PSST gig and arrests are made

 

I had just come back from three months working in Greece. No sooner had my feet touched Rhyl soil than I found myself back in the chaos — onstage with Psycho Sexual Sex Terrestrials at the Bistro.

The band were already in bits before I even walked in. Robin was pissed, Paul was pissed, Jon and Scott were pissed. Dean, ex–Dam Yankee, was holding it together on rhythm guitar, while Hot Scott was doubling up on bass. I clambered up and joined them for Kennedy and Distance, hammering the bass and generally wrecking the place. The set was a shambles — Robin broke two strings and just carried on regardless, Dean stopped mid-song to bollock Scott for fucking up, and I threw myself into what a reviewer described as a typical demonic Crud performance.

But the gig was a blast. A sweaty, chaotic mess of music, broken strings, shouting, and laughter. It was also the last time the Bistro allowed live music for quite some time. We burned it down in spirit, if not in flames.

The after-show was pure carnage. Paul was trying to juggle not one but two girlfriends — both sat at the same table, glaring daggers, while one of them, soon to be his wife and mother of his child, tried not to combust. The whole band was spiralling into chaos, fuelled by drink and bravado.

Leaving the gig, things got darker. Dean was assaulted outside, which sent Paul, Robin, and Jon — who doubled as a Special Constable — into vigilante mode. Dean spotted one of the culprits, so Jon screeched his car to a halt, leaving the engine running and doors wide open, Robin drunk in the back seat. Dean, Paul, and Jon bolted after the lad, Jon arresting him in full Special Constable glory.

But when they returned to the car, it was gone. Vanished. Robin, in his drunken wisdom, had decided to “help” by moving it out of the road to avoid an accident. Unfortunately, he moved it straight into the path of a police car.

The cops saw he was pissed and hauled him out. Robin, furious at not being recognised as the upstanding citizen he believed he was, kicked off. He lashed out at the officers, smashed the windows of their van, and earned himself seven charges: assault, destruction of police property, drunk driving, no insurance — the full house.

The entire band somehow ended up in the police station, joined by one of Paul’s girlfriends who had just discovered the other one existed. She was screaming, “I hope you catch fucking AIDS!” at the top of her lungs while Robin raged in his cell. The police even tried to confiscate the video of the gig to use as evidence. They didn’t get it.

By some miracle — maybe because Jon was a Special Constable, maybe because Robin had some kind of luck lodged in his bones — he walked away lighter than he should have.

It was a hell of a welcome home for me. Three months in Greece, then straight back to Rhyl, straight into the heart of the storm.

Day 78: Frankfurt to Paris - Training Thoughts

 

Train journeys are strange social experiments — quiet, confined hours spent in close proximity to total strangers, where everyone pretends not to be watching everyone else.

But of course, everyone is watching.

It’s the ritual of the observer: staring discreetly at the person opposite, then darting your eyes away the moment they make contact. It’s a subtle dance — as much a part of train travel as the ticket punch or the low rumble of the wheels.

Say what you will about the continent, but at least European trains run on time. They're clean, punctual, and notably free of graffiti like “MUFC 4EVA” or “Shaz 4 Darren” scratched into the toilet mirror. The air doesn’t reek of stale lager, and there's no sticky floor beneath your boots.

And the fares? Mercifully cheaper than back home.

Leaving Frankfurt, I settled in for the long haul to Paris — a journey made bearable by what I like to think of as seat-side theatre. You don’t need a book when the carriage offers an entire cast of characters.

---

The People-Watching Game

Across from me sat a middle-aged German woman, travelling with a small group who spoke in that soft-yet-stern tone peculiar to those born under heavy Teutonic skies. What fascinated me wasn’t what she said — I understood almost none of it — but her face.

Her neck was so broad that it was difficult to tell where her chin stopped and her face began. Even more captivating: at some point in her life, she had taken the time to painstakingly pluck every individual eyebrow hair… and then drawn them back on with all the elegance of a geometry set. Thin, arched, deliberate — like twin commas hovering above blank expression.

---

🎒 Enter the English

Around 25 people boarded with me in Frankfurt — all of them in hiking boots and ridiculous matching yellow hats, the kind children wear on school trips to make them easier to count.

They shuffled along the corridor, chirping their beige little sentences at each other.

“What time does the train leave, Roger?”

“Isn’t this a beautiful station?”

Ah yes, I thought — only the English could look that daft abroad. And sure enough, I picked up the accent as they passed.

Still, they were right about the station. Frankfurt Hauptbahnhof is nothing if not beautiful — all steel, glass, and sweeping arches. A far cry from the grime of Rhyl or the existential despair of Crewe.

---

Roland’s Germany

Earlier in the day, Roland (my German acquaintance with something of a vendetta against his homeland) had said to me with venom:

“Welcome to Germany. Look at all the nice people in their nice cars. Look how everything has to be in order. Not a thing out of place.”

To him, Germany’s obsession with order was suffocating.

To me, coming from the grey sludge of British public spaces — broken ticket machines, gum-stained pavements, bins overflowing with chip wrappers — it was reassuring.

You begin to notice just how filthy some parts of Britain are only after you leave them.

---

🎫 The Journey

There’s something therapeutic about a long train ride across Europe. The world rolls past your window like a slow film. Forests become suburbs, suburbs fade into farmland. People board. People leave.

And all the while, you're sitting there — between languages, between countries, between lives — pretending not to stare at the woman with the marker-pen eyebrows while quietly judging people in yellow hats.

---

Next stop: Paris.

Let’s hope the eyebrows stay behind in Germany.

Day 77: Ancona - Innsbruck - Bad Kissengen

 

After crawling through customs at the port of Ancona, I found myself once again at a crossroads — quite literally. With no onward ticket, no plan other than to head to Paris, and no real idea which direction to walk, my first task was to find north. The hope, as always, was to hitch a lift. I gave it a long hour by the roadside, standing in the Italian dust watching indifferent Fiats and overloaded lorries fly past. Just as I was ready to admit defeat and trudge back to the station in search of a train, fate intervened.

A VW campervan pulled up beside me. Inside were Roland and his girlfriend, Jutla — total strangers — who saw me stranded and took pity. Not just a short ride up the road, but all the way to Bad Kissengen in North Bavaria.

I climbed in, grateful and slightly dazed, and off we went — up the spine of Italy, across the Alps, and into Germany.

---

☁️ The Road North: Ravioli, Radios and the Return of Cold Air

We lunched on ravioli, shared stories, and cruised to a soundtrack of decent music. As the day wore on, we approached the Italian–Austrian border, stopping briefly to change money — where, for the first time in nearly three months, I felt the cold.

