Happy Easter to those that celebrate it, and happy long weekend to those that just enjoy the additional bank holidays. Here's Al Westoll with the final part of his age related trilogy of top fives. As I mentioned Al's band The Phantoms play The Alley Cat Club in Soho on Thursday 18th April. If you fancy a fun night out I'll see you there, come say hi and I might even buy you a beer! THE GIG HAS BEEN CANCELLED BUT WILL HOPEFULLY BE REARRANGED AT SOME POINT SOON.
Top 5 Things that show you are getting old!
Here’s something to warn your younger readers about! Enjoy your youth while you can. All was fine until I hit 40 & then all this lot started happening!...
1. Bladder induced sleep interruptions (& Wind!)
I used to have a bladder like a camel! Now, no matter how much (or little!) I’ve drunk before going to bed I still need to get up at some ungodly hour of the night for a pee! What’s this all about? Annoying but manageable whilst at home, slightly more problematic when camping at Glastonbury ! Whilst on the subject of peeing! At some stage in your life (40 as it turns out) you suddenly can’t do something simple like just have a wee without farting at the same time! Although this point is quite amusing!
2. Moisturiser
As a smooth shiny faced kid it would have been unimaginable to think that in later life you would need to use moisturiser! I mean, that’s the sort of stuff your Nan used! But after many years of sunburn & exposure to the lovely Feltham atmosphere your dry cracked wizened visage simply cant cope without a daily application of E45! By the way, all those cracks on my face are laughter lines, not wrinkles!
3. Hangovers
In your youth you don’t give this a second thought. You can go out on the lash, drink as much as you like & wake up the next morning feeling fresh as a daisy. I got very used to these amazing powers of recovery and so was very surprised one morning after a heavy night in my late 30’s to wake up feeling like someone had hit me over the head with a brick & small mouse had nested in my mouth!
4. Weight & Exercise
Growing up as a kid & then a young adult I never gave any thought to the health or nutritional benefits of anything I ate. I just ate what I liked! Similarly I never bothered with exercise. Well obviously I did but it never seemed like it! Endless hours of football, first in the playground with a tennis ball & then later, a kick around with your mates or a Sunday morning league game running around on a wet, muddy council pitch was fun, not exercise. And then you hit 40. All of a sudden you start to get a little heavier, your six-pack starts to become more of a three-pack and you can now ‘pinch an inch’! So, you are forced to start eating vegetables and going to the gym. How tedious!
5. Your ‘Get Up & Go’ gets up and goes!
I can’t remember the last time I sprung out of bed and skipped to work full of the joys of spring. Nowadays it’s a real chore to drag my sorry aching body out of bed in the mornings and summon up the energy to face yet another day! How is it possible to wake up more tired & knackered than when you went to bed the night before? I thought sleep was meant to be restoratory!
Apparently the current life expectancy of a UK male is 78. Blimey! I’m not sure I can put up with another 36 years of this. What’s around the corner, Piles & Dementia! I’m now starting to think they had a good point in the movie ‘Logan’s Run’ (the bit about knocking it on the head at 30, not wooden acting or Jenny Agutter getting her kit of at every opportunity – although that bit wasn’t all bad!)
Note. I’ve not mentioned anything about hair! For me, going grey is not a sign of getting old as I started doing that when I was 18! I’m sure if Chop was writing this he’d have had to add something about hair loss though! (No idea what you're talking about Al - Ed.)
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Part 2 of the Alun Westoll Easter extravaganza. Al is the drummer and driving force behind Feltham's finest covers band The Phantoms who will be playing with JB & The Wolfmen and Clarabella & the Cryptkicker 5 at The Alley Cat Club in Denmark Street on Thursday 18th April. See you there hep cats!
Top 5 things that as a kid I thought were fantastic and 30 years on, still are!
1. The Wizard of Oz, 1939 film
Probably the genesis of my attraction to gingers! The Wizard of Oz was my favourite film as a kid & still is today. Most people berate the fact that it’s churned out every Christmas but apart from the presents (and a sneaky swig of my Nan’s Snowball!), it’s annual repeat was one of the highlights of my childhood festivities! It’s amazing to look back at it and think it was made in 1939! It looked and sounded great then, and still does. By the way, it is possible to love this film & not be gay!
2. The Beatles, Pop Group 1960 to 1970
As a child I’m sure you can all recall those long tedious car journeys on the way to some hideous Butlins holiday camp somewhere in the UK for your annual Summer family holiday. All the way there you were forced to listen to your parents music from the back seat of the Ford Mondeo, something like Abba or The Carpenters, and whether you like it or not, that music stays with you forever. I should be thankful though. Although I’m still quite fond of Abba & The Carpenters, my parents favourite was The Beatles, and so from an early age was inducted into the brilliance of the greatest ever pop band! I was only 9 months old when they split up (the Beatles, not my parents!) but their timeless songs have stayed with me for a lifetime & still sound as fresh & innovative today as they did 50 years ago! Thank God my Mum and Dad didn’t like Barry Manilow!
3. Stephen King, The Stand, 1978 Novel
I used to love reading as a kid. First off it was classics like Treasure Island, Sherlock Holmes & Around the World in 80 Days, but as I grew older (early teens) I developed a love of horror books and authors like Stephen King & James Herbert. To this day I can recall as a 13 year old being asked to read out loud to my English Lit class at Abbotsford School a paragraph from the book I was reading at the time. I chose to read the chapter from James Herbert’s ‘The Rats’ where a couple get eaten alive by a swarm of rats whilst having it off! I digress. I’ve also always been partial to a big fat book, the more epic the better, and as a result my favourite book back in the 80s was ‘The Stand’ by Stephen King. It’s a monster of a book (734 pages) telling the tale of the fight between good & evil in a post-apocalyptic America. I’ve never tired of this story and as I’m still an avid reader, will every now & then dip into it all over again. I’ve still got the same paperback I originally had all those years ago, but it’s starting to look a little faded & dog eared! By the way, like a lot of Stephen King books, it was made into an awful TV series sometime in the 90s & later released on DVD. Do not be tempted to watch it, but do read the book!
