"Awoooo, werewolves of London" - Werewolves of London, Warren Zevon.
On the completion of my last London by Foot:The Capital's Curious Circuits walk it was suggested to me that for the next in the series I may like to combine three of my great loves (London, music, and walking) for the next one. Not one to shirk such an inviting challenge I set up about devising my first London music walk.
Initially it seemed more problematic than it should be. What do I show people? Plaques? Places where famous music people lived and died? Old venues? Roads and sites mentioned in song lyrics? At least with the architectural walks there are actual buildings to look at and take photos of. A house is pretty much a house even if Mick Jagger or David Bowie once lived there.
Also, I was becoming aware that many of the walks were covering a lot of the same ground (how many times can we leave Waterloo station, wander along the South Bank, and cross Blackfriars Bridge into Ludgate Circus?) so I was keen on exploring some new areas, figuring out that if they were uncharted by me there was a good chance that my 'guests' would also be on unexplored territory.
Luckily for me, I guessed (mostly) correctly on this. I even managed to show Pam, the only other native Londoner (according to Bee, if not Wikipedia, Uxbridge isn't 'proper' London), somewhere she'd never been before.
So it was I met with Neil, Bee, Shep, and Pam (not a 'good turnout' in terms of numbers but certainly very good in terms of characters) in Clapham Junction at noon and we soon headed off Up The Junction, "I never thought it would happen with me and that girl from Clapham", with the intention to Go West, across that dirty old river, and then on to Soho, hopefully not on a rainy night, to witness London's Brilliant Parade and have all the attendees down in the tube station well before midnight. They might not have wanted to go to Chelsea but that's what they'd be doing.
Down St.John's Hill and into St.John's Road, past the chi-chi boutiques and bars of Battersea before eventually taking a ninety degree turn into Wandsworth Common, a piece of London's grassland that was not familiar to me. Wandsworth Common is divided in two by the trains that run from Balham into Victoria so we crossed a bridge over the train tracks and picked up Nicosia Road which led us, via a few other roads, to HMP Wandsworth. It was time for me to grab a sheet of A4 out of my bag and start reading.
"In and out of Wandsworth with their numbers on their names. It's funny how their missus always look the bleeding same" sang Squeeze in their 1979 smash Cool for Cats. It was the second Squeeze reference of the day already and I was worrying my walkers would think I was taking them on a Squeeze tour. But, fortunately for us, HMP Wandsworth, a stark, imposing, yet somewhat beautiful in its austerity, jail has more than one pop cultural reference in its arsenal.
It cropped up in Switch by Senser, "Daddy's in Wandsworth sitting in a box", and it also appears on the Genesis song The Battle of Epping Forest (from their 1973 album Selling England by the Pound) and Let Him Dangle from Elvis Costello's '89 long player Spike. That song's a reference to Derek 'Let Him Have It' Bentley who was hanged, along with 134 others including one Lord Haw Haw, at the prison. Those with a musical bent who've survived their spell in Wandsworth include Pete Doherty, Ronnie Biggs (not an accomplished musician but he sang with The Sex Pistols so he's in), and two of Britain's most notorious celebrity nonces, Rolf Harris and Gary Glitter.
We now set off on a fairly long, and mostly uneventful, stretch that took us past a garden centre that seemed to be more heavily fortified than the prison opposite it, a bit more common, some roadworks, the mighty Thames itself (via the somewhat prosaic Wandsworth Bridge, one of London's least celebrated crossings), and a mocked up beach bar that was juxtaposed incongruously by three large oil tanks that looked as if they belonged in the paintings of Charles Sheeler or Ralston Crawford.
"I could be a writer with a glowing reputation. I could be the ticket man at Fulham Broadway station" sang Ian Dury in 1978 on his hit single What a Waste. If he'd been working when we passed by he'd have been having a busy day. Chelsea were at home to Cardiff and fans, police, and t-shirt sellers all mingled amicably, if noisily, in the shadow of the mighty Stamford Bridge while the odour of burgers and fried onions permeated the air.
We eased through the sea of blue shirts celebrating Didier Drogba, Gianfranco Zola, and Jorginho and made our way along the Fulham Road. Studiously avoiding the fact that Ed Sheeran (he seems a nice guy but Wembley Stadium? Really?) once sang about Fulham Broadway but remarking that Fulham Road is cited extensively on Jethro Tull's '73 LP A Pasion Play and crops up on the opening, eponymous, track on Morrissey's 1997 album Maladjusted, "At the Fulham Road lights stretch and invite into the night from a Stevenage overspill. We'd kill to live in SW6". The fact that that album is described on Wikipedia as having "received a lukewarm reception" is the least of Morrissey's current problems. The racist, moaning, old UKIP supporting expat has, in recent years, lost the goodwill of even his most ardent fans to a degree that mentioning him now seems more embarrassing than mentioning Jethro Tull. Reel Around The Fountain seems a very long time ago.
