The Alternative Hero Part 16

Despite Feathers' impressive emergency response, the incident caused Webster considerable distress and he has never discussed it in public. It was also the last time he wandered about on his own at such an event. Sadly, it was not the final occasion on which he was subject to obsessive behaviour; in fact, worse was to come.

In the summer of 1993 the Magpies staged their own large-scale event at Langley Park, near Slough. For supporting attractions they filled the early evening with a few ascendant bands of the moment: The Frank and Walters, Terrorvision and a promising outfit from London named Elastica, while the afternoon had been reserved for the unsigned winners of a demo scramble. During a break from the mammoth Bruise Unit Bruise Unit tour the Magpies themselves sat down in Bob Grant's office and listened to some four hundred demo tapes, selecting a list of three lucky winners: a funk-metal troupe from Kensington by the name of Fabric Flesh, a gloomy quartet from Middlesbrough known as They Say He Jumped and a solo artist from Luton who identified herself simply as Lesley. As anyone who remembers the day will attest, the first two acts were deeply unmemorable. The third was the precise opposite-but it had nothing to do with the music. tour the Magpies themselves sat down in Bob Grant's office and listened to some four hundred demo tapes, selecting a list of three lucky winners: a funk-metal troupe from Kensington by the name of Fabric Flesh, a gloomy quartet from Middlesbrough known as They Say He Jumped and a solo artist from Luton who identified herself simply as Lesley. As anyone who remembers the day will attest, the first two acts were deeply unmemorable. The third was the precise opposite-but it had nothing to do with the music.

Although her demo contained pa.s.sable angst-driven pop-rock (not a million miles from the noise Alanis Morissette began to peddle a year or so later), Lesley surprised the Magpies' sound crew by showing up with just her acoustic guitar and a videotape. When quizzed as to the whereabouts of her backing musicians, she embarked on a lengthy but plausible tale of woe: her ba.s.s player had attempted to smuggle incriminating quant.i.ties of cannabis on the way back from a short European tour, and the band had been stopped at Hook of Holland, where all the gear, both musical and narcotic, had been impounded, and what a nightmare it all was, and thank G.o.d she came back separately or she'd have missed this amazing opportunity, and "I promise to still put on a brilliant show," and "Can your lighting guy project these visuals during my set," blah blah. The crew thus persuaded, Lesley strolled onto the large stage at half past four and, in front of some twenty thousand people, began to play.

The first thing onlookers noticed was that she wasn't very good. She had the moves, for sure, throwing back her long brown hair while she bashed away at her low-slung instrument, her apparent lack of concern at playing for such a large audience suggesting an amount of experience, but the sound that emerged was far from accomplished: a scratchy, slightly out-of-tune guitar with approximated chords accompanied by a voice that was all expression and no skill. It wasn't totally unlistenable, however, which ensured that people continued to pay attention long enough to notice the second, more startling ingredient. Her lyrics were composed entirely of Thieving Magpies song t.i.tles.

"It's War on the Floor," she sang, " War on the Floor," she sang, "and it's Arguably the Last Time Arguably the Last Time I'll be riding your I'll be riding your Pit Pony." Other lines were less grammatically successful, such as Pit Pony." Other lines were less grammatically successful, such as "I'm going to sleep with "I'm going to sleep with The Cool and the Crooks The Cool and the Crooks while the while the Inappropriate Girlfriend Inappropriate Girlfriend sleeps with sleeps with The Ballad That Never Ends"-while some (" The Ballad That Never Ends"-while some ("I want you to f.u.c.k my Squarehole Squarehole with your with your Roundpeg") left little to the imagination. Towards the end of the first "song" she'd garnered more attention than she deserved on account of this feature; in fact, a collection of p.i.s.sed blokes down the front were merrily listening out for the t.i.tles and cheering each time they spotted one. But most observers had started paying more mind to the increasingly peculiar moving images projected behind her. Roundpeg") left little to the imagination. Towards the end of the first "song" she'd garnered more attention than she deserved on account of this feature; in fact, a collection of p.i.s.sed blokes down the front were merrily listening out for the t.i.tles and cheering each time they spotted one. But most observers had started paying more mind to the increasingly peculiar moving images projected behind her.

Some reports suggest Gloria Feathers was already calling for Lesley to be removed by this point, aggressively bending the ear of the stage manager next to the monitor desk (the Magpies' crew were quite used to fielding-and usually ignoring-Gloria's requests). But when the figure wandering about on the dimly lit home video became more recognisable, there is little doubt that she instantly made a beeline for the main sound desk. There were problems, however. The first was that Gloria's route-from the side of the stage, down the steps, across the crowded backstage enclosure, through the section where all the trucks were parked, past security into the main arena, around the bustling inner ring of fast-food stalls and bars, across the field strewn with happy punters and finally right up to the sound tower-took the best part of five minutes to navigate. When she arrived she encountered a fresh difficulty: no one would let her in. Feathers was so well-known on the scene that sometimes promoters didn't bother to give her a security pa.s.s; or even if they did, she rarely condescended to wear it. Usually this wasn't a problem, but on this occasion a brand-new security firm, LiveTime, was being used and none of the staff knew who the h.e.l.l she was. One can imagine the bemus.e.m.e.nt of the sound-desk guard, confronted by this frightsome woman with multicoloured dreadlocks, demanding to be let in, hurling various indignances ("How dare dare you you not not recognise me! I'm Gloria b.l.o.o.d.y Feathers! They should hand round photos of me at your f.u.c.king induction sessions!") while Lesley played on, her lyrics becoming more twisted ("Look Who's Laughing- recognise me! I'm Gloria b.l.o.o.d.y Feathers! They should hand round photos of me at your f.u.c.king induction sessions!") while Lesley played on, her lyrics becoming more twisted ("Look Who's Laughing-me when I Lose It, Lose It, kill you and feast on your kill you and feast on your Chopped Heart"), the visuals more worrying. Chopped Heart"), the visuals more worrying.

Actually Webster himself was watching the whole thing, but was too paralysed by shock to do much about it. For in front of his and now close to forty thousand other disbelieving eyes played what could effectively pa.s.s for a filmed summary of his recent activities. Starting, tentatively, with a few dark and grainy sequences of Webster wandering around a record shop, then following him along a few quiet streets, sometimes alone, sometimes with his girlfriend (who at this point was an Australian drama student named Camilla McBriar), the film then started to gain a bit more confidence and featured long shots of Webster having lunch in a restaurant, zooming in on his mouth as he ate, drank and spoke; then a series of shots that pursued him on a car journey along a dual carriageway, stopping next to him at some lights, tracking him through an industrial estate and watching him pull up next to a large brown factory, get out of the car with his guitar and enter an unremarkable building (this was the Magpies' rehearsal s.p.a.ce near the Guinness brewery in Acton); then it changed scene entirely, following him round a supermarket (Sainsbury's in Camden, as closer examination would prove) and again closing in on his mouth, hands, eyes and belongings, even to the point of focusing on the contents of his trolley (this prompted the film's one and only laugh from the audience, presumably due to the extraordinary number of Ambrosia creamed desserts you could see); then there came a montage of a.s.sorted situations: Lance relaxing in his garden, drinking with the rest of the band in a pub, driving again (this time filmed from a motorway bridge, under which a shaded Webster pa.s.sed), hurrying along streets in various parts of London (Kilburn, Soho, Putney) and concluded with-unbelievably-some similar footage of him in Amsterdam, Paris and what was almost certainly New York (the Magpies had recently played summer festivals in these various countries). But if the sequence had so far been, from a legal point of view, inoffensive-while certainly devious and creepy (not to mention well-funded)-here was where it became downright nasty and felonious. Via a method one finds difficult to fathom, the remainder of the film consisted of Webster and McBriar mooching around at home, cooking in the kitchen, canoodling in front of the television and ultimately, just before the video was at last removed from the player, having s.e.x in the bedroom.

