Prince: my tribute

My Brother has just Whatsapped me a link to a story confirming Prince’s death from an overdose of painkillers. His commentary was, “What a cliche.” I can’t say I see it that way necessarily. If you’ve ever had to endure persistent pain any kind of relief seems like a blessing. I’m biased though. I thought Prince was amazing and so naturally I’ll always cut the brother a little slack.

I didn’t start out a fan though. The first time I encountered Prince I was in the bedroom of my then girlfriend’s girlfriend who lived over by Lyme Park in a very swanky abode. We four - her boyfriend was there too - had spent a lovely summer afternoon chatting and sipping lemonade. 

At some point we repaired to my girlfriend’s girlfriend’s bedroom to flick through her music collection… It was clear the afternoon was winding to a close - no-one has music taste as good as mine - and so I tuned out. I remember wondering how we were going to make the journey back to Hazel Grove: hoping that my girlfriend’s girlfriend’s Mum, who looked extraordinarily like Dudley Moore, would give us a lift, when there was a scream. A prolonged, piercing note which made me wince. What the-? It was my girlfriend emoting dramatically having unearthed a rare Prince single, namely Gotta Stop (Messin’ About). 

“Ohmygodohmygodohmygodi’lldoanythingi’llkissyourfeetpleeeeeeaaaaaseletmehavethisilovehimilovehimilovehim!” I have had many occasions to look back on my relationship with this unhinged sociopath and experience regret and not a little embarrassment. I would say this is one of the 5 highlights from that particular reel. My girlfriend’s girlfriend looked puzzled and appalled, prised my girlfriend’s clawing fingers from her left ankle and eventually said, “Yes. Sure. Have it,” shooting me a look which seemingly asked the question: “Are you that desperate for regular sex?” I was.

On the long drive home - Our Dud was a particularly cautious driver - I examined the sleeve and was repulsed by the fop in the black, groin length stay-ups, posing pouch and red scarf under his black jacket. He had brown eyes like those of a baby deer and ostentatiously relaxed hair. He looked ridiculous, but for some reason my girlfriend was still shaking with excitement, her chest heaving with emotion.

A few months later we were lying on her bed and a song came on with a truly thrilling guitar solo which threw shards of light about the darkened room. I sat up. “Who’s this?”

“Prince.”

“Are you fucking joking?”

“No. And he’s playing all of the other instruments…”

“Hmmmm…”

“What?”

“Nothing.”

A grudging respect for his musicianship was flowering, but I still had a pathological aversion to this weirdo. Perhaps a year or so later and the short-arse was playing Wembley. Fine… I’ll go if you want. Same damned thing. She’s normal. She’s normal. Prince finally appears on stage and she loses her shit. Like completely and utterly. She’s elbowing past other concert goers and security guards to get to the front whilst screaming as if someone is ripping her left ankle through the top of her skull. 

I sigh, gather her abandoned effects from her seat and make my way more politely forward. I can see her form bopping away down the front. Somehow she’s hopped a security barrier and she’s having the time of her life. I look around the venue and everyone else is too. I look at the stage and Prince, in an effortlessly stylish yellow suit with oversized buttons is doing his best James Brown impression as he teases rhythmic chords out of a Hammond organ. Occasionally he’ll pirouette, perform a push-me-pull-you with the mic stand before dropping into the splits as he cues a horn break. Holy fuck!

I look around Wembley Arena. 10,000 people are smiling as they dance to a non-stop, machine-tooled groove. It’s simply the best thing I’ve ever seen. Ever experienced. Transcendental. Magickal. He slows the proceedings just long enough for us to bear witness to him bringing his microphone to a shuddering orgasm. Oh, Lawd… I was officially a fan. I eventually split up with the crazy screamer, but for a while the only thing that kept us together as a couple was a shared affection for Prince.

Unhappy at never receiving a thin penny for either recording or shows and reluctant to tour again under the same fund-free agreement, Jayne County dispensed with my services as drummer - using the N word as the ‘phone was slammed down. I didn’t care. The live reviews confirmed what was glaringly obvious: she was the weakest link in her own band. I wanted to do something else and got together with Peter Turner who was as into KISS as me and we fulfilled our Paul Stanley and Gene Simmons songwriting fantasy. After that I played with a guitarist who was in The Fall for two weeks and then toured Europe with Vicious Rumours. Upon my return I wanted to see if I pull off a Prince and do it all on my own instead of relying on other people whose priorities and values weren't aligned with mine. 

I borrowed a keyboard and a drum machine and wrote a couple of songs which were very Prince-like in nature, drawing from his synth-heavy Minneapolis sound blueprint. One of the songs sounded like a riffed up version of Control by Janet Jackson, whilst the other was essentially a re-writing of Prince’s acclaimed B-Side, Irresistible Bitch. I took some birthday money and booked a day in what is now Courtyard Recording Studio. I played everything except the guitar which I brought in Peter Turner to play. As became de rigeur for Pete, any time he had to leave his bedroom to play his instrument he froze. It took him an unbelievable 2 and a half hours to lay down an 8 bar lead break. In order to finish the session I had to rush a little more than I wanted and cut some corners, but the lack of polish added a vibrance to the tunes which means they still sound pretty good today actually.