Past the brasseries and bars of Fulham Road, we swung right into the expansive avenue of white painted houses and expensive sports cars that is Limerston Street and then left into King's Road stopping at number 430. Not because it had some kind of mad Alice in Wonderland clock with its hand spinning round super fast, or even because they sold a range in bizarre high heeled clogs, but because it's the former site of Vivienne Westwood and Malcolm McLaren's Sex boutique.
Sex stood at no.430 between 1974 and 1976 and it was the place where a young John Lydon/Johnny Rotten sang along to Alice Cooper's I'm Eighteen on the jukebox to audition, successfully as we all now know, for The Sex Pistols and where they sold Joe Orton inspired Prick Up Your Ears t-shirts. Fellow Pistols Glen Matlock and, Matlock's replacement, Sid Vicious both worked there along with Chrissie Hynde who famously went on to front The Pretenders.
As we followed King's Road all the way to Sloane Square, stopping for sandwiches along the way, we reached the 10k mark in our walk and we'd earned a drink stop. Clapham had been posh, Chelsea had been posher, but Belgravia took things to the next level. It's a slightly soulless and depopulated area where creamy mansions create long shadows even on surprisingly sunny September Saturdays but we managed to spot a blue plaque for Chopin (cue the story of his heart being removed after his death, taken to Warsaw, pickled in cognac, and buried in an urn) on our way to The Star Tavern, a place described on Google Maps as a "stylish pub with notorious history".
My interest had been piqued. What was the notorious history of this pub that nestles incongruously down a cobbled mews round the back of the German Embassy? It transpired that it was where The Great Train Robbery of 1963 was planned so Ronnie Biggs, yet again, entered our story.
It's a quiet, unassuming, place now where the only robbery is the £7.50 they charge for a posh fish finger sandwich. We rested our already aching legs and feet and relaxed with a pint in a boozer that was both quiet and friendly and quite at odds with the opulence that is so clearly the hallmark of Belgravia. Noel Coward, in I've Been To A Marvellous Party, remarked that "people's behaviour, away from Belgravia, would make you aghast" and we pondered how Lawrence of Felt, Lawrence of Belgravia no less, could possibly have afforded to have digs in this part of town. It seems unlikely that the royalties for Listening to Marmalade could have amounted to that much.
Past the vintage Mercs, the embassies (not just Germany but Spain, Portugal, Bahrain, and Italy), the statues of Columbus and Bolivar, and the guards on duty outside the Turkish Embassy listening to the football on their wirelesses, we crossed Belgrave Square - a place that looked far too lavish for any mere pop star - and soon arrived at Hyde Park Corner. A tour guide was, no joke, telling his charges about the 'Summer of 69'. I joked I'd arranged for him to be there and threatened a future Bryan Adams tour of Reading.
From Hyde Park Corner we passed along Piccadilly, sadly not to the tune of Highlife Piccadilly by The African Messengers, and had a quick blast of Florrie Forde's It's A Long Way To Tipperary, "Goodbye Piccadilly, farewell Leicester Square", before turning into the unpromising looking White Horse Street that opens up into the unexpectedly lively Shepherd Market, a hidden oasis of charming pubs and eateries that'll make you feel like you're on holiday.
I'd totally recommend the Turkish food at Sofra or the, and get this for a combo, the Polish-Mexican bistro L'Autre. The walk could easily have descended into a feast of bacchanalian gluttony at this juncture but the London by Foot crowd are made of stronger stuff, they like to earn their rewards, and, anyway, the next stop was to be one of the most interesting. Even if I do say so myself.
Curzon Place is an expensive looking, if not ostentatiously so, block of apartment blocks painted in monochrome colours and set back from the Mayfair thoroughfare of Curzon Street. There are no plaques on it and nothing to mark it out as anything other than a desirable residence in a central location not far from Park Lane.
But on the 28th July 1974, in Flat 9 of Curzon Place, Mama Cass, aged 32, died in her sleep after performing at the London Palladium. Contrary to both urban myth and popular belief she did not choke on a ham sandwich but she was twice her recommended weight.
