The first major interview that Steve gave the Melody Maker was back in '73. There are several more major interviews with the MM throughout '74 and '75. All worth a read of course.

Amongst that coverage there is one piece that Steve penned himself in late '74. I thought it was worth typing up for your perusal.

It came at a pivotal time (in late ’74); the original Cockney Rebel had disbanded in July, yet despite this Steve had gone on to pull off a triumphant Reading festival performance that August, and I guess the beginnings of ‘Best Years of Our Lives’ were in the air.

It is also the last reference I’ve seen to Simply Lorraine. I believe the original ’72 line-up each had a nickname within the band; with Stewart Elliot as Simply Lorraine.

(By the way Steve’s moniker was Muriel the Actor... and both were sung about in The Human Menagerie of course).

So, this tale could be seen as a last defiant, tongue in cheek, two fingered riposte as one door closes on those original Cockney Rebel days and another one opens onto new times ahead.

When coupled with the first major interview, just a year earlier, both articles neatly top and tail that first Cockney Rebel period.

MM EXCLUSIVE! AN EX-JOURNALIST TURNED ROCK STAR RETURNS TO WRITING TO ANSWER HIS CRITICS IN A UNIQUE SHORT STORY (MM 23-11-74)

Steve Harley Writes...

“I think you could have told me about the Unwritten Rule,” said Simply Lorraine to the Shapes of Hate. “What! And make it easy for you,” spat the Shapes, “What do you take us for!”. Simp stood firm, screwing up his fist and mumbling “One,two,three etc,” to himself, then spat back at ‘em: “I take you for fools and bigots and by keeping quiet about this latest addition to the Rules that only got added this minute in time and that nobody, not even YOU, can understand, I figure you have betrayed your own lousy prides.”

He was gasping through rage and jumped up, pushing back his Throne and thumping down his fist upon the table at which the throng was gathered for the Game and in contrived arrogant pose began yelling: “Ah-ahhh!!!” in the upmost agony. Then: “Confusion, I feel; confusion, I... confusion...,” he spake.

And there was much smug laughter from the many and various Shapes.

Uproar

And uproar amongst the Spectators in the Gallery, much cheering and jeering and yea-ing and naying, for even they were divided amongst themselves on account of this new Rule and not only did Simply Lorraine find himself at the centre of dissent within the gathering of the Shapes (for their animosity was by no means unanimous), but also the same upset was occurring within the ranks of the Spectators.
Panic. There was no time to lose.

Anxiety. No time for self-destruction at present. No right to self-pity either.

He spot-ran furiously from right to left, and breathless he paused to reconsider his subsequent tack.

Mopping the flood upon his newly creased forehead and fighting to control the frightful gasping in his lungs and stomach, he was preparing to rest: To put into perspective all the t’do around him. To sort out a little peace which he could cling to from time to time. To rest awhile and to...
Then suddenly, with no prior warning, the Angry Shapes descended on him from their self-made pedestal and were screaming and stabbing at the air around our prostrate Hero with fingers a-plenty and announcing with authority: “Death, death, metaphorical death to all who betray us then fall to confess.”

The Shapes lay upon Simply Lorraine this curse then disappeared into pure insignificance.

Confused

And again or Hero was confused, and he lifted himself with an arm to his feet and philosophised that “When we all grow up(and yes, we must surely ALL grow up) everything will be different. The Shapes of Hate will surely be shown the light and the Spectators will again cheer in unison and we will all be cheerful of each other and the Truth will prevail and, and, and, and, and... I think I shall go away and try to forget this Unwritten Rule!!!”

In the Game of No-Return, there are two sets of rules: One for those on the Way-Up and another for those on the Way-Down. Now simply Lorraine was most certainly in the Way-Up category, which should have meant in-the-pinkness for absolutely everybody; that is to say, for the Players, the Shapes who lay down the rules, the Spectators who were in need of an exciting new Gambler, and the Judges, too.

In fact, there was apparently no reason for anybody to feel put out in any way conceivable by our young Hero’s sudden rise to Fame Game. But it was his private despair that the harder he tried the more imperfect he became in the eyes of many. His pride had been his main motivator at the outset, but same was now potentially his downfall. The knowledge that in himself he was merely an instrument and of little use without being lifted-up by some other, maybe superior force or energy was difficult as poison for him to swallow. And THEY knew it. Boy, how THEY knew it.