I searched around for musicians to bring the songs to life, which was pretty tough in Stockport, but I told everyone we were going to be so good as a live band that there was no way we wouldn’t get signed. They were my Revolution and we rehearsed hard, making sure we had harmonies, gang vocals and on point choreography which set us apart from every other band on the live circuit. We’d go down to London and blow away all these bands that we’d read about in the weekly music mags.

We started getting a lot of press ourselves and I whizzed a copy of the demo over to Dave Roberts at FM Revolver inviting him to a gig at The International. He came up to me afterwards beaming. “I’ve no idea how to describe what you do, but that’s the best gig I’ve seen in years.” He signed me on the spot. I was elated because they were the label that had released The Stone Roses’ Sally Cinnamon. So cool. 

We had a photo shoot for the EP. It was all a tad untidy with everyone dressed differently and disparately. Eventually Dave dismissed the band and instructed me to take my shirt off. That was the cover. The chaps and chapess who included: Gary on drums; my Brother on percussion; Des and Clifford on keys, Greg Curley - who I’d played with in Vicious Rumours - on guitar; Mark Pearson from Jayne County on bass; and a singer named Shairon who set her predatory sights on our ingenue drummer, were disgruntled. What can I say? I was a lithe adonis back then before the steroids (for health reasons) and the piling on of muscle, and my perfect form demanded to be captured for posterity. I didn’t see the irony at the time, but I had just become Prince on the cover of Gotta Stop (Messin’ Around).

The 3 song EP was supposed to serve as a teaser for the rip-roaring album which would feature all of my best songs including the first two songs I’d written and set closer Rock This House which ALWAYS brought the house down. The album was recorded at Twilight Studio in Salford, and sounded incredible. We'd slimmed down to a 4 piece with me handling drums and vocals and my brother playing keyboards and the live bottom end contrasted with the machine operated rhythms we'd had before. Typically, as we delivered the album to the label Dave got poached by Nude and there was no-one else at the label who got what we were doing. The lesson is, of course: never save your best stuff.

After that first Wembley gig I followed Prince and his work studiously. I saw him 15 or so times in concert and have all of his albums. Even the ultra rare Gold Nigga. When Wireless signed to EMI in addition to my pristine Beatles box set, Gordon managed to secure me a promo copy of Emancipation. 

Eventually, disillusioned with the lack of suitors and benefactors the band morphed into Shake Babies who became Damaged Gods and are now The Xtraordinary Gentlemen, but the blueprint has always been that laid down by Prince. The motivation to recreate that feeling I had when I slowly panned around Wembley Arena and then looked at the stage to watch Prince doing stuff I’ve never seen before and never will again. 

I had a quick scan of iTunes when I heard about Prince passing and found that FM Revolver had reissued the EP. Half the globe away he inspired me to believe that I could manifest a world from my own imagination and have musicians help me build a gleaming edifice that others would enjoy. 

The day after Prince’s passing my Bro’ and I (who have always channelled that louche Morris Day/Jerome Benton vibe) played our first TXG gig in ages supporting Professor Elemental and Cosmic Rays featuring Charlie Adlard (The Walking Dead). I didn’t tell anyone, but as we teased smiles from strangers and demanded their enthusiastic participation in creating a thoroughly immersive experience, that was my tribute to Prince: His Royal Badness.

I blame the parents

My Father spent the last few months of his life sitting on, and lying in, not wholly uncomfortable hospital beds waiting to see heart consultants who would stroke their chins and "Hmmmm..." a lot as they studied his file. We would fill the spaces between these disappointments with political discourse. Tragic, n'est ce pas? But I guess that's how we were able to connect. Indeed that's how we would always connect. I remember watching Saturday morning television and rooting for the Goody Cowboys against the Baddy Indians until one day he asked me: "What makes you think that the Cowboys are the Good Guys?" And that kind of changed my perspective forever. Basil Creese Senior and I would chat about politics a lot. I would read LOADS around a subject and then casually bring it up in conversation so I could dazzle him with my erudition. He, of course, would still be far better informed than me and with a perspective which would be genuinely disarming.

The last book I took to him whilst he was in Wythenshawe Hospital was Pirates and Emperors by Noam Chomsky. The central premise of this work is a story related by St. Augustine of a pirate captured by Alexander the Great, who asked him “How dare you molest the sea?” “How dare you molest the whole world?” the pirate replied. “Because I do it with a little ship only, I am called a thief; you, doing it with a great navy, are called an Emperor.” St. Augustine thought the pirate's answer was "elegant and excellent" and 1581 years after his death it still resonates as we consider the notion of "terrorism": a word whose original definition was to describe the acts of violence perpetrated by government to ensure the submission of the populace.

