Bonus Episode: Dana Gillespie Remembers Her Teenage Romance with Bowie and Life as a Swinging Sixties 'It Girl'

The Who and the Rolling Stones. Today, we're going to talk to one of David's closest friends during that crucial learning period, Dana Gillespie, the legendary British blues singer whose career spans more than seventy albums. In addition to originating the role of Mary Magdalene and the West End production of Jesus Christ Superstar, she also acted in films by

iconoclassic directors like Ken Russell and Nick Robe. Her new memoir Weren't Born a Man is a fascinating look at her astonishing life at the center of the entertainment scene in the sixties and seventies. It's filled with tales of wild times with Bob Dylan, Sean Connery, Michael Can and Iggy Pop recording sessions with Elton John and Jimmy Page, and appearances on stage alongside Chuck Barry and Ooh Didley.

And that's not even the half of it. For anyone who dreams of traveling back to that very special time on this planet. I can't recommend your book enough. But back in four Dana was just another teenage music hopeful, just like David. They shared songs, laughter, beds on occasion, and also the unforgettable experience of rising through the pop pecking order at a time when the Fab four ruled the land. To begin, take me back to the mid sixties in London for a moment. The music, the nightlife.

Can you set the scene for me walking through Soho? What was a night out in nineteen sixty four? Like night A? Soho was exciting? I mean the nineteen Sixtyfoh. I was fifteen and in those days Soho was everything that you wanted it to be. Girls in doorways, red lights, women hanging out of windows, low life, guys treating about music bursting out of every bar. Um you know there

were and there were great clubs. Of course, there was the Marquee Club, which is where I first met Bowie, but you know, that was very much the blues club with bits of jazz. But down the road was the Flamingo and the All all Night Or which went till about six in the morning, where people like Georgie Fame who had his hit with Year Year, would be playing.

That was much more slightly blacker crowd and more purple heart pill popping was more at that club, whereas if there was in me at the market Cupboard and then I actually noticed it, but I was already hooked on that area. In two I decided I wanted to be a drummer for my profession. And Guy used to go to one of the main drums shops down the street that has all the the theaters on it, Sharkly Avenue,

and it was called Drum Cities. And I would get myself to there and I would stand literally with my nose pressed against the window, drooling at all the fabulous drum kits in the window. And I took from the age of eleven to fifteen the job of a newspaper delivery girl. I nearly said boy, because boys nearly always did it. And from that money I saved up and I got myself, sadly, not a marvelous colored, singly fangly, dazzling drum kit. I couldn't afford that to get a

plain white. One of the company was called Ajax for the chief a variety of flame white. And with the rest of my money, I used to go every week to my drum teacher, who was right in the heart of Soho, behind something called the Windmill Theater, which was the famous windmill that was called We Never closed. It stayed open north through the war, and it had sort of topless girls. I think maybe they had a g

string on. But in those days the law was such that if you had you sits up, you weren't allowed to move. You had to stand like a statue. Not that I saw this, but in the next in the same street was where thanks seeing my teacher gave me classes or classes. It was just him and me anyway, So that was you know, I just loved the area and my life changed the moment I walked into the Market Club because there were the Yardbirds playing, which is of course Eric Clapton on guitar and I fell in

love with the blues. I was already in love with the blues, but I didn't think you could see it live like that and see musicians playing with abandonment and just sweating and you know, dripping on stage, whereas everything on television in those days, of course we're still black and white. Um, nobody dripped. They just all wore very normal since and it wasn't very interesting. So I was. I was. My eyes were open to another world, and that was absolutely fantastic. And I never stopped going back

to that club that was my hangout. I still managed to get the school every day. I never missed classes, but um, I never missed any time that the Yardbirds playing, I'd be there. And it was one night. I think it must have been in ninetees before. It's in my memoirs.