Back in a recent piece of the Past other Shapes are grabbing at Simp by the arm and asking: “what does it feel like now? How are you settling into the life of a Superstar in the Game of the Great Pretenders? Yes, please tell us how does it feel???” And Simp, baffled by the Super and bothered by the Star, and becoming bewildered by Life itself, is assuming a rubbery grimace of the face and back-side and speaking in a low, farting tone.

Nothing

“Too many nobodys asking too many nothings, and too many notings all eager to answer the too many nobodys nothings and all making too much nothing about nobody in particular and nobody in particular is becoming a Hero in the Pretenders’ Game and to many Pretenders are taking part nowadays to make Nothing a very uninteresting set-up. And when Nobody attacks another Nobody all you got is Nothing. Understand? And when Nothing is said about Nothing, you still got nothing. Right? So the sooner all the lousy nothings disappear from sight and all the other nothings whom they attack in Match Reports, the happier we’ll all be about everything. Eh?” In short, our Hero could now be said to be definitely approaching the WAY-DOWN.

Escape for time-being. Europe. When a young man’s fancy turns to thoughts of red lights and tulips of blue berets and push-bikes, of miles of wartime graveyards and empty flat land, and mountains, snow-capped and surmountable and beirkellers, reeking and rocking in alcoholic frivolity and “ ‘Oo svitched off ze lights just zen?” And young girls with heads tipped to one side, resting inches from pouted shoulder and nodding gently like motorway tranced backseat driver and saying hushed: “I like to veeset your luvverly country one day. (Gasp) My farder wad der many years aygo. (Wheeze) And ‘e told me ze boys are all Mmmmm...” The Young Man’s Dream.

And for the perfect escape there is Paris. Paris, Walking along the Boulevard, smoking Stuyvesant and pretending to be Scott Fitzgerald Hero or a Hemingway Hood, confused in the search for identity. Dreaming and Pretending (don’t we all?). And there at Sainte Chappelle, shaking the left-bank blues, is Simply Lorraine, running yet again, and running furiously from left to right – left, right, left, right, left, sometimes catching a glimpse of certain Shapes and gun-slinging it down the street (rue) and contemplating the whole human menagerie that seems to have invaded his brain.
He turns to his left, stops and leaning and rigid, halts in her stride the Lovely Louise from Liverpool who took sixteen autographs from him at The Table at the end of a Game and all for her friends and kid sister. “Hey”, he bellows right into her face, 2YOU WANT ME TO SPEAK QUIETER OR DO YOU WANNA PUT UP WITH IT FOR ANOTHER AUTOGRAPH OR TWO OR EVEN A DOZEN, KID, HMMM?” And she, scouse, shrugs and hollers back into the Young Pretender’s own face.
“I got all I want, see. Now I’m leaving.”
“You don’t want autograph?” – Baffled.
“No!” – Positive.
“Whore ‘n’ More,” – Bitter.
“You loser. I read in Match Report!” – Impressionable.
“Balls!” – Wordless.

Worried

“Well, anyways, I’m sorry but I gotta go anyway”. – Not-so-certain-anymore. The Hero has Charm

But the Hero is worried, too. He collected up the messages of blasphemy that the Liverpool Lassie threw down in her wake and would hold them for evidence of Treason. And in his sad and sorry state he could hear the Shapes, laughing and screaming and smug. And their laughter embellished and bathing in echo at that!

Lying by the cafe wall and sipping cognac, Simp thinks: “Can a Pretender have a spirit of adventure and a desire to live long as possible at the same time? Do I want to live forever because I am so scared of Death? Do I want to do as many things and collect as many experiences as possible because I have that spirit of adventure? Am I a talented winner or masquerading as such? Am I worthless loser or now affected by paranoia?”

Misery

He was torturing himself with the Questions of The Thinking Man. He was putting himself through self-inflicted misery in an attempt to discover his raison-d-etre.

“And why do we always show off our schoolboy French when thinking of or speaking of France? O, the Questions, the Questions. YES! THE QUESTIONS ARE ENDLESS, DOES THE TINKING MIND KNOW NO BOUNDS, MUST THE MISERY GO ON FOREVER?”

