by Paul Sussman
‘Keith,’ he said, his voice a blur of pained adenoids. Since he didn’t actually look at me when he said it, it wasn’t immediately obvious to whom he was addressing the words.
‘I’m sorry,’ I said. ‘Were you speaking to me?’
Rather than answering he flipped out a hand in my direction.
‘Keith Cream,’ he elaborated, adjusting his sunglasses and sniffing. ‘As in the music-industry Keith Cream.’
I shook the proffered hand.
‘Pleased to meet you, Keith. I’m Raphael Phoenix.’
‘That’s cool, man. You are who you are.’
I agreed that certainly seemed to be the case.
‘I run the Record Roundabout,’ he continued. ‘Down the King’s Road. You probably know it.’
‘I’m afraid I don’t,’ I confessed. ‘I’ve been out of London for quite a while. I’ve only just arrived back.’
He nodded sympathetically and primped his Afro.
‘That’s cool, man. I don’t judge people. Be as you are now, not what you were then. You dig The Turtles?’
‘I can’t say I know them,’ I confessed.
‘’Cos I’ve got some bootlegs in today you can’t get anywhere else in Europe. Mint quality.’
‘Really.’
‘I’m not saying buy. I’m just letting you know.’
‘I see. Well, thank you.’
‘That’s cool, man. Cool.’
He slurped his beer, leaving a smudge of froth across the underside of his moustache.
‘So what sort of music are you into?’ he inquired after a moment’s silence.
‘Well,’ I admitted, ‘my tastes have been rather limited of late. It’s been Wagner mainly.’
He thought for a moment.
‘No,’ he said, shaking his head. ‘Don’t know them. I’ve got something that might interest you, though. Big Brother and the Holding Company, pre-Joplin, live in Seattle. It’s a collector’s piece.’
‘That’s really very kind of you, but I don’t have anywhere to play it at the moment.’
‘If you’re looking for a cheap stereo I’ve got contacts. Nothing flashy, mind. Just a good deck, basic speakers. Twenty pounds.’
‘I think not.’
‘Ten pounds, and I’ll throw in a couple of Richie Havens albums.’
‘It’s really not for me, but thank you anyway.’
‘Cool, man. I’m not going to get pushy or anything. You just be as you are.’
We relapsed into silence and sipped our respective drinks.
‘Although if you ever want anything by Moby Grape you know where to come.’
He finished his pint and, leaning forwards, fiddled in his back pocket, bringing out a crumpled cigarette packet.
‘Smoke?’ he said, offering me one.
‘Thank you.’
‘Been in music for years now,’ he went on, striking a match. ‘I’m what you might call an industry guru.’
I leaned forward to light my cigarette.
‘I’ll tell you someone I did rather like,’ I said. ‘Bing Crosby.’
Keith thought for a moment.
‘I thought it was David Crosby?’
‘No, definitely Bing.’
‘As in Stills, Nash and Young?’
‘I’m not sure. He smoked a pipe and made films with Bob Hope.’
‘Yeh,’ nodded Keith, ‘probably the same guy. I’ve got all their albums back at the shop.’
I sipped my whisky and gazed around the pub.
‘Everything seems to have changed so much,’ I sighed. ‘I grew up in London but now I hardly recognize the place. I’ve been away longer than I thought.’
‘I know where you’re coming from, man,’ said Keith, nodding his Afro up and down. ‘It’s like that Dylan song.’
‘Is it?’
‘Yeh. “The Times They are a-Changin”. It’s, like, about times changing. You know, one day it’s one thing, and the next it’s something completely different.’
I told him it sounded very appropriate, and downed the remainder of my whisky.
‘Another?’ I asked, indicating his empty glass.
‘Yeh, man, cool. And see if they’ve got any nuts, will you? I’ve suddenly got a real nut thing. Like, I’ve gotta have them or I’m gonna freak out and die.’
I squeezed my way to the bar and bought Keith’s pint and peanuts, and another large whisky for myself. Several people had started dancing, including an extremely large woman in a short skirt, who almost knocked me over as I returned to our seat.
‘So tell me,’ said Keith once I’d sat down again, ‘what’re your plans now you’re back in town?’