I've written a date, but I'm bad with all kinds of numbers, but I think it was sixty four and I went to see a band called Gary Fire and the key Bones, and the opening act was featured a young man with shoulder length lemon blonde hair in a Veronica Lake hairstyle. Although I think you were too young to know who Veronica Lake was and on when he walked on stage. This was David Bowie, but he was

still called David Jones in those days. Um, and I listened to the actual I can't remember a thing about their music because I'd come to see Gary Farr and the Tea Bones. But afterwards, when the show was over, and I was standing at that of the club brushing my shoulder length for oxide blonde hair, as I wore skin type black leopard jeans and a skin type top, and I was quite big busted even in those days non vergically enhanceday hastened to eggs. I'm really anti sucking

around in nature. Um. This young man with dizzy lemon yellow hair came up behind me as I was brushing my hair, took the brush out of my hands, carried on brushing my hair as he leant forward and whispered, can I come home with you tonight? And what could

I do but say yes, Well, I was. But you know, I've always lived by intuition, and sometimes when somebody says something to me about something I don't know, it could be in a thing, my inner voice tells me what to do, and I knew it was the right thing to do, and you have to take risks in lives, in your life, or I mean, I didn't think of it as a risk. It is just it seemed like an interesting thing to do. So he and I walked home from the club and I smuggled him up to

the top floor where my bedroom was. I grew up in a huge, quite fancy house right in the heart of London, in a very upmarket area called South Kensington, Knightsbridge, and I had this little single bed. Then we squeezed into it. I can't really remember what we did. We did something, because I guess we did. And he was two years older than me, so a bit more experienced than me. I didn't know anything um, but from that

moment our friendship was cemented. And so he used to sometimes walk me home from school in my ballet shoes, and he listened to my feeble attempt at songwriting. You know, I was very embryonic in my songwriting, but he was learning too, and we both progressed. We both played twelve twing guitars, because if you're not that great at guitars, if you have twelve twins instead of six, the sound is fuller, makes you sound a little bit better, and so I would you know. That's my early entrance into

the west, the west end of London. And this included a street called tin Pan Alley Denmark Street, and this was where all the music publishers were. And in this little street was a cafe that has a special crack above it. Now it doesn't exist anymore because some idiotis pulling all down all the interesting places of Soho. But in this cafe Giaconda would sit all the musicians, the out of work musicians, tying with a cup of tea, hoping that if they sat there long enough, it was

a eat full of song publishers. And if they were doing demos in their basement studios and they suddenly needed a backing singer or a bass player, they'd come into the geopondra and they'd shout, boy as he's got a bass player, and somebody will put his hand up and he would have a profession a gig. So this is where we spent a long time in the afternoon, nursing our cups of tea. And it was in this little

cafe that one day Bowie came rushing in. Everybody was still jones, of course, and said come with me, and he dragged me around the corner into a music store that was sold records as well as instruments, and pulled into tiny little booth and he played me his first singles on a kind of one earpiece, which is how you chose your singles in those days, with great pride. And I never forget that moment, excused his great pride, and within well within about a year, I've got my

first record deal. So I was able as he was. Same for him. There's nothing like the first record that you make. If that's your goal in life, it changes everything. We're so used to David Bowie the icon. But what was he like in the mid sixties, Like, what was it about him that attracted him to you? Was he

different than most people even then? Well, I mean I come from a rather upper class family, so I've certainly never met anyone working class, and you know, television was pretty terrible, you know, as I said, in black and white. So when he said to me, come and meet my parents, which meant getting on a proper train, which I've never

done that on my own. I was fourteens. Um, I've never been into a tiny working class house before to meet his parents, who sat there in silence, with the television being the main thing in the room, also very old fashioned TV. When his parents went out, David turned to me and he said, I want whatever it takes. I want to get out of this place. I never want to grow up like this. He was already burning with an ambition to get out. So what he was really like was just like a guy with a musical dream.

