July -September
The summer of ’95 was a hot one. This meant the first few months of not having a job, along with rehearsing, we were able to throw a Frisbee around Highbury Fields and sunbathe on the roof of the Georgian house where we lived. The house was divided into ten flats, ours being the basement, where the old servant quarters used to be – we still had their bells inside by the front door. The roof was white and had great views of North London. We were able to go up there, with a couple of towels and take in some rays.
The roof was u shaped, with the chimney stack in the middle. One afternoon Danny and I were up there sunbathing, not visible from the entrance. A neighbour must have thought someone had left the door open, so shut it and locked it. We only realised when we tried to get back downstairs. We were trapped. It was mid-week and not many people were around. I had to lean over, in my bikini and shout, ‘excuse me!’ when we saw someone. A few didn’t hear and kept going a few more probably did hear and kept going. When eventually someone looked up, I bellowed down, ‘please can you ring on all the doorbells! We’re stuck!’. Took about an hour. It was very hot and with no shade and we were genuinely starting to get a little anxious.
I got a nice tan though.
3 July – The British football transfer record fee is broken for the third time this year when Liverpool sign striker Stan Collymore from Nottingham Forest for £8.5million.
4 July – John Major wins the Conservative Party leadership election, gaining 218 votes to John Redwood’s 89
The famous Blur v Oasis battle of Britpop took place in August, with Blur declared the winners.
Until a few weeks later, when Oasis were declared the winners.
One of Jess and Martin’s friends and sister of Scouse Mick, Scouse Kate was moving to Australia with Stevie B. another of their group of friends. We had only recently got to know Kate and Stevie – they were very funny and it was a shame to be saying ‘goodbye’ when we’d really only just met. There were several farewells, including a big meal at a restaurant in Clapham and a mini festival in Hope, just inside the Welsh border in Flintshire.
Someone knew the owner of a pub there with a large function room and sloping mountain garden where people could camp. Pusherman and jump-rope were invited to play, with other friends djing. Danny and I drove, giving Paul R. a lift. Our drummer drove separately with his girlfriend.
The room at the back of the pub was perfect, it even had a proper stage. Once everyone had settled in, put their tents up and said their ‘hellos!’, we set up our gear, sound checked and got ready to play. Out we stepped, my guitar chimed, coloured lights hazy through the dry ice. Not much visibility, I went up to an empty microphone stand and got confused when I couldn’t hear my voice. We settled in, it started to feel really good and then, we got better again and sounded amazing. John Haskell, Pusherman’s sound man, did ours too and it was immense. We played well, really getting into it and enjoying ourselves, adding pieces and extending endings. We were elated when we came off.
Pusherman went on at around 10pm, heavy and blissed out. All of us out front dancing and whooping in the rave-like atmosphere.
After the live music was over, the djs did their thing and people danced or wandered in and out. When at last we couldn’t keep our eyes open any longer, Danny and I went to the car – which was right by the function room entrance. We changed into our pajamas, popped briefly back inside to brush our teeth and wash our faces. We pushed the two front seats back, got the duvet and pillows from the boot, shut the doors, curled up and fell asleep. The car felt like the best hotel room ever, it was such a relief to snuggle up and close our eyes. There were some bendy mirrors on the way into the hall and my last sight before drifting off, was of Paul and Jess laughing hysterically at their reflections, Jess saying they looked like Picasso portraits.
Hope in Flintshire.
Danny and I decided to clip three years off our ages.
This proved to be particularly awkward at a party we went to in a bar called Mars on Endell Street, Covent Garden. I bumped into a guy I hadn’t seen for ages, Andy, from Camberley. We got chatting and he asked my age, without pause, I told him the new version. ‘You went to Farnborough Hill didn’t you? That means you’ll have been in the same year as my girlfriend’ who he proceeded to call over. ‘Hey Kerry, come over here’. The girl came over and although she gave me a knowing look, she didn’t blow my cover. Thank you Kerry.
The Verve played The Astoria in London. We were on the guest list along with Pusherman. After the gig, someone knew where the band were staying, so we got a cab over there hoping for a party. Embarrassingly, by the time we arrived they had gone to bed. Jess and Martin were particularly friendly with bass player Simon Jones, who’s lovely American wife, Myra came down to the reception in her dressing gown to say there was no after show.