Harry Nilsson, Cass was loaning the flat from him, was so distraught that he decided to leave the flat empty. He came to believe the room was cursed so when The Who drummer Keith Moon asked if he could stay there Nilsson, at first, refused. He was talked round by Pete Townshend who opined that "lightning wouldn't strike the same place twice". I think you know where this is going.
On the 7th September 1978 Moon, also aged 32, and his girlfriend, the Swedish model Annette Walter-Lax returned to Flat 9 after an evening's meal with Paul and Linda McCartney. Maybe Linda's veggie sausages weren't filling enough as Moon suggested that Walter-Lax cook him some steak'n'eggs. A request Walter-Lax refused. Moon's angry response was "if you don't like it, you can fuck off". And then he died. Keith Moon's last two words on this planet were "fuck off"!
After years of alcohol abuse Moon was taking clomethiazole pills to counter the worst symptoms of alcohol withdrawl. His recommended daily intake was one pill, two if things were particularly tough, but that night he took thirty-two of them. Twenty-six remained undigested but the six he had digested were enough to kill him. Walter-Lax went on to have a son with New Avengers star and Nescafe salesman Gareth Hunt.
We walked up South Audley Street and through Grosvenor Square, past the former US embassy and the statues of Ronald Reagan (now in some kind of 'cage') and FDR and once the frontline of clashes between police and those protesting US involvement in Vietnam. For a place so central to the counterculture I could find only one musical reference to Grosvenor Square and that in the song Scarlet Begonias by The Grateful Dead, a band that never got as much traction in the UK as they did in America.
The top right hand corner of Grosvenor Square took us into Brook Street and that's a street that's not shy of music history. There are plaques to The Bee Gees (at no.67) and, further along, ones to both Handel and Jimi Hendrix. These two are next door to each other and Hendrix, it was actually his girlfriend Kathy Etchingham's place, used to claim he felt inspired by the spirit of Handel when writing new material there. When the blue plaque for Hendrix went up there was support for making it purple but the prudes at English Heritage weren't having any of that.
Nowadays, there's a Handel and Hendrix Museum there which'll set you back a cool £11 if you fancy a look round. Even though we had in our midst a man, Neil Bacchus, so fond of Jimi Hendrix that he used to have a sunstrip on his Vauxhall Viva with his name on (resulting in the none too musically educated folk of Basingstoke calling Neil Jimi for at least two decades after that) we decided to save our pennies and plough on. London's not short of musical sights. We hungered for more.
Our hunger was soon sated. A short walk, via Hanover Square and Regent Street (Pam said she'd never been to Shepherd Market before but Shep blew my mind by saying he'd never been to Regent Street before - meaning he'd not run into The Kinks Dedicated Follower of Fashion), took us to Heddon Street. It was here, at number 23 (now marked, of course, by a plaque) that David Bowie posed for the cover of his 1972 Ziggy Stardust LP.
The temptation to burst into Starman or Five Years was overwhelming and if we'd made a two pint mistake earlier it may well have happened. Instead we just commented on how much Heddon Street has changed (even if the 22 years I've been a Londoner) but also how you can still make out exactly where Bowie was standing.
From Heddon Street we cut into Soho proper and eventually Wardour Street. Thankfully there was no 'A Bomb' so we were able to stick with Bowie a bit longer as we recalled his Decca era classic London Boys and its mournful lines about "bright lights, Soho, Wardour Street. You hope you make friends with the guys that you meet".
Old Compton Street, that runs into Wardour Street from the east, was, between 1956 and 1970 the home of the 2i's Coffee Bar where both Cliff Richard and Tommy Steele were discovered. It was named for the owners Freddie and Sammy Irani but it was when Paul 'Dr Death' Lincoln, a former Australian wrestler, and his friend Ray Hunter took over that it became a coffee house and live music venue.
Over its fourteen year lifespan it saw performances by artists like Ritchie Blackmore, Screaming Lord Sutch, Vince Eager, Johnny Kidd, Adam Faith, Eden Kane, most of the Shadows, and one Paul Gadd who'd later find fame, and notoriety (and a cell in Wandsworth), as Gary Glitter. The 2is is a strong contender, probably the strongest contender, for being the birthplace of British rock'n'roll.
When it comes to musical history Frith Street's none too shabby either. Bar Italia was, of course, celebrated in song on Pulp's 1995 game changer Different Class and Mr Minuetting Mozart himself, Wolfgang Amadeus, once lived at number 20 with his father and sister during his family's European tour, an almost four year long holiday from 1763 to 1766 that took in Austria (obvs), Germany, the Netherlands, Belgium, England, France, and Switzerland.
