
Ian, Chris, George, Robin and John
Chapter 8 Willkommen in Hamburg
We assembled on a Monday late in April to drive the 500 miles or so to Hamburg, this took about 36 hours as the van only had a top speed of 40 mph. We had to arrive by the 1st May. We eventually arrived at the Top Ten Club on the infamous Reeperbahn, Hamburg’s equivalent to London’s Soho only worse or better depending on your point of view and I can tell you there were some views, late on the 30th April. We parked outside the club, and I volunteered to stay with van because of all the equipment onboard and the fact we couldn’t lock the doors, while the other went inside the club to suss things out and have a couple of beers.
Hamburg turned out to be a really wild city!
After a couple of hours the four lads came back for me and together with a little Scottish fella called Riky Barnes, who was the assistant manager of the club, went into a café-cum-restaurant next door the club for a meal and a chat. This café and a little Chinese restaurant in the back streets became frequent watering holes for the band over the next four weeks.
The next day, in the morning, the ‘Decadent Streak’ and another group, Rudy Jay and the Jaymen, a black West Indian R&B band from London, moved into the Top Ten Club. Both bands shared a flat above the club, if you can call two bedrooms, a kitchen and a bathroom sufficient space for 11 fully grown men. Apart from the space we all got on very well.
The club’s policy was that two bands played for the whole month, seven days a week, one hour on and one hour off from 7pm until 3 or 4 in the morning Sunday to Thursday and from 6pm until 6am Friday and Saturday. A very punishing schedule indeed. We also alternated which band started the night
The club was quite expensive so we didn’t eat there much but one concession was ‘house beer’, a rather foul brew but after a few you couldn’t tell the difference and the fact it only cost 1 Mark a bottle made it taste all the better. Added to this it seemed to be the done thing for customers of the club to buy the band a drink or two, so on many occasions the ‘hour off’ was taken up by drinking with the German fans. Everyone wanted the band to be seen at their table, so both bands did quite well for drinks throughout the night, in fact so well some nights they just about made the last set or two. The last set (commonly known as the dawn chorus) normally consisted of the band playing long blues numbers and about a dozen or so people dancing. The set ended when the manager had had enough and he flashed a small white light on the side of the stage. This was the sign for us to stop playing at the end of the current number. After a while we used to stop as soon as the white light went on.
1966 had a very hot May so on weekends after we had finished playing for the night we all jumped into the van along with some ‘girlfriends’ and headed for Timmendorf, near Travemunde, a coastal town some two-hour drive from Hamburg. On arriving at Timmendorf everyone had some breakfast and then it was down to sleeping on the beach before it got too hot. After some sun bathing and swimming, at around 3pm, it was back up the autobahn to Hamburg just in time the night’s performance. Back to the club, a quick shower and it was time to go on. Both bands had vast repertoires of about 100 songs and many more were made up as you went along but in the course of a night’s playing we used to repeat some numbers especially if requested.
After a few days of this intense performing both bands started to suffer from the dreaded ‘Hamburg Throat’, in other words the old voice box started to go. Once we got through this period the voice seemed to get even stronger and you could sing all night, added to the fact that in Germany, at the time, you could buy from the apothecary (chemist) a pill called ‘preludin’ (known as prellies) that had the effect of keeping you awake for long periods. All the bands used to use these including the Beatles whom had played at the Top Ten Club, a couple of years before, as well as the Star Club that was just around the corner.
We hardly ever saw nighttime during the month of May, it was always light when we went into the club and always light when we came out again in the morning. During the week when we tried to catch up on some much needed sleep before going to bed we used to give one of Rudy Jay’s band a list of breakfast requirements (the Jay men used to do a lot on their own cooking and had agreed to make ‘breakfast’ for us for a small fee) and about 5pm we were woken up with egg sandwiches, bacon rolls and coffee and boy did it taste good. This was a great arrangement. After ‘breakfast’ it was time for a quick shower, get changed it our stage clothes, downstairs to the club, a quick tune up and then it was time for another night’s performance.
Once the van had been unloaded and the equipment taken into the club the van had been parked-up on some waste ground at the back of the club and access gained to it by way of a small alley way next to the club. The only time the van was used now was on weekends to go to the beach.
During our ‘hour off’, if not taken up by drinking in the club, it was not uncommon for one of us in the group to show a lady fan the delights of the inside of the old Commer van and the young lady showing the bands ‘member’ the delights of her! Nobody actually kept score (excuse the pun) but the old van certainly clocked up a good few miles I can tell you!
Down at the lower end on the Reeperbahn on the right was a small street that was full of strip-joints, little bars and, by now, the infamous ‘Star Club. The REMO FOUR, a band managed by Brian Epstein and every bit as good as the Beatles, often used to play at the Star Club. Sometimes in-between our sets at the Top Ten we would pop round to the Star Club and have a beer and a chat. We became friendly with the Remo Four, whom later became ‘Ashton, Gardener and Dyke’ and had a couple of hit records. On one occasion the ‘Spencer Davis Group’ made an appearance at the Star Club and really brought the house down. From what Robin remembers, Chris, myself and Robin spent most of that night in a bar opposite the Star Club, called the ‘Block Hut’ having a splendid drinking session with Steve Winwood and Spencer Davis.
Further up the road from the Star Club was a little known jazz club. One night, the owner of the jazz club was in the Top Ten and after chatting to us invited us all back to his club after we had finished our last set (5am). On completing our last set we set off for the jazz club where we spent the next four hours drinking whiskey. After this heavy drinking session we all went back to the ‘flat’ above the Top Ten for some much needed sleep.
