‘Oh my God, there he is. I have until he manages to get out of the door to decide what to do.’ I said to myself.
This turned out to be longer than I needed as the more Timmy struggled with the door the less likely it seemed to want to cooperate—when he did eventually escape to freedom, he was relieved and I was ready. At least I thought I was ready.
‘Hello Timmy, I’m sorry to bother you but I was at the show today. I thought you were brill, I’m a big fan and…’
Now here’s the thing. There was no ‘and’. The sentence should have ended on the word ‘brill’, not a great word I admit, but it was nevertheless a word and an acceptable word to end on but now I had said ‘and’, that usually means there is more to follow. Timmy was now waiting for whatever was after the ‘and’.
‘…and…’
He was still waiting and was beginning to look worried. I had to say something and I had to say it fast.
‘…and…would it be possible for me to interview you before your show one night…er…for hospital radio…?’
There, that would do—it would have to and I’d said it now anyway, it was too late, the horse had bolted the gate, the cat was out of the bag, the fat lady had sung—it’s all I had and I’d used it. The fact that I didn’t work for hospital radio, although I had sat in on a couple of shows, didn’t matter. Nor did the fact that I didn’t even own a tape recorder on which to carry out said interview. On the face of it—things were maybe not quite as they seemed, but Timmy need not be aware of this—and besides, he was king of make-believe.
He paused before answering, I think I recall him looking me up and down and then he said, ‘Sure, why not, come before the show tomorrow, we’ll do it then.’
I may or may not have said thank you, I really can’t remember, my mind immediately jumping to the fact that I had less than twenty-four hours to book the afternoon off work, acquire a tape machine, think of some questions, dream up a plausible back story about my role at a fictitious hospital radio station and return to Manchester.
Top 10 Items of Technology in the Evans Household, circa 1983
10 Ronco Buttoneer
9 Stylophone
8 Casio calculator
7 Two-tone trimphone
6 Music centre
5 Panasonic video recorder
4 Portable television
3 Remington Fuzzaway
2 Clairol 2000 hairdryer (my sister’s pride and joy)
1 Grundig 350 deluxe reel-to-reel tape recorder (my brother’s former pride and joy)
I remembered my brother Dave had a tape recorder, it was a huge grey thing that weighed a ton—a Grundig 350 Deluxe reel-to-reel machine. It was notable also as the only thing other than my marvellous Mini that I remember Mum ever going into debt to buy.
No longer living at home, my brother had left his beloved Grundig behind. After enquiring as to its whereabouts Mum informed me that she thought it was probably at the back of the big cupboard in the second bedroom. Of course that’s exactly where it was.
The next thing I needed to do was see if it worked. I clunked on the power, optimistically, and the machine hummed back into life. I even managed to get it playing—Carly Simon’s ‘You’re So Vain’ (my brother kept that one quiet!). The rest of the simple controls were easy enough to figure but crucially there didn’t seem to be a microphone.
I shot off with the machine to an audio/music shop and hauled it up onto the counter with a mighty thud. The guy behind the counter looked at it somewhat bemused.
‘Wow man, what-is-that?’
What I wanted to say was, ‘That, my man, is my passport to a fully blown real-life conversation with my radio idol. Please can you provide me with something that might facilitate the possibility of it ever recording again—thank you!’
What I ended up saying was something far more panicky and less articulate—even though it was only lunchtime I could already feel the pressure of my first broadcasting deadline approaching fast.
The man could see my distress and kindly set about all he could do to help, eventually finding something equally as grey and antiquated as my machine that claimed to be a microphone.
‘There that should do ya,’ he declared almost triumphantly. ‘Oh and you’ll be needing a new spool of tape,’ he added. ‘I think that one’s well shot.’
Earlier on he’d tested the mighty 350 Deluxe for me, unfortunately hearing Carly Simon in the process. I was quick to point out that this was my brother’s tape machine and it was his recording of Carly Simon. He sympathised and carried on, though I’m not sure he believed me.
With my recording equipment now up and running, after the flat-tyre debacle of the day before I decided to leave the car at home and take the train into Manchester—also something I had never done before, let alone with the mass of a small land mass in tow. The Grundig was like a dead body. What in the blazes did they put inside these things to make them work?
The beginning of my journey at the Warrington end was not so bad, the car park being quite close to the platform, but the walk from Piccadilly train station in Manchester to Piccadilly Gardens seemed like an eternity. Why these two places bore the same name yet were so far apart was beyond me.
When I finally arrived at the other Piccadilly station—the radio station as opposed to the train station—I thought my right arm was going to drop off; my right thigh was bruised with the banging of the Grundig’s bloomin’ great hulk and the fingers of my right hand had turned blue with the deep imprint of its wide shiny metal handle.
I was a mess but I was an early mess and that was good—three hours an early mess to be precise.
Timmy waltzed in through reception around about an hour before his show. There was no Adam Ant outfit this time but instead a multicoloured stripy tank top over a bright orange shirt; he was also wearing a big fur coat and a beret. I didn’t know what it all meant but I quite liked it.
He recognised me from the night before and politely said that he’d send somebody out for me when he was ready for the interview. I waited patiently for about half an hour until the tall, sharp-looking kid from the fun bus appeared. It was quickly evident to me that this individual was someone I could perhaps learn from, he was supremely confident and I couldn’t help thinking he looked like a member of Depeche Mode.
Hurriedly he led me through several corridors—something I was finding hard to cope with as The Grundig was now back banging against my leg. Between the pain and my audible wincing I remember thinking how surprisingly unglamorous the place was, looking more like an office pool than a throbbing radio station—again showbusiness was proving to be more ‘business’ than ‘show’—when was I going to learn? Half a corridor later, we reached the office where the Great Mallett was to be found, head down, writing away—the master preparing.
The tall kid wafted out. It was now only fifteen minutes before Timmy on The Tranny went on the air for this Monday night, Timmy was still totally focused on what he was writing,
‘Won’t be a sec,’ he muttered.
I went to lift my machine onto his desk in readiness so