Chas and Dave. Chas Hodges

just about got to the centre of the stage, the crowd still quiet. Then one lone voice in the audience hollered, ‘Fuck off you cunt!’

      The place erupted. A hail of ice-cream cartons, beer cans and anything they could get their hands on flew towards the stage from all directions. I gotta admit I didn’t help things. I sort of tried to pretend I wasn’t with him. It wasn’t very professional of me but I couldn’t help it. You see, when I was in the role of the punter I was as bad as them and I’d holler and hoot if I didn’t think the band was any good. Mind you, it was only the poser-type bands I did it to. The flash bands that had no talent. Now I was thinkin’, ‘If I was out there, would I look upon me as being part of a flash band?’ I squirmed at the thought. I backed away from Heinz like he had the plague and joined in with the crowd. Like I said, it wasn’t very professional of me and I wasn’t proud of myself but I couldn’t help it.

      I must say he had guts. He didn’t let up. He went through the whole of his act, layin’ on the floor and all that, but it didn’t work. He was simply booked on the wrong show. He was a ‘dumb cluck tarts’ act. On some other tour he might have been passable. But not this one. Gene Vincent and Jerry Lee fans were hardly the most polite bunch, even to the best support bands.

      Backing Jerry Lee on tour was fantastic. It was made up for backing Heinz. We finished off at the Star Club in Hamburg, Jerry Lee only, thank fuck.

      Richie fell in love at the Star Club. Her name was Margret. I remember him saying, ‘Who’s that bird down the front who looks like Doris Day?’ And our tour manager, Henry Henroid, saying, ‘Blimey! He’s well hooked, ain’t he?’ He was right.

      Ritchie bought her an engagement ring and brought her back to England like a lot of musicians did who went to Hamburg. They all got hooked up with German birds. I think she was in the puddin’ club, though I can’t be certain (I don’t wanna get sued), but I remember the day they married alright!

      It wasn’t long after we all got back from Hamburg. We all went to the wedding and had to rush away to a gig in Salisbury. It had been a sort of unusual affair. Not the kind of wedding atmosphere I had been brought up with. I’d seen a few weddings in my time too. What with Great-grandfather’s and Mum’s. Richie got married and perhaps he felt different, but we all felt we’d been to a court case. Something that was our duty to do. We done it, and that was it. Now we had to get to the gig.

      We were second on the bill. This new band were topping the bill. They’d just got a record in the charts. A scruffy load of jumped-up Skifflers called The Rolling Stones. The place was packed. Mostly teenage girls who were there to see The Rolling Stones. We came on to do our set which normally went down a bomb, but they weren’t there to see us.

      Some of ’em gave us the time of day, but there was a bunch of girls down the front who, after every number started chanting, ‘We want The Rolling Stones!’ and all that.

      One of the girls at the front, who was directly in line with Ritchie, was drinking a bottle of Coke through a straw. She decided it was a good idea to suck up Coke through the straw and blow it over Ritchie’s trousers. Every time she hit the target her mates fell about. She was having a great time. Little did she know that Margret was in the wings watching all this.

      Now I could see what Ritchie meant when he likened Margret to Doris Day, but Margret was the German version of Doris Day. She was just a bit bigger all round, and I don’t mean fat, she had muscles. I don’t mean that unkindly. She told me once that a woman should take pride in the physical condition of her body. She should be fit and strong. Margret was. The girl who was blowing Coke over Ritchie’s trousers (and her mates) were about to find out.

      The girl was sucking down her straw for the fifth go at squirting Ritchie’s trousers when Margret’s run onto the stage, grabbed the girl and give her a punch that sent her sprawling among her mates. She stood there as the girl’s mates got up from the floor. Then one of ’em made a grab for Margret. She caught hold of Margret’s skirt. The rest joined in but all they succeeded in doing was pulling her skirt off. Margret, now stood there in her drawers, dived off the stage in among the lot of ’em.

      And she laid into ’em!

      A big circle was formed and the girls who weren’t flattened just run for it. The band kept playing, by the way, and though I was motioning to Ritchie to get down there and help her, he just gave me a wide-eyed and dumbstruck look. I suppose he thought, ‘I’ll carry on doing what I do best. She don’t look as though she needs any help from me or anybody.’ She didn’t, either. ‘I spend ze morning pressing my Reechie’s trousers,’ she said later. ‘I have no one spoilin’ zem.’ Quite right too.

      That girl’s eyes (and her mates’!) must water to this day everytime they hear a Rolling Stones record. Those around her must think she is weeping through nostalgia. But those who know, know better.

      Coming home from the Star club also meant Jerry Lee going home to America. The end of a heavenly tour. What now? Post Rock ’n’ Roll depression again. Like coming home from Butlins.

      But the next best thing was only just around the corner!

      Don Arden said Gene Vincent loves your band and wants you on the road with him. That don’t sound bad to me!