…I am delighted to report that Frank Dillon has managed to recreate most of his John Cooper Clarke poem from memory. Just as well, as I do not have a copy of it in my Ringroad scripts collection.
Frank wasn’t even in the country when John Cooper Clarke played that gig at Keele. Frank however writes:
As for John Cooper Clarke, I don’t have a copy of it, but I offer the following recreation, honed (or harmed) by the sands of time (i.e. 40 years).
It’s vitally important to read it in the voice of the great man, and with a hint of hysteria.
(And I do mean the great man – for this was a homage, nay, a pastiche, rather than an attack on JCC, for whom I retain an enduring fondness).
I hope it brings back fond memories. Anyway, here goes:
He runs the whole gamut of feelings, from A right through to B. At school he wore a cone-shaped hat that bore the letter D. He’s the first one, but he’s useless,Just like the word Aardvark, John Cooper Clarke. Where he came from is a mystery indeed. His mam and dad, they must have been too bloody thick to breed. If he’s half the age his jokes are, Then he came from Noah’s Ark, John Cooper Clarke.His so-called style is dissolute, his muse, the commonplace. The burden of banality is etched upon his face. He’s told more boring stories Than a bloody copper’s nark, John Cooper Clarke He’s the new enfant terrible of the trendy literati.His mordant wit is de rigueur at all the coolest parties.But like a puppy, laryngectomised, His bite’s worse than his bark, John Cooper Clarke He’s a Wimpy-bar philosopher, his lines are full of glee. He can find the secret of existence in a cup of tea. But like a wanker with his eyes poked out, He’s shooting in the dark, John Cooper Clarke He thinks he’s T S Eliot, or Keats, or Wilfred Owen And literary publishers will clamour for his poems He’s got more front and chutzpah Than a flasher in the park, John Cooper Clarke John Cooper Clarke John Cooper Clarke
I must say that I don’t remember that last couplet. My recollection of the closing couplet was:
But like a masturbating eunuch,
He’ll never make a mark,
John Cooper Clarke, John Cooper F*****G Clarke, John Cooper F*****G B*****D Clarke…
Still, a pretty impressive bit of brain archaeology from Frank there.
Most of my diary notes from that period suggest that I had my head down working at that time. My impressionistic memory tells me that I was quite urgently seeking to switch from halls in Lindsay to a flat in Barnes at that time, although the diary is silent on that matter until a bit later in the month, when I pulled off that switch.
Still, the diary highlights some interesting events at Keele and an eventful trip to London at that time. Forty years on, it’s time for me to share the highlights.
Friday 5 February 1982 – …stayed in most of evening apart from dreadful film, “The Main Event“.
Yup, that’s not my kind of movie. Never mind.
Saturday 6 February 1982 – Went to Newcastle quite late. Did very little work really. Went to Michelle [Epstein]’s party in evening. Sharon & Louise came back after.
Richard van Baaren &/or Benedict Coldstream might well also have been at that party, as I recall Sharon & Louise being part of that crowd. No mention of Anju on this occasion – perhaps she had something else on. We missed Mari Wilson & The Imaginations for that party, so for sure there were other things to do on campus that night. At that stage, I think Michelle was going out with a character named Joel. I don’t think Michelle got together with Neil [Infield] whom she married – I kept in touch with both of them for many years – until much later in our time at Keele.
Sunday 7 February 1982 – Did some work during day. Went to see Carrie & Scanners in afternoon/evening + did some more work
I have one very clear memory from that psycho-thriller movie double bill at Film Soc. I went to see those movies with a young woman whose name completely escapes me. She was a close friend of Katie’s (aka Cathy) – she of my dad’s embarrassing moment a few month’s earlier. Those two were very close pals of each other and I remained a casual pal with both of them for much of my time at Keele
Update: Katie (Cathy) has put me back in touch with Linda (Jones), who was that young woman at Film Soc 40+ years ago.
In fact, we might not even have gone to those movies “as a date” but possibly both ambled along there solo and simply chosen to sit next to each other, as Film Soc folk often did.
*** Spoiler alert for the movie Carrie ***
At the end of Carrie, the following “jump scare” scene occurs:
…at which point, my young woman friend screamed, jumped and pretty much landed in my lap. Fortunately for me she was quite a skinny, light girl, so she did me no immediate damage. Nor did she injure herself with her jump, other than a little injured pride perhaps as she couldn’t stop apologising for her scare-movie-timidity for the rest of the event.
Ever since then, I haven’t been able to think of the movie Carrie, nor even jump scares in movies generally, without thinking about that young woman and her reaction to that wonderful scene. I was reminded of it the other day (as I write in February 2022), almost exactly 40 years on, when a young woman in front of me and Janie at The Royal Court jumped almost out of her skin at the pre-interval coup de theatre in The Glow:
In February 1982, I didn’t think Scanners was in the same league as Carrie.
Monday 8 February 1982 – …went to [Barnes] G3 for dinner…
It was the G3 crowd (which I think included Rana Sen and Kath), who helped me to find my Barnes flat. I have a feeling that the cunning plan that led to my flat room-for-halls room swap a few week’s later might well have been seeded at that very dinner. More on that swap next time.
Tuesday 9 February 1982 – …went to see Gloria in evening – OK-ish.
Again, not my kind of movie I feel.