‘I haven’t the faintest idea,’ I admitted, accepting another crumpled cigarette. ‘I’ve got enough money to last a week at a pinch. Hopefully something will come up.’
He shoved a fistful of peanuts in his mouth and washed them down with a long gulp of bitter, smearing more froth across his already sticky moustache.
‘I dig your style, man,’ he said, wiping his mouth. ‘Like, you’re a real free spirit. Not like most oldies. You’re cool.’
‘Thank you,’ I said.
‘Take it from the guru.’
‘I will.’
We raised our glasses and clinked them together.
‘I’ll tell you what, you don’t want to come and see a band, do you? They’re mates of mine. Very hip. We all share the flat above the record shop.’
‘The Record Roundabout?’
‘Yeh, man. You know it?’
‘By reputation.’
‘Nice one. So how about it?’
‘Well, I’d like to, Keith, but I really ought to be finding myself a place to stay.’
‘But that’s just the point. We’ve got a spare room in the flat. Marvin’s gone into rehab and we’re looking for a new lodger. It all fits together, you know, like you coming into the pub now, at this time, looking for a place to stay.’
I sipped my drink and considered the proposition. Keith wasn’t, admittedly, the sort of person I could ever imagine myself sharing accommodation with. Judging by what I’d seen of him so far the flat was sure to be noisy, disorganized and, if his taste in clothes was anything to go by, horribly decorated. On the other hand, there didn’t appear to be any better options on the horizon and, as Emily had said, maybe it was time to start living a little. I therefore knocked back the remainder of my whisky and, not without a shiver of trepidation, accepted his offer.
‘Cool, man,’ he cried. ‘Like, cool-out at the OK Corral. We’ll have another couple here and then we’ll go. The band’s not on till midnight anyway. Single whisky, was it?’
‘A treble actually.’
‘Yeh, right. Cool. Life in the fast lane.’ With which he heaved himself to his feet and wandered off to the bar, returning a minute later to borrow enough money to pay for the round. ‘Bit short at the moment,’ he admitted. ‘Cash-flow problem with my agent in Nashville.’
The band Keith had mentioned were playing at a basement club on Windmill Street. It was a smoky, overcrowded affair, with a bar at one end, a stage at the other and a flag-stoned floor slippery with condensation and spilled drink. We arrived shortly before midnight, just as a group called The Magic Lizards were finishing their set.
‘I’ll go and tell the others we’re here,’ shouted my companion over the amplified cacophony. ‘You get the drinks in.’
He pushed his way off into the crowd, his Afro bobbing up and down like a beach ball in choppy water, whilst I navigated a path to the bar, where I bought a pint for my new friend and two treble Scotches for myself. I’d barely had time to sip the first of these, however, before Keith was back. He seemed agitated, and was primping his Afro violently.
‘We’ve got a serious situation, man!’ he puffed, wiping mist from the lenses of his sunglasses. ‘Like big-time serious. Dave’s fucked off.’
‘Dave?’
‘Yeh. Keyboard player with the band. Just upped and fucked of
f. The group’s buggered.’
‘Can’t you get someone else?’
‘Not at this short notice. The others are in a right state. This mine?’
He seized the pint and downed it in one.
‘I used to play piano,’ I said. ‘Years ago. A Canadian guy taught me. Nice fellow.’
I only mentioned the fact to make conversation. Keith’s reaction, however, was instantaneous.
‘That’s brilliant!’ he cried, throwing aside his cigarette, grabbing my arm and propelling me in the direction of the stage. ‘I knew you were in the business the moment I saw you. You’ve got that haggard, bluesy look about you.’
‘No, no,’ I protested, ‘I didn’t mean it like that. I used to play “Knees up, Mother Brown”. I couldn’t do the sort of stuff they play here.’
‘Don’t worry, man, it’ll be cool. Hurry up, they’re on in a few minutes.’
‘I can’t do it. It’s impossible.’
‘Nothing’s impossible,’ he cried, herding me onwards. ‘Just look how well Rick Wakeman’s done!’
