This Could Be Rock 'N' Roll

by Tim Roux

  Eight o’clock. I’m on. I wonder if Jerry will make it back for nine-fifteen.

  * * *

  I’ve been thinking a lot about how to publicise myself. It doesn’t seem to matter what I do. The outcome is the always the same.

  The only way to sell CDs is to have them with you when you are gigging. Friendly people come up after the show and say “Jake, mate, really enjoyed the performance. Do you have any CDs of your stuff?”

  “Sure,” I say, pulling out a pile of pre-recorded CDs like contraband from an overcoat.

  “You’ve done a lot,” they inevitably say, which is a bit like “You’ve got a big one.”

  “I’ve been around a while,” I reply.

  “Which is your best one, then?”

  That’s where the trouble starts. I’m a painfully honest guy and I have to answer an honest question as honestly as possible.

  “It depends …..”

  At which point I mumble an account of the pros and cons of each album until the guy picks one at random and staggers off before I get to the end. I need a greatest hits.

  Obviously I am up on a whole series of download sites from iTunes to EZ Folk to iLike and I work hard at getting any mates left standing to send in their reviews. I haven’t bothered with Amazon but I probably should, not for the sales as much as for the credibility.

  MySpace is my other home as it is for most musicians because you get the autoplays of whatever you load up there, and you can embed YouTube videos, list gigs, publicise new albums etc.. My MySpace site is as packed full of goodies as I can make it, including a blog. I am also on FaceBook and Twitter but I’m not sure what they do except waste my time. If you are really famous I can imagine that they work, but someone like me mostly attracts a pile of solicitations asking me to try their whizzo technique to get followed by lots more people - how to keep a fool happy. I certainly load up gig clips on YouTube and someone has kindly built me a couple of videos from stills.

  I used to send out CDs for review but that is total waste of time and money. Most of the so-called reviewers don’t bother reviewing them and those who do are mostly congenital idiots.

  After that there is the advertising at the pub or club - that’s the most useful because you are seen to be around. Then you can try to get the local radio stations like BBC Radio Humber, KCFM, WHCFM and Viking to mention you from time-to-time or, if you want to catch them comatose you can go for Kingstown Radio which broadcasts into Hull hospitals. They don’t play my stuff. They probably reckon that their listeners are suffering enough and that they may face massive law suits should any of their listeners snuff it mid-dirge.

  The ‘award-winning’ (who isn’t nowadays?) Hull Daily Mail covers most events and will announce your latest album. If you are considered posh you can get a profile in The Journal which is designed for nobs and sods. The most active site is the ‘award-winning’ ThisisUll which is packed full of aspiring journalists and amateur observers who are actually passionate about what is going on. Unfortunately, they don’t seem to be that passionate about my music but perhaps I simply haven’t reached out to them enough.

  One of Hull’s wackier musical characters is Glenn Williams, a fine bluegrass singer-songwriter. It’s not really what I go for - I am more into country & western (‘City of Refuge’ by Rachel Harrington being my current rave) - but he does do a damn fine job. Check out his ‘Winds Of Time’ album. He calls his stuff ‘Ullbilly and ‘Ullgrass, but I don’t hold that against him.

  * * *

  I am covered in blood. It’s running in rivulets down my face from both cheeks, my top lip, my chin and my neck. No, they haven’t been re-enacting some driller-killer movie in our ground floor flat - I’ve just been trying yet again to wet-shave. I simply can’t do it but my electric razor isn’t working this morning however hard I shake it or even kick it. I scored a superb drop goal with it through the bedroom window a few minutes ago. I’ll go and pick it up from the garden shortly to see if it has changed its mind.

  Cathy and I are actually going out together while Jade suffers on the couch in the sitting room. I feel really guilty to be leaving her there.

  Despite the looming recession, it’s been a great week for house sales. I’ve closed four deals this week and my boss is ecstatic. “I knew it would be your turn eventually, Jake, if we waited long enough.” He says he wants another four next week. Yeah, yeah.

