Transcription
Where madness meets genius – and nudity prevails:
Insights into the lost tapes from a ShyTalk survivor.
Jeremy Tinkerton proclaimed journalist, historian and raconteur. Famed for his seminal works ‘Broken Promise – the Fiasco of the 1848 Badminton Horse Trials’ and ‘Spinal Tribe, Two Rights can make a Wrong – Raving and Rioting during the Second Summer of Love’. His work is as eclectic as it is insightful – an ideal fit for ShyTalk Radio. He joined them during the all too significant transitional phase of their European broadcasts, he describes it as ‘a lost weekend that lasted five weeks… I was their official biographer and unofficial friend – until the inevitable happened’.
It was non-stop repetitive and primal. I had travelled from Manchester to North Wales, following the nascent Nazi Folk-Pop scene for my article ‘Skinheads in Clogs: the Rise of Acoustic Nationalism in the Urban Soundscape’. When, as if by divine intervention, I inadvertently found myself drawn to the quarry rave scene. A psychotropic masquerade ball, driven by a maelstrom of colours, masks and the sound of a deliciously repetitive 112 beats per minute.
Surely I had misheard. The phrase ‘turn on your monkey motor’ appeared to be on everyone’s lips. Was I a victim of the notorious ‘bad’ Anglesey acid – NO! this was the heady heartland of ShyTalk Radio, a beautifully broken and genuinely genius genre. I don’t think anyone knew what ‘monkey motor’ meant, other than it being a drug induced mantra for the start of another party adventure – and therefore, the perfect title for the groundbreaking first episode of ShyTalk radio.
Stu was my ‘in’, we met at the transgressive art emporium, Naked Bacon, ironic as it was Jim who famously championed the ShyTalk naturist stance. I think I alienated Jim on our first meeting by espousing my admittedly conservative attitude to the joys of being fully clothed – I have since reviewed my stance, but the damage was done, the first nail had been struck.
We Need to Talk about David Wilkie and Comb Your Face Wolf Boy, was their comedy equivalent of a ‘difficult third album’, but the process was transformative and, in many ways, set the tone for everything that followed. I asked Noz about the Wilkie reference, a rare look of contempt crossed his pale-northern, rave addled face. He demanded the strictest confidence. I explained that I was a journalist, ‘a truth seeker and chronicler’, we agreed a compromise. He told me the whole sorry tale, one I have never, ever, spoken of again. The compromise? We sent the sealed transcripts to a third-party legal firm, with the strict proviso that they wouldn’t be opened for a fifty-year period – Summer solstice 2049 will be a revealing insight for both comedy enthusiasts and swimming aficionados (obviously, I paid the legal fees. Noz has always had a surprisingly shrewd business mind – with cash anyway).
By asking questions regarding the show’s previous titles, I was able to get a deeper insight into all aspects of the ShyTalk mindset and their creative process. Quizzing Stu about the title of show 7, I was amazed to receive a straight answer ‘The Marks brothers define everything I care about, comedy, weed and socialism – in that order’.
Jim explained Breadknobs and Boom Sticks – ‘we were coming down, the party had been immense, I was wrapped in a blanket after one of my first forays into public nudity. Stu, kind of typically, produced a French stick. We sat there, nibbling the ends, chatting bass lines and glow sticks. I felt close to him that day’. There was a wistfulness to Jim’s recollections that has never left me, I too felt close to him that day.
Shows 14 – 17, form the Anglesey LSD quartet. Whether the acid was bad or simply surprisingly strong is lost to the annals of time. What cannot be disputed is the quality of work, defiant, damaged and disturbing – for sure, though undeniably, displaying the surreal brilliance that became their trademark. Undoubtedly the ShyTalk sound was firmly established.
Like a broken and deranged Lennon and McCartney they are each credited for all of the work. One of the things I love about the ShyTalk canon though, is how you can see where each of the artists has taken the lead, often for a period of several shows. Not so Fast, my Little Friend and Interpreting the Voices is classic Noz. Homo-eroticism and Better than Wanking have Jim’s fingerprints all over them. Stu’s agit prop theatre of hate politics is woven into the essence of The IRA of Comedy and Detention at Columbine.
For the weekend of monkey motor rave madness mentioned above, I had met up with Stu and Noz in Trearddur bay for the usual ‘pre-match’ preparations, scoring, smoking, face painting and stocking up Lucozade and Vick’s inhalers. It was a long (very long) weekend of raving sandwiched between the apt episodes of Turn Up, Tune Out, Drop Off, and Double Dropping Bad Acid. I like to think I was the inspiration for the posh-boy freak-out character in the Dance like a Donkey sketch.