But I don't think any of us were dreaming about, well in his face, conquering America or the world's musically, because it was it was beyond anyone's dreams. Even thinking about going on an airplane to America was beyond those people's ideas. It was you know, we could we we'd heard of Elvis Presley, but to get foreign records LPs was quite difficult. But you know, he had a little band and he went from one band to another. We stayed always friends because because of the actual location where

my parents place was the house. Eventually, when I was fifteen, they moved me to the basement, which nobody wanted to go into because it was dank and dark and damp. My parents said, you can go down there and play your drums. And by this time I got my piano, and I got I got some guitars and things, and I at fifteen, I could paint it black and orange and reds and you know, hangings and incense was burning. A real hippie paradise. But I was still under the

umbrella of my parents. But it was right near one of the top clubs or two clubs in London. So all the musicians would go to clubs if they weren't working, or even if they were working there they'd go. And you know, I can remember evenings, you know Rod Stewart, Long, John Boudry, Ronnie Woods, brother Art Wood had a great bank, all the art Woods, um, all these these great bands sort of that then turned into place people like Emerson Lake and Farmer bit of then they all used to

turn up there and all the kinks. And if they couldn't get home at the end of the night, or were too too drunk, or or I couldn't get a train home, or couldn't didn't have a car, then you know, why not go to the basement flash of dannat where Danna lift knock on the door and they would find refuge. So I was forever making great kind of sourcens full of brown rice and vegetables to kind of need poor, starving, hungry musicians, which I used to do with all of them.

Was this the Cromwelling Club, that's right, well, that's right Cromwelling. And there was another one around the corner called Blazes, which I remember going, I want be Dylan to see John Lee Hooker there, And so you thought one could see really good musicians in these in those days, it was fabulous. You mentioned all that the bands that David was a part of, the Lower Third, the Mannished Boys, the King Bees, and none of them cracked the charts,

and his solo material hadn't broken through. Was he discouraged in this time in the sixties or was he always pretty confident and just knew that the next thing that you know, he'd break through at some point. I don't think you. I can only equate it with how I felt, because who can really know what goes on in somebody else's heart. But I never felt this discouraged. So you just keep on keeping on, And I think he did

the same too. Just getting a single out was great, or seeing your name in the music papers, or or going to a record reception and you get to say a few words to one of the music journalists so that your name is mentioned the following week. I mean, all of that was a tremendous buzz, and we didn't assume that you were going to be instantly number one. And I don't think David he may have always had this yearning to be a star. I'm sure he did, but much more he always had a yearning to be

a songwriter. Both of our dreams was to be signed to a songwriting publisher and get us songs published. But in order for these songs to be heard by PubL it is you had to sing the blasted things, so you had to be a singer as well. And we didn't in England seem to have those things like you had in New York. The Brill Building, you know, where you working and everything, writing all the songs. We didn't

seem to have that. We just had tin pan alley where you hope that you would find a publisher, which I indeed did try to publish. I think you can find one before David did. But we had kind of strange parallel careers because there were times when we were both out of work and we both went to auditions for that musical hair until you believe that we both

got turned down. Um, so you know, you just keep on keeping on until one day you hope that something clicks, but it's you're in the laps of the gods as to how or when it's going to happen. But you have your goal in front of you, and I think unlike this rather unfortunate condition is what I call a sickness that sweeping the modern world where everyone wants to be a celebrity in just in it for the money. In those days, nobody thought that it was going to last more than a few weeks. He just kept on

doing whatever you could do. I mean the Stones or Mick Jagger's famously quoted as saying, I will give it a couple of years and then we'll get proper jobs. You know, nobody had aspirations to suddenly becomes, you know, world stars, because world stars didn't exist, so we didn't know what was going on across the pond for starts, so who knows what was going on in his mind. He was always experimental. He was going to learn his mind.

With Lindsey Kemp. He was doing kind of funny little films and I was going to dance classes and doing even odder films in my case, usually were lots of cleavage falling out of bits of leather, because they seem to always want big busted girls in these abe girls kind of roles, which I was quite happy to do. It had good all to do with music. But a gig is a gig, and he needed to pay your bills. And I always refused to take uh too much money from my parents. I mean I didn't have to pay

them rent because they owned the house. But and that did make a huge difference. And as I said, I was always something. I lived at my parents house, in my own flat till I was thirty. I never had to go and marry some ghastly man. And I don't need men of ghastly. I mean, I didn't have to marry for the wrong reasons to find somewhere to live. I always had somewhere to live. So in this place that was known affectionately prisoned by Angie Bowie as the Bunker.

