Necrophenia (3 page)

The school hall smelled of plimsolls.

In the days of which I write, all school halls smelled of plimsolls. Plimsolls and the armpits of the young. Not that I have a preoccupation with armpits, or with the smells thereof. Don’t get me wrong – I mentioned mine in an earlier chapter because they were smelly. I mention armpits again now only because the school hall smelled of them.

Nothing sinister. Nothing weird. Please don’t get me wrong.

The school hall also smelled of teenage girls. And that is a smell most men of the heterosexual persuasion… warm to, as it were.

The Sumerian Kynges were warming to that smell. Which wasn’t easy as we were waiting to go on stage in the school kitchen. We had glammed ourselves up in the boys’ bog and now we stood, shuffling nervously (but looking cool), scuffing our winged heels (I would describe those but I don’t have time) and cradling our instruments.

And warming to the smell of teenage girls.

Whilst having our nostrils assailed by the stench of rotten cabbage. Why all school kitchens always smelled of rotten cabbage is anyone’s guess. Our school cook, Mrs Simian, never even served us cabbage, rotten or otherwise.

But I digress.

Well, no I do not. I am setting the scene.

I set this scene because it is important to do so. I really do want you to know just what this was like. It is a long time ago now, but the memory remains fresh, whilst many others have long ago grown rotten.

Like cabbage.

The school kitchen was painted in cream gloss paint, which made the walls look like slabbed butter. The utensils were huge. And this is not due to the fact that we are smaller when young, so everything seems big. These were big utensils, seemingly borrowed – or stolen – from a giant’s castle. The utensils were huge and the pots, great aluminium jobbies in which the foodstuffs boiled and gurgled over flaming gas, were of similarly gargantuan proportions. You could have got a whole sheep into any one of those great aluminium jobbies. Or a pig. Or a horse. If you sawed the hoofs off.

And then there were the school plates. Thick white china. And you never saw one get chipped, or cracked, or broken. Even when you dropped them – accidentally, of course. As I so regularly did. Just to see, as it were. Just to see.

The plates rose in giddy stacks, in racks to the left of the butlers’ sinks. Fine old stoneware butlers’ sinks, where Mrs Simian and her harridan horde of dinner ladies (whom I, for one, felt absolutely certain constituted a coven of witches, if ever there was one) lathered up and dug in deep.

The forks were shabby, though.

But then forks always are. It takes great care and attention and dedication, too, to clean scrupulously between the tines. And I have to confess that I have, on numerous occasions over the years, had to send my fork back to the kitchen because it had been insufficiently lathered-up.

So yes, from the kitchen, the grim cream-glossed school kitchen.

Into the brightly lit hall.

That smelled of plimsolls and also of young women.

And no more mention of armpits.

The end-of-term school dance was a major event. The major event in the minds of many. These minds belonging in part, if not all, to fifth-year boys who were leaving school that month.

It would be the last opportunity to pull at school.

At a school dance where it was free admission. Unlike dances and discos to come. Naturally there were other major events – sports days, open evenings, exams. But curiously, I for one never had the faintest interest in any of these.

Into the brightly lit hall.

Brightly lit and brightly décored, too. Every year a theme was chosen by a committee formed of prefects. And therefore, in my humble opinion, hardly a representative committee. This sleek elite would sit about in their common room; oh yes, they had a common room, although only a small one, which doubled as the band room. But they would sit about on the Cameo Mason Celebrated Percussion Safe and choose the theme.

This year the theme was Space Travel.

Last year the theme had been Space Travel. As it had been the year before. I was informed that this year the prefects had actually chosen Women of the Orinoco Basin as the theme.

But it had ended up as Space Travel. As it always did.

Because Mr Jenner, the music teacher, who let the prefects use the band room as their common room, always had the casting vote.

And Mr Jenner really loved the subject of Space Travel.

And so it was a brightly lit and lavishly décored Space-Travel-themed school hall that The Sumerian Kynges had now entered, through the door that led to the school kitchen. And it was a full and crowded hall. And there were a lot of teenage girls amongst this crowd. And I knew, just knew, in my rock ’n’ roll heart, that they were just dying to get a piece of The Sumerian Kynges.

Although, of course, they were not, as yet, aware of this.

And so the scene is as set as it can be.

And Mr Jenner mounts the steps.

These steps are those that rise to the left-hand side of the stage (looking from the audience, that is). The very top step is quite small. Mr Jenner often commented that this was ‘one small step for a man’, but happily not tonight.

