by Irvine Welsh
Their first album, The Old Boys, brought them some recognition beyond their home town, although opinion was divided on the band and their motives. Were they simply mocking and undermining the generations before them in the cruellest possible manner, or were they a reactionary Trojan Horse within the castle of punk?
The Old Boys themselves never gave the game away, though several critics were pushed too far by the inflammatory and racist single ‘Compulsory Repatriation’. In response to a near riot at Nicky Tam’s Tavern which, it was claimed, was instigated byAnti-Nazi League members, Wes Pilton came out with the classic quote: ‘Has nae cunt in this fuckin doss ever heard ay irony?’
This summed up the Old Boys. They were a band ahead of their time: postmodern piss-takers in a more deadpan, serious, political era. Perhaps due to the frustration that nobody really got them, they started to parody themselves, with attendant declining returns.
It seemed as if this sordid chapter signalled the beginning of the end for the band. They staggered on until the inevitable split came in 1982 when Pilton was briefly sectioned under the Mental Health Act and committed to the Royal Edinburgh Hospital in Morningside. Mike Gibson, the band’s guitarist, left to study accountancy at the city’s Napier College. Steve Fotheringham, on bass, was the one Old Boy who stayed in the music business. He now works as a DJ and producer. Pilton returned with a solo album entitled Craighouse, a concept offering based on his experiences in the mental institution.
The band had the sort of luck with drummers that sounds like the inspiration for Spinal Tap, both of their skins men tragically having taken their own lives. Donnie Alexander, the original drummer, left the band in April 1980, following a horrific workplace accident which left him badly disfigured. He was found dead in a gas-stinking bedsit in Newcastle upon Tyne some eighteen months later. His replacement in the band, the unfortunately named Martin Smelt, committed suicide by throwing himself from the Dean Bridge in the summer of 1986. A keen Hearts supporter, he was said to have suffered from a deep depression following the footballing events of that year.
Over twenty years later, the Old Boys are playing a comeback gig, Smelt being replaced on skins by Chrissie Fotheringham, the American spouse of Steve, so at least there’ll be no excuse for the rhythm section not being in time.
It says that gig is next week at the Music Box in Victoria Street. I’ll definitely check that out and also pick up the Best of . . . CD that’s recently been issued.
I head outside and I’m finding it bitingly cold here after California, and it’s getting dark so quickly. Nonetheless, I’m still feeling quite chuffed until I get round to Duke Street and see that slimy little ratbag, shuffling jauntily down the road.
Busby. What’s his profile? What does that ruddy-faced nonce drink?
Export. Whisky. You decide.
I duck into a shop doorway and watch him going into one of the old gadges’ howfs that are struggling to stay open in the face of being undercut by the big Wetherspoon’s toilet on the corner, with its happy-hour pitchers of cocktails for thirty-eight pence or something like that. Yet as soon as the old gaffs shut down the prices will rise okay, make no mistake.
Busby.
I’m looking in on him through the long windows of the pub; greasy where fish-supper-eating squinty-eyed drunks have pawed at it with their grubby mitts, trying to balance themselves as they attempt to see if there’s any cunt inside that they can tap off ay.
Wee Busby, sitting there under the lights of some old Leith fleapit of a pub with his half of heavy and wee gold yin. The thin layer of sweat – or is it grease? – on his face. His strawberry nose. His busy, mocking, sneering little eyes, so at odds with that clamshell smile.
The insurance man.
What is the insurance man offering? He’s offering insurance against being ourselves. Which is no insurance at all.
I’m looking in, watching Busby sit there with Sammy. The big fella: chunky and bemused as his life has slid slowly into alcoholic debauchery. He’s scarcely noticed the departing years, wife, kids, girlfriends but now he’s feeling their absence and all he has left is that most loyal yet treacherous of bitches: who else but Dame Peeve?
Even worse for him, Busby, the skinny-framed sweetie wife, now has the measure of this hulk, a man he probably avoided for a large part of his young life. Things change though, sometimes so gradually that you don’t even notice, especially for auld cunts like them. Somebody as sly as Busby will always become the master of someone as slow as Sammy if he’s patient and takes care to insinuate himself enough.