Which is how, twenty minutes later, suitably fortified with several more whiskies, I found myself up on stage tinkling the ivories with what was later to become one of the seminal rock bands of the early Seventies. The crowd were going berserk, Keith was giving me the thumbs-up and I was thoroughly enjoying myself, especially when I looked down to see an extremely pretty girl gazing up at me and mouthing the words: ‘I want you.’
‘This is the life,’ I thought.
The band of which I had become an impromptu member was a five-piece outfit. As well as myself, there was Linus on guitar and lead vocals; Otis on mandolin, sitar and occasional harpsichord; Libby on bass; and Big Baz, one of the fattest people I’ve ever met, on drums. They had, apparently, all met at art college, and been doing the rounds of the small-club circuit for almost three years now, with little notable success.
Linus was the driving force behind the band. He wrote the songs, sung them and fronted the group, with the rest of us positioned slightly behind him. An emaciated, spotty young man with straggling tendrils of beard and a thick Mancunian accent, he wore the same purple bell-bottoms for the entire time I knew him. I heard that in later years he developed rather a serious drug habit and became, especially during the recording of his nine-hour rock-opera Hamlet, Prince of Moss Side, almost impossible to work with. During our brief time together, however, I found him perfectly affable, although if you made a mistake musically he could get very upset.
‘You fucked up the middle eight,’ he screamed at me more than once during our two-year association. ‘Don’t ever fuck up the middle eight.’
My memories of our first gig together are somewhat confused on account of the fact that not only was I drunk, but I’d also smoked some cannabis for the first time in my life. I know that we kicked off with ‘Love Typhoon’, Linus shouting out the chords as we went (Em, C, Am, F, etc.), and did a storming, 15-minute version of ‘Quintessence of Dust’. I definitely fucked up several middle eights, and played the whole of ‘Song to Doris’ in the wrong key (Gm as opposed to Dm), but on the whole I think I acquitted myself reasonably well. Indeed, considering I hadn’t been near a piano for the best part of quarter of a century, and prior to that my only musical experience had been playing cockney standards in a German prisoner-of-war camp, my performance was nothing short of miraculous. My fellow musicians certainly thought so. When we finally wound up ‘Tangerine Apocalypse’ and left the stage they slapped me on the back and duly asked me to join the band.
‘Your face fits, man,’ said Linus, lighting up a monster of a joint and handing it to me in the backstage cupboard that passed for a dressing room. ‘How about it? You wanna be in?’
I smiled, and took a deep puff on the joint.
‘Oh yes,’ I replied. ‘I wanna be in. I definitely wanna be in.’
Indeed how could I possibly not wanna be in when the band was so obviously tailored towards a man of my malevolent proclivities. They were, you see, called The Executioners. If that’s not a sign, I don’t know what is.
These days, it seems, no one has heard of The Executioners. They’ve been consigned to the scrapheap of musical history and only rock aficionados or collectors of obscure records remember anything about them. Their songs do occasionally pop up on the radio, usually as questions in late-night trivia quiz shows, but aside from a certain kitsch nostalgic value, their contribution to the canon of popular music has been all but forgotten.
In their day, however, they were big. Very big, especially on the Continent, where their incomprehensible lyrics and extended instrumental solos elevated them to near-cult status. When I joined them, of course, they were some way off their prime – at that point, they didn’t even have a record deal – but many of the songs that were later to become so popular were already in their repertoire. ‘Love Typhoon’, the first song I ever played with them, would later spend 31 weeks in the British charts, peaking at number eight, whilst ‘Quintessence of Dust’, ‘Woman, Oh Woman’, ‘Peace Explosion’ and ‘Sexual Alchemist’ were all destined for the hit parade of the early Seventies. ‘Phantasmagoria Elixus No. 3’, which I co-wrote with Linus, spent three years at Number One in Macedonia, and was later, apparently, used as a campaign theme tune by President Marcos of the Philippines.
All that, however, was in the future, as were the private jets, the white Rolls-Royces, the trashed hotel rooms and the sell-out concert tours of the world’s major sporting stadiums. Whilst I was with the band we were a strictly small-time outfit, playing nothing bigger than clubs and pubs and church halls; and if we did do the occasional gig at a more prestigious venue it was always on a midweek night when there was no one there anyway. Freddie Mercury did once pinch my bottom and congratulate me on my keyboard solo in ‘Fruit Surprise’, and I remember The Doors standing us a round of drinks after they’d seen us at The Marquee, but on the whole we were no more, nor no less, successful than the thousand and one other small groups doing the rounds at the end of the Sixties.
