John Van Der Kiste – Everybody’s a Winner; The Story of a Punk Band Known as London
Printed by Seaside Café Books 2025
As Punk approaches its fiftieth birthday – relying on which timeline you’re going by, after all – there’s no denying it’s outlived all of the unfavourable reactions on the time. The picture is now established in in style tradition and gives the subject material for tutorial conferences and research, and a gradual stream of books, often focussing on the principle gamers just like the Pistols, Conflict and Damned or the US model of the story.
The sarcastically titled Everybody’s a Winner takes us again to the dirty sweaty gigs at locations just like the Nashville and the Fulham Greyhound, hours crammed in sweaty Transits for provincial gigs, and the latent undercurrent of violence by no means too distant on the time. The e-book is certainly a little bit of a fan job – writer John van der Kiste has even performed on a few of their information – and none the more severe for that in capturing the texture of the time and releasing the group members from fears of being stitched up or misquoted. This all helps give depth to the London story – at occasions typical of many a gaggle making an attempt to make it however with some odd turns alongside the way in which. The group shaped in 1977 from 4 pretty skilled musicians who have been pissed off by a stagnant rock scene dominated by prog rock “dinosaurs” or mega acts like Floyd and Zeppelin whereas the highest 20 was dominated by ersatz watered-down showbiz acts like Mud and Alvin Stardust. Pissed off muso Miles Tredinnick was working on the Robert Stigwood Organisation, one of many administration heavyweights of the time. Altering his title to Riff Regan (as in The Sweeney character) he marketed in Melody Maker for like-minded “Punk musicians needed to type a band”, resulting in the recruitment of Steve Voice, Dave Wight and drummer Jon Moss – who would later have large success and private trauma with Tradition Membership. Up til then he’d been rehearsing with the Conflict however resented being handled as a employed hand, the ultimate straw being requested to hold Mick Jones’ guitar for him.
London bought off to a flying begin once they have been taken on by large title Supervisor Simon Napier Bell. That they had already constructed a fame as a very robust stay act, resulting in a help slot on an enormous Stranglers tour, adopted by signing for main label MCA. Napier Bell had determined he needed to money in on the punk scene earlier than all of the teams have been signed up and went for London and Japan, putting in them in a shared rehearsal area in Kilburn. Not probably the most harmonious association for both group by the sound of it. Signing for a big-name supervisor who’d had success within the 60s with the Yardbirds and Marc Bolan ought to have given the group an enormous benefit, however it wasn’t the proper match for both get together. Earlier than lengthy Napier Bell determined to focus on the Bowie/Roxy obsessives from Lewisham – apparently dismissing London as foul-mouthed, ill-mannered “oiks” in considered one of his books, though he provides them fulsome reward in his transient foreword right here.
Jon Moss’ departure to switch Rat Scabies – albeit briefly – in The Damned appears to have been the catalyst for a rising frustration within the group at their lack of success as varied stand-ins and replacements didn’t work out. All the identical, it was an odd choice to interrupt up proper after recording the Animal Video games album, It was clearly profession suicide and assured that MCA wouldn’t waste any time or cash selling a “product” from a gaggle that didn’t exist anymore. Equally, the group felt a scarcity of help because the token punk act on a mainstream label. Because of this you received’t discover something by them on punk compilations. A CD model was launched in 1997 by Punk77 Data, combining the album and their 1977 4-track ep. Unique copies go for a fortune lately. MCA didn’t launch the album til early 1978, by which period the unique “one chord wonders” blast of punk was diversifying with the likes of PIL, Journal and Siouxsie and the Banshees. Had they saved going a bit longer they’d have fitted in effective with the second-wave punk bands like 999, UK Subs and the Lurkers. As Riff observes now, they’d most likely have been higher suggested to signal to a extra simpatico label like Stiff. For what it’s value, I don’t assume the album cowl artwork – a cartoon of a Godzilla lookalike toying with a miniature group? – was a lot assist.
As soon as the group had folded RR reverted to being Miles Tredinnick and writing comedy scripts for Frankie Howerd and “One Foot within the Grave” amongst others. Persevering with the Unlikely Subsequent Profession Transfer, Dave Wight emigrated to Australia for an instructional profession as a professor of worldwide relations research at Sydney College Nevertheless in 2008 Riff determined to reform the group, with unique member Steve Voice joined by Hugh O’Donnell and Colin Watterson. Having misplaced none of their stay affect, they turned an enormous success on the Blackpool Rebel occasions, and from there to gigs worldwide, adopted by writing new materials and placing out a brand new album, Reboot, in 2012. There’s additionally speak of securing the unique tapes from MCA for a definitive reissue of Animal Video games.
After the principle narrative, there’s a bit with lyrics and commentary on all their songs. It’s additionally an absolute deal with visually, with plenty of b/w and color repro’s of posters, flyers, adverts, and tickets, all of which give the e-book an curiosity past simply the group. There’s a pleasant gig listing too, recalling the heyday of the punk period at locations just like the Nashville, the Greyhound, the Clarendon, the Hope and Anchor, principally lengthy gone or became gastropubs now however have been the lifeblood of the scene on the scene.
A extremely spectacular quantity of analysis has gone into penning this e-book. It was nice to be reminded of my first encounter with London, watching So It Goes, Tony Wilson giving them a usually Wilsonian intro, “If Anwar Sadat can get into Jerusalem, you may get into London”, because the monitor performed over a grainy collage of newsreel footage. It was sufficient to get us shopping for the only the following day, together with one other So It Goes tip, “Metropolis of the Damned” by Ricky and the Final Days of Earth – what occurred to them, I ponder?
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All phrases by Den Browne, you possibly can learn extra on his writer profile right here:
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