After a Greek summer of sweat, sun, and dust, that crisp alpine air was almost a shock. We passed through Brenner Pass, the mountains folding up around us, and caught sight of the massive Europabrücke (Europe Bridge) just before Innsbruck — an epic, sky-slicing piece of engineering, stretched above valleys and treetops. Roland pointed out a castle nestled at the foot of the mountains: once the only access through the Alps during winter, before motorways and flyovers came along.

---

🍺 A Bavarian Detour and a Pub Full of Cowboys

By 9 pm we reached a junction, and Roland turned to me and asked, “Left or right?” I shrugged and said left, and off we went — a spontaneous detour to Nusdorf, deep in southern Bavaria.

We parked up and headed into a local pub. It was packed with loud, beer-throated Bavarians — and when we walked in, it was like a Western: everyone stopped talking and stared at us. Roland leaned over and muttered, "That’s just how Bavarians are..."

The place was brilliant. Proper food, deep wooden booths, and best of all — real beer. Not the bottled Amstel I’d been drinking in Kythera for the past three months, but deep, earthy Bavarian lager. The kind that tastes like someone actually cares about it.

“More beer?” Roland asked after our first pint, and it didn’t take much convincing. Four pints later, I fell asleep in the back of the van, full, warm, and happily worn out.

---

🌧️ Nuremberg, Rain & a Midnight Rescue

We made a brief stop in Nuremberg, then continued north as night fell and the rain came down. Sometime in the early hours, Roland and Jutla gently woke me. We’d reached Bad Kissingen, a spa town in northern Bavaria. They didn’t want to leave me on the side of a motorway in the cold and dark, so they put me up at their flat, insisting I sleep properly.

We arrived at 4:30 in the morning, the kind of hour where streets are empty and the world feels paused. I crawled onto their comfy couch, grateful beyond words.

---

🧭 From Coastline to Castles

In a single day and night, I’d gone from Mediterranean coastline to alpine valleys, from staring hopelessly at a road in Ancona to sipping Bavarian beer in a pub where the walls practically smelled of history.

It’s the kind of journey you can’t plan — the kind that only happens when you’re travelling light, saying yes, and following strangers into the next story.

---

📍 Route:

Italy: Ancona → Bologna → Brenner Pass

Austria: Innsbruck

Germany: Nusdorf → Nuremberg → Bad Kissingen

Day 74: Leaving Kythera

 

The wind howled across Kythera this morning, the kind of gale that shakes shutters and whips the sea into a frenzy. For a while I thought it was fate’s way of keeping me anchored to the island, perhaps for another week. The ferries rarely challenge such weather, and with the island battered from all sides it felt like the Aegean itself wanted me to stay.

I hitched first to Potamos and then on to Agia Pelagia, expecting to find the port in lockdown, no boats daring to brave the waves. But at the Martha booking office the young woman behind the desk reassured me with a smile—it wouldn’t be Pelagia today but the more sheltered harbour at Kapsali. A ferry would leave at 5:30 p.m. Hope restored, I had a few hours to gather my scattered belongings and say my farewells.

Up at the Vouno I collected my pack, said goodbye to Cheryl, and left a note for Wayne before taking the winding road back down to Pelagia. I lingered there over lunch with an Australian teacher, though her conversation never strayed far from smoking joints and late nights. The sort of girl, I thought, you’d fall into bed with at a party and slip away from before morning.

The road carried me onward. Two Aussies gave me a lift as far as Aroniadika, then a Greek driver took me further—his car enlivened by an unlikely passenger: a London rasta with a Jamaican lilt and his Oxford-based girlfriend. Strange combinations, chance encounters; it seemed fitting as my Kytherian chapter closed.

At 6:15 p.m. the ferry pulled away from Kapsali. I stood on deck as the whitewashed villages and craggy hills slipped into the distance, swallowed by the dusk. Did I regret leaving? I wasn’t sure. Three months of steady work, food, and a bed had given me comfort and routine—but comfort can quickly turn to confinement. Out there lay uncertainty, hunger, nights without shelter… and freedom.

By the time we docked at Neapoli I had company again: the rasta, whom I dubbed “Peter Tosh,” and Marie, his girlfriend. They’d just been searched by the police and assumed it was racial harassment. But minutes later I was pulled aside too—their real quarry, it seemed, was a German causing trouble somewhere in town.

The night ended not with triumph but with fatigue. Hitching toward Sparti was hopeless; no cars stopped. I bought some bread and cheese and made do with a corner of an unfinished hotel as my bed. The stone was cold, the air damp, but I had crossed the water.

800 drachmas lighter, but one island heavier in memories, I had left Kythera.

Day 69: Kythera - Jackhammers, Postcards & Soviet Breakups

 

Location: Kythera, Greece

Some days on Kythera unfold gently — those extremely strong and sweet Greek coffees in the sun, a breeze from the sea, a bit of hitchhiking to somewhere stunning. Today was not one of those days.

By 7am, I was back on the building site, bleary-eyed and barely functional. My shift ran through to 2:30pm and concluded with a solid 45 minutes wrestling with three donkeys. They were only marginally more cooperative than the tools.

Not an hour after regaining consciousness from a sleep that almost took me to the other side, I found myself clutching a pneumatic jackhammer, cracking through rock under the already punishing sun. Kythera may be a Greek island paradise, but today it felt more like a quarry and "Trial by Heatstroke." But shit happens, and I know you lose pieces of yourself — and find new ones too.

The jobsite is ruled (if that’s the word) by Dieter, the mad German who looks more alarmingly like the Kaiser everyday and acts like someone with a nervous breakdown permanently pending. Today’s drama? Lambraki (Λαμπράκης) — one of the local lads — made a major construction blunder. Fortunately, Dieter spotted it just as the day ended, narrowly sparing us his full Teutonic fury.

Still, it's only a matter of time. The man is juggling too much, barking orders, flying off the handle, and generally spiralling. If anyone's going to spontaneously combust out here, it’s him. In a strange way, I almost admire the spectacle.

On the gentler side of life: I got a lovely postcard from Mum and a letter from Nain and Bob — always a boost. There’s something grounding about seeing handwriting from home when you're thousands of miles away swinging jackhammers. 

Wayne, meanwhile, received a copy of the Daily Telegraph in the post. Holding a British broadsheet in the middle of the Aegean felt surreal — like a telegram from another planet. But it’s good to get some context about the wider world again, albeit from a right wing perspective.

🌍 Elsewhere in the World

History's in motion:

Six republics of the Soviet Union have now declared independence — Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Armenia, Azerbaijan, and Ukraine. Even on a small island like Kythera, the tremors of global change are being felt. It feels like the world is shifting, and here I am up a mountain with a hammer, dirt in my lungs, and sweat in my eyes. 