Wednesday 10 February 1982 – very busy day – tutorials moved etc. J-Soc committee & Internal Affairs – very busy day all in all. Presidential forum – Simon [Jacobs] & Jon [Gorvett] came back for coffee.
I only vaguely remember being on Internal Affairs committee. Spike Humphrey (who was VP Internal that year) had been a leading light on Concourse the previous year, so I suspect that I was “open to Spiky persuasion” when asked. Forty years on, a simple googling of the fellow, still with his Keele nickname, finds him still doing committees. In the fulness of time that link won’t work, but here is a scrape of it in February 2022.
The controversy-ridden presidential election for 82/83 will have been the following day, but I make no mention of the election in my diary, perhaps because I wasn’t really involved with such things at that time. Yes, Truda Smith, who had, until recently, been going our with Jon Gorvett, was one of the candidates. But I didn’t actually support Truda for that election; I was supporting the official Labour candidate, a lovely lass named Jan Phillips, whose candidacy was ill-fated, perhaps because of Truda’s or perhaps because the power-brokers-that-were (e.g. Toby Bourgein) felt that Jan was unelectable. Meanwhile the Tory contingent, mostly under the Machiavellian guidance of a chap named Chris Boden, were looking to disrupt the election process that year. I’ll explain the resulting hoo-ha next time. Seems that I simply voted on the Thursday (not a noteworthy event) and got ready for my rare London trip.
Thursday 11 February 1982 – Lazyish day – did some work. Went to buffet supper in evening – did some work after.
Friday 12 February 1982 – Left for London early afternoon – Grandma Jenny had come for dinner – injured herself – spent evening in Kings casualty
If I recall correctly, the family crisis had already started to unfurl when I arrived at my parents’ house and we all went straight off to Camberwell. Now THAT’s my idea of a Friday night out in London!
Saturday 13 February 1982 – Got up quite early. Did some taping – spoke to people. Mum & dad went out – had relaxing evening in.
Sunday 14 February 1982 – Got up late. Went to Polyanna’s for lunch. Made tapes and spoke to people for rest of the day – quite enjoyable.
I should return at some point to the tapes I was making back then, some of which catalogue the soundtrack of our lives in the early 1980s.
Not sure who dined at Polyanna’s – probably just me and my parents, as I don’t mention anyone else. Polyanna’s was a rare example back then of a proper European-style bistro restaurant on Battersea Rise. It seemed well-decent back then compared with most suburban fare. Now The Humble Grape.
Monday 15 February 1982 – Met Caroline [Freeman, now Curtis] for lunch – > came back to Keele. Went to lousy UGM in evening -> Simon’s for coffee.
The lousiness of the UGM was no doubt linked to the presidential election hoo-ha, about which more next time.
Tuesday 16 February 1982 – Busy day as usual. Worked in evening – got quite a lot done. Didn’t go out at all.
Wednesday 17 February 1982 – Useful day. Spent afternoon in the library. Went to see Andrea [Collins, now Woodhouse] in early evening -> John Cooper Clarke -> Simon & Jon came back – up till quite late.
I am relieved to see several mentions of Simon Jacobs in the diary around this time, as Janie and I are seeing him for lunch tomorrow – Simon doesn’t much like these forty years on pieces unless he gets a few mentions!
I remember the John Cooper Clarke concert very fondly and am really glad I attended it.
Dave Lee’s book The Keele Gigs! has more on the topic of this concert. Dave kindly not only reminded me but sent me a copy of support act, Mightier than Kong, singing their only minor hit, a rather good cover version of Hey Girl Don’t Bother Me.
As for John Cooper Clarke himself, Evidently Chickentown went down extremely well, as did most of his set. Here is an audio of a live performance from around that time (late 1981). Trigger warning: contains…indeed more or less comprises…bad language.
I also recall a Ringroad sketch entitled John Cooper Clarke which was a parody of a JCC poem, each verse of which ended with the line “John Cooper Clarke”, each preceded by an increasingly bizarre simile which rhymed with Clarke. Was it one of yours, Frank Dillon? I might have a copy of it in my “Ringroad cornflake box copies file” at the flat – if so I’ll scan it and upload it in the next week or so.
I have been a bit remiss lately, while writing up my forty years on series, about the early 1980s, in the matter of sharing my soundtracks from that era.
An interesting mix, you might say. I make no apologies for my eclectic taste (or lack thereof) at that time.
Oh, the synthesisers!
Only a few of these would make my early 1980s playlist, were I to make one of those up for a forty years on party…not that we do parties any more, post pandemic. A theoretical, hypothetical early 1980s party.
For calligraphically-challenged readers unable to read my handwriting above, below is a version of the above list transcribed:
Showroom Dummies, Kraftwerk
I Travel, Simple Minds
Stick It Where the Sun Don’t Shine, Nick Lowe
Poison Arrow, ABC
Trouble, Lindsay Buckingham
Had Enough, Earth Wind and Fire
Cardiac Arrest, Madness
Easier Said than Done, Shakatak
Senses Working Overtime, XTC
Love Plus One, Haircut 100
The Model, Kraftwerk
Golden Brown, The Stranglers
A Town Called Malice, The Jam
Micky, Toni Basil
Fool if You Think It’s Over, Elkie Brooks
Say Hello, Wave Goodbye, Soft Cell
Hopefully most of the following YouTube embeds will still be here when you get to this piece, if you fancy hearing one or more of the tracks.