To those who viewed him upon this night, Mr Jenner was not a God amongst Men. He was, in the common parlance of the day, a bit of a short-arse. And, in secondary school terms, one of the very last of his kind – ex-RAF, with medals to prove it, tweedy and ink-stained, given to mortar boards and scholars’ gowns. Always with sheaves of music tucked under his arm. A hurler of chalk dusters. The man who conducted the choir. His head was too big and his feet were too small and he smiled when he spoke of Space Travel.

There was a mic up on that stage. The school microphone. It was a Telefunken U Forty-Seven. Every school had one of those. A few years later, no school had one, because with the rise of the minicab, the Telefunken U Forty-Seven had a penchant for picking up the signals of the cab offices and broadcasting directions for cabbies, to the great merriment of assembled students.

I was just dying to sing into that mic. We’d had to rehearse micless, and there was to be no amplification other than that mic, which meant that I was going to have to hold it near Toby’s uke when he did his big solo.

Fearing as we all did that Mr Jenner would announce us as ‘the school pop group’ or something equally uncool, Rob had penned an introduction that would introduce, as it were, the term ‘Rock God’ into popular culture.

That one, I note, lasted. While the other one – ‘Cheese God’ – apparently did not.

Mr Jenner walked up to that mic and tap-tap-tapped upon it. If something was to be achieved by this tapping, we, cowering (uncoolly, if I remember) all beside the stage steps, didn’t hear it.

‘Ladies and gentlemen,’ he began. The crowd went ‘boo’ and ‘hiss’. Not the kind of thing you could get away with on a school day. But this wasn’t a school day. This was the school dance.

‘Calm down. Calm down.’ Mr Jenner affected a light-hearted mien. ‘I know you’ve all come here to let off a little steam.’ We watched Mr Jenner from the side of the stage. He was going to read out Rob’s introduction, wasn’t he? He had stuck it straight into his trouser pocket when Rob had given it to him. He hadn’t even read it through. And now-

Mr Jenner did not take the introduction from his trouser pocket. He had words of his own to say.

‘These young gentlemen have rehearsed very hard,’ said Mr Jenner, ‘and I know that you are really going to shake, rattle and roll to their happening sounds. Please give them a really big hep-cat welcome: the school pop group, The Rolling Stones.’

I looked at Neil. And Neil looked at me. And Neil looked at Rob and Rob looked at Toby and Toby in turn looked at me.

‘I’ll get him for that,’ said Toby. ‘You just see if I don’t.’

The Rolling Stones weren’t that bad, I suppose.

Because, after all, it was their first ever gig.

The one that never gets a mention in biographies, authorised or otherwise. The one with the original line-up. With Wild Man Fosby on tea-chest bass and Mick Jagger’s sister on uke.

And Bill Wyman on uke. And Mick Jagger on uke and vocals.

My uke. And my microphone.

In case the reader is experiencing some degree of confusion here, allow me to explain, for it was my intention to create this confusion in the hope that it would in some way mirror the confusion that I and my fellow members of The Sumerian Kynges found ourselves in at the time.

We thought that Mr Jenner had simply got the name of our band wrong when he was introducing us. But not a bit of that. He wasn’t introducing us at all. He was introducing The Rolling Stones. A band that he had himself been coaching in the evenings. With the ukuleles that we rehearsed with during school time.

And Mick and Keith and Brian and Mick’s sister pushed right past us on the left-hand stage steps (looking from the audience), snatching our ukes from our hands as they did so.

We were not pleased about this at all.

Toby was in a blue funk!
[6]

‘I’ll kill one of them,’ he said. And he pointed to one of The Stones at random. Brian Jones, I believe it was. ‘I’ll kill him!’ said Toby.

Rob made calming gestures with his ukeless fingers. ‘It will all be all right,’ he told Toby. ‘They can be our warm-up act. Get the crowd going. Remember, they’re on before us. They are our support band.’

Toby thought about this. And so did Neil and so did I. I don’t know exactly what conclusions the others drew, but I was happy enough to have The Rolling Stones as my support act.

And so we stood and we waited. In the shadows beside the brightly lit stage. And we watched The Rolling Stones.

They were an R & B band then. In the days when R & B meant R & B. As opposed to whatever it is that R & B means nowadays. Which is not the same thing at all. So to speak. So The Rolling Stones did quite a lot of the blues.

They did ‘Love in Vain’, the Robert Johnson classic. And they did some Chuck Berry. They did ‘Johnny B. Goode’. And that is a classic.

They didn’t do any George Formby at all. Which I personally felt was a shame. I thought they missed a golden opportunity there, what with such an abundance of ukes and everything. But I didn’t really care. We had plenty of George Formby numbers in our repertoire. In fact, we were almost exclusively a Formby-orientated rock ’n’ roll band.

