Ballroom Image Borrowed From Keele Oral History Project – John Samuel
This was the business end of my P1 (first year of actual degree) initial term. It seems I did some work.
But that didn’t stop me from having weekend visitors aplenty – Caroline Freeman (Now Curtis) and Alan Tucker braved the journey to Keele on Friday 13 November 1981.
CarolineAlan
But before that, on Monday 9 November:
Not a bad day – UGM in eve – not a very good one
UGMs tended to be quite argumentative affairs as I remember them, although (by many accounts) relatively peaceable compared with the political bun-fights at some of the larger University’s Students’ Union meetings.
Was this one “not very good” because it was insufficiently pugnacious for my taste at that time, or because it was too pugnacious. In truth I don’t remember, but with Mark Thomas as President at that time, I suspect it was too tranquil by my taste.
Some of us were “cruising for a bruising” over the painful grant cuts being imposed by the UGC at that time and I suspect that, in November anyway, some of us felt that the Union wasn’t doing enough.
On the Tuesday evening I went to see the movie Brubaker. I must admit to little recall of this movie. Whereas the film I went to see the following Tuesday, Bad Timing, really stuck in my mind as a shocking story about sexual violence.
Simon Jacobs was clearly very much involved in the Caroline and Alan visit; not least because they were very much his “friends from home” as much, or in many ways more, than mine.
We went to a disco in the Union on the Friday evening, to Simons, then the Union, then a “party thing” on the Saturday evening. Then, on the Sunday:
Simon, Heather Caroline & Alan came for lunch.
How I catered for five of us in the tiny kitchen in F Block Lindsay I have no idea. I have even less idea how (or where) we all ate lunch in my study bedroom. Not all at the same time, perhaps.
Then, after Caroline and Alan had gone home, I went down with a rotten cold. It seems I had intended to go to London for a couple of days 18/19 November but didn’t go because of the cold.
The diary says I “watched football” on the Wednesday evening – a World Cup qualifier match – they might have put up a big screen in Lindsay Bar for that. Of course, the sort of screen that qualified as a big screen in those days is the size that many people today would turn their noses up at if proposed for their home. But I digress.
Wendy Robbins arrived for a visit on Friday 20 November.
We “did little” on the Friday night but then made up for it on the Saturday:
Went on cuts march – did work in afternoon, went to two parties in evening – up till late.
Sunday 22 November – Wendy left…
That sounds more like it. A proper Keele weekend day. Guess I must have recovered from that Keele autumn cold quite quickly.
…and returning to Keele, I squeezed in quite a lot of activity.
Some of the activity is more than a little illegible or indecipherable. I know that Lloyd Green and I were working hard those last couple of weeks towards a Keele racism awareness day, Anti-Facsist Day as it was badged. That activity, at places such as Hillel House, needed to be co-ordinated around the Jewish Holidays – Rosh Hashanah (New Year) was 30 September/1 October that year. Col Nidre/Yom Kippur 7/8 October.
Interspersed with those activities (with minimal regard for the rigours of the Jewish holidays on my part) were plenty of socials:
Sunday 27 September …Anil [Biltoo]’s for dinner party…
Wednesday 30 September …Met Jim[Bateman] at Rose & Crown…
Friday 2 October …Paul [Deacon] came over in the evening
Saturday 3 October …Anil came over for supper – went on to a party with him & friends -> back to Anil’s till early hours
OMG – “buy books” – at last a mention of something that might be vaguely connected with preparing for a new academic year at Keele. I was certainly preparing well for the social side of it.
Even by 1981 the congregation was on the wane; just a few dozen people. I was one of a handful of younger people who would still show their faces there.
I’ll write more about that congregation elsewhere, but I was reminded recently (forty years on) of one regular attendee on those high-holy days, Miriam Margolyes, who would regularly attend with her partner. Far and away the most interesting “nodding acquaintances” amongst what was mostly a small group of traditional old men.
With all of that effort preparing an honourable education campaign against racism and the many hours spent atoning for my first year at Keele, I might have anticipated an easy time getting back to University the next day.
But no.