Again, reports differ as to how Feathers was eventually admitted into the sound tower. The probable story is that she was spotted by one of the chaps inside and ushered in; a more colourful tale is that she punched out the hapless security guy. Either way it was certainly Feathers who pressed the eject b.u.t.ton. She then promptly sacked all the crew. Clutching the videotape, she stormed back to the main backstage area, sacked pretty much everyone else (it is a.s.sumed that, like Webster, they were all too transfixed by the film's sheer audacity to put an immediate stop to it), then grabbed Lesley by the scruff of the neck (she had finally been booed off by the crowd after the film stopped) and dragged her off to the nearest police van, where the officers simply cautioned her and advised that she should leave the site immediately.

The rest of the day pa.s.sed without further drama and was, if truth be told, a trifle dull. Even the Thieving Magpies themselves were a little under par, knackered from close to eighteen months of playing virtually the same set. Webster did not, as had been hoped, make some witty remark about Lesley's video, which perhaps demonstrated how freaked out he really was by the whole thing. Gloria Feathers angrily left the site around eight, after Bob Grant calmly reminded her that she was not in a position to go round dismissing Thieving Magpies employees when she was not even one herself.

In fact, as the autumn of 1993 approached, you didn't have to be within the Magpies' inner circle to surmise that Feathers' reign as their closest confidante was nearing its end. The band, although road-weary and in desperate need of the impending break, were bigger than ever, their mushrooming popularity now seemingly invincible to any hitch or bad move that Gloria may or may not foresee. Her arrogance, at one time laughed off by all as a charming quirk of her multilayered character, had now reached alarming proportions, and become insufferable to everyone from hotel porters to other rock stars, not helped in the slightest by her excessive drinking. The "last semiuseful thing she did," to employ Craig Spalding's expression, was to spot the infamous Lesley, camcorder in hand, following Webster around while he was on holiday with Camilla McBriar in Barcelona, and to again cart her off to the authorities (the Spanish police took a rather more serious view of Lesley's antics and kept her in a cell overnight)-but even this had its downside: one may reasonably ask what the h.e.l.l Feathers was doing in Barcelona anyway. It was supposedly a coincidence, although by now you were beginning to wonder. Whatever the explanation, Feathers' almost constant presence was causing noticeable strain between Webster and McBriar, and they eventually split just before Christmas of that year. 1994 dawned and progressed, with all its attendant cultural gear changes, and Feathers was seen less and less in public. For the most part she was unwelcome in Britpop circles (Liam Gallagher allegedly described her as a "punk-rock Miss Piggy"), but the feeling was usually mutual. She still ventured out to see some of her favourites: Swervedriver, Cranes, Senser, Eat Static-and even managed to fly to Seattle for the public vigil that followed Kurt Cobain's death ("Gloria would go to the funeral of an envelope," one music journalist quipped)-but her omniscience and popularity had long since waned. Even her indestructible friends.h.i.+p with Lance Webster was showing visible signs of wear and tear; they were seen having a rather large argument over dinner at Quo Vadis, leaving separately, Webster looking close to tears. In an interview conducted to coincide with the television screening of The Liar The Liar, he both acknowledged and denied that something was amiss with his chum: "Off the rails? Naah. Listen, you don't become someone like Gloria by having lots of early nights and drinking orange squash. And I've been friends with her through worse than this." Worse than what, exactly, he did not articulate; but it wasn't difficult to take a few wild guesses.

The last undisputed public sighting of Feathers was at the February 1995 Brit Awards, where Blur won in a record-breaking four categories. Britpop aside, the band had been indie staples since 1990 and were therefore known and liked by Feathers, who seemed very much her old self as she delightedly applauded their many trips up to the podium. She looked well and, un usually, in possession of a slight suntan-she didn't even appear to be drinking quite so much. Apart from her dreadlocks' new colour scheme (red, white and blue: perhaps a nod to the new obsession with all things British), the rest of her appearance could have been the Gloria Feathers of any point in the previous eight or nine years: short red PVC skirt, fishnets, thick studded belt, threatening boots and a heavily ripped Head of David T-s.h.i.+rt. She remained at the event until Sting took to the stage to present Elton John with his Outstanding Contribution award, perhaps deciding that this was a step too far into the land of the mainstream. Skipping off through the vast hall, kissing goodbye to a few friends, stopping to retrieve her fake-fur coat from the cloakroom, jumping into a taxi and heading south: that was the last the world at large was to see of Gloria Feathers.

Unlike history's other disappearees (not least Richey Manic, who had only been missing for a few weeks by this point), there was relatively little hue and cry about Feathers' vanis.h.i.+ng act, the fundamental reason for which being that her next of kin, father Donald Amhurst, decided not to report her as a missing person following a farewell note he received. In her legendary and incredibly well-researched feature "Where the f.u.c.k Is Gloria Feathers?" (published in the 1996 edition of the fanzine Things That Make Me Go Moo) Things That Make Me Go Moo), Alison O'Bawd quoted from this message (although how she managed to be privy to its contents also remains something of a mystery). "Fate united us," it purportedly read, "and now please accept that fate has separated us. You may wish to find me; perhaps you may not. If any love for me remains within you, please understand that I wish to be left alone." It is difficult to say whether Amhurst took his daughter's elegantly Garbo-esque advice as a result of any remaining love, or simply because he was sick to the back teeth of her. Either way, no official moves were made towards tracing her whereabouts, and the Feathers-spotter must rely on the few friends and family members who conducted their own independent investigations. Based on slight contributions from this group of people (which, conspicuously, did not include Lance Webster) and noting other independent sightings heard through the indie grapevine, O'Bawd's feature makes an admirable stab at constructing a possible pa.s.sage, thus: having shaved her head and donned unremarkable clothing, Feathers travelled to Switzerland, where she met with an old school friend, acquired a fake Swiss pa.s.sport and became Rosamund von Feder; she lived in the small town of Dietikon, near Zurich, for the next four months (among Feathers' few academic successes was her proficiency in German), after which she travelled by car to Moscow, where she ditched the vehicle with a hitchhiker (and Thieving Magpies fan) she happened to meet at a petrol station near Minsk, boarded the Trans-Siberian Railway and headed for Vladivostok on the far-eastern coast of Russia. Here her voyage apparently drew to a halt.

