by Dan Davies
Many have played a significant role in helping me through various aspects of the story: Meirion Jones and Liz MacKean, Mark Williams-Thomas, Liz Dux, Gerard Tubb, Tim Hicks and Nigel Ward at Real Whitby, Ross Howard, Neil Wilby at upsd.co.uk and, most significantly, all those who were willing to revisit the past and talk to me about their experiences.
My thanks also go to the very talented editors who commissioned the various long-form magazine features that serve as its foundations: Michael Hodges, David Whitehouse, Jeremy Langmead and Alex Bilmes. Gerard Greaves of the Mail on Sunday was also kind enough to give me the time to get it started.
Others to have contributed in a number of small but important ways include John Hopkins, Frank Broughton, Louis Barfe, Sam Parker, Toni Houghton, Richard Benson, Kester Aspden, James Brown and Michael Holden, and, of course, my parents, siblings and in-laws.
A special mention should be made of Andrew O’Hagan, whose brilliant essay, ‘Light Entertainment’, published in the London Review of Books in November 2012, provided renewed impetus and interest in the book, and whose advice and encouragement have been invaluable. The same goes for another author I greatly admire, David Peace, whose interest and generosity provided an unexpected boost when I needed it most.
The subject matter of this book, I feel, makes a dedication inappropriate. There is, however, one person who has shown the patience, the love and the understanding that has enabled me to complete it – my beautiful wife. Thank you sweetest, for all this and more.
Table of Contents
PART ONE
1. Apocalypse now then
2. Frisk him
3. Not again child
4. The first brick
5. The world was completely black
6. Specialist subject: ‘Jimmy Savile’
7. They felt they were in control
8. The power of oddness
9. Old and infirm
10. ‘Power’ is the wrong word
11. I didn’t ask
12. Look up, you bastard
PART TWO
13. Oscar ‘The Duke’
14. Smokescreen
15. Didn’t die, very good
16. All front and no back
17. Scumbags and slags
18. Sonderkommandos
19. Someone the kids could look up to
20. Little slaves
21. A lot worse if it was true
22. Project DJ
PART THREE
23. Nostalgic memories
24. The only punter you can recognise from the back
25. Let ’em think
26. A cross between a Beatle and an Aldwych farce curate
27. A dead straight pull time
28. Out of the mouths of babes and sucklings
29. An old man even then
30. TCP tonight
31. Good enough to eat
32. They know I’m honest
33. Eins, zwei, drei in the sky
34. More insidious than filth
PART FOUR
35. Young crumpet that would knock your eyes out
36. A bloody saint
37. It’s obscene
38. The best five days of my life
39. Pied Piper
40. The only thing you can expect from pigs
41. We always line our artists up
42. A particularly religious moment
43. The 1976 temptation
44. Your porter hurt me
45. Am I saved?
PART FIVE
46. Rewriting history
47. Sir James
48. All sorts of trouble
49. I wouldn’t let the side down
50. Like a Stradivarius
51. SOS – Same Old Shit
52. I am the boss – it’s as simple as that
53. 50 million, give or take a few quid
54. Runners are junkies
55. Off the hook
56. And a bit of leg-over and chips
57. Ultimate freedom
58. A void
PART SIX
59. The wrong idea forever
60. Operation Ornament
61. The policy
62. Piss and shite
63. Mistakes were made
64. Two 16-year-old girls from the Ukraine
65. The last great gimmick
66. In the palm of his hand
67. No local connection
68. All that remains
Endnotes
Select Bibliography
Acknowledgements