Friday 9 October 1981 – Left home midday – [Lloyd Green’s] car broke down – arrived late – key not to be found – stayed at John’s
By my reckoning, the journey to Keele from Streatham would normally be about three hours, so Lloyd and I clearly had quite a lengthy ordeal as a result of that break down. I don’t remember the details – Lloyd might of course and I’ll certainly report back here with his remembrances, if he has any. It might be that breakdowns twixt Keele and Streatham were a fairly regular event for him back then.
I think “The Lloydmobile” was something like this
I owe “John” both thanks and an apology. Thanks for putting me up/putting up with me that night and apologies because I have no idea which “John” this diary mention is talking about. If there is a John out there who wants to put up his hand and claim the merits for this act of charity, please chime in with your claim.
Saturday 10 October 1981 – Rose Early – Freshers Mart – went to town after. Simon [Jacobs]’s party quite good in evening.
Judging from the headline picture above from 10 October 2021 – thanks again Dave Lee – Freshers Mart has not changed much in forty years. Did I mention that Dave is at Freshers Mart forty years on selling his wonderful book The Keele Gigs!?
…the next few days read quieter and calmer – apart from a few signs of aftershock from the abusive note incident.
Sunday 31 May 1981 – Late rise – did little all day (essay) – Union in evening – reasonably early night.
Monday 1 June 1981 – Union Committee in morning – finished essay in afternoon – UGM in evening – Mark [Bartholomew]’s afterwards.
Tuesday 2 June 1981 – Late rise – handed in essay – went to see The Last Waltz – awful – latish night.
I don’t honestly remember attending Union Committee on the Monday morning. I do remember that word reached the SU about the abusive note that had been placed under my door on the Friday evening and that they took the incident very seriously. In some ways more seriously than I took it.
I think some people, with all good intentions, were considering an emergency motion at the UGM that evening or some sort of statement. I think I dissuaded them.
I’m pretty sure Simon Jacobs (plus others, no doubt) were at The Last Waltz (a highly-regarded film that simply did not work for me, nor did it seem to work for most of my entourage that evening, if I remember correctly) with me and would have been part of the unmentioned activities (probably beer and smokes somewhere) that led to the latish night.
A Veritable Procession Of Visitors
I’m sorry to say that I have no real recollection of the “so-called revision day” on Wednesday 3 June, which reads to me more like a visitors day than a revision day:
Wednesday 3 June 1981 – Revised today – OK – Mary [Keevil], Rani, Miz [Miriam Morgan], Hilary [Kingsley] etc. popped in -> Sneyd -> coffee with Hilary
Where this sudden burst of popularity with females had come from, I have no idea. Perhaps Sandra had been talking me up. More likely, these were well-intentioned check-ins from concerned friends in the matter of the abusive note, which seemed to be affecting some others more than it was affecting me.
Forty years on, I find it hard to imagine getting much, if any, revision done with that number of visitors.
My handwriting analysis suggests that I wrote this part of my diary up some days after the event. But still, the word “etc.” after a string of four visitors suggests that there were several others.
I’m pretty sure that part of Hilary’s purpose (a visit AND post-pub coffee) was to persuade me to agree to sit on the JSoc (Jewish Society) committee, something I had previously stated my extreme reluctance to do. I’m not sure whether Hilary was yet going out with Lloyd Green (a friend of mine from my Streatham childhood and coincidentally a Keele student a year or so ahead of me) but they did go out with each other at Keele and subsequently married each other.
Thursday 4 June 1981 – Exams today?? – Roy’s binge in evening – quite entertaining.
Friday 5 June 1981 – Politics exam today – Union in evening -> Sands [Sandra]!
Saturday 6 June 1981 – late rise – restive afternoon – went to Union with Sim [Simon Ascough] – supper – Union again – dullish evening
Roy was Simon Jacobs’s boyfriend pretty much throughout that year. Roy will have completed his finals around that time, so my guess is that the binge was related to that. Simon did not keep in touch with Roy after Roy left Keele. Nor did I keep in touch with Sandra after she left Keele, nor did I see much of her the following year, when she was doing finals.
I think I probably meant “restful” when I said “restive” afternoon, although there is something restive about my tone for the next few days. I needed to go to London to resolve some matters ahead of my late June return for the summer and/but was no doubt itching for the more exciting-sounding events that would form the end-of-term/end-of-academic-year summer activities.
A whole weekend between exams must have seemed like an imposition.
Darker. The UKSU snooker room was darker if I recall correctly.