Two Feathers-related visits to Vladivostok were made that year: the first by her elder sister, Persephone, who after a few weeks of fruitless searching was told by some locals on the outskirts of the city of a strange young Swiss woman fitting Feathers' description, living alone in a remote apartment block, calling herself Slava Pero ("Glory Feather"). Unfortunately this character was nowhere to be found at the time of Persephone's visit. Shortly before Christmas, Alison O'Bawd herself made the trip with her boyfriend, fellow writer Sam Northam, managing to locate Pero having lunch in a nearby cafe: She has short, scruffy black hair, a thick, baggy black jumper that easily hides any tattoos, a brown skirt, and a blank, stoned expression. A lot of people look like that around here. Must be the vodka. But one look at her eyes and she is unmistakably Gloria. She might as well be wearing a name badge. She's abandoned all her face jewellery, but you can see the little piercing holes from right across the room. Sam is initially not so certain-but after a minute or two Slava Pero glares at us, leaps up, frantically throws a few roubles at the waitress and darts out the door. We've not spoken a word since we walked in, and we're wearing purposefully neutral clothing, but she must just know know. Sam shakes his head and says, "That was blatantly blatantly Gloria." And that is the last we see of her. Gloria." And that is the last we see of her.

Or, indeed, that anyone saw of her.

Naturally, rumours abounded that Lance Webster was somehow involved in her vanis.h.i.+ng act; stories that he had ordered her to leave the country, to take on a new ident.i.ty, even that he had paid for her to be kidnapped, finally tired of her wild instructions and intrusions to both his personal and professional life. A particular advocate of this explanation was Persephone Amhurst herself, who had reportedly never cared much for the singer, believing he and his band had kept her Rosamund at perpetual odds with the rest of reality. When Webster's own world collapsed six months after the disappearance, Persephone made sure her opinions were heard in any media that listened: "This drunken, hostile lout has finally shown the world his true colours-a streak that our family have experienced at close quarters for too many years. It is our hope that he receives a custodial sentence and hefty fine for his violence and disregard for those who have given him a career." O'Bawd, however, saw it differently, as her exhaustive article-referencing a 1993 letter Feathers wrote to her friend, NME NME journalist Alan Leader-concludes: journalist Alan Leader-concludes: She was the life and soul of the party, the first to arrive, the last to leave, with a stamina few could match. Something had to give eventually. No one removed Gloria but herself. "I'm tired," her letter continued, "and feel older than I should. I long for far-off places, where no one knows me, where I can be myself, whoever that is. I had a dream, just the other day, of a distant city, with trees, and rain, and dramatic seas, and wilderness I can explore, unfettered by complication and all these silly, trivial things. Do you ever feel that way?" Her curiosity perhaps finally got the better of her. The choice of city is a bit dubious: a dirty, dark, cold, bleak and depressing sort of place, with an infeasibly healthy organised-crime ingredient-but maybe that is the whole point. Perhaps she has to sink right down in order to rise back up. And few can deny there is a typical ring of eccentricity to it: at the eastern end of the former Soviet Union, a mere thousand miles from Peking and Tokyo, and just five hundred miles from Seoul, but in what is still to all intents and purposes a European country, Gloria Feathers has finally found a place in which to unfetter herself.

Cynics also trumpeted that Vladivostok was one of the cheapest places in the world to buy heroin-but who really knew the truth. By the end of 1996, the question, "Where the f.u.c.k is Gloria Feathers?"-rather like, "Whatever happened to the fat bloke who introduced Carter USM?" or even, "Is the singer from Placebo a boy or a girl?"-seemed to be a question only losers would ask.

But the mystery remains. And there are still some losers out there who intend to solve it.

SUGGESTED LISTENING: Nirvana, Incesucide Incesucide (DCG, 1992) (DCG, 1992) Everything that's happened to me from that moment onwards has been vaguely disappointing I press save, and shut the creaking lid of the almighty laptop. The dark grey laptop I bought in 1997, when I inherited a grand from that great-aunt who met her end in a nursing home in Leighton Buzzard; the laptop that had seemed so slick and ultramodern back then with its groovy navigation keys and Windows 95, but now looks as ancient as my mum's typewriter when side by side with Polly's spanking Mac on the kitchen table. I've ridden it hard, like a faithful old workhorse (does one ride a workhorse?)-I've had parts replaced, upgraded the memory and processor two or three times, dropped it down umpteen flights of steps, allowed friends to skin up on it, almost set fire to it (it has no power switch thanks to this particular incident), spilled tea on it, nearly lost it completely when Heathrow decided to send it to Frankfurt while I was on the way to Copenhagen-but it still works. Granted, it takes two or three minutes to open up a Word doc.u.ment, and navigating to certain Web pages is often an excuse to pop out for another can of beer, but it's been a reliable old thing and I'll be quite sad to see it go. I say that as if I've got a spare eight hundred quid for a new one, which as you've probably figured is something of an untruth, but I imagine it'll happen one day when I get a windfall or it finally kicks the bucket and goes to the big IT department in the sky.

Like a s.h.i.+rking schoolboy, I've been studiously avoiding what I'm meant to be doing. It's now eleven o'clock at night, but the frantic scribbling of likely-looking plot outlines, sample chapters and character explorations for the alleged novel I'm supposed to show Mr. Webster tomorrow afternoon has not yet commenced. You may wonder what the a.r.s.e I've been doing for the last twenty-four hours. Funny, I've been thinking the same.

You see, being unemployed is not simply a situation one puts up with for a while. It's actually a full-time job in itself; a wholly absorbing occupation that commences the second you leave the building of your outgoing employer and doesn't stop until you arrive at the door of your next, however many days, weeks, months or years that takes. There is never, in my fairly comprehensive experience, a period of grace when one cheerfully thinks, "Ooh, I'll catch up on my reading/tidy my papers/go to a museum/learn to make curry/take advantage of the cheap afternoon cinema tickets," etc. From minute number one there is a ma.s.sive, ugly, concrete prehistoric mammoth of guilt and worry standing in the useful bit of whatever room you're in, trumpeting loudly whenever you try to concentrate, b.u.t.ting you with its tusks if you attempt to do something normal like have s.e.x or eat in a restaurant. A small number of unemployed people-chiefly dependent on their bank balance and/or mental state-manage to give the mammoth its marching orders at five thirty every day and at weekends, enabling them to coexist with partners and friends in a relatively civil and functional manner until nine o'clock the following morning; but alas, the majority continue to mope around like grumpy, directionless d.i.c.kheads until they're either too drunk to care or asleep. You can guess which group I belong to.