💸 Island Finances & Currency Shenanigans

I'm trading 15,000 drachma for $100 AUD with Martina — a cheeky little exchange rate hack that nets me the equivalent of £4. Not much, but here, every drachma counts. Between beers, bread, and borrowed time, we live off scraps and sunshine.

Sitting at Cafe Faros this evening, I heard English accents, very uncommon in these parts. I didn't latch on that I could speak their language, but ear-wigged their conversation;:

“I think feminists are women who can’t achieve orgasm.”

Ha ha - Everyone’s got a theory when the beer’s cold and the sun’s set.

My hair is now so full of dust it's forming natural dreadlocks. I might be mistaken for a Rasta if not for the accent (when I'm not pretending to be Greek) and industrial boots.

Emotionally, the homesickness creeps in quietly. I’ve made my decision not to return to Wales — at least not right away — but there’s a pull. I miss the family, especially little Daniel.

And in a final note of schadenfreude: Rupert Murdoch reportedly lost £187 million last year through his newspaper empire.

Ha ha ha.

There’s something soothing about rich people losing money while I count drachmas and barter my way through the Aegean summer.

Day 41: Kythera - Hard Labour, Cold Beers, and Long Walks

 

The alarm dragged me out of a restless sleep at 5:25am — the kind of sleep where you’re never fully under, just hovering in half-dreams. I threw on my raggy shorts and even raggier t-shirt, grabbed two big tomatoes for breakfast, and climbed the path to wait out on the main road in the faint pre-dawn light. After a long while, just as I was starting to think I’d been stood up, Kostas finally appeared around 6:30am, pulling up on his 600cc trial bike. I climbed on, and we set off.

He took me to Fatsidika — a village inland from Agia Pelagia, somewhere in the heart of Kythera’s rugged hills. I'd never been before, but it was a working place, not a tourist stop — raw and sunbaked, with the smell of cement and dust in the air. My task for the day? Unload 89 sacks of cement off a wagon, and then feed them one by one into the beton machine (I’m still not sure if “beton” is just the Greek word for cement or something slightly different — either way, it was heavy).

By 3pm I was ready for food, and the work was done and I was paid 10,000 drachmas — not bad for a day’s graft. We all sat down for a proper meal together — meat, bread, and cold beer, the best kind after a hard day in the heat. One of the many Nikos (they’re everywhere here) gave me a lift back to Pelagia, and cranked up a mix tape for the ride: The Doors, The Stranglers, and Echo & The Bunnymen blaring out of the speakers as we wound our way through the dusty roads. Perfect soundtrack.

Later that afternoon I walked down into the village and met up with Wayne. We took a swim in the sea — part wash, part cool-down — and were heading back up the hill when we bumped into Céline and Agnes, literally just as we were about to go looking for them. They were starving and there was no food at the shack and they had no money, so we convinced them to walk all the way back down the hill with us for a meal at Cafe Faros (and, naturally, beer).

Wayne stayed down in the village for the night (sleeping on the beach) — he’s working for Dieter tomorrow (traitor!). The rest of us trudged back uphill to Kalamitsi, slowly, legs aching. Céline and Agnes are leaving tomorrow — heading off to meet Philippe, Steffan, and Marie before making their way back to Paris.

I talked with Wayne about going home to Wales for a couple of weeks in September. There’ll be some challenges, for sure — the usual balancing act. But as long as I can keep working here regularly, I’ll manage. Maybe I can even stretch to a flight from Athens, if the drachs keep rolling in.

Day 39 – Kythera: Chasing Sun, Postcards, and Paprika

"Wake up, you lazy bastards!"

That was our alarm call this morning, courtesy of Wayne and his special brand of sunrise motivation. It did the trick — within minutes we were up and hitchhiking, pairing off to make our way to Potamos.

📍 Potamos – Our Postal Lifeline
Potamos is about 12 km north of Agia Pelagia — not far, but on Kythera, hitching is often the only way to get around. We go there regularly, drawn by the small thrill of eating hot bread from the bakery and checking for mail. Without a fixed address here, we rely on the Poste Restante system — a lifesaver for travellers like us. Basically, it's a service where the post office holds your mail until you come to collect it. Today, Wayne scored a postcard from his folks.

🏖️ Paleopoli & Avlemonas
After Potamos, we hitched down to Paleopoli for the third time this week. It's hard to resist — the beach there is wide, sun-drenched, and perfect for lazy sunbathing and great swimming. Once our limbs had absorbed enough Vitamin D, we headed east to Avlemonas, a tiny and stunning fishing village that looks like it was plucked from a postcard.

The road from Paleopoli to Avlemonas curves inland before dropping toward the coast again. It’s not a long ride — maybe 6 km — but we’re always at the mercy of passing cars. Today, luck was on our side.

🍅 Choriatiki & Beers by the Sea
In Avlemonas, we treated ourselves to a choriatiki (Greek village salad — tomatoes, cucumber, olives, onions, feta, all drenched in olive oil) and a cold beer. Simple, perfect, and part of my calorie controlled diet. We lingered, savouring both the food and the view, before starting the return journey home.

🚗 Hitchhiking Back – A Waiting Game
Celine and I got lucky again and scored a lift straight back to Potamos, but then wasted an hour and a half waiting for Wayne and Agnes to catch up. Hitchhiking: part travel method, part social experiment.

📉 Island News – Work Woes and Surprises
The mood shifted slightly when Wayne found out that Taso doesn't want him to work for the season. Not ideal. Meanwhile, I found out that Costas does want me to start work — at 7am on Friday. 

🌶️ The Paprika Incident
Back at the shack, we cooked up a vegetable dish that should’ve come with a warning label. I don’t know what we were thinking — maybe we underestimated the paprika, or maybe it was a different kind entirely — but within two bites we were all frantically gulping water, eyes wide, noses running. A fiery end to a long, sun-drenched day.

Day 27 – Kythera: Blood, Sweat & Bush

Agia Pelagia, Kythera

My fingers are absolutely wrecked today — six and a half hours of swinging a pickaxe at solid rock will do that to you. I must’ve shifted half a mountain into that wheelbarrow, and all for 500 drachmae an hour. Slave labour? Pretty much. It’s fine when I’m shovelling pig shit for 20 minutes — not exactly glamorous, but doable. But breaking rock for hours on end? That’s another level.

I’m seriously beginning to question the value of my time and my back. Cheryl muttered something about “writing down another hour” when I finished at 1pm. The so-called policy seems to have become a 2pm finish. But since when was that ever mentioned out loud? Tomorrow’s payday, and I’m going to have a quiet word. If they sack me, so be it. Let’s see them find another mug willing to do this kind of work for those wages. I’d actually be okay with 4,000 drax a day if the hours matched the job — it’s the imbalance that stinks.

