rebelfreak1 wrote:From around 15 years old my world has been intertwined with a few things that have become very important to me over the following 43 years.
Basically my family,football and music.
Great story. Family goes without saying, but I think the twin football / music obsession is something that quite a few of us share; my team for the past 45 years being Stockport County (these are not our glory days – we’re crap but it’s my crap) who I’ve seen play on well over 120 grounds.
I think for some people the bands you loved as a teenager, like your football team, stay with you forever. Steve and his various Cockney Rebels are certainly in this category (the other two parts of my unholy trinity being Lou / the Velvets and Ian Hunter / Mott the Hoople). There are lots of other bands and singers I like, and see regularly, but these are the “nailed ons” that have stood the test of time.
I remember being awestruck by Steve’s first three albums, the changes of direction and style, the similarities and the differences, and wondering what would come next. And Timeless Flight came next, which for me was the opus that proved Steve really was the master of his craft; the diversity of the songwriting, the tipping of his hat to Dylan, and the sheer class of the songs. Followed by what I always think of as “the experimental album”, Love's A Prima Donna. I don’t think every arrow hit the bull on this one, but it was a brave shot and it produced some classics (as do all Steve’s album’s).
Like a lot of artists, the late 70s seemed to be a career downturn; good albums going nowhere and the music press and record buying public focusing on newer trends. And by the 80s I thought we’d lost Steve for good when up he popped, half way through the afternoon, at Reading Festival in 1983 (I did a lot of festivals back then). Brilliant. I was like a pig in, err, shall we say a trough. Then memories of various gigs in the 80s and 90s, telling friends “you have to see this”. About half of Stockport getting the buses to the International 2 (more than once) and Steve singing Mr Tambourine Man all the way through, the night before some of us had to get an early bus to Wembley to watch the County. The changing <ahem> hairstyles. Not finding Yes You Can in any shops and having to buy the cassette at a gig. Lots more, but I could go on forever; the main point being that the man is still here, and still doing what he does best, and if possible, getting even better at it. The later albums hold their own against anyone’s music and the acoustic shows and the orchestral shows add something different every time.
When I started this ramble, inspired by Jim’s much better ramble and the football link, I’m sure I had a point to make. But I’ve forgotten what it was, so it’s really just more pointless words. But they mean something to me because it’s all been part of getting older and still being here; part of feeling like a teenager when you hear the opening notes of Mr Raffles, Judy Teen or any of the others at a gig, and then you have to grow up and go to work next morning. And wait until you can do it all again …
Mick