Sunday 7 June 1981 – Late rise – did little – snooker – bar in eve – dull day.
Monday 8 June 1981 – Read in morn – exam in afternoon, Union in evening – v late night.
I mention snooker a few times in my diary towards the end of that summer term. I recall playing the game a few times with Sim and Tim – I’ll write that up a bit more when I get to the second half of June – but perhaps these early efforts were with Simon Jacobs.
Forty years on, Simon and I discussed this matter when he visited us (late May 2021), agreeing that our ability to play snooker was slightly improved by a drink or two, then rather more dramatically diminished by each subsequent drink. If only we had been able to retain information from formal scientific experiments in class as well as we have retained the empirical evidence from those informal “clinical trials”.
Anyway, by the Monday, that was it, academically-speaking. Last essays done, last exam done. I had no formal purpose at Keele for the next few days, so I popped back down to London on the Tuesday.
It’s sometimes difficult to get up in the morning when you are a first year Keele student. Who knew?
Back then, I had an alarm clock a bit like the one depicted above. I could easily sleep through the ringing of that alarm. I remember bringing back a metal biscuit tin after the Easter holidays with the sole purpose of increasing the volume of the ringing, by placing the alarm clock within the biscuit tin. Didn’t work, I know, I know.
The Key To Getting A Good Night’s Sleep As A Keele Undergraduate
Mind you, it doesn’t help if you start the term as described above. Here is a transcript for any readers not so well versed in the rarefied script that is my handwriting:
24 April 1981 – Exams today. After dinner went to Mark’s [Bartholomew] -> Union. Talking till late with Sim [Simon Ascough], [Mad] Harry & Dave [Johnson, I think].
25 April 1981 – Easy day. Went to Union in evening -> Roy’s for drinks – Melanie [Print], Ashley [Fletcher] & Louise [Lorenc] – locked out – stayed…
26 April 1981 – …overnight. No sleep. Found keys in morning- had lunch – wandered aimlessly & slept from 6 pm until 8 am.
With thanks to Ashley for recalling Melanie & Louise’s names. Neither of us really remember what passed that night, other than a lot of bullshit chat no doubt and Ashley probably went to town with his Adolf Hitler and Ian Paisley (senior) pastiche/parody speeches.
“The flag of my country is hanging upside down outside this building”.
I simply cannot imagine sleeping 14 hours straight through any more. It’s not just that I know I couldn’t do it; I really cannot even imagine it.
Still, that extended night’s sleep got me up in good time for the first FY lecture of the term. What a fresh start.
My First Rolo & My Last Rolo
That peculiar sleep pattern got me up in time to see Professor Paul Rolo’s 9:00 history lecture and Professor David Adams’s 11:00 American Studies lecture.
I recall being fascinated by both of those lectures. Peculiarly, the allure of Russian and Fascist revolutions did not enable the alarm to rouse me on the Tuesday, but the idea of another Paul Rolo lecture somehow enabled the alarm to interrupt my slumbers on the Wednesday and get me to the FY Lecture Theatre for 9:00.
Similarly, the prospect of order in the post-war international system, combined with the alarm clock, failed to get me out of bed on the Thursday morning, yet the subconscious thought of another David Adams lecture woke me and got me to the Chancellor’s Building for the 9:00 lecture on the Friday for the third time that week.
This is the first sign of a pattern that persisted throughout my student years; I was able to get up for lectures, even at 9:00, if I thought they’d be worth the candle. Otherwise I tended to skip the lectures, read up on stuff at leisure (if need be) and sleep in like a teenager…which is what I was.
I didn’t get to know Professor Paul Rolo – he left a year or so after I did FY – but he could lecture and he sounds like a fascinating chap.
Professor David Adams I did get to know when I sat on Senate and also prior to that, when I sat on the train from Stoke to Euston or from Euston to Stoke. He must have gone to London quite a lot because I remember encountering him several times. A really interesting and lovely chap.
What Else Did You Get Up To, Kid?
Ok, ok, I’m getting to it.
Monday 27 April 1981 – First lectures etc. – finished moving etc [all the way from pokey Lindsay F1 to salubrious room with a view Lindsay F4] after dinner -> Union, quite pleasant
Tuesday 28 April 1981 – Light day. Went to see film in evening (Fame – v good,) -> on to union with gang – quite good.