At the top end of the Reeperbahn, on the left, was a newly built ‘Wimpy Bar’. The ‘Decadent Streak’ was invited to open the restaurant. This was done in one of our ‘hours off’. The opening ceremony consisted of a giant hamburger and I mean GIANT plus plenty to drink and we actually got our photo in the paper the next day stuffing our faces full of this giant hamburger.
The month of May finally drew to a close and the next gig loomed, a two-week stint at the ‘Crazy Horse’, still in Hamburg but across the other side of town. A flat when with the gig but this time a short drive from the club. We made plenty of noise and action on stage at the Crazy Horse and the flat saw plenty of action too!
The third and final gig on that tour of Germany was another two-week stint at ‘Rabes Hotel’, Eutersen, about 50 miles south of Hamburg. It was the scene for many a good drinking session and to our surprise and pleasure we actually got one day of a week. ‘What’s a day off’ we cried in unison. This one-day off was spent in driving up to Hamburg, in the faithful Commer and visiting the Reeperbahn going to the Top Ten and chatting to the group that had taken over from our month there. This band was from Wales and called ‘The Smoke-less Zone’, who later was to change their name to ‘MAN’. On this night in Hamburg one of our group got left behind and spent the evening with friends in a night club before spending the night with a stripper and having to catch the bus back to Eutersen the next day just in time to play at the evening session. Totally shattered he missed the after show drinking session and went to bed. His identity shall remain nameless to spare his embarrassment! Fully refreshed in the morning he promptly got off with hotel owner’s daughter and never did visit Hamburg again.
During our stay in Germany we did quite a few photo shoots for various newspapers and magazines. One of these shoots was ‘on location’ on a deserted beach with a couple of the girls we had befriended. The photo’s looked more like an advert for Fender guitars, I having now swapped by Rickenbacker for a Fender Precision bass at the local music shop on the Reeperbahn, Chris with his Fender Stratocaster, George sporting a Fender Telecaster and John with a Fender Jazz Master (serial no. 78184) that he bought from Selmer Musical Instruments ltd for £108 on the 25th November 1966. Robin was left holding a drumstick. We were all wearing hats of various descriptions and standing up to our knees in the sea.
Ian, Chris, George, Robin & John (advert for Fender guitars?)
We left for home on 1st July 1966 after an amazing time in Hamburg and arrived back on the 3rd.
Our next gig was an audition at ‘Oscars Grotto’, a new club in Ilford, Essex, on the 6th July. We then actually played there for real on the 9th and having only to do 2x45 mins. Sets we played like never before. So hyped up by playing such long sets in Germany two 45’s were a breeze. Friends were amazed by our slickness and we went down a storm. The gigs seem to flow in and in no tome at all we were playing nearly every night and sometimes two gigs a night. On one occasion we were due on stage at 11pm at the ‘Café des Artistes’ in Chelsea but first we had to open a show in Southend, Essex, which also featured ‘The Tremeloes’ and ‘The Moody Blues’. We had borrowed the Tremeloes equipment, as ours was already set up in the ‘café’, and after the second house had driven straight back to London for our third gig of the night.
The ‘Café des Artistes’ in Redcliffe Gardens, Chelsea, became another regular gig for us. It was one of the ‘in ‘clubs in London and all the groups that were in town at the time seem to use it as a meeting place. It was a most unusual club in the fact that it didn’t serve alcohol, so whenever we played there we used to frequent the ‘Redcliffe Arms’ opposite for a few ‘bevvies’ before taking to the stage at around 10pm until 2am. The ‘Café’, a basement club, was a hot and sweaty club with low ceilings and lots of little alcoves, a very intimate club (in more ways than one!). Other bands that used to play at the ‘Café’ included ‘The Lovers’, after Lulu had dumped them; they later changed their name to George Bean and the bass player went on to play with ‘Manfred Mann’, and Jeff Beck with his brother on drums. It really was a swinging place.
John’s girlfriend, at the time, shared a flat in Redcliffe Gardens with three other girls; it was just down the road from the ‘Café’. One of the girls was a hairdresser and one Saturday afternoon both John and myself were at the flat having our ‘locks’ trimmed before going to a gig. The other girls were out at the van adding to the already impressive amount of lipstick that adored the vehicle. When they had finished they came back into the flat and one of the girls passes a strange remark ‘I’ve shut the window that was open!’ John looked at me; I looked at John we both knew that we hadn’t left a window open on the van. Everyone rushed outside to the van only to find that someone had broken into the Commer and had made off with two guitars, my Fender Precision bass and John’s Fender Jazz Master guitar.
Terror struck us both, what would we do now we had a gig to go to. After some frantic phone calls, Stu Calver (a former member of the band) lent me a Fender bass, which I would eventually buy for £50 and John borrowed a guitar from ‘Freedman’s’ musical instruments, a music shop in Leytonstone.
Sunday 17th July 1966 Chris Manders decided to leave the band and went back to Germany with a band called ‘Summer Set’. A guitarist named Eddie replaced him but he didn’t stay long. We were down to four again and this was going to be the line-up for the foreseeable future and most probably the best line-up of all. We four carried on gigging and again changed our name to ‘No Flies on Us, But!’ and on the 25th August went into Dick James’s recording studio in London to record a demo record that was eventually to become our first single; ‘I’M NOT YOUR STEPPING STONE’ and on the ‘b’ side we recorded ‘Something new’ but that would never become the ‘b’ side, it was going to be ‘Talk to me’ a song written by Ivor Raymonde our producer.