And why not? Busby’s no threat, he’s got nothing Sammy wants, save the stolen nights with bored or lonely single women like my mother. Then as Sammy’s alcoholism and confusion grew, he’d find in Busby a strange companion. Deferential at first: Aye, you’ll soon be back on your feet, Sammy, they cannae keep a good man doon and you’ve ey been one ay the best, Sammy . . .
Now, though, the contempt is showing. It shows in the sneering glances that Sammy is too languorous and alcohol-fuddled to notice. Or the odd barbed aside that cuts through his muffled layers of consciousness because suddenly Busby’s approval has become so important for Sammy as it’s now the only quasi-affirmative show in town.
And I see in Busby and Sammy how fucked up things are when you take responsibility for somebody else, how much you can come to rely on them. For Busby and Sammy, read Skinner and Kibby. Or every cunt and any cunt in every grotty bar in every town and city in this country. Everybody who has missed the boat and has nothing left but each other and their own sad dramas full of loathing and dread to fall back on. You can enjoy a mocking dance with somebody, but it’s such an albatross around your neck. Especially when the music stops and you find yourselves so deep in each other’s desperate embrace that you can’t untangle.
Not yet twenty-four years old and I can see that it’s all fucked already. My twin curses, Kibby and alcoholism, have taught me that. Is alcoholism the product of bastardism, or is it just another fucking excuse? Discuss, discuss, discuss.
But I so want to go in there and buy a drink for auld Busby and Sammy. Take the old boys on a trip down memory lane. Listen keenly, yes keenly, as Sammy slobbers and even gets coy as sneaky auld Busby’s rubber mooth becomes even slacker with drink as the secrets get coughed out.
‘Aye, you could be ma laddie right enough. Aboot then that ah cowped yir ma. Wee punk rocker she wis at the time n aw. Mind ay her, Sammy! Nice pair ay tits oan it! Wir you no thair n aw? You wir eywis a Slade man but, eh no, Sammy? Noddy Holder.“Cum On Feel The Noize”? Mind ay that yin, Sammy? “Skwueeze Me Pleeze Me”!’
Just to give me permission to stand up and smash my fist into that face, that twisted rubber mouth which has talked its way out of a thousand such punches, to watch as the dentures or the last remaining teeth hurtle across the bar like bullets. But no. Because I’d need to take a drink myself for that yin and one is never enough and a thousand is too much.
I’m saving Brian. Denying myself to save Brian, and not just through fear of reciprocity, which is real enough. It’s more than self-interest or self-preservation. I simply don’t want him to die, I never did. Because he doesn’t deserve to die. All he was wis an annoying sooky wee cunt. All I ever wanted to do was boot him up the arse.
But the pull, oh my God the fucking pull, aye, much stronger in dingy auld Edina than in sunny Cal-i-for-nigh-ay. One can of lager. Just one fucking cool pint of Michael Philip. I’m heading up the Walk, passing the Lorne Bar now. The Alhambra, with its door wedged open. Duncan Stewart’s perched on the bar stool; I see the back of his shaved head. Every bar I pass containing a face: a memory, a story, and the fabric of a life. More than the alcohol I’m addicted to that way of life, that culture, those social relationships. I can’t go in there, though, and just drink water or lemonade. I can’t go in there. I can’t stay here, the invisible hand of expectation guiding, cajoling, pushing and thrusting me in the same direction, or directions. I’ve backtracked and I
’m heading the way I came, back doon the street. I’m at the crossroads but all the roads lead to the same place. Cause it’s everywhere. Where do you go from the foot of the Walk? Up the Walk to the Central, Spey, et cetera, et cetera, or along Junction Street to Mac’s, the Tam O’Shanter, Wilkies, et cetera, et cetera? Or perhaps Duke Street to the big Wetherspoon’s or the Marksman, et cetera, et cetera? Or maybe Constitution Street to Yogi’s although it’s no his any mair, or Homes or Nobles et cetera, et cetera?
It’s everywhere.
A good pint. Aye, they dae a good pint in here, son. A fucking great pint! It contains syrups, corn sulphites, pyrocarbonate, benzoate, foam enhancers, amyloglucosidase, beta-glucanase, alpha-acetolactate, decarboxylase, stabilisers, ascarbonates. Might even also contain: malt, hops, yeast, water and wheat. Maybe. Don’t bet on it though.