Despite being eight years old while he lived there the plaque proclaims, almost definitely correctly, that Mozart composed in this house. Perhaps less impressive musically but certainly better looking is Natalie Imbruglia whose song Glorious mentions Frith Street. I've never heard that song and I have little intention of ever listening to it. I include it purely because I fancy Natalie Imbruglia. Sorry.
The third happy coincidence of the day (following Chopin and Bryan Adams, there's a line up) was seeing the words Freak Scene written on the window of a nearby eaterie as we moseyed on up to Soho Square to check out Kirsty MacColl's memorial bunch. The bemused patrons of the square relaxing on the bench didn't seem to mind as we gawped and took photos.
From here we turned down Greek Street. Next door to where Casanova once lodged stands the former site of the folk club Les Cousins. If the 2is was the cornerstone of the British rock'n'roll scene then Les Cousins performed the same role for the folk revival. Performers included, take a deep breath, Bob Dylan, John Martyn, Sandy Denny, Davey Graham, Bert Jansch, Roy Harper, Jackson C Franck, Donovan, Nick Drake, Joni Mitchell, Cat Stevens, Paul Simon, Champion Jack Dupree, and The Incredible String Band. Les Cousins ran from '65 - '72. Elsewhere on Greek Street it is said that you can see artworks by Noel Fielding and Icelandic avant-rockers Sigur Ros upstairs at Maison Bertaux. But Maison Bertaux, like so many former Soho institutions, stands no more.
We left Soho and we passed through Covent Garden only stopping at the end of Great Queen Street to see a plaque marking the former site of the Blitz Club where Spandau Ballet played their first gig (so true, funny how it seems) and regulars included Boy George, Marilyn, and Martin Degville from Sigue Sigue Sputnik. Steve Strange and Rusty Egan from Visage both hosted and ran (a legendarily hostile) door.
To cut a long story short we were all in need of another drink so we passed over Kingsway into the decidedly quieter, almost desolate, knot of streets that surround Lincoln's Inn Fields and carried on into Holborn. It was a nice touch to pass The Old Curiosity Shop while embarking on one of the capital's curious circuits but it was even nicer to find the wonderful Seven Stars pub on Carey Street. There had been a lot of stars on this walk but these seven were amongst the most welcome.
The Seven Stars is a great little boozer as any pub that features a cat wearing some kind of Shakespearean ruff and a landlady called Roxy Beaujolais should be. A fine selection of ales, chequered tableclothes, and a display of art that'd bring an OCD sufferer out in hives all combined to create one of the most convivial pit stops of any London by Foot walk so far. Inevitably one pint led to another.
But only two. I was running a tight ship and we were on the clock. We needed to be on Waterloo Bridge in time for, you guessed it, Waterloo Sunset. "As long as I gaze at Waterloo sunset I am in paradise" must be a contender for one of the most famous, and evocative, London lyrics of all time.
The skyline from Waterloo Bridge has changed a lot since Ray Davies penned that line back in 1966 but it's still dominated by the dome of St.Paul's and it still takes one's breath away. There wasn't much evidence of a sun setting but the autumnal twilight was both evocative and melancholic.
We'd "wandered lonely streets behind where the old Thames does flow" (History, The Verve) and we were looking out on the river where during the Silver Jubilee The Sex Pistols played their famous boat gigs and where, 301 years ago, Handel's Water Music was performed in response to a request for a concert on the Thames by George I.
I proposed our final stop (except another pub after, obviously) should be, not a curry as usual, but a tribute to The Jazz Butcher's 1988 album Fishcotheque and I was pleased people went along with it. They had no booze so I had a cup of tea (most of the others on Diet Coke) to wash down my chips, beans, and copious amounts of heavily buttered white bread. Signs outside boasted of a Fishco Inferno and inside there was a vinyl copy of said Jazz Butcher album on the wall.
We'll almost definitely be back to Indian food again soon but for this walk this seemed a very apt and very tasty, if none too healthy, denouement. I'd been a little cautious about how the walk would go but in the end I felt it'd been something of a success. We finished our meal, and our drinks, and I took the 63 bus home. The journey wasn't long but maybe that's because I'm a Londoner and "I, I live by the river".
Thanks, as ever, to Shep, Pam, Neil, and Belinda for joining me. The walking, the music, and the London was all good but the company of friends was, as always, the main point of the day.
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