Alfie Page 9
But that was Amsterdam. I couldn’t live in that haze of second-hand smoke every night at college. Every single evening I’d come back and they’d be sat around the table and I’d be thinking, ‘Please, please, please don’t start smoking.’ But it would only be a matter of time before the cigarette papers came out and they’d start rolling joints. And at 11pm the beers would come out, drugs would be flowing, dealers would be knocking on the door at 4am demanding money . . . I couldn’t deal with it. So one night I said, ‘I’m sorry fellas, I’ve got to move out,’ and I just left there and then, moved in with a mate of mine for a few nights who lived round the corner. But although I’d escaped the drug pit, he and his lot were into porn. Lots of it. Porno movies all over the place. And that was just miserable. I didn’t know what was worse, that or sitting down every night with the acid-swallowers. I was really depressed, I just felt sick. I had no money coming in, was working myself to death at college, my living situation was dire. It really was not a positive time. And I just walked out. I wanted to be on my own. So I went and slept on a bench in Hyde Park for a few nights. It wasn’t quite what I’d envisaged for my life at the Royal College of Music, but at the time, it seemed like my best option.
Chapter Twelve
CLIMBING OUT OF THE HOLE
My temporary homelessness didn’t seem all that dramatic to me, though that may speak volumes about my perspective back then. It wasn’t a great time in my life by any means, but it was the middle of the summer, it didn’t get dark till late. I could leave a lot of my stuff in my locker at college and spend my evenings drinking in the bar till 11, or later if they extended it. Then just after midnight they’d lock the doors and I’d go over the road to the park with my sleeping bag, settle down on a bench and attach my rucksack to my ankle to stop people trying to nick off with it. Had to hide from the wardens if I saw them. And in the mornings I’d go back into college as soon as the doors opened at 9am, shower, have breakfast, shave and have my first lesson at 10. I could wash my clothes there too – the wardrobe department had laundry facilities. I spent a lot of time in that wardrobe department. There was an element of fun to it, being able to party and just collapse on a bench at the end of the night. A few of us used to drink in the park anyway. I hardly had any money and preferred to spend what little I had on food and drink rather than rent, it seemed to make more sense when there was a bench available for free.
I was being really stubborn about work – I wanted to be a singer, and with the occasional gig coming in like the Amsterdam thing, I thought I should be able to make a living doing that, which in retrospect I clearly couldn’t. Getting some other job wasn’t an alternative, at least the way I saw it. But it was a stupid thing to be doing. Mum went absolutely crazy when she found out. Somebody from college found me there and sent me to a counsellor, who sent me to a hostel on Cromwell Road. Mum was really upset that I hadn’t told her, and I felt really disappointed with myself. I wasn’t trying to be a martyr. I didn’t think much of it at all really. I was just doing it, and it was fine.
I was drinking a lot. Drink has always been a bit of a problem for me, or at least it was. I used to have massive binges from time to time. It frightens me now to think of it. I got myself into some states in my life where I really scared myself. I went to Ronnie Scott’s one night and drank myself stupid, threw up all over myself in the back of a cab, woke up face down on the floor in the college halls, really scared, really freaked out about the state I’d got myself into. I didn’t want to be like that. Just the other night I was in a bar and somebody was buying Jägermeisters and asked me to have one, and I didn’t. I don’t touch that sort of stuff, I can’t do it any more. I shook it in America when I was trying to get my career on track, and I’ve never really gone back to any of that.
Once I moved into the hostel I started to see sense. It was a Catholic hostel run by a Catholic priest and I had a lot of counselling there – we’d talk a lot. I had to go to church and to Mass, and I had time to meditate and think about things, and pulled myself around a bit. There were a lot of times at college when I was really deeply depressed, really, really down. Having no money, not knowing what was going on career-wise, if I was wasting my time. Really wanting to achieve, and people like Russell Watson were getting out into the world, people who were discovered in pubs and were making it and doing what I wanted to do, to an extent. I was really working for it, really working, and I had a vision of where I wanted to be and it wasn’t happening. There was a lot of frustration and angst. I tried to never let it show too much, I didn’t want to mope and moan about it because that sort of thing can always bite you in the arse. But deep down I was extremely frustrated. I knew I had to be patient, and I had some optimism somewhere in the back of my mind. That was the first thing Richard Van Allan, who helped me get into college, had taught me – don’t try to jump the gun. And as discouraging as my situation was at that time I held on to that, tried to stick to it, and I’m glad I did, because he was right. And I think I’m in a much better position to handle it all now, I don’t think I could have coped with things back then, I was too young, I don’t think I was psychologically equipped.
