1995 October – December

The jump-rope tour supporting Lloyd Cole, finished at the Empire in Shepherd’s Bush, London on 3 October 1995.

We were really happy with this gig. The last night and our best. Derek, Lloyd’s manager, congratulated us afterwards. Lloyd invited everyone back to the bar in his hotel, which walking distance from the venue. We stayed there drinking and chatting for a few hours, our friends Amanda and Rudy were there with us.

Then myself, Danny and our drummer, headed back to our basement flat in Highbury, eking out the last few hours. Somehow a cat had got in and casually walked passed where we were sitting, startling us and jolting us into accepting the tour was over and it was time to call it a night.

2 October, Oasis released their 2nd album ‘(What’s the Story) Morning Glory?‘, which sold a record-breaking 345,000 copies in its first week, making it (at the time) the second-fastest selling album in British history.

We had met Simon Jones, the bass player from The Verve a few times along with his American wife, Myra, at parties over at Jess and Martin‘s place in Newington Green. We got on really well with them. Simon and Myra had just moved to London and so we invited them over to our flat for a bite to eat. Amanda and Rudy came over too. Before my veggie days; I was very middle class and used a Waitrose recipe card to make a Thai green chicken and lime curry which was delicious and got many complements! It was a lovely, relaxed evening, with much chatter and laughter.

Just when you thought Oasis couldn’t get any bigger, they released ‘Wonderwall’

‘Wonderwall’ was recorded at Rockfield Studios in Wales, during the two-week ‘(What’s the Story) Morning Glory’ album session in May 1995. Owen Morris produced it with Noel. Liam sang the lead vocals, after Noel had given him a choice between ‘Wonderwall‘ and ‘Don’t Look Back in Anger‘. Noel played bass instead of Paul ‘Guigsy’ McGuigan, this decision apparently displeased Liam, who said, ‘That’s not Oasis’.

Pusherman had also been at Rockfield recording with Owen Morris and their debut single, ‘First Time’ was released on a wonderful limited edition, numbered 12″ on the 27 November.

They went on tour to promote it, as part of the ‘Melody Maker’ Shaker Maker tour, with Powder (with Pearl Lowe on vocals), Strangelove and Elka.

Thanks again to Pete Cole for these press cuttings.

My parents sold the large garden from the house where I had been brought up to developers. This meant all us six children got an unexpected wind fall. Danny and I decided to go to New York for a few days and celebrate his birthday there. The Pastels and Yo La Tengo were playing a gig together at the Knitting Factory plus Banco De Gaia (who was on Planet Dog where I had done his press) was playing at the Limelight night club. Maurice and Andy put us on the guest list and we arranged to see them there. Our friends Paul and Claire were also in New York, arriving before us, we arranged to hook up with them when we arrived.

It seems incredible now, but both Danny and my passports had run out and we didn’t notice! We were even able to get through security and enjoyed a glass of champagne waiting for our flight to be called. It was only when we tried to board the plane that the stewardess noticed and wouldn’t let us board. Treating it like a gig where my name wasn’t on the list, I was saying ‘go on, please let us on’ to which she replied ‘even if I did, you’d be put straight on a plane and sent back’. As we were through passport control, we now had to have a member of the security staff accompany us until we were back through to the other side. They had to delay the flight to get our bags off! Then we were walked to somewhere we could put the luggage in hold and told to go to Passport House in Central London, where there was a special desk for people with imminent flights. When we got there, we had to get photos done, we had already changed all our money to US dollars but luckily I had a single pound coin, enough for one session in the photobooth. Danny went first and leapt out after two photos were taken, I jumped in for the second two and although our hair looks caught in the breeze a bit, they turned out ok. When we got to the special desk, she asked when our flight was, looked at our tickets and said ‘oh, you’ve missed it’. She was very quick, and were soon back on the tube to Heathrow with our new passports.