That's what so many musicians used to turn up there. Um, so I had a kind of freedom, and he I don't. I kind of vaguely remember him moving from place to place, but we always stayed in touch. I never expect it to be the only girlfriend of him. I mean, the one thing I learned very early on is if you're going to be a musician, especially a lead singer and probably a lead guitarist, but one thing you've got to go out is go out and pull as many girls as you can. Otherwise, how on earth can you learn

your craft and know what you're singing about. You have to learn to love and lose and suck up and win and lose everything again. I mean, that's how you write songs. And we were both just kind of getting on with our things, and he never really told me about his other girlfriends until he met Angie. And then he rang me up and he said, listen, I've met somebody I think you'll really get on well with. And he brought her over to my place. From the moment she walked to the door, we knew that we were

instantly like soul sisters. I finally had somebody could have a hooped. She was the funniest He is incredibly funny. Um. But you know, he always stayed in touch, especially if he needed some brown rice with vegetables, and occasionally the odd as the British said, quaintly call it a shag, But I said, I do you know what that expression is? I never know. We have to remember, of course, the English and American is a completely different language where worlds

are parts. But anyway, he he, he would ring up, and I mean, there is one occasion he called me up and he said, I, I'm only ten minutes away and I've just written a song half an hour ago, and I think it's kind of interesting. Can I come around and play to you? And he came over instantly and Saturn played Space Oddity. So that's how much in and out of each other's pockets we were. And then

of course he's I would go with him too. The TV studios of Ready, Steady Goat, which is quite a famous TV show then, and it's where young aspiring musicians would go and try and network in their green room and hope that somebody would sign you on for the TV show. I don't think they ever signed David, but they signed me on the two shows. So I was doing that before him. But he was far better at networking than me. I just had to deal with all these kind of slightly growsy guys that, rather than look

into your eyes, look at your tips instead. But I kind of got used to that because that's how it was in those days. You have to laugh it off in a way. And yeah, did you have noticed that there was a separation between David Jones and David Bowie? Was there a division between the private man and the public persona? Or was was what you saw what you got? Well?

What I saw is what I got because when you know somebody from early teens and you know he was mid teens, then for me, even when he became iconic galactics, you know, he for me didn't really change um. But of course one I didn't really see him after n because he moved to America and I stayed in England. And but he had always said to me that the one thing that was lacking in his life, and of

it was my life too, was a decent manager. Up until then, most musicians called their managers damagers because they landed up in court with him, which of course is what actually happens. But this company that was formed was a company called main Man by a fantastic guy called Tony Defrieses. And you know, Bowie and I had been searching, as I said, we both auditioned for hair and got turned down because we just needed a gig, any gig, I mean not quite serving in tables, but in the

musical gig, anything that involved the music biz. And then one day I got a course from David. He said, I found the man who I think is perfect to be our manager, and he took me. He and Angie took me around to meet this extraordinary, marvelous um, large with big asso haircut um guys turned to Freeze with a legal mind, who did the one thing I like in any man. But it's rare to find these days somebody that puts their hand on the on your shoulder and says, they're there, lets me take care of this

for you. And that's exactly what he did. You know, in the next five years, certainly the first four years when everything was going great, he facilitated everything that any musician would ever need, which is, you need these musicians, you can have them. You want that studio, Yeah you want to go there, Yeah, let's do it. You want this artpick. Yes. He gave everything for David that David wanted. We both signed the same contract, which was, okay, a

fifty cut. I didn't mind, because you know, fift of something is better than a hundred percent and nothing. So I never quite understood why David went through the madness of all this dreadful legal wrangle at the end that he was by this time surrounded by other legal people who were saying, I can do better for you, and they all started whispering in his ear. But the first few years the main man were marvelous because we were