Wednesday 29 April 1981 – OK day. Went to Concourse meeting – on to Mis [Miriam Morgan] & Heather [Jones] for heavy evening
Thursday 30 April 1981 – easyish day. Did little. Short stay in Union – reasonably early night.(Simon [Jacobs] & Sim [Ascough] came back after)
Friday 1 May 1981 – not bad day. Busy afternoon (Kallah photos). Went to see film (yuk). Went back to union – bon.
I’d started going to Film Society by the end of the second term and went a lot in this third term. I am pretty sure the 1 May film which I did not name but described as “yuk” was Fellini Satyricon. If I remember correctly, there weren’t all that many of us in the FY lecture theatre at the start of the movie and by the end I think just three or four of us had stuck it out.
Saturday 2 May 1981 – Easy day. Shopped in Newcastle – went to see David [Perrins] & friends, supper they came over -> Sneyd, Union bop -> Amanda’s.
Sunday 3 May 1981 – Lazy day – went to Lloyd’s [Green] and Amanda’s -> Union in evening.
I feel bad saying this, but I cannot remember who Amanda is/was, but she was unquestionably a diary highlight that weekend. Simon might remember. Lloyd might remember. But I feel that it is me who should remember. Apologies. If you are out there, Amanda, please do get in touch and jog the memory…if by chance you remember anything about it.
Tuesday 5 May 1981 – Busyish day. Saw All That Jazz in the evening. Simon’s [Jacobs] for coffee after – good.
Wednesday 6 May 1981 – OK day. Went to see Discipline and Lounge Lizards in evening – v good.
Thursday 7 May 1981 – Easyish day. Laundry etc. Easyish evening.
Friday 8 May 1981 – Busyish day. Went to Burslem in evening. Enjoyable evening. (Came here for coffee).
Saturday 9 May 1981 – Late start, Newcastle shopping – ate – Union in evening – back here after.
That new room of mine, Lindsay F4, was salubrious enough to become a focal point to the extent that people had started coming back to my place. It might also have had something to do with the fact that I was going in to Newcastle on the weekend to buy food so always had something to eat – possibly even some left overs of cooked food but at the very least plentiful biscuits. My mum would have approved.
I should highlight the fact that Simon Jacobs gets a couple of mentions in this piece – he wrote to me saying that he was mightily put out that he didn’t get a mention in the previous Keele piece.
I did a holiday job at Newman Harris that first Easter holidays of my Keele life.
My motivation for working was purely financial. I was enjoying/wanted to enjoy my time at Keele. The student grant only went so far. There was no bank of mum and dad (BOMAD) for me. Getting into debt was anathema.
I hadn’t worked for Newman Harris since 1978 – that first experience being a subject I shall most certainly Ogblog in time. (I had worked full time during the summer of 1980, for BBYO – which should be another rich seam of Ogblogging once I get my head into that topic.)
The Easter 1981 vacation was the first time I worked for Stanley Bloom; he wasn’t at the firm in 1978. Yes, that’s right pop-pickers:
I got a job with Stanley, he said I’d come in handy.
Anyway, here is my diary from the first couple of weeks of that experience.
Graham in this instance must be Graham Greenglass. We were going through a process of swapping music on cassette at that time. Coincidentally, Graham furnished me with a fair smattering of Elvis Costello material, including rare groove such as Hoover Factory.
Jimmy (Bateman) was a friend from Alleyn’s. I wonder what has become of him? We met up a lot when working the University holidays those first couple of years at least.
David Robbins is Wendy Robbins kid brother. No longer a kid of course.
Caroline Freeman and I lunched and dined a lot in the holidays back then.
In fact, if my older adult self might be so bold as to observe my young adult self, according to that diary page, there seems to have been a heck of a lot of lunching, dining and going out generally. As a result, I’m not sure that the bank balance replenishment exercise could possibly have gone as well as I had intended. Perhaps that’s why I didn’t work Easter holidays again after that first year. But heck, I was having a good time.
On Friday 27th, a meal at Borshtch N Tears (posher and pricier now, I’d guess) followed by Elvis Costello and the Attractions at the Hammersmith Odeon, with Anil Biltoo (my friend from school, with whom I went to Mauritius in 1979), Caroline Freeman and Simon Jacobs, who I met through BBYO but with whom (and indeed through whom) I went to Keele.
