That’s exactly where I wanted to be. That’s exactly what I wanted to do.
It wouldn’t be long now. I could feel it in my bones. Being back in London had started a fire in me. The city was mine again - and it owed me a living. Destiny would take care of the rest.
1972
It was in January of 1972 that my future destiny as the Zeitgeist-surfing dark prince of seventies rock journalism actually started to experience lift-off. The year began inauspiciously enough. I returned to my student digs in Regent’s Park in readiness for a new term at university only to discover I’d arrived several days too soon and everything was still boarded up. I decided to hitch-hike up to scenic Barnsley deep in the northernmost bowels of England on the off-chance that I’d encounter two friends, Nigel Good and Chris Roddick, who’d lately moved up there to work on an underground paper called - if memory serves - Styng . At 8 a.m. one grey January morning I stood at the North London entrance to the M1 motorway with my thumb outstretched. Five hours later, a large articulated lorry and its obliging driver had deposited me in Barnsley town centre. There was only one drawback: I had no address or phone number for the people I was searching for. Not to worry, though: long-haired youths were few and far between in this neck of the woods so I just had to describe their appearance to some locals congregated in a market square and they gave me exact directions. ‘Try the nearest pub’ was their advice, and of course they were right. It was a joyous reunion. My pals couldn’t believe I’d temporarily abandoned swinging London to spend time in their sleepy little backwater. And I was
just happy to not be spending the night alone sleeping in a bus shelter.
In due course they took me back to their communal homestead - a two-storey house with minimal furniture and no central heating - and I got to meet the rest of the Barnsley counter-culture. There were only five conscripts at this juncture - Nigel, Chris, a fellow called Roger Hutchinson who was very much the man in charge, his pal, a bespectacled youth whose name now escapes me, and his pal’s girlfriend - so it was hardly a thriving community; but they approached their role as rabble-rousers to the drowsy North with great zeal and commitment. Partly, this commitment involved publishing from time to time new issues of their broadsheet stuffed with features detailing the latest conspiracy theories and calling for a full-blown social revolution. Mostly, though, it involved sitting around a smouldering log fire, smoking copious amounts of pot and passionately voicing their drug-drenched dreams for the future. In this regard, we were very much kindred spirits. Well-read, streetwise druggies with a vague work ethic were my kind of people, I was quickly discovering.
I only spent some forty-eight hours in their midst but those hours would prove to be deeply significant ones for me personally. I got to take speed for the first time-a black bomber - and felt my brain suddenly rushing through my skull like a locomotive train ablaze with thought. Twenty-four eye-popping hours later, the comedown began, leaving me distinctly drained and disorientated, and yet I had no regrets. The drug had freed up something in my cerebellum and offered me a more intense way of perceiving the world. It was an experience I was determined to try again at the earliest opportunity.
On my last night there, I managed to broach with Roger Hutchinson - Styng ’s nominal editor - the subject of maybe writing some articles of my own for his periodical. Not about politics per se, but about music. He appeared enthusiastic but duly noted that - as I was then resident in London - I’d be better off contributing to that city’s more prolific underground network. Roger then mentioned that he was in contact with Frendz magazine, a fortnightly journal based in Ladbroke Grove that he claimed was often in need of new writers. He
It wouldn’t be long now. I could feel it in my bones. Being back in London had started a fire in me. The city was mine again - and it owed me a living. Destiny would take care of the rest.
1972
It was in January of 1972 that my future destiny as the Zeitgeist-surfing dark prince of seventies rock journalism actually started to experience lift-off. The year began inauspiciously enough. I returned to my student digs in Regent’s Park in readiness for a new term at university only to discover I’d arrived several days too soon and everything was still boarded up. I decided to hitch-hike up to scenic Barnsley deep in the northernmost bowels of England on the off-chance that I’d encounter two friends, Nigel Good and Chris Roddick, who’d lately moved up there to work on an underground paper called - if memory serves - Styng . At 8 a.m. one grey January morning I stood at the North London entrance to the M1 motorway with my thumb outstretched. Five hours later, a large articulated lorry and its obliging driver had deposited me in Barnsley town centre. There was only one drawback: I had no address or phone number for the people I was searching for. Not to worry, though: long-haired youths were few and far between in this neck of the woods so I just had to describe their appearance to some locals congregated in a market square and they gave me exact directions. ‘Try the nearest pub’ was their advice, and of course they were right. It was a joyous reunion. My pals couldn’t believe I’d temporarily abandoned swinging London to spend time in their sleepy little backwater. And I was
just happy to not be spending the night alone sleeping in a bus shelter.
In due course they took me back to their communal homestead - a two-storey house with minimal furniture and no central heating - and I got to meet the rest of the Barnsley counter-culture. There were only five conscripts at this juncture - Nigel, Chris, a fellow called Roger Hutchinson who was very much the man in charge, his pal, a bespectacled youth whose name now escapes me, and his pal’s girlfriend - so it was hardly a thriving community; but they approached their role as rabble-rousers to the drowsy North with great zeal and commitment. Partly, this commitment involved publishing from time to time new issues of their broadsheet stuffed with features detailing the latest conspiracy theories and calling for a full-blown social revolution. Mostly, though, it involved sitting around a smouldering log fire, smoking copious amounts of pot and passionately voicing their drug-drenched dreams for the future. In this regard, we were very much kindred spirits. Well-read, streetwise druggies with a vague work ethic were my kind of people, I was quickly discovering.
I only spent some forty-eight hours in their midst but those hours would prove to be deeply significant ones for me personally. I got to take speed for the first time-a black bomber - and felt my brain suddenly rushing through my skull like a locomotive train ablaze with thought. Twenty-four eye-popping hours later, the comedown began, leaving me distinctly drained and disorientated, and yet I had no regrets. The drug had freed up something in my cerebellum and offered me a more intense way of perceiving the world. It was an experience I was determined to try again at the earliest opportunity.
On my last night there, I managed to broach with Roger Hutchinson - Styng ’s nominal editor - the subject of maybe writing some articles of my own for his periodical. Not about politics per se, but about music. He appeared enthusiastic but duly noted that - as I was then resident in London - I’d be better off contributing to that city’s more prolific underground network. Roger then mentioned that he was in contact with Frendz magazine, a fortnightly journal based in Ladbroke Grove that he claimed was often in need of new writers. He
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