Alle & Joe (and everyone else)
Jade called me a number of months ago and said, “Are you
still photographing weddings? Well, I
might be able to get you one but I want a favour in return”, “What’s the
favour?” I asked. Knowing Jade this
could be anything from lending him a tenner to giving him a hand delivering
something to China in a van. “I want a
photo shoot of the family. So do you
want the wedding gig or not?”. I would
have photographed Jades family for free anyway so with the return from the
wedding I wouldn’t be losing out. “OK,
give me the details” I said. “It’s on
the 1st November for Alle & Joe (mutual long time friends) and
you’ve got to do it for free. Right, I’ll
speak to you soon, see ya”. So not only
has he acted as a charitable agent he has also given Alle me as a wedding
present! He’s somewhat of a genius and a
cheeky little monkey.
Shortly after leaving the army all those years ago I began
playing in a band. Jade had told us that
he knew of a brilliant bass player and he introduced us to Shaun. In turn Shaun introduced us to loads of other
people, seriously cool people, independent free thinkers, people who wore tie
dye, girls who didn’t wear bra’s all the time and people who smiled and wanted
to be friendly. I have written about
meeting ‘groovy’ people in the ‘Ma & Pa’ post but these people were genuine
and proper cool, and even today I still feel a lot of love towards this
crowd.
Alle and Joe were part of that circle. I used to play in a band with Alle, she was
so playful, entertaining and lovely all the time, and she still is today. Joe, who I thought was her husband 24 years
ago, was a tall and smiley man and I have never heard a negative word leave his
mouth. They weren’t married but today
they were going to rectify that. This
wasn’t going to be a wedding with veneers, this was true happiness surrounded
by friends they loved and friends who loved them, a simple gathering of
beautiful people to celebrate the union of Alle & Joe.
Shaun lived with his girlfriend at the time, Paula. She scared me at first because she was quite
forthright but it didn’t take me long to realise how beautiful and intelligent she
was. Her best friend was Mandy, and if I
was Terry Thomas I’d be tempted to call her a beautiful creature, but it seems
quite sexist coming from my mouth. These
2 girls fell into the category of ‘the girls that sometimes didn’t wear bra’s’,
and as a single boy that had just left the army I appreciated that very
much. I would never dare say anything
that would be considered ‘lewd’ in fear of being ejected from the social
circles I was mixing in, or indeed being knocked out by a single punch from a
woman!
I was being introduced to a whole load of new
experiences. I would have dinner at
friends houses (that felt very grown up!), listened to new music, even house
music (but quite honestly, without drugs it did my fucking head in!) and the
band was starting to gig. We played our
first gig in Blackburn, a charity gig.
Our support act was a bunch of kids in a Chinese dragon thing, not very
Rock n Roll but hey! Paula’s sister
Clarey had just got married that day and she and her new husband were in the
crowd. That night we all went back to
Shaun & Paula’s to get pissed n ting and to celebrate Clarey’s wedding. They ended up sleeping on the floor at Shaun’s,
now that’s Rock n Roll!
Jude was a matriarchal character in the peer group and she used
to tell me stories that had me laughing for days. The ‘bleach of the peach’ & ‘the Rochdale
hedgehog’ are 2 stories that firmly stick in the mind. (I did tell Jude that I had posted about the
hedgehog recently but it wasn’t in this blog, I think I mailed the story to a
chap in Germany. I will post very
soon!).
Although the day was truly beautiful it did make me feel a
tad old. The last time I saw Louis, one
of Alle & Joe’s kids, I was carrying him on my shoulders during the Preston
Guild fireworks in 1992, now I was sat next to him talking about his new
baby. Diane Hutchinson was there too,
the last time I saw her was in 1986! And
there were loads more people I hadn’t seen in ages.
A truly lovely day.
"Joe n Alle" |
Comments
Post a Comment