And a few good things started to happen. There was an external engagements office at college – you’d put your name down and they’d offer you a gig, singing in a restaurant, the odd little concert, £250 or so. I did a few. There were demo jobs, and I volunteered for all of them. They were great. When a singer, a recording artist, needed a sound test or a sound check and couldn’t turn up, the likes of me would go along and do it for them. And there were a number of projects going on at Abbey Road at the time where they needed a singer to test out this old recording method, cutting a record into wax discs, making old 78 records. I did the pre-tests, so they used me as a guinea pig to figure out how to do the recording. As a result I have a load of records at Mum’s, me on old 78s, and they sound beautiful, like genuine vintage records. I loved all that sort of stuff. When I was doing that I sang into the same funnel that Enrico Caruso sang into when he recorded his albums – a real thrill. Wonderful experiences, and I learnt a lot about recording.
I was going into Abbey Road Studios quite often doing all these demo recordings. I did one once for Queen, or for their sound engineers at least. They were doing a project where they were getting classical artists to sing or play Queen songs. Andrea Bocelli and Sarah Brightman were involved. Those two did a duet on her album around that time. I know she covered ‘Who Wants to Live Forever’, but I’m not sure if the Queen album ever actually happened in the end. But I went and demoed ‘The Show Must Go On’ and ‘Who Wants to Live Forever’. Mum’s got that recording as well at home. It was awesome. I was in Studio 2, The Beatles’ studio, which reeked of history, and I was singing Queen! It was moments like that that kept me going. Moments like that inspired and encouraged me, kept me thinking, ‘Something’s happening. I’m getting there.’
I was still living at the hostel, and I finally decided it might be a good idea to earn a regular wage, and got a job as a waiter at the Covent Garden Brasserie. Late one night I was serving two guys their pasta and just as I was putting the plates on their tables I caught sight of a rat running past, stamped my foot on it and said ‘Enjoy your meal’ as I dragged its carcass back to the kitchen as subtly as I could, leaving a trail of blood on the floor. I think I got away with it. They didn’t leave anyway, munched obliviously on their lovingly prepared microwave pasta. We used to save the food that we didn’t need, or that hadn’t been eaten, and feed homeless people at the end of the night. I was always the one who had to tell them to leave when they were begging the customers. I was always the one sent out to tell them, ‘Come on guys, come back later on, we’ll make sure you’ve got something in your belly.’ Always me. There was one guy who used to come around all the time, a boxer who’d split up with his missus and hit the bottle and moved down to London. His daughter had left home as well, left her mother in the north of England to come and live on the street
s with him. They used to come to the café late at night and we’d make sure they had soup, sandwiches, pasta, whatever we had left. He showed me pictures of himself as a young boxer, sparring with Muhammad Ali. It was incredible to get to know people like that who’d come off the rails, to hear their stories.
After the Brasserie I got a job as one of the security guys at the front of concerts at Shepherd’s Bush Empire, looking out to see what trouble was going on, who was fighting, who was fainting, trying to drag Julian Cope back from the throng after he stage-dived. I saw, or at least heard, what with my back to the stage, some great gigs too. I became a big Marillion fan after they played there. It was an odd double-life, studying classical music by day and having my ears blasted at these rock gigs by night. And ironically, after some time doing these jobs, towards the end of my second year I started entering singing competitions and I realised I could make some sort of living by singing, certainly by winning those. The first big one I did was in Munich. James Lockhart put me forward to take part in Lyric Tenor of the World. I was chosen to represent the UK, had to learn seven or eight different operatic arias, and got through to the final with three other tenors. A German guy won and he was really outstanding, he had a beautiful voice. But I came second, and to have done that, in a competition that started with 2000 people, was great, and I also won the audience prize, the audience vote, which I was really chuffed about. I’ve always felt like I’ve had a connection with the audience, throughout my career. I won about £5000 for that competition, which as a student was immense, my word. That set me up for a long time, it really helped me through that second year and into the third.