  When I say that Cathy and I are going out together it’s almost like a real date, which would be a step up in our relationship if it wasn’t at the Black Horse in Ellerker. In other words, she wants to check out Harry’s parents’ mansion with suitable cover. I told Roger at the office that I was taking an extended lunch and he said that he didn’t mind as long as I came back clutching a result. Unlikely.

  Cathy is in a surprisingly cheerful mood as I pick her up at Priory Grove. She even smiles at me, nicely. I am immediately on my guard. “It’ll be nice to get out of town,” she says. She works from home as a telesales operator (one up or one down from being an estate agent, depending on your point of view) although not much given the amount of money I still have to pay for her and the kids each month.

  “So why the Black Horse?” I ask innocently.

  “Jill and Bruce were talking about it the other day. They say it is really good, for Hull.”

  It will probably be better than most of the pubs I get to go to.

  “It’ll certainly make a change from Waterstones.”

  “Yeah, I feel that we need to start again somehow.”

  How?

  Cathy is still smiling when we get to Ellerker. She keeps looking at me in an almost affectionate way, you know, the way man-eating tigers sidle up to you.

  “OK, so where do Harry’s parents live?”

  “Who cares?”

  “You do, probably.”

  She is going sour again. “I didn’t come here to look up Harry’s parents. Who do you take me for?”

  “You have to admit that it is a bit of a coincidence.”

  She relents. “All right. I suppose it is, but honestly that is not why we are here.”

  “I’ll take your word for it.” That sounds a bit grudging. “Honestly, Cathy, I believe you.”

  Hauled back from the brink. “Blimey, this is a bit posh.” This is the top end of the pub grub market. How on earth am I going to pay? I don’t even need to see the prices on the menu - I can sniff the décor.

  Not joking. £6 for a starter, £20 for the main course, and £6 again for dessert. We are talking £100 here just for Tuesday lunch so long as I can steer Cathy away from the Château Calon-Ségur at £69.50 a bottle.

  “Don’t worry, Jake. I’m paying.”

  Which means I’m paying. Well, maybe not ……..

  “Harry’s treat.”

  “Why?”

  “Guilt money, I think, because his parents won’t have anything to do with me.”

  “Really?”

  “Come on, Jake. You’ve already said that Harry told you.”

  Sancton pigeon? That’s a bit specific isn’t it? Just down the road. They probably race them from the pigeon loft to the restaurant and cancel the return trip, laying them to rest on a bed of black pudding and bacon apparently. Thanks, Harry. I am reconsidering the Château Calon-Ségur.

  Remarkably, we manage to avoid throwing either wine or main courses at each other and we even have a few laughs. I keep finding myself wriggling and bouncing in my seat which is always an indication of my enjoying myself. Who’d have thought it?

  And, yes, afterwards we get to walk around the village. “Well I am a little curious,” Cathy explains.

  And Harry’s parents are a bit rich. Blimey. Walled garden, stately home and electric gates which puts all the rest of us into context. Our doorbell doesn’t even work.

  Back at Priory Grove, Cathy invites me in for coffee.

  “Better not. Jade is feeling terrible today. I had better get back to her.”

  Cathy even endeavours t
o look disappointed.

  Chapter 9

  Down the Hessle Road, just past ARCO, in front of Smith & Nephew and next door to the Alexandra Hotel there is an architectural salvage place dominated by a statue of a knight on his horse.

  I don’t know who the statue is of but for me he is El Cid, the guy who drove the bad guys out of Spain (except that they were doing just what everybody else was doing at the time).

  He strikes an incongruous figure overlooking the Hessle Road dual carriageway surrounded by garden ornaments but in some ways he reminds me of me.

  Dad said once that El Cid used to be down Spring Bank West somewhere before making his way onto the Hessle Road. I know how he feels. Here is this monumental guy, towering over everything around him and he has only made it a couple of miles down the road. I haven’t looked at the map, but it is probably even arguable whether he is any further out of Hull than he was.