Meanwhile, Mickey reckons he might have a better gig lined up — same sort of work, but 10–12k drax for seven hours. Now that’s a conversation I want to have.

And speaking of imbalance, there was a bit of a diplomatic riot in Athens last night. Six hours of chaos to “welcome” George Bush to the country. Nothing like a bit of molotov diplomacy. I need to find out more, but it sounds like the Greeks gave him the warmest possible anarchist greeting. Yeah!

Oh, and the alarm clock’s gone on strike again. Second morning in a row. Still, I was up on time, even the Greek Clock Gods can't stop me.

Later in the day, I tried to get cracking on some beach-cleaning work for Taso. Showed up at 3pm, but he wasn’t around and I didn’t have the tools to start. I finally bumped into him at 4:30, and he gave me the old “Where were you at 3?” line. Absolute tosser. Whatever — I’ll do it Sunday morning, properly.

Rounded the day off with a siesta on the beach — not bad, actually. Sun in my face, waves in the background, and two stunning French girls sunbathing topless fifteen feet in front of me. Life has its moments.

A quick swim, cold shower, then back to Mickey’s.

Kythera continues to grind and glow in equal measure.

Day 8 - Crete to Thessaloniki

For the first time in days, I almost managed a full night’s sleep. The sun woke me at 6.30am, and for once the mosquitoes had given up tormenting me. Instead, drunk Germans had provided the hassle, stumbling over Wayne and me as we slept on the beach. Wayne was still curled up in his sleeping bag as I tried to shoo them away with half-awake diplomacy.

By 9.30am we left Stalida—Crete’s answer to Rhyl—and, once again against the advice of my ever-patient guidebook, tried hitching the hundred miles across the north coast. Wayne and I agreed to split up and try our luck solo, arranging to meet later at Hania bus station.

My thumb was barely ten minutes into its shift before a Scottish couple pulled over, beginning what turned into a four-hour patchwork journey. They told me, quite casually, that civil war had just broken out in Yugoslavia. I blinked. Yesterday I was battling mosquitoes and elephant-foot toilets; today whole nations were imploding.

As we drove, I chewed over the madness of it. Why is it humans keep fighting over scraps of land, religion, or oil? Cats scrap over alleys, fair enough, but people? I pictured a BBC newscaster announcing: “Today, the Revolutionary People’s Army of Yorkshire lay siege to Manchester…” Ridiculous. Yet elsewhere, entirely real. It all came down to influence, conditioning: what you’re told to hate, who you’re told to fear. In Wales we were taught to hate the English enough to torch their holiday homes—though not quite enough, in my case, to bother with the matches.

The Scottish couple dropped me outside Iraklio, Greece’s third biggest city. I watered a bush in one of the countless half-built skeleton buildings (seemingly a national pastime: build half, then lose money, interest, or both) before sticking my thumb out again. A taxi screeched to a halt. I shook my head, turned my pocket inside out, but the driver waved me in anyway.

His cab was no Rhyl Skoda rattler—red leather seats, mahogany dash, BMW badge. He chattered in Greek, gesturing at landmarks and women, while I nodded “neh, neh” like a trained parrot. My eyes strayed nervously to the meter ticking up drachma. At 950 I panicked, grunted, and pointed. He laughed, flicked it to zero, and repeated “dhen pirasi” (doesn’t matter). Seventy-five kilometres later, I gave him 1,000 drachma (£3), thanked him with my best “efharisto poli,” and staggered out in Rethimno. In Rhyl, £3 wouldn’t get you into the cab, never mind halfway across North Wales.

From there, it was back to thumbwork: a motorbike ride, a farmer in silence, more long trudges through the heat. I sweated up hills, entertained myself by imagining the road as a lava river and the ants as alien “biological mechanisms” on a distant planet. At one point, I burned my leg on a motorbike exhaust. At another, I nearly kissed a farmer for pulling over, but settled for a polite “Hania?” and silence all the way.

By the time I limped into Hania, I’d been hitching five and a half hours. I bought bread, fruit, and cheese, and perched on the Venetian harbour wall to eat, refusing the shallow grins of waiters who looked like double-glazing salesmen begging me to sit down. A full English breakfast was my dream meal, but my wallet said otherwise.

By five, I dragged myself back to the bus station—grim, red benches back to back, the air heavy with exhaust fumes. Two Greek girls sat opposite, whispering and glancing at me. Attractive, though one was short with that sexy type of bulging body, the other, very pretty if a little under-nourished. They broke the ice in classic fashion: asking me to watch their bags while they both went to the toilet together (an international female ritual I’ve never understood).

Their names were Eleni and Nikola, both seventeen, both chewing gum like it was an Olympic sport. Eleni did all the talking—university in Iraklio, summers in Thessaloniki with her uncle, then on to Bulgaria to see her grandmother. They hated the American army base, hated smoking ads that promised “SMOKE A FAG AND GET A SHAG,” and were horrified when I admitted to having only £160 in travellers cheques and 10,000 drachma. “Very little in Greece,” Eleni scolded.

We talked until 6.45pm, and then Eleni, after a huddle with Nikola, turned to me and said: “Would you like to come with us?”

I blinked. “Where? Bulgaria?”

“Yes.”

It was insane, but tempting. They even offered to pay three-quarters, “our parents are very rich.” My brain whirred: was this a prank? A trap? A cosmic gift? And what about Wayne? Would I be betraying him? No. He’d have done the same if the roles were reversed.

So at 7.30pm, I was waving goodbye to Crete from the militarised port of Soudha, clutching an 8,200 drachma ticket for a coach to the port, a boat to Piraeus, then a coach to Thessaloniki. Only once onboard did the girls casually mention that I wouldn’t be able to stay with Eleni’s uncle (“he is very strict”)—but not to worry, “Granny in Bulgaria is fun.”

Was I being played for a fool? Possibly. Was it reckless? Definitely. But you only live once. Before leaving Hania I left Wayne a note, sellotaped to a bench:

WAYNE – GONE TO ATHENS, THESSALONIKI, AND BULGARIA! HONEST! WORK?

And with that, I was off—destination unknown, companions questionable, but adventure guaranteed.

Day 7 - Crete

After three days of broken sleep on ferry floors, and a grand total of about two and a half hours’ rest, I found myself slumped on yet another bus—this time rattling from Kastelli to Hania. The plan was simple: catch a bit of kip between potholes. The execution, however, was sabotaged by a man four rows ahead who clearly thought he’d been born to broadcast.

He began in Greek, but soon switched to an excruciating American drawl. “Greece,” he declared, “is the same size as the United States.” When his audience didn’t bite, he raised the stakes: “The map makers are liars, they just want to ridicule the Greeks! I can prove it. It took me the same time to drive from New York to San Francisco as it did from Thessaloniki to Neapoli!”

