BA DA DA DAA

1986

I am a one legged man bobbing through traffic, drifting away. Francis is at his weather map and Debbie McGhee beside me. Frank Bough’s soothing fruity tones are soporific, hypnotic. Tom seems to be handling him awfully well. The sofa is a giant pair of lips, whispering sweet nothings to me. Then the camera swings full face and I wake up fast.

“So it’s Cramp without an ‘s” says Frank.
“Yes, absolutely.”
“And not ‘Clamp’?” He’s toying with me.
“Absolutely not.”
“And it’s on at the…?”
“Bloomsbury.”
“Sure?”
“Absolutely.”


They cut straight to the news desk.

Exotically attired male models began forming up for the fashion spot, which was next up. They were very beautiful. Tom’s eyes were moist. He was whimpering like a puppy on a leash with the field in sniffing distance. Frank leant across at him, conspiratorially.

“I wish I could wear clothes like that.”
“Suit you Frank,” said Tom.
“Nesta won’t let me.”
He seemed sad.
When we came off the air I rang my mother.
“How was I?”
“You looked very effeminate, somehow. Like a homo.”

I tried Pat instead.
“Your hair looked a bit thin darling,” was the best she could manage.
On my way into the theatre that afternoon I bought a hat.

A mysterious message awaited at the stage door: Ring Rick Lloyd. I didn’t know him but apparently he knew me. What’s more, he wondered if I’d be interested in joining the Flying Pickets. The lead singer had left – the one with the sideburns – taking the bald one with him.
They’d already replaced the one with the sideburns….
“Fing is, how would you feel about coming in and having a little chat wiv the boys?”
He was one of these people who adopted a cockney accent when it suited them. Chat meant audition, obviously. They’d had a Christmas Number One, I remembered, a couple of years back. That nice one. How did it go? Ba da da daa, ba da da daa….what was it?…..all I ever knew….
Only You.
“Sure Rick! A chat sounds great.”

I parked up in the multi storey and made my way along Wigmore Street to the rehearsal rooms. The corridor was a gauntlet of cacophonous sound. A lone trumpet gave way to a practising cello who’s bowed lament was stolen by a soaring soprano. I knocked and pushed on door number eight. The hot, weary room contained four thin men, middle aged and some would say, rather unattractive (more than some, in fact. They were voted ‘ugliest band in the world’ in 1984. All that was about to change). Each wore the same glazed smile on his vaguely recognisable face.

The Flying Pickets. Like, wow. A pock marked type with greasy grey hair came casually towards me. The handshake was limp, a touch almost, as if he eschewed bodily contact. His white T shirt could not have been more wrinkled if the dog had whelped in it.
“Rick,” he said, with a rictus grin. I grinned back. His eyes slid away sideways and he turned away.
The next handshake was better. Vicelike, in fact.
“David,” he intoned mellifluously, eye contact secure and twinkling. He was very small and looked a bit like Dudley Moore. But not as much as the next guy looked like Neil Kinnock.
“Gareth.” The voice was deep, designed for sermons. The smile kept coming, long after we’d shaken hands. The vicar was stoned. He looked too old for that sort of lark. He had brimming eyes and thinning red hair.
The fourth one wore a glossy suit, smart tie and brogues, completely at odds with his hair which was straining in every direction, stiff with soap and dyed platinum blonde, a colour which argued violently with his pepper grey beard, though at least his roots agreed. His eyes were flirty and dancing with humour. He looked like some awful northern club comic, but I liked him immediately.
“Ken,” he said. Ken! Perfect.

Five weeks at number one had bestowed upon them a certain aura.
“You know we’re left wing,” blurted Ken, excitedly.
“That’s cool,” I shrugged.
They all nodded. Right answer, right dismissive gesture. I crossed to the piano and played Stevie Wonder’s ‘For Once In My Life’.
“Christ, that was loud!” said Ken, when I’d finished.