When we arrived back at the Virgin desk, the same staff were still on duty and gave us a round of applause! We picked up our luggage and incredibly made the next flight. The steward knew what had happened and gave us two miniatures of whiskey each as he walked passed, saying, ‘I expect you’ll need these’.

We had been unable to let Paul and Claire know about the delay but called their hotel from the airport when we landed and explained we were running late. We checked into our hotel and were given a hideous tiny room with noisy, boiling hot pipes running through it. I complained and we were given a better one. We then jumped in a cab and met Paul and Claire in China Town, where we ate a very relived meal and relaxed, laughing about our journey, deliriously happy to be there. New York! The next day we met up again and caught the Staten Island ferry together, before they left to go back to London.

That night we saw The Pastels and Yo La Tengo at the Knitting Factory. A brilliant gig, two great bands.

Yo La Tengo from around that time:

The next day was Danny’s birthday and we had room service breakfast as a treat.

We saw ‘The American President’ in Times Square.

Then it was over to the Limelight to see Banco De Gaia and meet up with Andy, Maurice and Paul West (Senser‘s manager, now also looking after Banco). It was fairly wild in the dressing room afterwards. People constantly clattering in and out, the volume of the house music increasing and decreasing as they came and went. There were crazy people doing cocaine from each other’s long finger nails, shrieking and laughing. We deciding to go for a wander; lots of different rooms out front, dark, dry ice and lasers, full of people dancing.

We hired a car and drove to Atlantic City, checking in to a motel with promise of a ‘Continental Breakfast’, then went along the Boardwalk to a large casino. Bizarrely, George Foreman was walking through and we somehow got tangled up in his entourage for a few steps, getting ushered forward.

The next morning there was a knock at our door, the ‘Continental Breakfast’ was two donuts in a paper bag with coffees in Styrofoam cups. The breakfast of champions.

December 9 1995 – my 30th birthday, but because I was now lying about my age – my 27th birthday.

We went to see The Stone Roses at the Brixton Academy. Rather than getting straight down the front we moved around a bit. Sometimes in the crowd, sometimes at the bar. Just taking it all in. I still wasn’t enjoying these gigs nearly much as the ones with Reni in 1989, but felt I needed to go, it was a pretty good way to celebrate my birthday, however old I was. It’s not good lying about your age. It means everything you do is based on a lie, even if it seems a relatively harmless one.

We had backstage passes as we knew people at the promoters, SJM.

Brixton Academy is a mad place back stage, lots of rooms on different floors. It’s easy to get lost. After the gig, we were in one of the large upstairs rooms, where a dj was playing. Primal Scream were all there, Annie Nightingale with her son Alex. Ian Brown appeared, so Danny and I went over to talk to him. Danny asked him, ‘Do you remember playing The Buzz Club in Aldershot?’ he looked at us for a moment, said, ‘Mebbe’ and shuffled away.

This become the word of the night between Rudy, Amanda, Danny and I. ‘Rudy, do you want a drink?’ ‘Mebbe’.

I bumped into Neil from SJM and he asked me if we wanted to go to the Reading Rivermead show a couple of days later, on the 11th. He put us on the list and we had VIP passes waiting on the door for us. We just walked around the venue for this gig when the band were on stage. By now, Danny and I had seen their new set a few times and knew when the bits we didn’t really enjoy were happening, so headed to the bar (basically most of the tracks from ‘The Second Coming‘). There were drinks afterwards. None of the band appeared so we didn’t stay long ourselves.

The Stone Roses in 1989

Another version of ‘Wonderwall’ was released….

For Christmas that year we stayed in London and were joined by Paul R., Amanda and Rudy. Before ringing our bell they put blue Christmas wrapping paper up the two pillars outside the main front door. Sheila, our elderly upstairs neighbor put her head through her window and said ‘that’s one of the nicest things I’ve ever seen’. We then had ourselves a very merry Christmas.

Read 1995 July – September here.