And on and on he went, like a scratched record nobody wanted to own. I considered explaining that America is roughly 3.5 million square miles compared to Greece’s 60,000, but in my current state I couldn’t decide whether to deliver this information with words or a size-12 trainer to his jaw. In the end, I chose the only sane option: ignore him and drift into fantasies of sleep.

Breakfast was hardly worth the name—bread, crisps, melon—and Wayne and I scribbled postcards home in the classic traveller’s style: “Sorry can’t write much, in a hur...” Enough to let everyone in Wales know we were alive, if not entirely well.

The next bright idea was to hitch across Crete to Malia, ignoring the sage warnings of my guidebook. We shouldered our rucksacks and trudged out of Hania. After 5 kilometres, 85°F heat, and a steady waterfall of sweat down my back, we descended into that familiar travelling mood: the blame game.

“You bastard, Wayne, this is all your fault.”

“It was your idea to hitch, dickhead.”

“No it wasn’t, I thought you’d have the Greeks sussed by now.”

“The Cretans are different, you long-legged wanker. And the book said get the bus.”

So we got the bus.

First to Iraklio, which from my initial impression should really have been named “Excrete.” I’ve never come to terms with Mediterranean elephant-foot toilets—squat, aim, and pray for accuracy. Judging by the stench and the splattered misses, elephants had clearly been testing them before us. Give me a quiet hedgerow any day.

From there, we caught another bus to Malia, only to overshoot and trudge back to Stalida. This, apparently, was where our friends Andy Fatman and Jane were holed up. Malia itself could have been Rhyl-on-the-Med: British lager louts everywhere, hardly a Greek face in sight, while the locals kept wisely to the shadows.

Finding the Stallos Hotel was an odyssey in itself. When we finally arrived, sweaty and sunbaked, I tried to stride in confidently. But the owner blocked me with a palm to my bare chest.

“No English,” he barked.

“Not English,” I protested, “I’m Welsh, here to see my friends.”

He shook his head, immovable. “It is policy. No English.”

“I’m Welsh!”

Still nothing. His palm didn’t move, his face didn’t flicker. No English, full stop. Twice in one day the Greeks had made violence feel like an attractive option—but I swallowed it down.

We never did find Andy or Jane. Instead, Wayne and I cooked aubergine, courgettes, and onions on the beach, and slept there under the stars. The views, I have to say, were decent—particularly the liberated German women who seemed determined to redefine topless sunbathing for the reunified Fatherland.

Been feeling a little pissed off today, probably due to the lack of sleep over the past week. In a bit of a dilemma over what to do next.

The Ruthin Misadventure

It was John’s brother’s stag night, so of course we were duty-bound to paint Ruthin red. We did the traditional pub crawl, one slow pint at a time, before staggering into the Seven Club. Inside, the night took a surreal turn: I bumped into Lindi Punk, who hadn’t seen me in years, greeted me like a long-lost lover, and promptly kissed me. Not long after, I spotted Maria—who, astonishingly, still looked exactly the same as she had eight years earlier. It was as if Ruthin preserved people in formaldehyde.

While I was chatting with some strangers outside, John suddenly strolled past with a girl in tow. He gave me a cheeky wave and called out, “See you later, Neil!” as if he was off to the shops, not sneaking away from his own stag party arrangements. I stood there stunned, muttering something along the lines of, Well, that’s a family drama I didn’t sign up for.

With nowhere else to go, I headed back to his brother’s house, which hadn’t changed one bit since the last time I’d been there. The same faces were slumped around the room, smoking the same spliffs, producing the same silence that passed for conversation. I was offered a drag but declined—too much beer had already turned my stomach into a washing machine. I lasted all of ten minutes before deciding I needed to escape.

So I hit the Denbigh Road, weaving along like a man trying to remember which way gravity worked. I flagged down London-style black cab, it stopped some 20 metres past me. Unfortunately, my coordination was about as reliable as my dignity by that point. I broke into a heroic sprint… only to misjudge the distance entirely and headbutt the back of the taxi.

The next thing I knew, I was flat on the tarmac, dazed and seeing stars, while the taxi driver hauled me up by the arm like a parent dealing with a wayward toddler. I explained, in the slurred tones of a man who thought he was speaking Queen’s English, that I only had a fiver. Generously, he took me as far as Trefnant.

Stranded, bruised, and slightly less sober than I thought I was, I phoned John's soon to be sister-in-law. She was shocked to hear from me—especially at that hour—but still kind enough to drive all the way from Llandudno to rescue me. I told her I’d “lost John outside the club” and “couldn’t find the house,” carefully omitting the part where I’d assaulted a stationary taxi and the bit about her brother in law.

And that’s how John’s brother’s stag night ended: with John disappearing, his brother’s house frozen in a haze of smoke, me concussed on Denbigh Road.

Overthrowing the Government

It began, as all great revolutions do, with a daft idea and a dodgy hotel corridor. Wayne and I had decided that the downfall of John Major’s government could be engineered not with marches or manifestos, but by stealing his latest speech. Cut off the supply of waffle, and the nation might finally rise up.

The corridor outside his room smelt of stale carpet and nervous anticipation. We moved with the brisk, officious air of men who belonged there, clipboards under our arms, dark suits stiff at the shoulders. When the Prime Minister’s personal aide intercepted us, Wayne tapped his earpiece—a prop, of course—and muttered, “Security sweep. We’ve got reports something’s missing.”

Dressed in our best “we-look-like-security” suits, we barged into the Prime Minister’s hotel suite. Major was there in person, polishing his glasses with the weary air of a man who suspected even his spectacles might be plotting against him.

“Everything all right?” he asked mildly, as if two sweaty blokes bursting into his room was part of the day’s itinerary.

“Security check, sir,” I said, puffing out my chest. “We’ve had reports something’s missing.”

That was our excuse. Brilliant in theory, doomed in practice. Because the trouble was, nothing was missing. The desk was perfectly neat, the briefcase locked, the ashtray tragically devoid of drama. Our plan was already creaking like an old bicycle.

Wayne, however, wasn’t the sort to let logic get in the way of a coup. He scanned the room, muttered something about “needing to make it convincing,” and before I could stop him, he grabbed the wardrobe—an enormous mahogany beast—and heaved it across the carpet. With a grunt of triumph, he launched it straight through the window.

Glass exploded, pedestrians screamed, and the wardrobe landed in the street below with a thud that probably registered on the Richter scale.

Major removed his glasses, pinched the bridge of his nose, and said in the tone of a man scolding naughty spaniels, “Gentlemen, if this is security, I’d hate to see burglary.”