in this mad curcas. By this time Bowie had brought in Nick Romson on guitar, and before this people forget that Bowie was quite a fakey singer. I mean he was quirky. He sang with this strange Tony Newly voice. For those that don't know who Anthony Newly is, He's he used to be married to Joan Collins. That he had this unusual singing voice, and um Bowie used to really rate his voice and kind of copied this voice for quite a few albums. He kept this Tony Newly voice,

and he acknowledged that he kept his voice anyway. We had them wildest of times. It was marvelous. May mentor cold of everything, the freest said to us, all of us should move through life first class. If you want to create first class you existing first class when it comes to you. So we were all told that you must have an assistant, a personal assistant. I mean I didn't really need one, but hey, hey know, I was happy to say. Yet he had twenty four seven Limosum

wherever we wanted, we're in the best studios. Were in something called Tribent Studios for weeks and weeks. I mean that either Bowie was in there doing his album or I was in there doing Weren't Born a man, and occasionally our time could overlap. Of course, I was lucky enough to sing on his Busy star Dust album during the it Ain't Easy track I remember, but um he was. He wrote this song for me called then the Warhole. I've never known why, because I said, particularly want Andy

Warhole art on my wall. But he seemed to the the rest of the world like that kind of stuff. And Bowie was far more taken with the New York scene than I ever was, so he wrote this song for me. I think probably he wrote it and didn't really you know, he thought, well, let down I sing it, So he says he wrote written it for me, and then we took into the studios and rumps and producing it and If you listen to Cathie, you can hear Bowie playing

his twelve string guitar and singing in the background. He

was doing my backing vocals. But then he liked my version so much that he did another version on his album for the Hunky Dory album, which actually came out before mine was ready, because I was still I was started doing the I was the original Mary Magdalen in Jesus My Superstar, so I couldn't get to the studios every day, and so he finished an album before me, and he then took off for America with the Free And by this time I got my own band and we'd all moved to New York and Bowie has was

very taken with this show called Pork that was run by Andy Warhole's a lot. It was an Andy Warhole show, and he was so taken with them that he he and DeFries decided to have all the people who performed in it to be the people that worked for main Man. We had had offices number forty five Park Avenue. I was put in an apartment street between second and third. That means that as as sitting in a distance from blooming Dale's, all bills were for had a great time.

I mean, as I said, assistant, you know, and I'd been on that I was signed to Ostka, as was David. I was in my shocking and suspenders and mad slightly broussel of in clothing, and Bowie by this time had been on the front of his album wearing a dress or men just didn't wear dresses. So the whole company was quite edgy. And then they got Andy Warhol's lot to do my next album cover, which is called Anker the Plano Second Fiddle, So we had a we had a good image. It was just sad that the whole

thing fell to pieces. But let's face it, nothing last forever, so I should have. I knew the House of Cards was going to go eventually, but I just didn't know when. And you were with David the night before the famous farewell concert at the Hammersmith Odian in July when he retired Ziggy Stardust. How did you feel about that at the time. Did it seem like the end of an error or was it just an exciting new beginning and onto the next thing. I don't think it felt like either.

It was just one of those ideas that Bowie had and DeFries always went along with Bowie's ideas, especially in those days. I mean there were very much a team. You know, DeFries and he would work out things. I mean, and Angie of course was people. People really don't give Angie enough respect and acknowledgements for the amount of help that she did in those days. They were a real duo. If he went to a party, by the way, with David and Andie, it was Angie who would turn more

heads than that. David he would be kind of almost shy and retiring well until he got with the boys and then he could be quite naughty. But um yeah, I knew about it, but it's just nobody seemed to have thinking anything odd about it. Nobody knew the reaction that was going to be either. I mean, you know, with people almost running out to slash their risks when they heard this, because I don't think people realize what

an impact Ziggy Stardust had made. I think DeFries did, and maybe Bowie had an inkling, But DeFries with the men, that was a or to see from above what was happening, because he was the kind of coolest and the calmest of everyone. So yes, I was there. I did know it was going to happen, but you know, I don't say anything if I we knew it was not going to be announced till till it was announced, And it may have seemed like the end, but it was a