23 July – War in Bosnia and Herzegovina: British forces sent to Sarajevo to help relieve the Siege of Sarajevo.
6 August – Pubs in England are permitted to remain open throughout Sunday afternoon for the first time.
In 1995 for the first year in quite a while I didn’t go to the Reading Festival, but instead to the Notting Hill Carnival, also on the Bank Holiday weekend. After bowling around, dancing in front a few sound systems, a gang of us went back to Amanda and Rudy‘s flat. They lived right in the heart of the carnival, on Westbourne Park Road. Their roof was perfect for seeing the sites and partying.
Here’s Danny, myself and Amanda. (Danny is wearing his Vivienne Westwood tee shirt. Jess worked there and was able to get staff discount. All the Pusherman crowd wore them in either black or white.)
Claire and I.
A Blondie remix album had just been released which we had on repeat and much fun was had.
Every year, on the first Friday of September, Michael Eavis throws, what is now called the Pilton Party, in 1995 it was the Pilton Fayre. This is a fundraiser and ‘thank you’ to the local businesses, residents and to the staff who worked the Glastonbury Festival. They usually asked the headliners from that year to play. In 1995, even though they hadn’t played in the end, The Stone Roses were invited. It was top secret, but Dodgy had also been asked to play, the bill was Dodgy ‘plus special guests’. Andy, my boss and Dodgy‘s manager told a few of us and we were able to get tickets (which were £8).
Andy also knew a place where we could camp, in the garden of the local vicar. He had a couple of old caravans that could be rented plus people could bring their own tents. A group of us went, including Scouse Mick, Fran, Bo and Martin from Pusherman. Mick drove.
Michael Eavis had been right in front of the stage when The Roses played, I reached over and was able to shake his hand and mouth ‘thank you’ to him. It was the first British gig for The Stone Roses since Glasgow five years previously.
As everyone left the field where the gig had taken place, a bit of an altercation took place between Bobby Gillespie from Primal Scream and Martin Rossiter from Gene. They started hurling insults at each other as we all kept walking and watching. Liam, Noel and the rest of Oasis were also there.
Our posse headed to the back garden / camp site where we were staying. There was a small party in our caravan. At one point Bo and Danny tried to light the gas oven, this resulted in a mini explosion where Bo singed his eye brows and after the initial shock, we all found this very funny. We didn’t have any drinks, so Scouse Mick and I left to see if we could find anything. We came back ten minutes later, proudly holding up a half empty (half full?) bottle of QC Sherry found in the back of Mick’s car.
The Verve, had released their ‘A Northern Soul‘ album in July and now, Richard Ashcroft decided to leave the band and therefore split them up.
‘History‘ was said to be their last single.
I had been in touch with Derek McKillop, Lloyd Cole‘s manager a few years previously. Derek had organised the band I had at the time, Poise to demo a few tracks, which didn’t lead to anything. I posted him the latest jump-rope recordings, ‘Burn’ and ‘Crowded Day’ in July. My timing was good – Lloyd was playing a short tour at the end of September / early October to promote his ‘Love Story‘ album and we were invited to be the support. This was just what we needed and we worked hard getting the set ready.
We borrowed my parents old Rover car and were just able to squeeze us plus all our gear in there. The first gig was in Dublin at the Mean Fiddler on September 27th. For this one, we actually also managed to fit the drummer’s girlfriend in the car with us. She was pregnant, and we were pretty short of space once we were loaded up and ready to go.
We got the ferry over from Holyhead and arrived in Ireland early. Danny and I had stayed at a hotel, (not unlike the one in The Shining) on a previous trip to Dublin, just near Phoenix Park, so this is where we stayed again. Large, slightly spooky rooms at a reasonable price. We tried to have a snooze in the afternoon but I wasn’t able to – I was looking forward to the gig too much.
The band played well and then enjoyed watching Lloyd‘s set. Van Morrison was in the audience and joined us back stage with his entourage afterwards for a fairly surreal evening.
We hung out with the Irish stage crew who told us amusing and unrepeatable stories about both UB40 and The Cranberries.
The next morning we were up and off, heading back to England – the tour continued at the Warrington Parr Hall on 30th. We were able to go home to London for a day before loading up the car, this time just the three of us and head off to the venue which was not far from Liverpool. We were greeted warmly by Lloyd’s tour manager and roadies, they made us feel very welcome and were happy to offer us advice. (The tour manager, Mick Brown was in our lives a while later when he worked for The Flaming Lips who played the Green Man Festival in 2010.)
Indie Through The Looking Glass 