We stood there, surrounded by shards of glass, feigning professionalism as if hurling hotel furniture into traffic was all part of the procedure. The speech, naturally, remained un-stolen. The government, un-overthrown. And Wayne, for the record, was banned from every branch of Travelodge in the country.

Day 70: Kythera - Upsetting the German hippy

The sun rose over Kythera and so did I — reluctantly, as usual. You know it’s going to be one of those days when your morning starts with Dieter (our resident mad German foreman) storming around a half-built house, shouting orders like a man one stone short of a breakdown.

We were building again today — another stone wall, another chance for bedlam. This time, it came courtesy of Irving, a German hippy with a spiritual connection to rocks. I’m not sure there’s a worse combination than patchouli and perfectionism. Irving insisted on choosing “beautiful stones” for the wall and flipped out when Georgo (my Polish co-worker) and I committed the unthinkable crime of using… cement.

To be fair, Georgo and I are hardly a slick duo. He speaks no English. I speak no Polish. So we get by in pidgin Greek — a mix of gestures, swear words. The only Polish word I know is for “shit,” which, funnily enough, sees a fair bit of use on site. "Gówno" (pronounced GOOV-no).

---

🌍 Meanwhile, in the Rest of the World...

While we were wrangling rocks and egos, the outside world kept spinning — and cracking.

A Ugandan Airlines 707 was forced to land in Yugoslavia today, intercepted by fighter jets and found to be carrying 19 tons of ammunition. Nobody seems entirely sure where it was headed, but it's a stark reminder that not all travel plans are made for pleasure.

In the East, the Soviet Union continues to disintegrate. Today, Uzbekistan and Kyrgyzstan declared independence, bringing the tally to 10 breakaway republics. Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Ukraine — the list grows by the week.

Wayne quipped:

We’ll know Russia’s truly democratic when they include it on the Interrail ticket.

---

📞 Mum, Maps & Money

Managed to get through to Mum today by phone. She said Marshall’s in Florida and heading back to the States soon. More importantly, she’s posted maps of Italy and France to help me on my next leg westward. No smartphone, no GPS, just creased paper and a vague sense of direction.

I also handed over 15,000 drachma to Martina, who promises to sort me out with more Australian dollars at the current rate.

---

🎭 Dieter’s Mood Report

Shockingly, Dieter didn’t lose his temper at me today — which felt almost suspicious. But he made up for it by yelling at everyone else on site. He’s not so much managing the project as surviving it one tantrum at a time. The man looks like the Kaiser and acts like he's one faulty cement mix away from exploding.

---

📝 Final Thoughts

Kythera is a strange place to watch the world fall apart. While republics crumble and planes full of ammo land under suspicion, I’m knee-deep in dust, swatting mosquitoes, building imperfect walls with perfect strangers.

I’m not sure where I’m heading next. But today — just for a moment — I felt like I was exactly where I needed to be: sunbaked, sweating, arguing about cement, and somehow still smiling.

---

On Tomorrow’s Horizon:

• Will Martina come through with the dollars?

• Will Dieter implode?

• Will Irving find the “perfect stone”?

• Will Georgo teach me another Polish swear word?

Stay tuned.

"Keith Richards!" – A Night at The Bistro with Joe Bear

 

21 July 1990 – Rhyl

Last night at The Bistro was one for the books — a night laced with sweat, nostalgia, and the smell of stale lager clinging to black and salmon walls. But what made it truly unforgettable was running into Joe Bear — legendary Denbigh rocker, local myth, and walking embodiment of Keith Richards worship.

Joe’d just come back from Maine Road, where the Rolling Stones were doing what they do best — making shitloads of cash with sweat and swagger. It was one of the gigs on their Urban Jungle Tour, the Stones deep into their steel-belted stadium rock phase, with Keith prowling the stage like a half-dead pirate god. And Joe? He was buzzing. High on it. Properly alive in that way only a lifelong rocker can be after brushing against the real thing.

Every time I saw him that night — and it felt like I passed him on every lap to the bar or bogs — he was in a slightly worse state than before. Pints turning into doubles, turning into slurring sentences and a slow descent into the usual Joe Bear wobbling stagger. But every single time, without fail, he’d grin, prop up his invisible Telecaster, and rasp:

“Keith Richards!”

Then he'd mime one of those half-shouldered licks, eyes rolling back, lost in the moment.

The Bistro, if you’ve never been, was Rhyl’s dark, sticky womb of alternative music — punk, goth, indie, metal, the occasional trance night if someone forgot to check the playlist. It was the kind of place where the DJ booth was part pulpit, part bunker, and the walls sweated with decades of feedback and body heat. Every corner had a tale. Last night was no different.

By the end of the night — early hours now — I staggered into the toilets in search of a piss and possibly my remaining dignity. That’s when I saw him.

Joe Bear.

Face down on the soaked tile floor, one arm submerged in the blocked porcelain trough, the other stretched out toward the urinal wall like he was trying to commune with the plumbing gods. His eyes, bleary and half-conscious, found mine. He didn’t speak at first. Just kind of blinked.

Then, with the slow, tragic elegance of a fallen hero, he lifted his soaking wet arm from the piss-water, raised it to his chest, and started strumming the air guitar again.

“Keith... Richards...”

he slurred, barely audible over the bass thump still leaking through the toilet walls.

That was it. That was the moment. The full Joe Bear experience — a man half-drowned in lager, piss and rock ‘n’ roll, still worshipping at the altar of his six-string saviour.

He might have been wrecked, but he was glowing with something pure. It wasn’t just booze and nostalgia — it was belief. Joe didn’t just go to see the Stones. He absorbed them. Channelled them. Brought them back with him like sacred fire, only to collapse in the urinal like a martyred prophet.

And you know what?

In that moment — half-dead, piss-soaked, muttering about Keith Richards — Joe Bear was and is a fucking legend.

4Q: Birkenhead: The Lennon Backlash That Never Came

 

March 3rd, 1990. The same day the Liverpool Echo ran the headline FURY OVER LENNON SONG SLUR – BAND’S TASTELESS ATTACK ON JOHN & PAUL, taking aim at us for our version of Lennon’s Imagine — the one where we sang that maybe Macca deserved a bullet too. It was pure piss-taking, punk provocation in the classic style, but to the Scouse press we’d desecrated their holy shrine.

The timing couldn’t have been worse: that night we were booked to play in Birkenhead, across the water from Lennon’s city. Cumi was bricking it. He tried to pull a Paul Puke manoeuvre, claiming, “I’m going away this weekend, so I can’t do the gig.” Truth was, he didn’t fancy facing a mob of irate Beatles disciples. To be fair, I had my own doubts. If we were going to get our heads kicked in for slagging off the Lord Lennon, then so be it — but it would’ve made a hell of a story for Crud.