I bonded with Dogger as he talked me down off of the now notorious Anglesey acid. He invited me to spend a week at his home studio in Spanking Clare – the beautiful Cumbrian hamlet. Listening to him speak now, especially through his trademark comforter, the ever present Whiffle ball gag, you would never have suspected his Harrow education – until you saw his parent’s house.
Noz and Jim arrived together, as was often the way, Noz accompanied by yet another of his ‘edible girlfriends’, Nasturtia, I think? Jim was made to put some clothes on, for fear of offending the hired help. Stu turned up wearing a full body wig and tiara, claiming to have parachuted in. Nobody batted an eyelid, partly because we were more interested in Bolivian coke, Indian Hash and Dutch ecstasy, he nonchalantly threw on Dogger’s mixing desk.
My stay was a whirlwind witnessing of creativity and excellence. The boys, as was their way, partied, produced and performed, a hybrid cross breed of bulldozers and the Bolshoi ballet – it was beautiful to witness, an honour and a privilege. Actually, being there when they performed Latently Offensive and Piss Play Therapy pt 1, was the equivalent of being at Woodstock, a Lenny Bruce gig and the rumble in the jungle all rolled into one. Dogger directing and producing like, in Stu’s words, ‘a jam smeared, razor handled, psychedelic squirrel’ – who was I to argue.
The post-production party was quietly deranged, Noz espousing the holistic worth of lego-themed sex kinks, having shipped Nasturtia out and invited Coco into the fray. Jim, wowing us with his impressions of celebrities shitting, was allowed to get naked. Dogger’s beautiful ex-model and socialite mother, Penelope joined us – soon we were all naked. I remember Noz confiding to me that he didn’t mind the nudity, but he just missed wearing socks (a foreshadowing of episode 53 perchance?).
In the morning, I awoke to an empty house, hungover and shell-shocked. I tried to piece together images from the previous night – half dream, half fantasy. That I had been given my first acting credit, a small part in the sketch Return of the Mix-Clown was a trophy that could never be rescinded. Participating in group nudity was another ‘coming of age’ event. My battered brain kept returning to Lady Penelope looking radiant, revelling in her nakedness. That night I got it, that was the night I understood the ShyTalk vision. I would have been ecstatic if I wasn’t on the come down from hell. Lost, I cast my eyes downwards, and found a note in Dogger’s scrawled hand Sellotaped to my still bare chest. It directed me to a Paris address and a date for the start of the European gigs – I finally felt like an accepted part of the ShyTalk troupe (how wrong could I be).
The following week found me in the French capital, still reeling, clutching the crumpled piece of paper I had previously found taped to me. I rang the bell of a paint peeled door facing out onto a ruinous street in an insalubrious arrondissement. Noz answered, berobed, looking not unlike a French Noel Coward (if you had been there you would know what I mean – he was all cigarette holders and arrogance, emanating a smouldering underground resistance vibe). Dogger was just visible in the back ground, wearing a clear plastic gimp skirt being led from room to room by a dog lead, stopping occasionally to lap water from a bowl. I hadn’t realised, but the tone had been clearly set. It was the beginning of the ShyTalk debauchery phase – the European tour. A month of decadent madness which I chronicled in my semi-autobiographical book ‘Pigeon English: Duty Free and Depravity for the Seldom Clothed’. Six countries, fourteen gigs and four recorded shows.
The idea originated after the feted, but unsuccessful ShyTalk Eurovision entry. Taking advantage of it being the first contest since 1976 which allowed entrants to perform in the language of their choice. ShyTalk (featuring the Henry Diamond percussion trio) performed Noz’s rock-stomp vision Bang your Boom Boom Baby. An adroit mix of English, Welsh and Afrikaans – often sung simultaneously with surprisingly effective harmonies. They of course lost out to Precious, who Jim bitterly described as ‘a cut price, wet-wipe version of the Spice Girls without the character assassination’.
In reality, the tour would only encompass five countries. Stu was denied access into Belgium, possibly due to a well (self-) publicised act of public indecency on the grave of Jacques Brel with the popular Flemish children’s presenter Petite La Fleur, ‘He would get it’, he leered lighting another Gauloises. Others say it was due to his non-stop heisting of hotel towels, often including whole cupboards of linen in a single stroke. Whether a genuine graft or just for giggles he wouldn’t divulge.
The tour was co-ordinated by the up-and-coming music mogul Dutch Boy P, minor rap sensation and heavyweight drug user – with the money and contacts to provide every form of addiction and perversion our three visionaries could imagine – and boy, could they imagine. I think it is fair to say the future of ShyTalk took a very long detour down an unlit, overgrown path that month. I personally am not sure, judging by the oil rig shows, whether they ever fully recovered – I defy anyone to listen to Delusions of Competency and deny it wasn’t the product of group trauma and Still Looking for Answers is a truly heartbreaking listen. Mind you, I can’t be described as escaping scratch free myself, but I get ahead of myself…
Negating Dangerous Waters chronicles the journey, the vision and Doggers ever fluid Franco-phobia. Listen closely to the notorious Charles de Gaulle samples. His mammoth skills in both mimicry and fakery nearly caused a diplomatic incident with this proud nation. Like so much of their best material, it is now lost to the annals of time – or if other rumours are to be believed, used in MI6 training sessions.