And it’s fucking well everywhere.
It had been an amazing transformation. Now he was sitting up in bed and eating solids. The new liver was functioning efficiently and, more importantly, there had been no further night seizures. All the medical and nursing staff to a man and woman were shy of employing the term ‘remission’ but Brian Kibby’s rapid progress and the stretched resources of the NHS were such that the surgeon, Mr Boyce, estimated that he’d be home within the week.
Joyce was delighted at the news, and couldn’t remember when she’d last been so happy. Her prayers had been answered. Her faith, shaken as it had been by Keith’s death, and tested to breaking point by Brian’s illness, had emerged intact, even renewed. But worry and concern were by nature and circumstance so well embedded into her psyche that she felt somewhat exposed without their accompanying presence. Brian Kibby knew his mother well and saw that even through her glee there was a spectre at the feast. — What’s up, Mum, is there something wrong?
His mother was aware that her son’s question had just made her physically recoil, so any attempt at concealment would be folly. — Son . . . I know you said not to bring this up, she began cagily, — but it’s Danny . . . Mr Skinner from the office. He really wants to visit you.
Brian Kibby’s face contorted into such a twisted parody of itself that Joyce immediately regretted her disclosure. Sitting rigidly upright in the bed, struggling to contain himself, he looked evenly at his mother, wearing a hitherto unseen expression that chilled her to the marrow. — I hate him, he said to her, — I don’t want him anywhere near me.
— But Brian! Joyce shrieked. — Da- . . . Mr Skinner was phoning from America all the time he was out there. He emailed that nice girl at your work nearly every day to ask about you!
It was now Brian Kibby’s turn to be concerned at his mother’s reaction; upset as he was by the way his response had aggravated her. — Let’s not talk about Skinner. I just want to get home; just you, me and Caroline, he said, all the time thinking: What does Skinner want with me?
34
Shock and Awe
IT’S A RAW, freezing day, but at least it’s a brutally honest one, devoid of spirit-crushing icy rains or torturous winds. The last of the weak sun is fading and the sulphurous sky is turning mauve. My feet scrunch on iced-up patches of pavement as soon as I turn off the main St John’s Road, down the winding backstreet towards the Kibbys’ gaff.
I’ve come here to see Joyce, who’d called me up, very concerned about Brian’s behaviour. She said I didn’t need to, but I insisted, as I wanted a nose around Kibby’s pad before he gets home from the hospital the morn.
I chap the door and as it opens . . .
Jesus fuck almighty . . .
. . . I get a big shock as a stunningly beautiful girl of about nineteen, twenty, appears before me.
What a honey! She has straight, blonde hair pinned back on one side with a gold clasp. Her large grey-blue eyes ooze a soulful depth. Her pearly teeth are dazzling and she has the smoothest skin I’ve ever seen.
Fuck sakes.
She wears a green top with green-and-black camouflaged combat trousers.
What the fuck’s gaun on here? I am . . .
She raises her eyebrows quizzically at me in lieu of a response that’s some time forthcoming as her very presence has knocked me right out of sorts.
Ya cunt that ye are.
Aroused, not so much sexually as emotionally, I struggle to maintain my cool, forcing a clamped smile. — I’m Danny. I, ehm, work with Brian at the council, I explain, almost moved to describe myself as a friend of his, but managing to stop short in time.
— Come in. I’m Caroline, she says, and she turns in an easy twist and heads into the house. I’m so shocked that this, this, is Kibby’s sister. I’m following eagerly, desperate to remain close to her essence and, of course, to ascertain her curves in detail.
Joyce Kibby, who is already in the hallway beside us, interrupts my eyeful. She’s as nervy and jumpy as her daughter is poised and graceful. — Mr Skinner . . . she says.
— Danny, please, I reiterate, more for Caroline’s benefit than hers. The dopey cow should really have managed to dispense with the formalities by now. I get no response from Caroline though, who saunters into the living room without further acknowledgement.