When I told Cumi we’d do it without him if necessary, he backed down. He wasn’t about to let 4Q march into Birkenhead minus its frontman.

We rolled up at the Golden Fleece to find the place rammed — not with outraged Beatles fanatics but with punks. Proper punks. The room was so small they stood only inches from our faces. A couple we recognised from Planet X were there too, members of the band Go Heads, grinning like they’d come for blood but stayed for the fun. Even the landlord was in on it: he knew our parody lyrics to Imagine word for word. Instead of hostility, the scandal had done its job — it pulled people in.

We let fly with a longer set than usual: LSD, I Hate TV, Mental Asylum, Bat Gooch, Nein Werk, Video Party, Poo On My Shoe, Burn in Hell, We Want You, Imagine, 4Q Blues. The room shook, punks yelling back every line, bodies pressed against us. When the landlord himself starts singing along to your blasphemous Lennon send-up, you know you’ve won the night.

The crowd wouldn’t let us go, so we encored with Stand By Me and VD, then ended with a cut-down reprise of Bat Gooch — rechristened Bat Goo after we hacked it to pieces. By that point it hardly mattered; the atmosphere carried us.

The moment that still makes me laugh, though, was the little old lady who shuffled to the front mid-set, wrinkled brow, politely asking if we could “turn it down a bit, because I can’t hear myself think.” God knows how she ended up in the Golden Fleece that night, surrounded by 100 punks and a band tearing Lennon’s memory to shreds, but there she was — the most surreal critic of all.

In the end, no fists flew, no bottles were hurled. We didn’t get lynched for mocking Lennon. Instead, we played one of our tightest, most electric gigs. What the Echo called a slur turned into the best publicity we could’ve hoped for. The cult of Lennon survived unscathed. 4Q, on the other hand, walked out bigger than we’d walked in.

4Q / Black Listed - The Swinging Sporran

Manchester. The Swinging Sporran. It sounded exotic, like the sort of place you’d expect to find wild Highland dancers or whisky-fuelled riots. What we actually found was a mostly empty pub with a scattering of punks and a landlord who thought he was running the Hacienda.

When we rolled up, a knot of out-of-town punks were waiting for us — kids who’d been buying Crud fanzine for years. They gave us a hero’s welcome, and for a moment we thought we were in for a packed night. But as it turned out, apart from Danny Williams, John Casey and a mate, that was pretty much the lot. Thirty people, tops.

Still, thirty punks are louder than three hundred indie kids, and we made the most of it. Black Listed, the semi-metal band we’d sort of adopted from Penmaenmawr, opened up. They were eager, tight, and clearly desperate to do everything “the proper rock way” — the posturing, the flourishes, the ritual of “being a band.” I don’t mean that unkindly, but they would’ve done better just being themselves. You can’t fake sweat and chaos. Still, they got through it, and for a bunch of lads still finding their way, it was decent.

Then it was our turn. After the 500-strong Aberystwyth gig the week before, playing to thirty in Manchester should’ve felt like a comedown, but it wasn’t. If anything, I enjoyed myself more. The smaller the crowd, the more personal the piss-taking, and the night quickly became a running exchange of banter between us and them.

We blasted into LSD and Mental Asylum, the sound bouncing off the walls like we were playing in a rehearsal room. I Hate TV and Bat Gooch kept the energy up, but then Matt smashed through yet another bass pedal — his third that week. With him out of action, we killed time with an impromptu Stand By Me, everyone singing along, the sort of daft interlude that makes a gig feel alive.

We patched the set back together with Burn In Hell, Poo on My Shoe, Imagine, and We Want You. During the latter, my bass just dropped clean off — strap gone, instrument clattering to the floor. I just laughed and carried on. The crowd loved it; nothing like a bit of unintended slapstick to keep people happy. We closed with 4Q Blues, Robin shredding like he was headlining Donington in front of 30 bewildered Mancunians.

At the end of the night, the landlord decided to play the heavy. He turned up with a seven-foot-wide bouncer in tow, demanding twenty quid for room hire. Twenty quid! We’d pulled in barely thirty punters. But after some fast talking, a lot of shrugging, and a cheeky promise to “forward the difference next week,” I got him down to a tenner. He probably knew he’d never see the other half, but we shook hands on it anyway.

We left Manchester grinning. No, it wasn’t the triumph of Aberystwyth, but it was raw, ridiculous, and ours. Sometimes thirty punks in a half-empty pub are better than five hundred students in a hall.

Aberystwyth: The Night 4Q Took the University

 

Aberystwyth University. Five bands, 550 students, and a PA that cost £180 but sounded like it had been salvaged from a skip. We were on the bill with U Thant, Mavis Riley Experience, the Mistecs, and Jon Busker, and while the night promised plenty, it quickly descended into the kind of glorious wreckage only 4Q could deliver.

The Mistecs opened — a gaggle of Blaenau schoolboys thrashing out a tupenny-ha’penny Metallica imitation. Everyone has to start somewhere, but honestly, they should’ve stayed at home with their homework. Then Jon Busker followed with his anti-fox-hunting song, which was so dreary it made you want to pick up a shotgun and go after the nearest fox just to spite him.

Then came the Mavis Riley Experience, and they were wonderful. Even Matt liked them, which was a miracle in itself. By the time we were up, the place was primed for carnage.

We didn’t get a soundcheck thanks to U Thant turning up late, and it showed. With two lead guitarists battling for supremacy, the mix was shite, and to the poor sound engineer it must’ve sounded like a car crash. Within minutes of plugging in, Gumpsh pulled a “Neil Crud special” — breaking a string by looking at it. While he wrestled with his guitar, the rest of us jammed Stand By Me to fill the gap. The crowd lapped it up.

And then it was on.

“Thank you, c’mon!” Cumi bellowed.

“There’s not enough room for them to come up onstage, Cumi,” I shouted back.

We launched into Mental Asylum — or as I renamed it mid-song, Mental Shed. It was so loud we couldn’t hear a bloody thing we were playing, but the crowd didn’t care.

“This one’s for everyone who watches Coronation Street,” I quipped.

“Is everyone enjoying themselves?” Cumi yelled.

“Yeah!” came the reply.

“What about you lot at the back? You’re all boring.”

On we went, chaos and noise. I Hate TV ran two verses short because Cumi lost track. I demanded more guitar in the monitors. We barrelled into Bat Gooch, where we bullied the crowd into joining in with a chorus of “Oi!”

We tore through Twisted Tabloids, which I introduced with a story about getting lost in a field near Blaenau Ffestiniog on the way to the gig. We Want You followed, then Cumi tried to big us up: “We’ve almost secured a record deal, this one will almost definitely be the single. It’s called Burn in Hell.”