‘Do you think we’ll ever make it big?’ I once asked Linus.
‘Well, we can’t make it much smaller,’ he replied.
We all lived together – myself, Linus, Keith, Otis, Libby and Baz – in a large, three-storey house on the King’s Road, the ground floor of which was given over to Keith’s music shop, The Record Roundabout. The latter was a small, dingy affair which, in the two years I knew it, was never once visited by anything that might reasonably be called a customer. People occasionally popped in to ask for directions, or collect for the Salvation Army, or escape from a sudden rainstorm, but they never stayed very long, and displayed not the least spark of interest in Jethro Tull or the latest themed triple album by Frank Zappa and The Mothers of Invention. All day Keith would sit behind his plywood counter, smoking pot and reading his Record Mirror, and all day more dust would settle on his sparse album racks and more grime accrue to the already grimy windows at the front of the shop. He did make a sale in early 1970, a bootleg recording of Pete Seeger and The Little Boxes, but by that point he was so stoned he undercharged for the tape and ended up losing out on the deal.
‘It’s a temporary slump,’ he opined optimistically. ‘Music’s a fickle lady.’
If nothing much happened in the Record Roundabout, the same could not be said for the three floors above it. The flat in which we all lived, with its mouldy maroon carpets and disintegrating furniture, was the scene of a permanent party, and became, indeed, so renowned for its swinging 24-hour-a-day, anything-goes Bohemianism, that one merely had to mention ‘The Flat’ and anybody who was anybody knew precisely to which flat you were referring.
My bedroom was on the first floor, wedged between the kitchen and the living room. Linus and Baz were on the floor above, as were Otis and Libby, who were a couple and so shared a room. Keith lived in the attic, where he slept on a Lilo and, although he didn’t know that we knew, kept a large stash of pornographic magazines secreted beneath t
he floorboards.
For reasons I never quite understood my room was always the room in which everyone chose to congregate. There was plenty of space elsewhere in the flat, and plenty of other rooms to choose from, but, as if by some irresistible magnetism, flatmates and visitors alike were constantly drawn to my particular bedroom where, once drawn, they would remain for hours and, in some cases, days at a stretch. It wasn’t unusual for me to wake up to find myself sharing an eiderdown with five or six people I’d never met before, whilst on more than one occasion I ended up camping out on the living-room sofa because there was no longer any space left in my own bed. Even police raids, which occurred on a weekly basis, seemed to focus exclusively on my room, which was fortunate, because we always kept our drugs upstairs in the bathroom cabinet.
‘What is it about my bedroom that makes everybody want to be in it?’ I once asked Keith.
‘I don’t know, man,’ he replied. ‘It’s just got this, like, karma. I reckon it might be on a ley line.’
After all those gloomy, silent years with Lord Slaggsby, this new, relentlessly communal lifestyle obviously took a bit of getting used to. I was particularly concerned that, with so many people about, especially so many stoned people, something untoward might happen to The Pill or The Photo (I could just see someone getting hold of The Pill, mistaking it for speed or something, and ending up having a rather more permanent trip than they’d intended). My killer tablet, therefore, I secured in a heavy gold locket about my neck, where I could keep an eye on it day and night, whilst The Photo I kept about me at all times in the pocket of my trousers.
Once the safety of my most precious possessions had been assured, however, and once I’d got used to the idea of co-habiting with what seemed, at times, like half the population of London, I found I was actually extremely happy in my new life. I enjoyed smoking dope, and dropping acid, and snorting cocaine and dancing all night. I liked being surrounded by young people, and listening to loud music, and wearing colourful clothes and letting my hair grow (Lord Slaggsby had insisted I keep it short). It was fun getting up at four in the afternoon, and eating baked beans out of the tin, and never doing the washing-up, and spending hours on end discussing the meaning of life with people who were so stoned they couldn’t even remember their own names. Above all, I absolutely loved having all that sex.