Simon always claims not to remember anything from those days, although he might make an exception for Elvis Costello. Example: which tracks did Elvis play that night, Simon…
How Simon got allocated a whole page for an album review is anyone’s guess, but let’s just note here that the Concourse editors were sacked before the next edition went to press. That edition had to be cobbled together at the last minute by me and Dave Lee, with predictably hilarious results, which I shall write up soon enough. Simon got a regular-sized column that time.
Anyway, we must have really enjoyed the gig because we went back for more Elvis that summer; at least I know I went back with Simon for a second go and I think Caroline also joined us in the summer.
Here is a great vid of Clubland (from Trust) to give you a taster of the gig, although the Hammersmith Odeon didn’t look like the vid as far as I can recall…
Gosh that was quite a fortnight at the end of my second term at Keele. But by the end of it, I was back at my parents house writing grumpy notes in my diary:
I love my aftermath diary notes from that Ball, on 12 March:
Simon’s for coffee, Neil came back afterwards -> brekky, ballot box, FY Committee slept.
Simon would be Simon Jacobs. Neil I’m pretty sure must have been Neil Infield and I guess we all wandered over to Lindsay refectory for breakfast.
Ballot box that day I’m pretty sure must have been the election for Social Secretary that year. Eric Rose won that election, only to be bundled out of the job around the following Easter for financial impropriety and who at the time of writing (March 2021) is festering in a New York State prison for murdering his wife. Not cool. Not Keele at all.
I’d forgotten that I served on FY Committee that year. I served again as Education & Welfare Officer in 84/85.
I’m fairly sure the “slept” comment refers to subsequent behaviour and not the idea that I slept during the FY Committee…but there is an absence of punctuation in the diary note between the phrase “FY Committee” and the word “slept”. Subsequently, I did once fall asleep during a Senate meeting in 84/85 – understandable circumstances – which earned praise from several of the senior academics on that august body, not least Philip Boden who declared it to be the most succinct and incisive contribution to the meeting that day. A teaser until this “40 years on” series gets there, some time in 2025, all being well. But I digress.
Perhaps returning to the bosom of my family in March 1981 felt like a real anti-climax, or perhaps I was rather hungover by the time I returned to Streatham, but I describe a…
Rough evening
…on the Friday night of my return and…
not a good day
…on the Saturday, despite:
Taped. Went to Record & Tape Exchange…
…which was usually the stuff of very good days for me, not bad ones. Especially as I bought heaps of records on that occasion, which I shall write about in one or more music-oriented postings about “that vac”.
I liked Record & Tape Exchange shops so much in the 1980s I moved around the corner in 1988, where I can sometimes still be found!
No, I think I was probably arguing with my parents about politics and social affairs; them sensing that I was not quite the same boy who had gone off to Keele for the first time six months earlier and me sensing that my parents world and their attitudes were smaller-minded than I had previously supposed.
My relationship with my parents didn’t get too bad, but I suspect that hackles were raised a fair bit that time.
Further, I suspect that I was missing Keele already. The prospect of five weeks of office work in the West End of London to rebuild the coffers was nowhere near as enticing as the fortnight that had just passed at Keele.
I didn’t write a lot of album reviews for Concourse, the Keele Students’ newspaper, but I did write this one, in March 1981. I think my neighbour in F Block Lindsay, Paul, had bought the album; I’m sure I didn’t buy it.
I ended up writing a great deal of that beleaguered March 1981 issue of Concourse, as I shall explain in another post, but clearly I had been commissioned to write this review before the hoo-ha that led to interim editing and all hands to the pump for the paper deadline.
Anyway, my hatchet job on The Stranglers sits next to an equally acerbic review of The Steve Gibbons Band by my good friend Simon Jacobs, without whom I, for sure, would not have ended up at Keele. But that’s another story.
In truth, I don’t think mushrooms were central to most of those parties
The diary & scribbles in my FY programme suggest that I wasn’t going to let lectures get in the way of my planned activities much that week, or indeed for the rest of the term. It seems I managed three FY lectures in the last three weeks of that term.
Well, it was cold and icy.