I won the Clonter Opera prize. There was a singer in that who said, ‘Well done for winning, Alf, but I won the audience prize, which really outshines the first prize. That’s what really matters, pleasing the audience.’ He’s still cocky now, that guy. I thought, ‘OK, you walk away with your eight hundred pounds, I’ll walk away with my fifteen hundred pounds.’ That’s not what it’s about and that might make me sound just as cocky; I was delighted with my audience award in Munich. But that was one thing I couldn’t stand about college, people who came through the establishment because of their standing, where they were from, with attitudes like that. A lot of singers there held that mantel pretty high and made everybody well aware of it. And I never did, because I was from Fleetwood, and happy to be so. I think that’s why the classical world grates on me so much, because of people like that. It’s not that my face doesn’t fit, because I’ve been in it and I’ve done well in it, I’ve held my own. But the arrogance of some of those people never ceases to amaze me.
That second year ended magnificently. The Royal Opera House was closing for refurbishment that July, and there was a big screen in the Covent Garden Piazza showing the closing gala performance, a big shindig, opera, ballet, the works. I was drinking in the area with my friend Joe Shovelton. It was a boiling summer’s day, we’d bought some wine from a restaurant and were knocking it back rather enthusiastically. And I guess I was full of Dutch courage because I decided we should hustle our way into the Opera House and gatecrash the after-party. I was still in touch with Paul Griffiths, the head coach there who’d taught me ‘Che Gelida Manina’ a couple of years earlier, and I knew some of the door staff so it seemed within the realms of possibility. We were so wired. And we got to the stage door, walked over all these TV cables and just went in. That easy. I just waved at the doorman and he said, ‘Good to see ya!’ and we walked in. I knew how to get to the stage, so we made a beeline for it, because I wanted to nick something from the Opera House as a souvenir – they were tearing the place apart and I wanted a piece of history. But these really famous opera singers appeared, started walking past us, and we got to the stage and found ourselves at the end of the line-up, which wasn’t part of the plan, but we went with it. I still had my bag over my shoulder, big old RAF canvas bag my brother John had given me. And there was Thatcher, Prince Philip and John Major, getting closer and closer and closer to us. Joe was whispering, ‘They’re coming this way, they’re coming . . .’ and I was saying, ‘Just go with it, make something up.’
John Major materialised in front of us. He said, ‘Hallo, boys!’ And we said, ‘Hello!’ And then the line dispersed, mercifully. And there were all these people on the stage, and I somehow found myself chatting to Plácido Domingo, right there in the middle of the Royal Opera House stage. I was full to my eyebrows with wine, RAF bag still on my shoulder, and there was a huge circle of women surrounding us. I said to Domingo, ‘I’d love to sing for you one day, mate.’ He could clearly tell I was drunk as a fart. And I think that’s always stayed with him, because I have worked with him a few times, sung for him a couple of times, and there’s always a look in his eye that seems to say to me, ‘Oh yes, you were that drunk idiot.’ Still, he got his manager to give me his card, and all these women came up to me asking me what we talked about.
Then we did somehow blag ourselves into the party and these women in ball gowns came up to us asking if we were in the show, and I said, ‘Yeah, we’re ballet dancers.’ And Joe, who’s a scrawny little tenor, suddenly straightened himself up, attempting to look tall and lithe and proud. They asked us what part of the show we were in, and I said, ‘We were in the second half, it was hard work.’ They said, ‘OK . . . lovely.’ It turned out there hadn’t been any ballet in the second half. Wayne Sleep came over and said, ‘Look at these three lovely boys!’ There were only two of us. He’d clearly been enjoying himself too. Bryn Terfel was there, and his eyes certainly said, ‘OK. Here we are. Two drunk idiots.’ Chris Maltman, who’d just won the Lieder Prize in the Cardiff Singer of the World competition, could also see that we were smashed. But what the hell, we were having the time of our lives.