I vocally busked along to ‘River Deep Mountain High’ and tried not to ruin ‘Only You’. I put on my latest demo. A bit of banter later, they offered me a job. But first I had to finish a national tour of ‘Cramp’. I commuted from wherever to Wembley to record a single with the boys: – Take My Breath Away. They gave me the lead vocal, an early test.
‘Think sex and money!’ whispered Ken as I entered the vocal booth. ‘And left wing’, I muttered to myself.

The other new guy was there, Gary. He did trumpet impersonations on Esther Rantzen’s ‘That’s Life’. He looked like a cross between Max Headroom and the front end of an ‘e’ type jag. He was handsome in a Sherlock Holmes kind of way and laughed a lot, though the eyes were watchful. His hair was prematurely grey and he smoked his cigarette like a girl, narrowing his eyes as he did so. The eyes were bedroom and the voice smooth, too smooth We were as different as two new boys could be but we had our new boy status in common and were younger than the others, so we bonded.

I went on a diet and bought myself a black kohl eyeline pencil. We did our first group photo session. ‘Cramp’ was drawing to a close and I rang Rick every couple of days to reassure myself I had a job to go to.

“Oh hi man,” he would say, casually, “Listen, can you see if River Deep suits you in A? What else? John Sherry’s got the photos and they’ve come out well – Sherry, our manager? He’s picked one out. What else? Good feedback on the single. I’m sure there was somefin’ else. Oh yeah. Spain. Live T.V. Is that okay? For your first gig? It clashes with an Amsterdam T.V. date but it’s better money…”

Last time I was in Barcelona it was a dingy pensione with bickering women and howling babies in the corridor. Now it was double room, T.V. remote, fridge, massive mirrors and marbled bathroom. We ate in the Plaza Real off the Ramblas. Then Gareth disappeared into the red light district. Rick went off for three minutes and reappeared with some dope. They were behaving like proper rock stars.

I was here to lip-synch for the first time in my life, to Only You, of course. Playing it safe they’d given me the vocal snare drum part – ‘Ker CHU!’ I had to go, ‘Ker CHU!’ over and over, for three and a half minutes. It wasn’t very difficult. We were supposed to pretend it was Xmas day. Amazingly, that was when this would be going out in Spain. The cameras started rolling as a nubile blonde slipped into the seat in front of me and a waiter filled our glasses with champagne. The camera honed in on us. Blonde babe beamed dreamily, as if we were starring in a toothpaste advert with a champagne mouthwash. I knew what was required of me. Ker-Chu! I went in her beautiful face, Ker-Chu! I was tasting pop stardom. Don’t ask me what she was tasting.
Back at the hotel, I smoked some dope in Ken’s room. It had been a long time. Twelve years to be exact.. A cloud of locusts seemed to be plaguing my vision so I coolly made my excuses and left. I somehow found the key to my door and passed out on the floor.

Next morning, Ken was all of a lather. We were waiting for Gareth, who could not be revivified in his room.
“Everybody’s so selfish” he ranted. “It makes me want to shoot you all, that’s my dream. I hope you all fucking die and the human race is eaten by the leopard and the square taken out of nature.”
We were about to miss our flight.
“I’m held to ransom by people’s drunken personalities.”
Ken didn’t drink.
“I really resent it. I’m at a very crucial stage in my life. It just takes one thing.”

Brian – our tour manager - decided to save time by settling the extras himself on Gareth’s room. One hundred and fifty pounds. We’d only been there for one night. Mine had come to four pounds fifty. I would try to do better next time.

And so it came to pass, one failed single, one Spanish T.V appearance, one Belgian radio fiasco and a few gentle dates in Holland later that we were ready. The great British public awaited. We unveiled the new line up on the stage of The Hackney Empire, over three nights, just before Christmas. We had a backdrop of the Leningrad skyline. During ‘Space Oddity’ a hardboard Karl Marx flew across it, hammer and sickle in hand, dressed as Santa. I had died my hair purple for the occasion and borrowed Ken’s black leather jacket.

The hard-line fans were there – Tina and Gina, who ran the fan club, Bridget the midget and Liz the policewoman; the voodoo twins Brenda and Glenda; fans who were going to have to get used to two strange new members replacing their beloved Brian and Stripe.