Also, I had worked out by then that you could get pretty much everything you needed from the FY lecture notes. Keen scouts who liked attending FY lectures would bring fistfuls back to F Block Lindsay for the rest of us to read. It looks as though that system broke down for the last week of term, but that’s another story.
I did attend a swathe of topic tutorials and write a couple of essays that week, though, so it wasn’t all parties and student journalism.
I think one of the essays was part of my law double topic, finishing off my law studies for that year but sealing my decision to study law along with economics for my degree. Thank you, Michael Whincup.
I remember doing a topic on Hormones & Reproduction with Dr Peter Chevins and I think I wrote my essay for that topic that week. There were 10 to 12 of us in that class; I think I was the only male (other than Dr Chevins).
I don’t think I was taking it all in. I blame my riotous teenage hormones.
I have a feeling I spent most of the class time ogling the girls and not enough of it getting my head around the relevant reproductive aspects of endocrinology. Still, I think some private study (unfortunately for me there was no practical experimental learning in pairs for that topic) meant that I managed to write a decent essay. Clearly I also learnt enough then and subsequently to get me started when I wrote a student guide book on sexual matters, Sexplanations, when I was Education & Welfare Office in 1984/85.
Tuesday 24 February 1981
Not bad day – wrote essay. In evening, went to see California Suite. Late night in Harry’s // etc.
Somewhat cheesy movie if I remember correctly – great cast though, with Jane Fonda, Richard Pryor, Bill Cosby, Alan Alda, Michael Caine, Walter Matthau, Maggie Smith…
In late February, then, I guess we were still in the period twixt Harry’s small trouble and big trouble. My guess is that this party was a fairly impromptu affair centred around Harry’s room. The // symbol indicates that we imbibed some dope and that I didn’t even then remember much about the gathering. We probably talked a whole load of rubbish while convincing ourselves that we were putting the world to rights. Possibly we even did put the word to rights – in which case it is such a shame that none of us the next day remembered the answers we came up with that night. Oh well.
Wednesday 25 February 1981
Easyish day. Went to party in evening // at Miriam’s – pretty good.
Miriam will be Miriam Morgan, who, along with her partner Heather (Jones) was the doyen of the Keele Gay Society. I have written up an earlier party with that crowd the previous term, at which I first met Ashley Fletcher – click here or below:
Discussing those parties with Simon Jacobs in late 2020, Simon recalled that, at one of them, there were some magic mushrooms doing the rounds. He and I both very tentatively sampled the mushrooms, probably being too timorous to take enough of the mushrooms to get enough effect to impact on the senses beyond the drink and the (if the // symbol is anything to go by) dope available at the party.
I have a feeling that this party was part of Gay Lib week, as Simon wrote that week (and party) up in the March 1981 Concourse and I cannot imagine another Wednesday night being the party night to which he refers, given my documented events of the various Wednesdays that term:
Reading Simon’s article again after all this time (I probably typed it up for that Concourse – I typed up much of the darned thing), I am struck by how tiny and nascent the Gay Soc was at that time – a dozen or so people – perhaps including me and one or two other “supporters”. Within a year or so that tiny group of active students transformed that Society and well done them.
Ashley reminded me (in correspondence late 2020) that, at one point, I was designated the Gay Soc Mascot, by dint of my support for the group. I had a feeling that honour came later than this, but perhaps it was at this event that the honour was bestowed.
Thursday 26 February 1981
Not bad day. Concoursed in evening etc.
This is a bit of an anti-climax, don’t you think? I can only apologise to readers for interrupting this programme of parties with such an ordinary-sounding day. Note that “working on Concourse” has become a single-word verb; concoursed. Let us move swiftly on.
Friday 27 February 1981
Busy day academically. Anna’s party in the evening // pretty good.
Hostess with the most-ess
Anna Summerskill’s party was probably quite a low key (perhaps a dozen or so of us) but almost certainly a dope-ridden affair. I’m trying to remember where Anna lived that year; I think Harrowby House, but I could be wrong and someone out there might correct me.
I have written a fair bit about Anna already in the same “Winter Draws” piece as Mad Harry – click here or the links above. Mark Bartholomew – also written up in that earlier piece, would no doubt have been there. Probably (but not necessarily) Simon Jacobs and one or two others from that mini dining club in Lindsay refectory, which by sacred tradition included Anna’s ceremonial fellating of a banana at the end of almost every meal, before Anna would roller-skate off to her next engagement. It’s hard to believe she’s no longer with us (sadly she died of lung cancer in 2012), she was such a force of nature, was Anna.