That said, a few hours spent on the life of Gloria Feathers is hardly time wasted, and will be handy for my eventual masterpiece. Even Alan might give it a quick read. He went through a period of unnatural obsession with Gloria; oddly, it was long after what might be described as her "heyday," by which point she looked extra emaciated and white as a Tudor. Alan, nearing the end of a degree at Manchester University, had heard the song "4st 7lb" from the Manics' Holy Bible Holy Bible, decided Gloria was anorexic (he wasn't entirely alone in this opinion) and made it his mission to "save" her, as recounted in this charming sc.r.a.pbook entry:

WEDNESDAY 5 OCTOBER [1994]S*M*A*S*H, Manc Union Went with Gavin Walker and Dave Smith cos everyone else was revising, turned out to be a f.u.c.king nightmare, never going near either of them again. They had loads of speed before then drank about five pints and just got really obnoxious, support band unknown think they were local, then GLORIA appeared. Can't believe it, what's she doing up here. Haven't seen her in time and she's even worse than before but she's so delicate, beautiful, why didn't I notice this years ago, she's ill though, sure of it now, waited til band came on (don't know what all the fuss is about really) then went up to try and say h.e.l.lo ... she ignored me at first then I said "would you like a drink" and she said "yes, but don't expect me to talk to you." I got her a vodka and she smiled when I pa.s.sed it to her, my G.o.d her eyes are so gorgeous, they look into your soul, I was just going to ask her something about her health when those p.r.i.c.kS came up and asked if she wanted a cheeseburger. I kept telling them to p.i.s.s off then Gloria moved away. Was so gutted bought myself three bottles of Mad Dog and had them all while walking back down Wilmslow Road then puked, phoned Clive It cuts off just like that. I remember my university years being peppered with these late-night phone calls from Alan, which became more drunken at both ends of the line as the years went by and our student debts soared. The discussions usually involved either a band he'd just seen and felt the need to gush or rant about (Miranda s.e.x Garden and Suede, respectively, seem to stand out in my memory), or a girl he'd just been wounded by. "Why won't she go out with me, man?" he'd whimper, while I'd try to work out which one of the many he'd recently mentioned had spurned him and why I was suddenly considered an expert. I'm straining to remember the contents of that specific night's discussion, s.h.i.+vering as I probably was in one of the long corridors of my hall of residence near Marylebone, hanging on the incoming-calls-only intercollegiate phone, wearing my boxer shorts and Power of Dreams "100 Ways to Kill a Love" T-s.h.i.+rt (I kept my rarest s.h.i.+rts for pretend-nonchalant use around the hall in the hope that some girl would notice). It was around this time I turned down the job at the won't she go out with me, man?" he'd whimper, while I'd try to work out which one of the many he'd recently mentioned had spurned him and why I was suddenly considered an expert. I'm straining to remember the contents of that specific night's discussion, s.h.i.+vering as I probably was in one of the long corridors of my hall of residence near Marylebone, hanging on the incoming-calls-only intercollegiate phone, wearing my boxer shorts and Power of Dreams "100 Ways to Kill a Love" T-s.h.i.+rt (I kept my rarest s.h.i.+rts for pretend-nonchalant use around the hall in the hope that some girl would notice). It was around this time I turned down the job at the NME NME (oh yes) so maybe we were talking about that, in between bouts of Alan's ongoing Gloria-related misery and Mad Dog-fuelled blethering. (oh yes) so maybe we were talking about that, in between bouts of Alan's ongoing Gloria-related misery and Mad Dog-fuelled blethering.

I place Alan's fragile sc.r.a.pbook carefully on my desk and make the usual trip past Polly's bedroom (she's in there with someone, judging by the wrestling noises) towards the kitchen in general and the fridge in particular, where I find my habitual can of liquid refreshment. I hold the funny, cold metal tube in front of my eyes for a moment, pondering its ingredients and precisely how I'll benefit from them. Looking at it logically, I'm not drunk, nor do I need to be, but there's the general buzz of half a dozen units of alcohol inside me; if I increase that buzz, is it really really likely do anything for the creativity which must occur at some point between now and 3 p.m. tomorrow? It's doubtful. I'm thirsty but there's water in the tap, tea or coffee in the cupboard, milk in the fridge, even some orange juice. I could have any or all of these things. Polly, in a fit of health consciousness, has even bought some echinacea tea, which I also could sample. likely do anything for the creativity which must occur at some point between now and 3 p.m. tomorrow? It's doubtful. I'm thirsty but there's water in the tap, tea or coffee in the cupboard, milk in the fridge, even some orange juice. I could have any or all of these things. Polly, in a fit of health consciousness, has even bought some echinacea tea, which I also could sample.

I stop being so silly and crack open the beer.

Returning to my room, I decide-inspiration now being somewhat thin on the ground-to take a look in my Important Box. This is a wooden chest I inherited from a university friend who'd been at boarding school, in which I have stored my most valuable and noteworthy items: my pa.s.sport and birth certificate, my twenty-first-birthday cuff links, my signed copy of Casual s.e.x in the Cineplex Casual s.e.x in the Cineplex by The Sultans of Ping FC, my university dissertation (some rambling b.o.l.l.o.c.ks about Arthur Miller), my letter from Stephen Fry ("I am delighted you so hugely enjoyed by The Sultans of Ping FC, my university dissertation (some rambling b.o.l.l.o.c.ks about Arthur Miller), my letter from Stephen Fry ("I am delighted you so hugely enjoyed The Hippopotamus") The Hippopotamus"), my Letter of the Week in Melody Maker Melody Maker ("You are an important and usually excellent newspaper; STOP abusing your position!"), other a.s.sorted paraphernalia and some of the more superior copies ("You are an important and usually excellent newspaper; STOP abusing your position!"), other a.s.sorted paraphernalia and some of the more superior copies of Vorsprung Durch Peanut of Vorsprung Durch Peanut and its Britpop-era successor, and its Britpop-era successor, Definitely Not Definitely Not. Although I'm supposed to be writing about anything but music, I can't resist a quick leaf through these. The first issue that reaches my hand is from autumn 1991, by which time the Peanut Peanut had evolved from a bedroom concern to a bedroom concern with slightly faultier equipment (I'd managed to buy one of my ex-school's old photocopiers at a knockdown price). It primarily consists of a report on the "Great Summer Indiethon"-an insane, forty-two-band slog designed to take in various Reading Festival warm-up gigs, in-store performances, the festival itself and, coincidentally, the secret Thieving Magpies appearance before which Alan and I thrashed those two roadies of theirs at pool in the pub next door to the venue. Throughout, we're referred to by our fanzine nicknames, Clive Pop and a.n.a.l Alan; there's a cast of other occasionals (including Alan's university chums Steve the Swede and Emily from East Anglia), loads of banter, in-joking and far less cider than one might imagine. Reading Thursday of that year was my eighteenth birthday, in fact. had evolved from a bedroom concern to a bedroom concern with slightly faultier equipment (I'd managed to buy one of my ex-school's old photocopiers at a knockdown price). It primarily consists of a report on the "Great Summer Indiethon"-an insane, forty-two-band slog designed to take in various Reading Festival warm-up gigs, in-store performances, the festival itself and, coincidentally, the secret Thieving Magpies appearance before which Alan and I thrashed those two roadies of theirs at pool in the pub next door to the venue. Throughout, we're referred to by our fanzine nicknames, Clive Pop and a.n.a.l Alan; there's a cast of other occasionals (including Alan's university chums Steve the Swede and Emily from East Anglia), loads of banter, in-joking and far less cider than one might imagine. Reading Thursday of that year was my eighteenth birthday, in fact.

A happy memory.