“Single what?” I chipped in. “Single cream?”

People danced! Fuck me! Next was Poo on My Shoe it hit like a hammer, “fucking spot on.” Imagine descended into comedy, with Gumpsh starting it out of tune to our delight, and the audience split down the middle on whether John Lennon was genius or tosser. We wrapped it with 4Q Blues, Robin hammering out a ridiculously over-the-top metal solo just to put the cherry on the cake. And Cumi doing a walking handstand.

“Cheers,” I said. “I thought we were bloody marvellous.”

And we were. For all the feedback, the string breaks, the insults, and the nonsense, we’d owned the night. So much so that when U Thant came on after us, they had to work twice as hard just to keep the crowd. I even stayed to watch three songs — which for me was a compliment.

We pocketed the cash, packed up, and headed home. Robin, true to form, managed to upset Cumi’s Jane by climbing on her car and vomiting everywhere. A perfect 4Q ending: noise, chaos, laughter, and a trail of mess in our wake.

The Bee Hotel Massacre – 4Q in Rhyl

 

The Bee Hotel in Rhyl was never a great gig. Cumi and Matt didn’t want to do it, and I couldn’t blame them. Bee gigs were usually more trouble than they were worth — dodgy sound, small crowds, and an atmosphere that felt less like a venue and more like a waiting room. But a gig’s a gig, and in those days, we didn’t say no to playing.

At first it looked like we’d made the wrong call. The room was empty until 9:45pm, then suddenly people began streaming in — mostly Matt’s clan of family, friends, and admirers who’d come en masse from Colwyn Bay. By the time we were ready, the Bee was packed and already brimming with trouble.

Soundcheck was a nightmare. Levels wouldn’t sit right, feedback screamed, and then someone called Boz decided he was the star of the night. He picked up Robin’s guitar like it was his, and when I told him to put it down, he mouthed off, slagging us off like he had some divine right to any instrument in reach. I’ve never had time for musos like that — the type who think playing a few chords entitles them to anything they want.

If the saying’s true — that a bad soundcheck means a good gig — then this night was determined to prove otherwise. We opened with LSD, only for both Robin and Gumpsh to snap strings almost simultaneously. Absolute carnage. And there I was, trying to impress Martin Trehearn, hoping he’d consider booking us for The Bistro, while our set collapsed around us.

Once the guitars were restrung, Gumpsh’s lead gave out. Cheap gear will always betray you at the worst time. While he fumbled about, the rest of us tried to keep the crowd alive with a chaotic rendition of Purple Haze. It was shambolic, but at least it bought us time.

From there, the set lurched forward: Nein Werk, Video Party, Bat Gooch, VD, Poo On My Shoe, Burn in Hell, I Hate TV, We Want You, Imagine, 4Q Blues. It was raw, loud, and messy — a typical 4Q gig. By the end, the Bee looked like a scrapyard: smashed glasses, puddles of beer, debris of a night too wild for its four walls.

The image that’s burned in my mind, though, isn’t the broken gear or the broken glass. It’s one of Matt’s endless girlfriends, slumped unconscious in a chair, her head thrown back, vomit tangled through her hair and streaking her face. That sight was the punctuation mark on the whole night — ugly, tragic, unforgettable nad really fucking funny.

We’d rolled in from Colwyn Bay and trashed the place. It wasn’t a triumph. It wasn’t a disaster. It was 4Q: chaos in motion, leaving wreckage in our wake.

Manchester Boardwalk Blitzkrieg / 4Q

Huw Prestatyn kindly agreed to drive us to Manchester’s Boardwalk. On arrival? Total confusion. Our promoter Dave Bennett was supposed to front £170 to cover the venue, soundman and door staff. The manager wasn’t having it at first and it looked like the night was dead in the water. After much arguing, he finally relented but warned that if the takings didn’t cover the costs, he’d baseball bat the promoter. Fine by us.

By 10pm the place was empty. Not a soul. Then, just as despair set in, a huge throng of fresh-faced first-year students came marching down the road, chattering and singing with their new grant money burning holes in their pockets. At least fifty of them. I intercepted, laid it on thick, promised them the night of their lives for £2.50 — and fuck me, they all came in.

The gig that followed lives long in memory. None of these kids had a clue what punk was, but they didn’t care — they danced, cheered, stage-invaded, got pissed, and turned the Boardwalk into a madhouse.

We tore into Nein Werk and Video Party. Cumi was on form, spouting:

“Mary had a little lamb & it was always grunting, she tied it to the garden gate & kicked its little…”

Then introducing VD:

“It’s about Wales, sheep & the things you do to them.”

Me: “He mentions that at every gig.”

Cumi: “I don’t, you do.”

Me: “Do you want me to take my clothes off?”

Crowd: “NO!”

Cumi: “They don’t want to see a gnat’s penis.”

By Not Now Not Never I was pointing into the crowd: “This one’s dedicated to him. It’s a description of his sex life.” Cumi piled in: “And his dick.”

During 1984 I peeled off my jumper just to show my “trendy designer t-shirt.” Cumi: “It’s fashionable, isn’t it?” Cue wooos from the students.

We crashed through Dope Fiend and PMT (my adaptor plug came loose, cutting the guitar out completely). I shrugged: “They don’t need a guitar, they seem to manage quite well without me.” Cumi filled the gap: “This is the interlude where we have a rest and you can buy your sweets, ice creams & crisps in the foyer.”

Jerks went down tight. Afterwards I joked: “People always say we’re cliched. Well, we’re going to show you just how cliched we can be.” Cumi: “Cliched?” Me: “It’s a French word meaning ‘we’ve seen it all before’.” Someone yelled: “It means crap!” Me: “Yeah, that’s about right.”

God Save the Queen got a massive cheer — the best we’ve ever played it. Twisted Tabloids was introduced by Cumi: “This song’s about donkey’s piss flaps.” Big cheers, none the wiser.

We closed with Systemisation, me giving it the “last disco smooch” spiel:

“This is for all you sweethearts. You know when you’re at a trendy disco and the last song is ‘Last Christmas’ by George Michael? Well this is our version. Have a smooch.”

Cue chaos and mock ballroom dancing. Before the last chorus I announced: “I think Blitzkrieg are the best band I’ve seen this week, a fine bunch of musicians.” The room erupted, standing ovation, chants of “More! More!”

Cumi signed off: “Thanks a lot, goodnight — if you want to see us again we’re at the Swinging Sporran in Chorlton, a week on Saturday.”

“Who with?” shouted someone.

“Wham, Kajagoogoo & Tina Turner,” deadpanned Cumi.

I went to turn my amp off and fell flat on my face, raising the roof one last time.

Then Blitzkrieg came on. After three songs, the place emptied.