Back home and asking again: “What now?” Simply Lorraine has changed. He has been playing Pretender for only a matter of months. He has observed the various Shapes of Hate from afar and aclose and come to the conclusion there are those with integrity and those with none. They are rather like newspapers in that sense. He has also been Spectated by many men of the street and been cheered a lot and jeered a little. He has noticed that memories of jeering stick longer and go deeper into the sub-conscious mind.

He has been up and down more times in the Game than he has been during the other-part of his life. He’d been in the Game, I repeat, months. He’d been in Life for years. He’d watched other Pretenders pretend, but deny this. He wondered did they realise the truth or were they underprivileged in this sense, or maybe did they all have unhappy childhoods. He’d heard them cry “Fake” and wondered “where?” He’d been fighting the lions and was winning but the gates of the arena were unopened and the lions (each new recruit fresh and eager to begin battle) kept coming at him. With nowhere to run, he had to stay around and fight back. Exhausted and confused, he was. \beater, or about to be, he was not. He just kept right on running from left to right, leaning still distinctly to the left, and waited for Fate to intervene.

Confronted at last by Shapes of Fate and Anger No 1. “Tired, are you? Eh? Are you getting tired Master Simply Lorraine? Are you feeling like retiring from the arena of Pretence? Are you suffering Master Lorraine?”

Winking

And Simply Lorraine took an icy long drunken Courvoisier stare at the words: “Cross. Shoulder. Vastness. Straight...Long. Masturbation... Winking. PARASITE!” And the Shape was baffled, too. Eyes agog. Balance shakey. Lips parted (as always) and two Way-Out to ever recover. And Simp was relentless. He carried on throwing up and spitting out waste matter at the Shape and the poor thing began losing some of his lovely colour and to wilt and sulk in the corner, but the Hero, truly heroic now, did not CARE AT ALL, my friends.

And me, just the relator of this tale, a mere innocent bystander you could say, a looker-on and nothing more, I tell you. And I tell you, too, I WAS SHOCKED at this tirade, this, this diatribe of our Hero’s. And I began to ask “Why?” and who was to blame for this change in the boy anyway? And still he was lobbing spew at the Other Person and was being VERY VITRIOLIC, brothers, and was looking him a five-star look and went: “PARASITE.” And oh, the ultimate in vitriol and outrage.

And no longer was the Shape standing. In fact he was now a thoroughly wilted Shape and was wilted, not on his feet, (Oh, no) but ON THE GROUND. The Confrontation was over. There was no winner and no loser . Just two sorry states who had needlessly hurt each other. And why? Ah, the Questions of the Thinking Fool go on and on and on and on.

Down and out or up and out or down and in or in and out or left and right or right and left or right or wrong or left and lonely. “Maybe,” said Simply Lorraine, “we can work it out.”
“Are you prepared then to comply with the Unwritten Rule,” enquired the Boss Shape.
“I didn’t say that,” replied Simp.
“But are you?”
“Can’t say right now. I want time to THINK about it. Time to consider. And I also want the negatives from the last few Match Reports so I can contemplate this Rule.”
“No way, Simp.”
“The no comply.”
“Listen. You wanna stay in this Game of the Pretenders or don’t you?”
“I wanna stay.”
“You wanna be a Star Pretender or don’t you?”
“You said that first, not me.”
“Yes, but do you?”
“Yes. It’s better to keep winning than to lose on occasion if you already know plenty about the loser’s side of things. Right?”
“Right. SO COMPLY.”

And Simply Lorraine did think about it and did consequently decide No and was quite laughed at and mocked and looked upon smugly at the table of the Game.

Rule

And again the Spectators were divided like never before and again the turmoil and mess of dissent surrounded our young Hero. Yet again and again, young Simply Lorraine would refuse to comply; to accept this Unwritten Rule. And always he would retreat after or during these visions confrontations to his Toilette and play alone and in private bliss. He had set himself the task of smashing the Unwritten Rule.

“I will wait,” he screamed daily. “I will wait and wait and wait and wait and... politely refuse to abuse myself.”

Can anyone give me a link to a York notes study guide on this piece......or an extra quarter of a century of my life to analyze it myself?

Simply...............wow..........the content of that is phenomenal