Now, I'm not normally the kind of bloke who mopes around wondering where it all went turnip-shaped, but there's an irony to all of this that's making me wince. Unless the rose-tinted specs are messing with me, it goes something like this-eighteen: contented, not a lot to worry about except how much indie the human body can physically absorb, indulging in cheeky snogs and fumbles with whichever female permits it, my weakness for alcohol still in its infancy, trouncing two hardy, dreadlocked Thieving Magpie roadies at pool. Fast-forward to thirty-three: frustrated, no job, next-to-zero money, recovering from a six-year relations.h.i.+p which probably lasted five years too long, my weakness for alcohol well into its senility, being scolded by two hardy, shorn-headed, former Thieving Magpie roadies for writing foolish, bunny-boiling letters to an ex-alternative superstar. I wouldn't say things were improving with age, would you?

And yet, they tell me to grow up.

All right, so I've had a few drinks and Thursday is rapidly turning into Friday, but I'm deathly serious: how many problems, arguments, insecurities, guilt complexes and overdrafts are a direct result of this "growing up"? The demon adulthood, and what's expected of you, or what you expect of it?

"Grow up," they say. My ex-girlfriend said it. Alan says it. My mum says it. My sister once said it (then my five-year-old nephew repeated it all afternoon). My bank manager says it, albeit in a style owing slightly more to interest rates and loan top-up policies than models of emotional development. Geoffrey "Lance" Webster says it; for what was the sending round of his pair of amplifier-lugging stooges, if not a big, unwashed crustie fist with the words "GROW UP" tattooed in that hideous, faded greeny-blue colour? And now even f.u.c.king Polly-Polly the neurotic, nymphomaniac disaster, who somehow manages to hold down a legal job in between crazed nights of mainlining red wine, tying pizza-delivery men to her bed and getting taxis from London to Bristol, Polly who can't even sit still through a film at the cinema without nipping out for a f.a.g and a gin and tonic-she has decided to start saying it. Why? Why are all these people trying to convince me that life would somehow improve if I started behaving like a textbook version of a thirty-three-year-old? has decided to start saying it. Why? Why are all these people trying to convince me that life would somehow improve if I started behaving like a textbook version of a thirty-three-year-old?

For my small amount of money anyway, most people on this paltry little island are actually trying to be younger younger, at least cosmetically speaking. Or feel feel younger. They want the body, face, libido and spontaneous spirit of a twenty-year-old, welded seamlessly onto the carca.s.s of an individual with a forty-year-old's level of experience, discipline and knowledge of the property market. I spend a substantial amount of my time trying to squeeze forth the tiniest drop of enthusiasm for any of that stuff. But in truth, I'd rather drink dishwater than glance in an estate agent's window; would sooner chat to a dead pigeon than with someone who's about to renovate their loft. younger. They want the body, face, libido and spontaneous spirit of a twenty-year-old, welded seamlessly onto the carca.s.s of an individual with a forty-year-old's level of experience, discipline and knowledge of the property market. I spend a substantial amount of my time trying to squeeze forth the tiniest drop of enthusiasm for any of that stuff. But in truth, I'd rather drink dishwater than glance in an estate agent's window; would sooner chat to a dead pigeon than with someone who's about to renovate their loft.

I find it fascinating, this differing view of "growing up." For me, it was nothing more than the process of becoming physically larger, less interested in getting extra track for my Scalextric and more interested in what lay behind women's clothing. Maybe I'm deeply lacking something, but that was pretty much it; apart from being able to buy certain items and go to certain places without pretending to be Billy Flus.h.i.+ng's elder brother. From then on, the improvements of aging ceased. My first eighteen years were spent looking forward to the age of eighteen, while-if I call upon the sort of brutal honesty only five cans of lager can summon-the last fifteen have basically consisted of looking back.

Blimey.

I sit unhappily in my chair, staring through my bedroom window at the funny little yardy bit we never use ("Why don't you try growing veg out there, man?" Alan once asked), nagging on my beverage, wondering if there was ever a period around the turn of my twenties (the "happy gap"?) when I was satisfied with the status quo, and if so, how long did it last? Or was it more like some deranged Venn diagram of life, the middle loop representing a period when I was looking both back and forth with equal levels of dissatisfaction?

Being in the fortunate possession of what amounts to a diary covering the days following my arrival in adultland, I leaf through the Peanut Peanut-looking so impossibly dated now with its thin, typed white pages, slightly thicker blue paper serving as a cover, and near pitch-black photographs (Jane Stokes from Beef, "surely the most underrated and undervalued indie group to currently grace the circuit," is virtually unrecognisable as that season's cover star)-to see if there are any clues. There's indeed much evidence of a fun and carefree time: "The Peanut Peanut team do their best to ruck among the retail racks like it's a real gig, but Clive Pop knocks over a huge stack of Blue Aeroplanes CDs;" "Clive Pop is back at his team do their best to ruck among the retail racks like it's a real gig, but Clive Pop knocks over a huge stack of Blue Aeroplanes CDs;" "Clive Pop is back at his Peanut Peanut 'stall' trying to flog last season's fanzine as people leave the club-the only one he sells is to a pa.s.sing elderly Indian chap who walks off studying the Scorpio Rising feature intently;" "The official 'stall' trying to flog last season's fanzine as people leave the club-the only one he sells is to a pa.s.sing elderly Indian chap who walks off studying the Scorpio Rising feature intently;" "The official Vorsprung Durch Peanut Vorsprung Durch Peanut Clive Pop eighteenth-birthday celebration takes place on the way back from Camden Palace at four in the morning outside 7-Eleven in Hendon, with packets of Jelly Babies and (Clive Pop's favourite) pork scratchings, plus various cans of soft drink which the a.s.sembled 'crack' open, champagne-style. a.n.a.l Alan has his second minisnog of the day (different girl, obviously ... shhh!)"-and so on. My eyes skim past antics we'd never get away with, nor even attempt, these days: a penniless Steve the Swede had bought a dodgy Reading wristband which came off in the Five Thirty ruck on the second night, so he snuck into the arena at daybreak, while the toilets were open for the campers, hid under a catering lorry for the next four hours with only a bottle of Mendip Magic and a bacon sarnie for company, finally emerging when the gates opened properly at noon. What strikes me most, though, is how little we actually drank. Sure, we had a few, but it was more a case of "let's pa.s.s this bottle of apple schnapps round, get a bit tiddly, dance our a.r.s.es off to De La Soul and then sober up," rather than the emphasis on pint after pint of lager that took over by about 1994, when we had access to comparatively large reserves of borrowed cash. This change in approach also had a big effect on the Clive Pop eighteenth-birthday celebration takes place on the way back from Camden Palace at four in the morning outside 7-Eleven in Hendon, with packets of Jelly Babies and (Clive Pop's favourite) pork scratchings, plus various cans of soft drink which the a.s.sembled 'crack' open, champagne-style. a.n.a.l Alan has his second minisnog of the day (different girl, obviously ... shhh!)"-and so on. My eyes skim past antics we'd never get away with, nor even attempt, these days: a penniless Steve the Swede had bought a dodgy Reading wristband which came off in the Five Thirty ruck on the second night, so he snuck into the arena at daybreak, while the toilets were open for the campers, hid under a catering lorry for the next four hours with only a bottle of Mendip Magic and a bacon sarnie for company, finally emerging when the gates opened properly at noon. What strikes me most, though, is how little we actually drank. Sure, we had a few, but it was more a case of "let's pa.s.s this bottle of apple schnapps round, get a bit tiddly, dance our a.r.s.es off to De La Soul and then sober up," rather than the emphasis on pint after pint of lager that took over by about 1994, when we had access to comparatively large reserves of borrowed cash. This change in approach also had a big effect on the end end of our festival day-again, from twenty-one onwards I would ingest as much beer as anatomically possible and pa.s.s out by one o'clock at the latest (even if drugs were involved), whereas in the old days we sat around the campfire, ours or anyone else's, singing, talking b.o.l.l.o.c.ks, perhaps going for strolls around the moonlit arena, not considering hitting the sack until either the smoke became too much for our eyes or we'd finally tired of endlessly debating which of the two Ned's Atomic Dustbin ba.s.sists was better. of our festival day-again, from twenty-one onwards I would ingest as much beer as anatomically possible and pa.s.s out by one o'clock at the latest (even if drugs were involved), whereas in the old days we sat around the campfire, ours or anyone else's, singing, talking b.o.l.l.o.c.ks, perhaps going for strolls around the moonlit arena, not considering hitting the sack until either the smoke became too much for our eyes or we'd finally tired of endlessly debating which of the two Ned's Atomic Dustbin ba.s.sists was better.