Not quite sure what came together to make that a (rare) busy day academically, but I was probably trying to get work out of the way ahead of my anticipated marathon efforts towards the looming Concourse deadline over the next five days…
…and there’s a story to the meeting of that deadline, I could tell you. Indeed I shall tell you, in the next episode.
While trawling the diary for Concourse memories, I spotted a few entries that brought back memories of a visit by Caroline during our second term at Keele. When I say “our”, I mean me and Simon Jacobs.
Allow me to translate:
Friday 20 February: Not bad day – went to meet Caroline – went to see Too Many Chefs – Simon’s for coffee – not too late a night.
Saturday 21 February: Late start – went to Sneyd for lunch – lazy afternoon – went to “O” party in evening // late night snowballing and making…
Sunday 22 February: …pancakes. Late start. Simon’s for ploughman’s and booze. Romped in snow – lazy evening.
Caroline will have dossed out at mine on this visit – Simon was with a really nice chap named Roy at that time.
“Too Many Chefs” will have been this movie – actually named Who Is Killing All the Great Chefs Of Europe – at Film Club. Reading the synopsis, I remember this kitsch, eminently forgettable movie surprisingly clearly.
Sneyd for lunch, eh? How many times did I end up eating a meal there during my time at Keele. Often. It wasn’t at all bad, as I recall. Landlord Geoff O’Connor knew and liked his food…but not in a Too Many Chefs sort of way.
“O” party in the evening is not a reference to a 1950’s erotic novel. I think it was the block in Hawthorns where Miz and Heather lived…or perhaps the one in Barnes where Roy lived. Anyway, it will be the name of a block.
I really like the notion of late night snowballing and making…pancakes – spilling from Saturday night to Sunday morning. My guess is that I was trying to reflect the actual timings of those things. Such simple, youthful pleasures. Romped in snow was, I’m sure, similarly innocent fun.
I don’t mention Caroline’s departure, but she must have departed at some point – at least I’m pretty sure she isn’t still visiting Keele as I write. I hope I took her back to Stoke in much the same way as I went down to Stoke to meet her. I’ll guess that Caroline’s departure was between the romp in the snow and the lazy evening.
If anyone else (Caroline? Simon??) remembers this weekend, please do chime in with your memories.
I remember this particular evening surprisingly clearly. It has been brought back to mind in the spring of 2019 by correspondence with Dave Lee, with whom I and other friends worked on Concourse, the student newspaper.
My diary records the event:
18 February 1981: Easyish day – in evening went to Labour Club. Simon then forced me to see Krokus – yuk.
“…forced me to see” is not a phrase you’ll often see in my diary. But I do recall on this occasion that I did not want to see the Swiss hard rock (or should I say heavy metal) band Krokus, but Simon had agreed to review the concert for Concourse, so he had to go.
I remember Simon exerting some “more than gentle” emotional pressure, along the lines that he really didn’t want to attend this particular heavy rock gig on his own. Something about fear was mentioned, as if Simon attending along with an eighteen-year-old, eight stone weakling like me was going to make the evening any safer.
Of course, being a Keele Ballroom gig, there was no real danger of the gig being over-run by packs of Hells Angels intent on causing trouble for weedy students anyway, but I suppose we were newbies still and had not been to such a gig before, so didn’t really know what to expect.
Simon reviewed the gig in the famous “Film Star Makes President” March 1981 issue of Concourse, about which I shall write plenty in the fullness of time.
For now, please just enjoy Simon’s review, headlined “live or dead?”:
I think it is fair to say that Simon didn’t like the concert much.
I especially like the line that describes:
three overpowering guitarists with about as much style as an airbourne [sic] rhinoceros.
As it happens, I have subsequently been to visit rhinoceroses in person (in the jungles of Assam in 2005) and can confirm the resemblance:
The airborne one can just be seen in the distance through the undergrowth.
In any case, I think my single word diary entry review – “yuk” – says enough. Although possibly my take would have been insufficient detail for Dave Lee’s editorial needs at that time.