4. The Wombles Band!
The first albums I can remember playing on my tiny child’s record player were by the ‘furriest and possibly the tidiest band’, The Wombles (in reality songwriter Mike Batt). I loved all the songs and can remember many happy hours singing along to the lyrics reproduced in the lavish gatefold album sleeves! The Wombles released 4 albums between 1973 & 1975 and I had them all (my ‘little’ nephew has got them now but seeing as he’s now 18 maybe he can give them back)! Sadly they split in 1976 when Wellington left to pursue a solo career (really)! But why are they still great now I hear you ask? Well, in June 2011 I was lucky enough to be in the front row of a packed Avalon Tent at the Glastonbury Festival to witness the Wombles reunion! The capacity crowd (made up mainly of 40 somethings!) sung along to every word, just like me! Check it out! Fantastic!
5. BBC Classified Football Results (& Baked Beans on Toast)!
For many years as a young kid the highlight of the weekend for me was staying over with my Nan in her council flat in Brentford on a Friday night. I’d then spend Saturday morning doing my homework & watching TV. My parents would then come back and we would all sit round for our tea (always beans on toast for me!) at about the same time as Final Score on Grandstand & listen to Len Martin read the classified football results. This has hugely nostalgic memories for me & to this day I still love to tune in every week and listen the how all the teams got on (East Fyfe 4, Forfar 5, etc, etc) and remember my old Nan! Ahhhhhh. Incidentally, despite now being a bit of a foodie, I still love nothing better than a nice plate of beans on toast too! Oh, and a cup of tea. Obviously.
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A bumper Easter special. You may remember by pal Alun Westoll from his previous Guest top five double header "Top 5 Bands that only ever made one album" and "Top 5 Bands that SHOULD only have ever made one album". Well he's back with not one, not two but THREE top fives and I'm gonna give them all to you over the next few days.
(Editor's note: I particularly like how Al has attempted to recreate Bruce Campbell's pose in the swimming picture)
Things that as a kid I thought were fantastic but looking back were not so great
1. Live Aid, Concert (1985)
Kicking off with the inspiration behind this top 5. Fellow band member, Mark Gibson, recently lent me his DVD box set of Live Aid which I slowly worked my way through over a number of evenings. This is a prime example of something everyone (including myself until now) rave about saying what an amazing gig it was. But having now watched it all over again it’s definitely not as good as we remember! Yes, the odd bit still holds up (Quo, Queen) but mainly it’s terrible! From the Wembley gig, the performances of The Style Council, Adam Ant & Paul Young have not aged well. And as for the Philadelphia gig, it’s all quite painful, with the Thompson Twins a particular low point! See for yourself! 27 years later I’ve now taken off my rose tinted specs regarding Live Aid and well and truly stomped on them!
2. The Evil Dead, Movie (1981)
I can vividly remember being scared witless watching this film one Halloween at about the age of 12. A bunch of us got together round a friends house and scared ourselves silly watching it on VHS. Then sometime in my mid 20’s I can recall going to see a late night re-run of it at the cinema & this time laughing all the way through! The time lapse plasticine special effects & ‘raping tree’ were certainly not as terrifying the 2nd time around! I have to admit that I still love this film and rushed out to buy it when it was released on DVD. OK, so as a horror film it no longer cuts the mustard, but it’s a great watch with loads of top memories attached!
3. Swimming!
Kids love nothing better than splashing around in the pool & would stay in there for hours if it wasn’t for your parents having to drag you out. I know I used to love nothing better than a trip to Staines swimming pool. But somewhere along the line the fun seems to go out of it and as an adult it just seems like exercise. And there’s no fun in that!
4. 80s Fashion!
Growing up as a kid in the 80’s it was all about having the in-look! All the girls wanted to look like Madonna. All the boys were busy nicking VW badges to look like the Beastie Boys! For me it was a mullet haircut (which I still had when I started work in 1988!), a Gallini jumper (a hideous 3 coloured horizontal striped sweatshirt with a huge logo in the middle), dark blue jeans with a thin red (or white) pin stripe down the leg and white socks! All bought from Feltham Market (where Tesco’s is now)! For my Sister it was massive hair, leg warmers & Ra Ra skirts. Good grief, what were we thinking! Although the Parka Jacket was good! Now when I see young white kids walking around today with baseball caps on sideways (like the chavy comedian Lee Nelson) I’m amused to think that they will probably regret it too in 30 years time!
5. Madness, Pop Band, 1976 to now (unfortunately!)
I used to love this band when I was a kid. I can still remember Baggy Trousers being the ultimate anthem as a 10 year old at the Echelford School disco! I spent many hours on a Sunday night up in my bedroom listening to Simon Bates presenting the top 40 on Radio 1 & taping the Madness hits (desperately hoping no-one would make any noise whilst I hit the Play & Record buttons on my cassette player)! I used to listen to them all the time. Which was probably as annoying for my family as I found my Sisters constant rotation of Tight Fit’s ‘The Lion Sleeps Tonight’! Some people still love the Ska sound but now with adult ears it’s just too close to Reggae for my liking! One step beyond! BTW, why do these pop dinosaurs keep getting wheeled out every time there’s some kind of high profile gig recently? It was bad enough having to see them ponsing around on the roof of Buck House at the Jubilee gig. And just as I thought they had gone they were back again (singing exactly the same bloody song!) at the Olympics closing ceremony! Please make it stop!
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