  I wonder how badly he wants to escape. I wanted to escape from Hull very badly once. I wanted to play my way to London and from there around America, and here I am still in Victoria Ave playing for snacks money in the same old pubs over and over again. If I should ever make it to Birmingham I’ll be thinking I am going national.

  People say to me “Why don’t you go on ‘Britain’s Got Talent’ or anything else with Simon Cowell in it”? They are joking of course. Simon Cowell would take one look at me and toss me even further than he threw Susan Boyle before he snatched her back. I wouldn’t be so lucky, or so unlucky, depending on your point of view.

  I realised a long time back that I am minority listening which is OK because I am one of that minority as is Jade. So long as both of us can still stick me I’m going to carry on.

  I think I’d stand more chance on ‘The Apprentice’. At least when Sir Alan sacked me I could punch him in the face. That would be PR worth having.

  * * *

  Poor Jade. She really is suffering. She hasn’t been off the couch in days, maybe weeks. I keep trying to lure her onto her feet because I’m sure it isn’t good for either her or the baby to be lying there all the time but she’s just not interested.

  I’ve sold another two houses this week, and I’ve a gig in Grimsby on Saturday.

  I can’t think of Grimsby now without conjuring up that scene from Daphne Glazer’s ‘by the tide of the humber’ where she gets into a Grimsby dock to prepare to swim across the Humber. Her man has committed suicide in Hull prison, her mum committed suicide in the Humber when she was a child because her dad was having an affair, and her boyfriend was her man’s prison warder without her knowing it. That counts as an uneventful life in Hull.

  Anyway, there is this scene where she has to get undressed alongside a bunch of male long distance swimmers and then climb into the dock which is freezing cold, slimy, smelly, murky and with all sorts of disgusting things hazardous to safety and health floating above and below the surface. The water is so cold that it numbs her whole body except for her head which it gives a splitting headache. She finds it really hard to breathe. Then all these floating things come at her as she has to dip her head under the putrid, crumby water. Her biggest fear is of rats. I’m rather fond of rats, personally. Some of my best friends are rats, as they say. One definitely is.

  Mind you, the whole of Grimsby is a bit like Daphne’s dock in my experience. I’ve never played the Matrix Club before but for some reason I often get a decent turnout in Grimsby so it is perhaps time I started to make an effort to like the place.

  Daphne’s ‘Goodbye Hessle Road’ (I bet old El Cid prays hourly for the opportunity to say that) is definitely worth a gander too. It’s about a prison visitor (well Daphne is a prison visitor) whose best friend from childhood falls into drugs and prostitution before being murdered. It’s based around Victoria Ave somewhere where some days bodies litter the streets or at least skips do.

  * * *

  Not only is Harry failing to do his bit for Cathy but he keeps coming around to see how Jade is. I am beginning to feel stalked. Hasn’t he got a home to go to? He’s got a fucking enormous home to go to (just seen it) and failing that he’s got mine in Priory Drive. Does he have to live here too?

  I’m getting a bit worried about him. He keeps putting his arm around me in a more than matey way. I keep expecting him to kiss me on the cheek or something. Do you think he is trying to take over my life, to be me in some sort of weird kinky way? Poor deluded fool. Well, I suppose we could swap and then I’d get Cathy back and a huge pile of money. I’d have to give up the music though. Harry is tone deaf and likes all the bands I can’t stand, starting with Maximo Park and heading straight for Blur.

  I’ve always been picky about who my friends are so it grieves me that Harry has decided he is going to hang around me like a council snoop. Insofar as he keeps Cathy occupied and decent, I really like the guy, but when he tells her that she is persona non grata and starts hanging around here day and night he is definitely a lot less fun.

  Apart from anything else, we don’t really have anything to say to each other and Jade won’t talk to him at all. However, he does manage to get her off the couch. As soon as she realises that he is at the front door, she is straight on her feet and off to bed. After that, Harry and I enter this eternal conversational loop which no amount of electronic enhancement or sound effects could make interesting.

