Keeping alive the glorious spirit of 1976
There was something else about 1974, and thereabouts, which deserves a mention. Those who, like me, first discovered pop music when it was at its glammiest, in my case during the peak Slade-Sweet-Glitter era of 1972-73, felt just a twinge of disconcertment when the genre seemed to tweak itself in the direction of 1950s nostalgia a year or so later.
Continue Reading. Anybody who remembers the 1970s will recall the sense of stark fear that pervaded during the Cold War, when the West and the Soviet Union fought proxy battles around the world and faced off behind their respective formidable nuclear arsenals. Everyone knew that if the balloon went up there would be no winner, and […]
Continue ReadingI first saw Concorde fly over my home in 1970. I was eight years of age, and the Anglo-French supersonic jetliner was landing at London’s Heathrow airport, under the flightpath of whose Runway 28-Left my Isleworth home was located. My late father, who saw it too, was unconvinced. He told me it was a Vulcan […]
Continue Reading. On 13th December 1975 my own team, Brentford, then plying their trade in English league football’s fourth tier, won a comfortable 2-0 victory at the appropriately named Plough Lane, home of non-league Wimbledon, in the second round of the FA Cup. I attended the match with my mate Tim, in whose company I would […]
Continue ReadingThe scene is set with a reminder that 1897 is Queen Victoria’s Diamond Jubilee year and, needless to say, for the children who were to become the first pupils at the brand new Worple Road Infant School in Isleworth this was an occasion like not many other. On March 1st of that year they took up their places at the school, resplendent as it was with all the latest technology in the form of gas lamps and coal fires.
Continue ReadingHoly Holy is led by Mick “Woody” Woodmansey, the legendary drummer and sole surviving member of The Spiders From Mars, the quartet fronted by David Bowie during his Ziggy Stardust period in the early 1970s. The band’s description of itself as a “supergroup” is audacious and assertive, but entirely justified. I’ve seen a whole bunch of tribute bands, some of them very good, but this is something so immeasurably different as to be off the scale.
Continue ReadingOnce again from the pen of my former primary school teacher Ken Noakes has issued forth a gem to keep alive the most precious of memories – those earliest years spent at primary school, in my case the eponymous Worple Road School in Isleworth.
Continue ReadingBook enthusiast Fiona McVie (left) has been interviewing authors for many years. Her blog Authorsinterviews is a rich resource for anybody who wants to learn a bit more about the people behind the stories, so it was my great pleasure to respond to her questions when we communicated last week.
Continue ReadingTo begin with this book was an easy sell to me because I find myself enchanted by the seventies in general and by anything to do with 1976 in particular. So a simple glance at the title made it a must-buy. When I discovered that it was set on the Isle of Wight, not only in a town but actually around a street with which I am very familiar (for it has been the venue of countless family holidays in more recent years), my complete and undivided attention was assured.
Continue ReadingTony Visconti looked up at me as I approached the table behind which he was sitting with a welcoming expression, and what appeared at least to be a genuine willingness to engage me in conversation and an eagerness to be helpful in answering any questions I might have had for him.
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