however, was a different story. Most Monday mornings, thuggish, antisocial ‘bovver boy’ Dave wouldn’t make it into work. If you are wondering why he wasn’t fired, well, I did say this place was as eccentric as Fawlty Towers, and Chris the boss was super eccentric. He was a real softie; I don’t think he had the heart to fire Dave.
Chris used to walk around the office muttering ‘subs . . . subs’—I had no idea what it meant. Elly had to finally tell me that it had something to do with sub-totals. Anyway, I had to ask Dave what he did every weekend, although he was guarded about his private life. But Elly and I had broken down barriers, and now Dave and I were about to embark on our own journey.
Dave, you see, came from the East End, a rough part of London—he hated everyone and everything. He hated hippies, he hated the world. Why? Because everything was fucking hopeless, hopeless, hopeless; no future, no hope. I once saw Keith Moon from The Who interviewed, and he said that when you were growing up in the rougher parts of London in the sixties, you had two choices: become a pop star or spend your life in jail.
As it had been with Elly, Dave and I were quite hostile to each other at first; we were from two warring tribes. After a few weeks of his Monday disappearing act, I forced an answer out of him. I was pissed off that this little twerp thought he was so special as to have problems that I would not be able to understand.
His answer was simple. Every weekend, Dave and his mates followed one of the London soccer clubs—I think it was Fulham—and they would drink themselves into oblivion. Then, irrespective of what was going on in the match, he and his gang of bovver boys would start punching anything that moved. Blood and gore would be flying every which way, then the Bobbies would step in to break it up. This was Dave’s favourite bit. He just wanted to kill coppers. (If ever police deserved my profound sympathy, it was right then.) Consequently, Dave spent most weekends in the police lock-up.
I recoiled in disgust and horror at this stupid boy, but my curiosity and compassion got the better of me. I persisted and Dave began to try to explain himself to me. Gradually the crap started to melt away and he burst into a torrent of tears. Dave had never cried before. He’d never talked to anyone in this way. I won myself a new friend.
During my two years at the Radio Society, I became more and more entranced by music and by musicians. My passion for artwork was being eclipsed by an overwhelming desire to be a musician. I was deep into my Dylan period by now. It’s important to note that Bob Dylan gave birth to The Byrds, who together and singularly were the strongest formative influence in the craft of my music.
But this was London 1967! What a time. Virtually every gig I saw was simply incredible. I think perhaps Pink Floyd with Syd Barrett one Saturday night at the UFO Club, the biggest ‘underground’ club in England, might have been the pick. Pink Floyd’s music is not necessarily my favourite, but I loved the all-consuming atmosphere that the audience created at Floyd gigs. Their gigs were more akin to an LSD trip than a mere concert. I didn’t take acid, but didn’t need to. I just had to see the Floyd.
I was so fortunate; just as I was becoming a musician in the true sense, there I was, in the midst of an era we’ll never see again. I believe that this was rock music’s L’Age d’Or, its Golden Age.
Try this for size: I saw Cream; Jimi Hendrix; Traffic; Emerson, Lake & Palmer; Fleetwood Mac (with guitarist Peter Green); Bob Marley; Ten Years After; Howlin’ Wolf; Muddy Waters;
The Faces—Rod Stewart with Jeff Beck, Ronnie Wood and Ronnie Lane; Deep Purple; Joe Cocker; John Mayall; Joe Walsh’s first band, The James Gang; plus The Nice and many, many, more. Such an amazing time.
One of the more memorable gigs was seeing the Rolling Stones in Hyde Park, London, on 5 July 1969, mourning Brian Jones’s death. Musically, this was a fairly awful-sounding gig, yet the event itself was absolute magic. I remember the whole day quite vividly. Despite my aversion to drugs, I thought the druggies (virtually everyone except the ambulance officers) were so cool. Even though I didn’t imbibe, I still remember the afternoon as having this slow motion, LSD kind of vibe. Even the afternoon light in Hyde Park seemed surreal, like you were looking through a star filter.
At Sydney in 1965 there was so much screaming it drowned out the sound of the Rolling Stones. In Hyde Park, they were playing through a very loud PA system, yet they sounded awful. As their biggest fan, I figured that they had been through a hell of a lot that week—they were more of a family than just a band—so this must have been totally devastating for them. They were excused. The Shelley poem that Jagger read, dedicated to Jones, and the hundreds of butterflies they released into the park was an overwhelming emotional experience. There I was, surrounded by many thousands of people with tears welling up in their eyes, right in the centre of London. It was quite a contrast to the grumpy, uptight, pinstripe and bowler-hatted fools I saw on the Tube every morning. A real moment.
Describing the scene at the UFO Club is more difficult. If you have seen 1960s art movies like Blow-Up, and remember the scene where Jeff Beck is smashing his guitar, then that makes it much easier for me—that is a reasonable depiction of clubs like the UFO. Like all nightclubs it was smoky and dark and sweaty, with this kind of psychedelic vibe in the air. Everyone walked around as if they were treading on clouds, a sort of trance-like walk. Everyone’s body language was warm and welcoming. I was probably under some sort of influence myself. It always seemed like the bright yellow sun was shining, even at midnight. (Honest officer, I’ve never taken LSD in my whole life!)
The Best Years of Our Lives Page 2