THE KNIFE HAND

It’s always cold just before dawn no matter where you are, he’d heard it said. They were right, the wind sneaking up from the riverbank found the holes in his denim jacket and quickened his pace along the railway cutting. The random flare of sharply inhaled cigarettes and rustling of newspapers guided him across the gravel to the knot of figures clustered around the gatehouse. He unrolled his own paper and squatted on his heel, acknowledging no-one. A few glances in the gloom revealed the usual c...

A Rock’n’Roll Memoir

At the start of the Eighties I was sitting on my arse in Melbourne. My missus had left me, and my band had gone down the tubes.




I had been working as a night watchman at the local hospital, but after I’d sprung a couple of staff-members loading up their car from the back of the dispensary about 3am on a rainy morning, they threatened me, and I reported it. There were obviously bigger fish involved because...

I can’t remember the name and our paths only crossed once, but had a profound effect on me. It stays with me to this day. I left school at 15, jumping before I was pushed: I hadn’t been getting on with the powers that be at school. They were determined to get rid of me one way or another: my political activities in relation to Vietnam and the Springboks had made me a marked man. My parents were devastated, and offered to pay for me to go to Uni if I would stay on and bite my lip. I was havi...

DON’T DROP THE SOAP


I grew up in Queensland, so I’m no stranger to hot weather, but I was suffering on this trip. The coast road on the Mediterranean side of Spain passes through some very dry country, and hitching was a slow way to get around. It was high summer in the dying days of the Franco regime and the mood of the people was as sullen as the climate. I’d nearly been beaten up in a Madrid bar for chatting up a senorita, and fair-haired tourists didn’t seem too popular. The b...