But I clutch on to my can of beer and refuse to entertain the thought that this malaise is entirely down to booze. No-it must be something else.

It doesn't take me long to find it. Cast your eye over the snippet below-and bear in mind that this is August 1991 we're talking about.

4:15 p.m. [Friday] Another minidebate over the Peanut Peanut team's next move. Clive Pop is off to meet and greet The Family Cat, but a.n.a.l Alan and Steve the Swede decide to see Nirvana on the main stage ("They're meant to be pretty good, man"). Clive Pop sticks around for a few minutes, the first song is energetic but pretty metallist (plus they've got some really irritating bloke with a Mohican doing a Bez) so he sticks to plan A and heads for the signing tent. team's next move. Clive Pop is off to meet and greet The Family Cat, but a.n.a.l Alan and Steve the Swede decide to see Nirvana on the main stage ("They're meant to be pretty good, man"). Clive Pop sticks around for a few minutes, the first song is energetic but pretty metallist (plus they've got some really irritating bloke with a Mohican doing a Bez) so he sticks to plan A and heads for the signing tent.4:25 p.m. It's a big queue for the Cat! They're not playing until Sunday, but the fans are already out in force. Good for them.4:30 p.m. Still queuing for the Cat. A song Clive Pop faintly recognises drifts over from the main stage-must have heard it in a club. Not bad. Never mind, we'll soon hear all about it from a.n.a.l Alan.4:40 p.m. Swizz! Who should walk past Clive Pop but all five members of The Family Cat! The cheeky so-and-sos have only just arrived! only just arrived!4:50 p.m. Clive Pop reaches the front of the queue, his copy of the Peanut Peanut is cheerily autographed by the band. "Nice of you to turn up," Clive laughs. "Sorry," they all chorus. "Watching Nirvana," admits the singer, shaking his head. "Jaw-dropping." is cheerily autographed by the band. "Nice of you to turn up," Clive laughs. "Sorry," they all chorus. "Watching Nirvana," admits the singer, shaking his head. "Jaw-dropping."4:55 p.m. The Peanut Peanut team reconvene by the Pennine Pizza bus. For a minute or two it looks like a.n.a.l Alan and Steve the Swede have just been told a relative has died, they look so shocked. After a while Steve manages to blurt "that was the greatest of my life"-but this is his standard post-gig proclamation (he even said it recently about a Cud show), so there's no need for Clive Pop to worry. team reconvene by the Pennine Pizza bus. For a minute or two it looks like a.n.a.l Alan and Steve the Swede have just been told a relative has died, they look so shocked. After a while Steve manages to blurt "that was the greatest of my life"-but this is his standard post-gig proclamation (he even said it recently about a Cud show), so there's no need for Clive Pop to worry.

Except, of course, there was.

For the rest of the b.l.o.o.d.y day, as I now recall, I heard nothing other than how unbelievably brilliant Nirvana had been, sprinkled with general mirth that I had missed them in favour of "The Family Shat," as Alan and Steve immediately christened them. My usual comeback to such garbage (which I very successfully employed when Alan made similar noises about Underneath What and The Atom Seed) was to calmly state that we'd see how big they were in six months' time. But on this occasion, fate was stacked so heavily against me that I get a toothache just thinking about it. I don't need to tell you (but I'm going to anyway) that by the time those six months were up, not only were Nirvana the biggest alternative-rock band in the world, but they'd also unwittingly set the plan for nineties popular culture firmly in stone. I had missed what is widely regarded, at least in Britain, as the pivotal moment-by about two hundred metres. Of course, I saw Nirvana headlining the following year, as everyone and his dog did, but by then it was far too late.

Call me melodramatic but this recollection hits me square in the emotional goolies. I grab Alan's sc.r.a.pbook again to cross-reference. There it is, plain as day, in Alan's usual blend of hyperbole and questionable grammar: Thank f.u.c.k I ignored Clive going to get signatures from the f.u.c.king family shat cos instead I saw NIRVANA, okay they started a bit metallist but by song 4 they were b.l.o.o.d.y revalation. Amazing then I remembered it was them that do the q. good "gramma take me home" one we dance to at that s.h.i.+tty club on Oxford Street but man, they made everyone else look s.h.i.+t. Singer dived into kit. Could be big. Poor old Clive we took the p.i.s.s a bit he spent the rest of his birthday money getting drunk, had to wake him up for the poppies.

Yeah, poor old Clive. Now I think about it, I do have a faint sense of the rest of the weekend feeling entirely different, like I'd become another person.

My G.o.d.

Panicking slightly (G.o.d knows why, it's sixteen years too late to do anything about it), I quickly nip to the kitchen for another beer, pick up my phone and speed-dial number three.

"Yeah?"

"Alan, it's Clive."

"I know," he growls. "I meant 'yeah' as in, 'what can you possibly want at this time of night?'"

I glance at my watch. b.u.g.g.e.r. Twenty past midnight.

"Sorry, did I wake you up? Need to ask you something."

He does that maddening trick of not replying, leaving the phone line a silent void which only I am required to fill.

"Err ... you know when we saw Nirvana at Reading in ninety-one?"

"Uh-huh."

"Were they really that good or were you guys just winding me up?"

His usual scoffing-burp sound comes speeding down the wire from Crouch End. "Doesn't it say anything about this in my sc.r.a.pbook?"

"Yeah, it-"

"Because part of the reason I gave you the d.a.m.n thing was so I didn't have to answer daft questions at times like this. I've got to be in Cardiff by eight thirty."