Basil pére read the book and was "amazed" at its power and wondered how come, if this book was in circulation and freely available, people weren't rioting in the streets. I was so pleased he had enjoyed it. I couldn't have been more elated if I'd written it myself. As I sat there feeling smug, he asked me, "Have you heard of Diego Garcia?"

"Was he on the subs bench for Brazil in the last World Cup?" I asked.

"No," he sighed wearily, and put his head back on the pillow. "If you want to know what the world is like, just look at Diego Garcia."

"Diego Garcia?"

I got a bit distracted and didn't look to research it straight away. My Father's Father, Hazel, had died whilst he (Basil Sr) and a friend were at the cinema watching Gone With The Wind, so I spent the next few days tempting fate by going to see lots of rubbish movies between visiting hours, and if Pater was ok when I got back to hospital then that meant everything was going to be all right.*

After his funeral, at which I delivered a joyful eulogy, Diego Garcia swam back into my field of vision and I decided to find out what the Big Fella was talking about.

The great John Pilger described it thus;

"There are times when one tragedy, one crime tells us how a whole system works behind its democratic facade and helps us to understand how much of the world is run for the benefit of the powerful and how governments lie. To understand the catastrophe of Iraq, and all the other Iraqs along imperial history's trail of blood and tears, one need look no further than Diego Garcia."

Diego Garcia was a British colony inhabited by the descendants of slaves who had been there for 200 years. In the 1960s the British Government leased the island to the US Military so that they could install a base which would act as a staging post for their Middle East interventions. The islanders (casually dismissed as mere "Man Fridays" and "Tarzans" by the Foreign Office) were expelled and repatriated to Mauritius, whilst successive governments perpetrated the fiction that the island had never been inhabited and that the islanders were only ever "migrant workers" meaning their rights would not come under the jurisdiction of the UN.

I mention all of this because more than 150 exiled Chagossians gathered in London about three weeks ago to call for a return to their Indian Ocean archipelago home. Sure enough a rebuttal came in the form of a piece written in the Guardian by a Pew Trust (a group who strive to "

acquaint the American people with the evils of bureaucracy and the values of a free market")

representative who asserted;

"We believe the Chagos Islands and their surrounding waters should be protected for the resources and values they have today."

And that;

"The designation of the Chagos archipelago as the world's largest fully protected marine reserve is a bright spot we should all celebrate."

So far, so ho hum. These poor chaps can't return because of the their effect on the fragile ecosystem. Notwithstanding that B52's and Stealth Bombers roar in and out of the place on an hourly basis. Nor the fact that the recent Wikileaks controversy highlighted this as a mere strategy of obfuscation;

Friday, 15 May 2009, 07:00

C O N F I D E N T I A L LONDON 001156

NOFORN

SIPDIS

EO 12958 DECL: 05/13/2029

TAGS MARR, MOPS, SENV, UK, IO">IO">IO, MP, EFIS, EWWT, PGOV, PREL

SUBJECT: HMG FLOATS PROPOSAL FOR MARINE RESERVE COVERING

THE CHAGOS ARCHIPELAGO (BRITISH INDIAN OCEAN TERRITORY)

REF: 08 LONDON 2667 (NOTAL)

Classified By: Political Counselor Richard Mills for reasons 1.4 b and d

Summary

More than 2,000 islanders were evicted during the Cold War to make way for a huge US military base. The islanders have fought a long battle to be allowed to return. British Foreign Office and American officials discuss plans to establish a marine park on Diego Garcia and the surrounding islands, which they say would effectively end the islanders resettlement claims.

Read related article

1. (C/NF) Summary. HMG would like to establish a "marine park" or "reserve" providing comprehensive environmental protection to the reefs and waters of the British Indian Ocean Territory (BIOT), a senior Foreign and Commonwealth Office (FCO) official informed Polcouns on May 12. The official insisted that the establishment of a marine park -- the world's largest -- would in no way impinge on USG use of the BIOT, including Diego Garcia, for military purposes. He agreed that the UK and U.S. should carefully negotiate the details of the marine reserve to assure that U.S. interests were safeguarded and the strategic value of BIOT was upheld. He said that the BIOT's former inhabitants would find it difficult, if not impossible, to pursue their claim for resettlement on the islands if the entire Chagos Archipelago were a marine reserve. End Summary.

Diego Garcia is a tragedy which has been exacerbated by British governments of all hues. Luckily for us and our insistence on the right NOT to know. Anything. The coverage of this affair remains

virtually non existent in western mainstream media. Servitude to power regularly wears the cloak of silence and the fight of the Chagossians is a very good example of this.

Back in 1982, just before the Argentinians claimed the Falkland Islands, Mrs Thatcher's government made the first conciliatory move for 17 years; the Chagossians received approximately half of what they were due in compensation to allow them to rehouse in Mauritius. The British public were made aware of the Falkland Islands and the people who inhabited them whilst at the same time the Chagosians remained resolutely "unpeople". Anonymous and abandoned.

If you knew nothing about Diego Garcia, don't sweat it. Blame your parents.

* When the end came my brother was in the cinema watching Hellboy.