‘I notice,’ noticed Neil, ‘and I notice that I did not notice this before, that Michael has quite long hair. It covers his ears and also his school-shirt collar.’

We nodded.

‘Your point is?’ Toby asked.

‘Long hair is for girlies, surely,’ said Rob. ‘Long hair, well shampooed, “because you’re worth it”, so to speak.’

‘I think I’ll try and grow mine,’ said Neil. ‘Just to see how it looks.’

‘You will look like Guy Fawkes,’ said Toby. ‘You are already the only schoolboy I know who sports a goatee beard. Do not add to your notoriety by styling your hair like that of an effeminate anti-parliamentarian. ’

‘I don’t wish to look like some Muff Mary Ellen. I’ll shave my head tomorrow,’ said Neil. ‘Just to be on the safe side.’

And he did.

And in so doing unconsciously invented a look that would later find favour with The Village People.

‘I do hate to say this,’ said Rob, ‘but The Rolling Stones are rather cool. Although it is a rubbish name for a band. They’re playing a lot of Robert Johnson – they should have some sort of Demonic name, but with a bit of a regal quality to it, like ours.’

‘Their Satanic Majesties,’ Toby suggested.

‘Don’t be silly,’ said Rob.

And then suddenly The Rolling Stones had finished. We didn’t clap them, of course. How uncool would that have been? Neither did we cheer. Not that we could have cheered had we wanted to.

You see, we’d had to talk quite loudly while The Rolling Stones had been playing. Shout, really, in order to make ourselves heard. So we had rather sore throats. Which would not help my performance.

The Rolling Stones came off stage to considerable applause, and we Sumerian Kynges suddenly found ourselves in the midst of a bit of a crush. Most of the teenage schoolgirls of Southcross Road School ’s fourth and fifth years seemed rather anxious to make the personal acquaintance of Michael and his band. We found ourselves getting all pushed about. But we did get our ukes thrust back into our hands, so we elbowed our way onstage.

And Mr Jenner wasn’t there. He’d gone. Left the stage by some other steps. Steps we knew not of. And that was the last time I saw Mr Jenner. He vanished mysteriously quite soon after that.

I always wondered what became of him. Nothing good, I hope. Some years after that, when The Rolling Stones became famous (and yes, of course I know what happened to them), I saw a photo of them standing with their manager Andrew Oldham. And I recall thinking that if Andrew took off the sunglasses that he always wore, he’d look the dead spit of Mr Jenner.

Whatever. Because we were now on the stage.

And I ‘one-twoed’ with vigour into that mic.

And I introduced the band as the Rock Gods that we were. Or soon would be. And I counted in our first number. And we played. How we played.

And I’ll bet, just bet, that if there had been anyone left in the school hall, anyone who had not followed The Rolling Stones out into the playground, where they were apparently signing autographs and deciding which fourth- and fifth-year girls they would be taking on elsewhere, then I bet, just bet, that had there been anyone remaining to watch us play, then that someone would have been really impressed by our musicianship and stagecraft. Even though my vocal renditions were a tad countertenor-ish.

But there wasn’t and we played to an empty hall.

And when we were done, Toby reiterated his intention to kill one of The Rolling Stones. ‘Drown his head in a bucket’ being the expression that he used.

‘I’m thinking,’ said Rob as he retuned his ukulele, for he had done some fearsome finger-work, ‘I’m thinking that perhaps I am not cut out for the crazy world of rock ’n’ roll. I am thinking that I might just go into advertising and become a copywriter.’

‘Not quite so fast,’ said Toby. ‘Playing to an empty hall is part of paying our dues. It will not happen again, you have my promise on this. And let’s look on the bright side – the fact that the hall was empty means that no one will ever know how truly rubbish we were.’

I looked at Neil and Neil looked at me and Neil looked at Rob and et cetera and et cetera.

‘We were pretty rubbish, weren’t we?’ said Rob.

‘We were excruciating,’ said Neil.

‘I was good,’ said I.

‘You were the most rubbish of all,’ the blighters said. In unison.

‘Perhaps I could go into copywriting also,’ I said.

‘You’d be rubbish at that, too,’ said Rob.

‘So where does this leave us?’ I asked.

‘It leaves you, gentlemen, with a most exciting option.’

Now, I never said that, and nor did Neil and nor did Rob and nor did Toby. And nor did Mr Jenner, nor any of The Rolling Stones, nor any of the fourth- or fifth-year girls of Southcross Road. Nor even Mrs Simian the school cook, nor her weird sisters of the kitchen cauldrons.

