When we arrive, there is a queue of several dozen scantily clad local
‘faces’ waiting to find out if they’ll be let inside tonight, but Phil knows
the guys on the door. The security rope is pulled aside to admit the band as
Brighton’s Bright Young Things crane their necks for a glimpse of these
unlikely celebrities. A tottering Robert ‘The Chief’ Lloyd is stopped by the doormen
and asked to surrender an almost depleted bottle of his beloved High
Commissioner. It is a tense moment as Lloyd squares up to the two doormen, seemingly
prepared to defend his hard-earned third bottle of the evening against whatever
they can throw at him. But before any blows can be exchanged, Lloyd slowly,
defiantly lifts the bottle to his lips and drains the contents in one go before
staggering triumphantly into the club. And they say that the spirit of punk is dead!
Inside, we are led by Phil to a booth which has been
reserved especially for the band. There is a plush, semi-circular bench-seat
clad in dark red leather arranged around a gloss-black circular table – room
enough to seat the entire entourage. The booth’s sole occupant – a
harrassed-looking Tobi Juggs – sits nursing a lemonade. He gets up as we
approach and has to shout to be heard over the band playing live on stage: “I
know. I know,” he says, “it’s my round.” And with an air of infinitely resigned
sadness he mopes off in the direction of the bar.
As we settle ourselves around the table, we realise that Mark
‘Ace’ Jones is nowhere to be seen. “Sit. Stay. Enjoy,” says Phil calmly. “I’ll
go look for him.” The club, meanwhile, is buzzing and the dance floor is full.
Onstage, live blues is provided by local heroes The Sussex Shitkickers who are
entertaining the joyously inebriated party animals of Brighton with a selection
of classic rock ‘n’ roll numbers. I thought that Status Quo had cornered the
market on the denim-waistcoats-and-jeans combo, topped off with long grey hair
tied in a pony tail, but I was wrong.
Juggs arrives with a tray of drinks and the band settle
back, winding down. It’s been a magnificent tour, but now it’s time to relax. To
my left, Andreus ‘Andi’ Schmid is quietly chatting to Dave ‘Big Dave’ Wassell. Over
the course of the tour I’ve become aware of an oddly affectionate respect that these
two seem to have for each other. Big Dave, for example, is the only member of
the band who calls Schmid ‘And’ rather than Andi. When I finally ask Schmid
about this his reply surprises me. “So, you call yourself a German, eh, Kuntz?
And yet you don’t recognise a kindred Germanic soul shining forth, though
admittedly it shines forth from a sehr
unordentlich exterior. It must be
your stupid, industrial northern upbringing that has blinded you to the real
German soul, my friend.”
I’m baffled and intrigued by Schmid’s allusion to Big Dave’s
‘Germanic soul’, and ask him to explain. It turns out to be the case that Big
Dave, though British to the core, actually has some German blood running
through his veins. A strand of his family on his mother’s side originally
hailed from the town of Bielefeld in Westphalia. Dave's knowledge
of these relatives is sketchy, but it seems that some scandal or other soured relations
with the Bielefelder branch of the Wassell family and they were rarely talked of again.
All that Big Dave has been able to establish is that there was a great uncle
Ludwig Wassell whose son – Horst – appears to have abandoned a promising musical career to take up
with a bunch of unsavoury political activists, sometime during the 1930s or
thereabouts. I glance across at Big Dave – all hydra-hair and sawn-off
clothing, staring down at his newspaper, pen in hand, deep in thought – and see
him in a new light. The light of a Germanic soul, perhaps?
* * *
* * * *
The music seems louder as does the conversation whirling
around me, and the lights seem to explode like fireworks in time with the
raucous rock ‘n’ roll music. As the familiar ringing guitar notes of “Johnny B
Goode” (Chess, 1958. Cat. No. 1691. Produced by Little “Bongo” Kraus.
Engineered by John “Johnnie” Johnson. Billboard Top 100 highest position
reached: #8) bring the song to a close the audience erupts, clapping, stamping,
demanding the next tune now now now. An ear-piercing scream rips from the PA
system, silencing the crowd, and as the scream dies away the band pick up a loping
riff which I’m sure I recognise, though I can’t actually recall what it is.
The singer moves to the front of the stage, cups both hands around the
microphone and begins to sing: “There’s a man walks the streets of London late
at night...”
Suddenly, Mark ‘Ace’ Jones is standing in front of the
table, bowler hat askew on his flowing locks, Ozzy Osbourne shades reflecting the pulsing
strobe lights. There is what appears to be a cape draped across his shoulders, though
it is rather small – a child’s dressing-up cape rather than a real one – and there
is a tall cocktail glass half-full of a dark liquid in his right hand, a celery
stick protruding from the top: a Bloody
Mary, of course. In his left hand he holds another tall glass which is full to
the brim with a yellow liquid. The glass is bedecked with several chunks of fruit, a
swizzle stick, a paper umbrella and a sparkler which spits splinters of fire onto
the surface of the table. From the PA speakers, the band's backing vocals rip through the club: “Ripper. Jack the Ripper.” Of course. They are
playing the old Screaming Lord Sutch classic. (Decca, 1963. Cat. No. F11598.
Produced by Joe “Telstar” Meek. Engineered by Heinz “Baked” Beanz. Banned by
BBC: Radio Titanic Hot Hits 100 for 11 weeks.)
“I got you a drink, Kuntz. As it’s your last night and all.”
Jones holds the glass of yellow liquid towards me, the faintest gesture of a
smile playing at the corners of his mouth as he does so. “It's a cocktail, Kuntz. It’s called a Fruchtig Fruchtig Fruchtig Bananen,
apparently.” This is most unexpected. What a very civilised offering! I’m very
moved by this gift from the man whom I’d come to regard as something of a
threat. What could I possibly have been thinking?Clearly, I have let my own insecurities
blind me to Jones’s affectionate and humane nature. Hot tears
of shame well up in my eyes though I fight them back and take the drink from Jones’s
hand. “Mark... no, Ace... may I call you Ace?” He nods. “Ace, my friend, my
brother... your very, very good health.” We touch glasses momentarily, and each
down our cocktails in one, in true party spirit. “Delicious, Ace. Fruity, yes - a strong note of banana on the palate, as one would expect,
though with an odd metallic finish that lingers at the back of the throat.” “That’s probably just the sparkler,
Kuntz.” “Ah, of course, Ace. Of course. All the same... I’ll never forget this
moment. Never. It’ll stay with me for as long as I live.”
Mark ‘Ace’ Jones puts his glass down on the table. “Yes,
Kuntz. It'll stay with you as long as you live. Just for as long as you live...” And with that enigmatic
phrase reverberating in my ears, Jones melts into the crowd and is gone.
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