"Sorry. It says they were a 'b.l.o.o.d.y revalation.'"

"Well, there you go."

"Yes, but was it, like, life-changing?"

"Oh, probably not."

"Do you think it changed me?"

"Changed you?"

"Yeah."

"You missed them, didn't you?"

"Yeah-I mean, do you think not not seeing them changed me?" seeing them changed me?"

"How the h.e.l.l should I know?"

"Sorry, it's just that ... I've suddenly realised, everything that's happened to me from that moment onwards has been vaguely disappointing ..."

"Oh, for G.o.d's sake."

"And that it might have been the start of me ... you know ... losing it slightly."

Unexpectedly, this heralds a laugh.

"Losing your edge," Alan chuckles. "And you were there, off your t.i.ts at Spike Island, 1990. 'It'll never catch on,' you said."

"Did I say that?"

"Something along those lines. Forget it. Listen, put that c.r.a.p away for the night, finish your can of beer [how'd he know I was drinking one?], get some sleep and stop being so b.l.o.o.d.y hysterical."

But Alan is an expert at the slick closure of a phone call, even agreeing to a swift morally supportive coffee tomorrow afternoon before I meet Webster. I can't say I feel an awful lot better, though. I ignore his advice, return to the fanzine, and yes: the post-Nirvana results are quite remarkable. According to our reporter, Pop Will Eat Itself and Ned's were both "a disappointment." The Fat Lady Sings "didn't deserve an encore." The Sisters of Mercy were "ridiculous." Flowered Up and Teenage Fanclub were "boringly similar" (which seems unlikely), while Blur "only have one good song." The Family Cat's actual performance on the Sunday doesn't even garner a review. Only De La Soul sparkle-watched, as we know, with the a.s.sistance of Steve the Swede's apple schnapps-but this judgement is accompanied by a sophisticated observation that "drinking at a festival is actually quite fun, all the bands sound great when you're a bit p.i.s.sed, and no one cares about the weather; this could be the way forward."

f.u.c.k.

I drain the last of my can, pull on my hooded top, grab my keys, stumble through the kitchen and just go, out into the northeast London night. I know from experience that feelings like these are only soothed by walking. It doesn't really matter where I go, but naturally I always end up heading in a south-westerly direction, as if magnetically drawn towards London's centre. I don't really spend much time there these days, but its pull remains compelling. It's a dry, windless night, and after an initial stiffness (I haven't left the house since yesterday evening) I'm soon up to speed, hurrying out of my locality, past a few stragglers contemplating a kebab after leaving one of the later-shutting pubs, beyond the church, past the final bus stop and out onto the road bordering the park. There was a time when I would leap over the fence and cut across, but nowadays even I-naivete and slightly disposable att.i.tude to life aside-take the long route round. Not that I've ever had the problems with muggers and nutters some of my friends have had. I put this down to perpetually marching at breakneck speed, pulling my woolly hat down to my eyes and doing my best to look more barmy than anyone else.

There are two things I always see on these small-hour jaunts. Indeed, both appear with such clockwork regularity I think I'd be concerned for the state of the universe if I didn't see them. One is a collection of elderly African ladies with huge multicoloured shopping bags. Doesn't matter what time it is. Once I saw them at three in the morning. It's extraordinary. They always look perfectly happy, gossiping away, never in the same place (tonight they're ambling along Green Lanes; another time they were coming out of a house in Finsbury Park; once they were even as far away as King's Cross). When I spy them this evening I almost feel like saying h.e.l.lo. The second thing I habitually encounter is an old chap walking his dog. Again, time seems to make little difference-one o'clock, two o'clock, even around six on one occasion. Both man and dog always look totally miserable. The bloke's probably got one of those jobs with crazy s.h.i.+fts, like Alan's tenure a few years back in a certain banking department that required him to be there from 11:30 p.m. until 8 a.m., Friday to Tuesday; the bizarre upshot being that his working week kicked off just as everyone else was getting plastered at the end of theirs, and his "weekend" began first thing on a Wednesday morning. Typically, Alan made d.a.m.n sure he didn't miss out on a proper "Friday night," rooting out some meatpacker's boozer near Smith-field Market, where he would sup away happily until lunchtime and then drunkenly retire to bed. "Sat.u.r.day-morning hangovers are so much nicer on Wednesday evenings," he would tell people, "plus there's better telly on."

Tonight's dog-walking man is looking extra p.i.s.sed off, tramping past Canonbury station as his dog feigns enthusiasm for a clutch of weeds.

"Ivan!" he shouts. "Git a bladdy move on!"

Loosely following that stupid bus route that doesn't go anywhere useful, I enter the no-man's-land between Canonbury and Highbury, my mind frantically sifting through a mult.i.tude of topics-my bank balance, Nirvana, Alan's continued indifference to my plight, Spike Island (why did he have to bring that that one up?), the ubiquitous Mr. Webster, my ubiquitous ex-girlfriend-although my anxiety is beginning to recede thanks to my ferociously marching along. It works every time. The gaunt, alert figure of a fox appears from behind the council block a few hundred metres ahead, then vanishes up that posh tree-lined road I always turn down by mistake when waywardly returning from nights at the Garage. I wince as I pa.s.s the school where I vomited after one tequila too many on Alan's thirtieth birthday. I round the corner where I had that huge row with The Ex (I wanted to walk, she wanted to get a cab: a recurring theme) and stride past those silly-looking cafes that precede Highbury Corner, finally shooting straight down the strip of overpriced shops and restaurants that is Upper Street. one up?), the ubiquitous Mr. Webster, my ubiquitous ex-girlfriend-although my anxiety is beginning to recede thanks to my ferociously marching along. It works every time. The gaunt, alert figure of a fox appears from behind the council block a few hundred metres ahead, then vanishes up that posh tree-lined road I always turn down by mistake when waywardly returning from nights at the Garage. I wince as I pa.s.s the school where I vomited after one tequila too many on Alan's thirtieth birthday. I round the corner where I had that huge row with The Ex (I wanted to walk, she wanted to get a cab: a recurring theme) and stride past those silly-looking cafes that precede Highbury Corner, finally shooting straight down the strip of overpriced shops and restaurants that is Upper Street.

Given that I've never been overly attached to this particular thoroughfare, it's remarkable how effectively it h.o.a.rds memories and unleashes them as I walk, like one of those slow-release vitamin-pill things. That's the problem with living in one corner of a city for too long, I suppose, and this top mile of the main Islington drag is all about (again) The Ex. No wonder she moved to Camberwell. Example: when I look at the Hope and Anchor, I don't see a semidecent music pub with a creditable punk heritage, I see the place I first met the friend of a friend who joined us for a pint after we'd seen Arab Strap at the Union Chapel. When I see that petrol station on the left, I see the first packet of sandwiches we shared while waiting for a cab to take the two of us and a paralytically drunk Polly home. The King's Head pub is the place I spilled my first pint over her. The Turkish restaurant is where I took her for a date on that first Valentine's Day and my debit card got rejected. The Bull is where I used to listlessly wait for her to finish cackling with her work colleagues on a Thursday evening. Then the cinema, where I realised once and for all that she'd never fancy me as much as she did Ralph Fiennes. The Slug and Lettuce, where I got into that huge argument with a male friend of hers about his method of getting to work (he used to drive drive from Hackney to Willesden every morning; had he never from Hackney to Willesden every morning; had he never heard heard of the Silverlink train line?)-the argument which finally precipitated The Conversation. of the Silverlink train line?)-the argument which finally precipitated The Conversation.