‘Who said that?’ asked Rob. ‘Or Who’s Next, as I might put it, if it were an album, or something.’

‘Allow me to introduce myself,’ said a gentleman. For surely indeed this was a gentleman. He stepped from the shadows at the rear of the brightly lit hall. The left-hand side, when looking, as we were, from the stage.

‘Looks like a man of wealth and taste,’ Rob whispered to me, as I was standing closest to him.

‘Who are you, sir?’ I asked.

‘Call me Ishmael,’ said Ishmael. ‘Mr Ishmael,’ said Mr Ishmael. ‘I liked your performance.’

‘You did?’ I was puzzled by this. To say the very least.

‘Perhaps he’s a homo,’ whispered Rob. ‘They’ll say anything in order to get a bit of youthful bottom.’

And then Rob said no more. He sort of clutched at his throat and sort of fainted dead away. And all we Sumerian Kynges hastened to ignore Rob’s plight and see what Mr Ishmael’s ‘most exciting option’ might be.

‘You are not, by any chance, the owner of a vast cheese empire?’ Neil asked Mr Ishmael.

‘Why do you ask me that?’ the other replied.

‘Because Rob has fainted. I’m asking on his behalf.’

‘Ah,’ said Mr Ishmael. ‘I see.’

‘Glad that someone does,’ said I.

‘The Sumerian Kynges,’ said Mr Ishmael. ‘I like the name. It is very – how shall I put this? – meaningful.’

Our young heads went nod-nod-nod. Here, it was clear, was an adult who was on our wavelength.

He had now stepped fully from the shadows, and we were able to have a really good look at Mr Ishmael. The hall being so brightly lit, and everything.

He was very, very smart, was Mr Ishmael.

He was tall. In a way that transcends the way that the famous are tall. Because the famous are, in truth, rarely if ever tall. The famous are mostly short, but look tall because they are famous. And one naturally feels that famous folk must somehow be tall, and so we invest them with a quality of tallness, which mostly belies their shorthood.

Such is ever the way.

But Mr Ishmael was naturally tall. He topped the magic six-foot mark with ease. And he had the big barrel chest of an all-in wrestler. And the barrel chest and the rest of his parts were encased (with the obvious exception of head, neck, hands and feet) within a sumptuously expensive blue velvet suit. His hair was black and all slicked back.

His complexion tanned, his cheekbones high, there was an oriental cast to his features, but it was impossible to put a place to the look. He leaned upon a black Malacca cane that had as its head a silver penis and a pair of balls.

It was a notable cane.

‘I do not like your music,’ said Mr Ishmael. ‘And believe you me, the ukulele has seen out its days. But I discern potential and I would be prepared to finance you, to the tune of appropriate instrumentation. ’

‘And new stage clothes?’ asked Neil. ‘I’m not too sure about these sequins.’

‘The sequins stay,’ said Mr Ishmael. ‘I just adore the sequins.’

And he twirled his cane and tapped it thricely on the floor.

‘Instrumentation?’ said Toby.

‘Electric guitars. Amplifiers. A PA. A stack system.’

‘A what?’

‘All in good time. I think – in fact, I know – that you have the seeds of greatness. Sown, as it were, and yet to be reaped. A field of gold, as it were, also.’

The us upon stage that were conscious did further lookings at each other.

‘Serious?’ said Neil.

‘Serious,’ said Mr Ishmael. ‘I will manage you. Promote you. I will make your names household words.’

‘I’d like that,’ said Neil (whose surname was Dishwasher).

‘What is your surname?’ Mr Ishmael asked of Neil.

‘Garden-Partee,’ said Neil. (Whose surname was not really Dishwasher.) ‘It’s hyphenated. We’re a hyphenation, but we have no money to go with it.’

‘But you will. You will.’ And Mr Ishmael approached the stage. And as he did so, a certain coldness approached with him. A certain chill in the air.

‘So,’ said Mr Ishmael. ‘Will you let me take you to fame and fortune? What do you say?’

And what did we say?

Well, we said yes, didn’t we? Because what else were we likely to say? And Mr Ishmael produced a contract for us to sign, didn’t he? Well, of course he did. And we all signed it, didn’t we? Well, of course we did that also. We even moved Rob’s unconscious hand on his behalf. And we signed in blood?

Well, that goes without saying, really, doesn’t it?

And so, upon that night, the night of our very first gig, we, unwittingly, but greedily and without thought of any potentially disastrous consequences, signed away God alone knows what to Mr Ishmael and played our part in bringing the world and the universe to the point where I would almost save Mankind. Almost.

What a carve-up, eh?