When we left I walked into the auditorium and saw workmen ripping the place to pieces. Straight away they were working on the place. It was a sad sight and I wanted to save a piece of it. So I leant over the balcony and took one of the little red lampshades, shoved it in my bag. I still have it at home in Fleetwood. It’s on my wardrobe next to my clogs that I had as a kid.
Chapter Thirteen
SPACE OPERA
I can’t remember who put me in touch with Clint Boon. Clint was the keyboard player of Inspiral Carpets, who’d split up a couple of years earlier in 1995. I grew up listening to all that British indie music when I was at school and I liked the odd track they did, ‘This Is How It Feels’, ‘Dragging Me Down’, although I was more into The Stone Roses and The Charlatans. I think one of my friends at college knew him, and my name had come up in conversation. Clint called me, then sent me a demo tape of some tracks he was working on, and asked if I would improvise on some of them. I didn’t know what it would lead to, there wasn’t any sort of plan, but it was nice to be asked and I thought I’d have a go. Clint had a good history of recording and making records, a history in the business. I thought maybe something cool could come of it.
He drove over to me in Fleetwood one Saturday and took me back to his house in Milnrow, just outside Rochdale. I expected the signature long moppy hair he had in the Inspirals, and he’d cut it short, but he was still very obviously Clint Boon – he’s got a pretty iconic look. We went upstairs and then up a little ladder into this tiny little attic studio, which was just about big enough for two people. We had to crawl through a really tight little space to get into it. I found out recently that Elbow did their first demos in there, which is quite cool. I’m a big Elbow fan. They’re good mates, Guy Garvey and Clint. That Manchester scene is kind of small really, everybody seems to know each other, a lot of them grew up together. I came downstairs one day and Paul Gallagher, Liam and Noel’s brother, was on his sofa – he’d written a book about growing up with them. The Oasis boys were the babies of that early ’90s scene, and before they formed Noel had been a roadie for the Inspirals. Clint says he’s like the Forrest Gump of the indie scene, popping up and overlapping with all these other bands.
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sp; Initially he didn’t really say what he wanted from me, but he did have a vision for what he was working on, this music that was within the realms of indie pop, but with a dance element to it, more psychedelic than the Inspirals, and a bit of opera. He later described it as “space opera” in fact, which kind of makes sense when you listen to it. He played the songs he’d sent me on the tapes and I just started improvising, no words, just some la la las around the tracks, and he recorded it. Then he’d play it back and I’d harmonise with myself, and he’d play that back and I’d do more. So I was overdubbing my own voice on it as well, improvising around the tracks. And we started hanging out more and more, and recording more. He’d ask me to sing arias of sorts, ad-libbing. Sometimes he would do the lead vocals, and sometimes I’d harmonise with him. The only time I did the lead vocals was a version we did of ‘This Is How It Feels’, which was great, and never released. It’s on YouTube somewhere. And it was all really exciting, because it was a new direction, something fun that I thought might really work, and so different to what I’d been doing. It was pop music!
We became mates, having beers and going out in Manchester, and he came over to hang out with my family in Fleetwood. It was a bit of a tricky time, because Dad was suffering with his illness, he wasn’t long out of hospital. I wanted to spend as much time as possible with Dad, coming home to Fleetwood on the weekends, but my college schedule was flexible, and sometimes Clint came down to London during the week. Towards the end of my time with Clint, Dad was really poorly and it was difficult for him to socialise with anybody. He couldn’t really handle any intensity around him, and Clint’s a very active guy. One Saturday night we were having dinner at his house after recording all day. I was staying over for the weekend. We were having a good laugh and started singing Elvis songs, because we both loved Elvis, and we were breakdancing, if you can call it that. And he was doing some move, trying to hold himself up on one arm, and crashed down onto the coffee table and broke his rib.