  Nowadays I drag him down one of the bars on Newland Avenue (usually either Zest or Sleepers) in the hope that we will bump into somebody worth talking to, not that I particularly want to be seen in his company. Failing that, I can at least watch people around me and pray for as much silence from Harry as possible.

  You would think that I might enjoy somebody else complaining about Cathy’s spiky little ways but somehow it really bugs me, partly because Cathy and I are at last getting on better and partly because I really don’t need to be reminded about that part of my life. Harry’s job is to keep Cathy happy and otherwise to keep his mouth zipped. After a hard day of showing people around houses I really don’t need a hard night tolerating Harry.

  I’ve had pretend friends,

  And swear til the end friends,

  A few round the bend friends too.

  Promise the world friends,

  And unfaithful girlfriends,

  And head in a whirl friends,

  Well they’re nothing new

  And there’s something to say,

  For walking away,

  When you’re drifting apart anyhow.

  If you’re not my friend today,

  Hey, it’s way too late now.

  Taking it all friends,

  Bang head on brick wall friends,

  And unreturned call friends too.

  Fat pack of lies friends,

  And can’t meet your eyes friends,

  And fuck off and die friends,

  I’ve had one or two

  And there’s something to say,

  For walking away,

  When you’re drifting apart anyhow.

  If you’re not my friend today,

  Hey, it’s way too late now.

  So don’t dog me to death,

  Or curse under your breath,

  Like it’s some kind of personal treason.

  So you knew me when,

  We were younger young men,

  But we parted back then for a reason

  And there’s something to say,

  For walking away,

  When you’re drifting apart anyhow.

  If you’re not my friend today,

  Hey, it’s way too late now.

  * * *

  Jade is going to get laid off by Skeltons however much her mum struggles to keep her job open for her. She’s just never there unless they set up a branch in our sitting room with Jade tossing buns at people from our couch.

  I don’t want to be hard on Jade because I can imagine that being pregnant and constantly sick is not all its cracked up to be, but I do think she could perhaps make more effort - just get herself o
nto her feet and persuade herself that she can cope with life. I know that when the baby is born she will no longer be working anyway, but immediately the additional income would be useful even if I am on a winning streak of selling dodgy houses.

  The other problem is that I am constantly feeling summonsed. Jade wants me to sit on the couch with her and chat all the time, except when I am getting her pots of tea and various natural remedies she so believes in. If they are that good, why isn’t she dancing down Victoria Ave?

  Obviously, it’s nice to spend time with Jade but not all the time. I have my writing to do and I keep being distracted by Harry.

  Jade keeps asking me about pregnancy and what is normal. Should she feel as bad as this? Cathy didn’t - she sailed through. Should she be talking to baby? What exercises should she be doing (on the couch?)? Should she be watching noisy quiz shows (never!)? Would baby like gardening programmes? Do I really have to go and play this gig in Grimsby (as if I haven’t repeatedly been asking myself the same question)?

  The trouble is that I’ve totally forgotten what having a baby is like. I even forgot between Josh and Sam being born and that was only two years.

  I can tell you that NCT is a complete waste of time, especially the moment when they attach a bloody great falsy to your front and say that this is what pregnancy is like, and would I mind imagining squeezing out a nine pound turd? I can also tell you that whatever resolutions you make in the quiet of your paper and pencil haven get torn up once you register yourselves into the hospital and the doctor and nurses take over. It is all “If you don’t do this, everyone will die, the baby will be malformed, disaster will happen!” and all you can say is “OK. We are in your hands.” I can also remember that the birth itself is beautiful and that you hold this tiny living creature in wonderment while your wife is thinking “Shit, what do I do now?”, and that after three years everything is OK again. That’s it. There will be a lot of discussion as to whether you should buy enviro-friendly washable nappies or those polyprop things that are raising Britain another one thousand feet above sea level and then, if you go for the disposables, whether Pampers, Huggies or supermarket own are best. Then there is the whole breast feeding bit and the role of baby foods, organic or toxic, and what sort of baby gyms you should have and, at that point, I rekindle my interest in football which has never been great. I’m a Hull City supporter after all, about once every fifteen years.