The Munich ‘Lederhosen for Beginners’ gig, was the zenith for me, a highpoint of good vibes and camaraderie. It was a night to never forget – typically though, when I woke in the morning, I could recollect little. That morning also marks the date Dutch Boy P started spiking me with drugs at every available opportunity. To begin with I took it in the spirit of youthful high jynx, but after I had accidently ingested 17 drugs in 6 days, I was in no fit state to tell or care. It got to the point that I daren’t eat an apple for fear he had injected it with Ketamoids or some other chemical concoction of his own devising. Later, I had hoped to interview him for Pigeon English…, but, possible for the best, it wasn’t to be. He had fallen in the vicious Eindhoven record label turf wars, having been gunned down, run over and eventually defiled in the spring of 2000.
As a result, I have very limited, blurred memories of Sonderborg, Goteborg, Hamburg and Luxemburg. In retrospect, thanks to P, I had become a foil for every depraved tour prank he could think of – to begin with, the lads joined in. In the end I believe they saved me.
I interviewed Marge, she was ‘seeing’ Noz for the last leg of the tour. It was 9 months after the Euro-excursion and she was happy to talk, any good will towards ShyTalk long since evaporated. I will allow her to continue in her own words:
‘I wouldn’t have described you as conscious when you arrived, your arm loosely dangling over Dutch Boy P’s shoulders and the toes of your shoes scuffed where your feet had dragged behind you. The post-production party was in Cheap Brass, the groundbreaking brothel that was applying supermarket practices to whore-houses. It was all loyalty cards and buy one get one free deals. DBP, as he had taken to calling himself, hired a private room and threw you on the bed – I thought it was sweet, him taking care of you, then he joined us in the party’
I allow her to continue, despite my tears and her obvious distress in recounting the tale.
‘He kept disappearing, we realised in the end, back to your room, adding drugs and sexual devices to your body, bit by bit. Even Dogger blanched when he saw them. It was him and Jim that saved you, Jim was getting suspicious or curious, nudged Dogger and they followed him’.
Marge looked me square in the eye,
‘I don’t think that Dutch bastard had actually fucked your nose when Jim dragged him off – but it was close’.
That was it, the dream was over. I remember gaining a sense of reality. Noz and Marge nursed me for a day or three. Stu, phoned my mother – I have no idea how he got her number. When I quizzed him, he mumbled enigmatically, ‘y’know, the usual way’. The last time I ever saw the ShyTalk team all together was them waving me goodbye at Schiphol airport – and, I wasn’t the only one crying.
Do I regret my time with ShyTalk, not one bit. Did it shake my faith in humanity and prevent me from forming meaningful bonds with others, costing me thousands in therapy? – absolutely. But, without it, I wouldn’t be where I am today. Pigeon English sold 600,000 copies in the first four months, and topped the bestseller list – twice. It cemented my career, a few scars, both mental and physical, seemed a small price to pay. I don’t know if the boys got off so lucky.
Their material and production values remained peerless, Donald is Dead and Stockholm Syndrome for Surveyors stand out as the strongest in their series of Stealing Estate Agent sketches. But, something occurred, a change in tone was apparent in Broken to Order. The dark got darker and the joy of bleakness was lacking in Geoff Capes Told me to Fuck Off completely evaporating by the time of Another Accountant Waiting to Happen. I have it on good authority that Dogger took The Bastard Love Child of Lady Penelope as a personal afront.
Whilst taking drugs had often inspired and galvanised, we can see in Conceived on LSD and Lessons in Tantric Dreaming for Psycho-Biological Wellbeing it simply contributed to the downwards spiral and breakdown that followed. With It’s Hereford All Over Again we see the last vestiges of bonhomie leaving the team (and no, like everyone else I never got to the bottom of exactly what happened in Hereford). Everything is blue and My bed smells like a morgue sound exactly like what they are – a cry for help from those experiencing emotional and mental collapse.
I sobbed listening to It was Never Supposed to be Like This. Like others, I had known it was over six or eight shows previously – but like all the fans, I listened and I hoped, because I knew what it could be like – I had been there when it worked in all its beautifully shambolic and surreal chaotic brilliance. Mention DJ Pigeon vs MC Easy Tiger to anyone who remembers it being broadcast and they will look wistfully into the distance of their memory, appraise you with increased regard and probably holler ‘Turn on your monkey motor – sports fans’.