— How’s Brian? I ask Joyce, ready to follow Caroline, but I’m ushered into the kitchen. As I reluctantly sit down I catch a glimpse of her daughter through a crack in the door. She’s more than just a looker; I can’t recall having a reaction like that to a woman before, ever.
Well, maybe Justine Taylor in second year. Or Kay. Or Dorothy. But even they were different somehow. This is fucked. I can’t just –
Joyce is bringing the kettle to the boil. It’s probably cause of her daughter, but I’m scrutinising the old girl now, trying and failing to see a younger, tidier self. I see only the tight, prissy curls and that stiff, jerky manner. — He’s getting better but he seems really confused mentally, she tells me in that shrill voice of hers, which dovetails with the sound of the kettle whistling.
— Oh, not so good. How so?
Joyce puts two spoonfuls of tea into the pot, then adding one for luck, in the style of the Old Girl. Come to think of it, she too must be ages with Siouxie Sioux, although you’d never believe it in a million years. This woman was probably born old, or maybe it’s just this cloak of uptight solicitude she’s shrouded in. — He has a strange obsession about his old job, she says. Then she looks at me quite shamefully, disclosing in a low, cagey voice, — This is so embarrassing . . . it’s just that he’s been really horrible about everything you’ve tried to do for him. He just doesn’t seem to realise that you’re here to help! I cannae understand why he’s so set against you when you’ve been so good to us and so concerned about him. There’s no good in it, no good at all, she says, her face flushing and her head shaking as she puts the cup down in front of me.
— Joyce, this has been a terrible ordeal for Brian. He’s bound to be confused, I advance in a conciliatory manner. The tea is in a silly little china cup that holds fuck all with a handle so small that it’s almost impossible to pick up.
— Yes, Joyce Kibby agrees vigorously, and continues rabbiting one thousand apologies on her son’s behalf. But all I’m thinking of right now is her daughter. She is gorgeous and übercool, a fucking megababe; everything that Brian Kibby and his dopey mother aren’t.
Caroline Kibby.
Brian Kibby.
And it just comes to me in a blinding flash of inspiration! There was a way that I could keep monitoring Brian’s progress, a legitimate reason to continue visiting them! It would be killing two birds with one stone, and a labour of love. It would also, in all probability, get right up poor Brian’s nose.
— It makes him seem such a bad person, Mr Skinner, and he’s not, he’s a fine young man . . .
Caroline.
That divine and splendid prefix which, to my hungry, restless mind, now totally neutralises the toxicity of that previously sickening word ‘Kibby’. There is no sugar in this tea but I’ve yet to taste a sweeter elixir. If I was seeing, dating,
Caroline Kibby, I could come here if I wanted to, and Brian could do jack shit about it. I could take care of him, at least until he was strong. Eat healthily, get plenty of rest and good lovin’ and watch him thrive. And while doing this I could get to understand him, find out why I have this strange and terrible power over him!
— . . . he never gave me or my husband, God rest his soul, a bit of trouble . . .
Caroline Kibby.
No, it wasn’t a bad word at all. Quite beautiful really: Kibby, Caroline Kibby. Yes, I could make Brian strong before I go home to San Francisco . . .
Dorothy.
In some ways it seems so far away already, but it was so real, so good.
— . . . and his attitude towards you . . . I can’t explain it . . . if he knew you were here even . . .
— Okay, I say to Joyce, — least said, soonest mended. Brian’s still very ill and the last thing I want to do is to upset him. I’ll take off now and I’ll keep away from the hospital. Provided, of course, that you keep me up to date with his progress.
— I certainly will, Mr – Danny, and thanks again for being so understanding. Joyce looks at me in that imploring way.
And for the first time I’m thinking about how there might just be some wonderful divine purpose behind this strange curse. I finish my tea and as I take my leave, stop off and poke my head around the door of the front room to say a cheery, — Bye, to Caroline, dropping her a smile.
— Bye then, she says, turning up from the table she’s sat at, at first quite puzzled, but then she returns the smile and I’m thinking, whoa, that is a fucking exceptional lassie!
I’m floating out of the Kibbys’ on cloud nine, almost oblivious to Joyce’s cooing and clucking. Then I seem to fall a thousand feet through my own body as I think again of Dorothy over in San Francisco. I don’t know what the fuck I’m going to do.