Which I'm not going to bore you with.

As I reach the southern end of the street the memories are older, often of an Islington that no longer exists. The Camden Head pub, once the second-best jukebox in London, now replaced by the questionable music taste of the bar staff. The old pizza restaurant, long since replaced by something trendier, where Alan and I used to do the all-you-can-eat buffet thing for about three quid, scoffing vast amounts of stodgy, nutritionless mush before going to gigs at the Powerhaus. The old tube station, prerenovation, without ticket barrier, an essential bolt-hole for every discerning student fare-evader. And then: the Powerhaus itself.

Today, the idea of an impossibly dingy, dirty, sick-smelling indie hole parked squarely on the front line of Islington's retail paradise is as incongruous as ordering a snakebite in Starbucks, but exist it did, and we f.u.c.king loved the place; the scene of some of our crunchiest, sc.u.mmiest gigs: Extreme Noise Terror, Die Cheerleader, Tad, Cardiacs (I've also heard Alan boast to people that we saw a very early Radiohead show there, which I regret to say is b.o.l.l.o.c.ks). It was the perfect alternative venue, a fabulous, feedback-drenched sin bin of head-crus.h.i.+ngly loud musical chaos; you could smell the clientele as they rolled across Islington High Street, particularly after the gig, when the cider, beer, sweat and patchouli oil had blended to form a now sadly extinct compound we christened Powergunge, caking the boots, leather jackets and hair of the faithful as they headed home. That the Powerhaus was replaced in the mid-nineties by an All Bar One tells you all you need to know about London's descent into chain-driven consumer nonsense. That the All Bar One subsequently became a branch of the Halifax is where social commentary and I go separate ways.

By this stage in my thoughts I'm standing right opposite our former glory hole, getting my breath back. It's just hit me how knackered I am and how many beers I've had, and considering it's now quarter past one in the morning and I've still not put finger to laptop for the Webster project, I probably ought to start thinking about home. But an unseen force is drawing me across the wide road. I skip across to the central reservation and wait for a half-empty police riot van to pa.s.s, its pa.s.sengers eyeing me suspiciously as I itch the back of my legs. I hurriedly take off my woolly hat and tidy my hair-my typical, feeble knee-jerk attempt at looking innocent-and the van switches on its siren and speeds off in search of real criminals, leaving me to stroll over to our old haunt with its unchanged mock-Tudor front. I stare through the sterile windows, now advertising tax-free savings and personal loans rather than appearances by The Fall or Huggy Bear, and wonder if customers ever feel the Ghost of Indie Past as they fill in their deposit slips, whether the staff realise their quiet, carpeted office is exactly the room in which three hundred unwashed lunatics rucked to Crazyhead, spat at The d.a.m.ned, gaped at Polly Harvey or blissed out to Orbital, or if they know they're interviewing new mortgage customers in the very same s.p.a.ce of air from which Wayne Hussey once breathed to serenade his eskimos. It's doubtful.

I linger awhile, not entirely sure what I'm trying to find. Perhaps nothing. I suppose it would be enough to think that, very occasionally, an office junior s.h.i.+fts some file boxes in a back room and wonders what that foul smell is, or speculates on the origin of the awful substance clinging to the bottom of the filing cabinet, or asks why his suit always reeks of patchouli oil after working late. Satisfied by this notion, I'm taking a deep breath and turning to go when something odd-no, make that b.l.o.o.d.y extraordinary-catches my eye.

On an otherwise standard-issue black signpost between the Halifax and Snappy Snaps are the remnants of a sticker: a black, triangular sticker that somehow resisted the efforts of the graffiti removal teams. Although it's faint, I can still make out an unmistakable red-and-yellow comic-book-style emblem, formed from the letters A and H, an emblem I first beheld about sixteen years ago, not ten yards from this very spot, emblazoned on the cover of a fanzine ent.i.tled Alternative Heroes Alternative Heroes. The geeky bloke enthusiastically peddling the fanzine to the gathering pre-gig crowd was none other than Mr. Billy Flus.h.i.+ng.

My face is now so close to the signpost I'm practically licking it, but I still can't believe what I'm seeing. When did the Powerhaus close down? 1995? 1996? I'm pretty sure Billy wasn't still doing his fanzine right up until that point, but even if he was, a sticker like this couldn't have remained on a signpost for the eleven years since. Stuff like this gets blasted off almost immediately these days, even in Camden. No, this sticker must have been slapped on recently. What's more, unless there's another oddball out there with a job lot of Alternative Heroes Alternative Heroes promotional stickers, it's Billy himself who's been doing the slapping. promotional stickers, it's Billy himself who's been doing the slapping.

This established, I don't hang about. I turn and run back up the street, frantically hailing a pa.s.sing bus. I whip out my mobile and call my own number, leaving one of those ridiculous aural notes-to-self as I pelt down the Ess.e.x Road, after which I sit down for a moment and ransack my memory.

The Powerhaus gig Billy showed up at with his stack of fanzines was a fan-club-only Thieving Magpies show to launch the single "Roundpeg Squarehole" in June 1991. By this point our once enthusiastic friends.h.i.+p had completely evaporated, but I nodded at him outside the venue and strolled over to look at his creation while Alan scoffed and went inside.

I must confess my heart sank when I examined it. Evidently using Billy's brother's stationery resources to the full, Alternative Heroes Alternative Heroes had a glossy cover and proper, newspaper-style pages. Inside, Billy had combined his knowledge of music with his deeper love of comics, creating double-page strips featuring some of the alternative world's current stars: a wacky, had a glossy cover and proper, newspaper-style pages. Inside, Billy had combined his knowledge of music with his deeper love of comics, creating double-page strips featuring some of the alternative world's current stars: a wacky, Beano-style Beano-style battle between Faith No More and the Red Hot Chili Peppers, a ghostly drama concerning The Cure's Robert Smith, a seaside caper involving The Wonder Stuff, a sitcom with the Pixies as a dysfunctional American family, and on the front page a swashbuckling adventure story starring all four members of the Thieving Magpies. It was imaginative, original, witty, frequently surreal and decidedly well-constructed. In those terms at least, it was streets ahead of battle between Faith No More and the Red Hot Chili Peppers, a ghostly drama concerning The Cure's Robert Smith, a seaside caper involving The Wonder Stuff, a sitcom with the Pixies as a dysfunctional American family, and on the front page a swashbuckling adventure story starring all four members of the Thieving Magpies. It was imaginative, original, witty, frequently surreal and decidedly well-constructed. In those terms at least, it was streets ahead of Vorsprung Durch Peanut Vorsprung Durch Peanut-and Billy, of course, knew it.

"Nice 'zine, Billy," I offered.

"Thanks!" he replied, neglecting to look