new beginning. I don't think David want to be wanted to be locked in his own character, but I've always felt that he's far better playing a character. He was better at doing characters. I mean, tim Machine, that band that he had when he was finally sort of just going out to a musician was never as good as when he was actually playing a part. And of all these incarnations, I absolutely adored the Dumb and Dogs Show. It was just it was very New York and it

was very Broadway. I saw it many times when it went to I think there was it Hollywood Bowl or somewhere. It was brilliant. And by this time to Freeze had already okay, you know, Jules Fisher was the top lighting men in all the Broadway shows in New York that we had. There were dancers, everything was just incredible, so uh it was. It was. It was an exciting time. The Quad British never even got to see the Diamond Dogs Show and it was far too expensive. With its

moving stage and things that went up and down. It was the best show I've ever seen, probably even now, and I've seen many many shows. This was just phenomenal from its staging alone. And you know, David did something like eighties shows in eighty days. How he survived, I don't know, but he got thinner and thinner, and at the end of the tour he definitely earned the title of the thin White Duke. But he never once put

on a bad show. He always was professional. It may not have looked professional, but you know, I've always recognized in him the thing that I recognized in myself is that music is your master. Music is your god. Getting your songs across, getting some mad ideas across, that is the most important thing. And he had that thing. I occasionally see it in others, not very often. And he didn't do it, thankfully, like younger people seemed to want to only do stuff too for the money. Nothing was

done for the money. You did it for the love, for the passion. And when you do things for passion, it takes you far further than you can imagine. It can take you further than your dreams can take you. Was there a moment for you when it became a parent that David was not only becoming a well known pop star, but he was this gargant in figure that

really belonged to the world. So I think in a way, his mega stardom happened with you know, things like let's um and the songs that happened afterwards, and I was not part of that. I really can't talk about it,

so I don't or won't can't. I can't talk about Burie after nine because he then moved into another world and he didn't really stay in touch, mainly because he was somewhat piste off that I'd always remained friendly with his ex wife, Angie, and I've never ever believed that because two people split up, you've got to choose camps and whose one over the other. But geographically it wasn't sound either, because I had a lot of work in Europe and not much put me to America, so um,

you know. But it was great that he was able to do what he wanted and he had a manager that agreed with what he wanted. I mean, how lucky both of us were so lucky who have been in this kind of this star alignment was for five years just a joy and the beginnings were great, you know when when de Friese and I would turn up and David and She's place where he lived in this place for Haddon Hall, which was a really bunkers wild little place on the edge of London. It was really like family.

And you know, to hear that the freest plotting and planning and David sitting there in a pair of jeans and a T shirt, drumming, spinning cross legged on his beds with his gutime snacked the place and something that he wrote songs. I mean, they were great. They were great times, but they were also great when we all moved into the Sherry Netherlands. So as telling new Orton seemed to stay away for about three months. I mean,

it's it's good that we're all you know that. I was going to say that we're all still alive to tell the tale, but of course some of us aren't. The hadden Hard days seemed absolutely incredible me. It seems like one of Gertrude Stein's salon or something exactly. It was a bit. It wasn't as kind of stoned as people would imagine, you know, David was never had a joint smoker ever, sint smoke a joint and he was not much I don't think I ever sat taken an

in psychedelic I don't take um. And he was always kind of almost a chain smoker. So it was not as drug es you might have imagined the sixties would have been. But I think that's because work was the ethic. It was work. It was getting writing your songs. I mean, you do whatever you have to do to get your production finished, your your your music is the first thing. It's music is not the most important thing, then you're not in the right profession. That's my view. Anyway, when

was the last time you saw him? Do you remember? No, I can't actually mids seventies, I guess in New York. I can't an America somewhere. I mean, the trouble is, it was really painful for all of us. People can't imagine how close we'd all been for so many years. And he was famous for literally cutting out of his life everybody, I mean, everyone who had helped him in his early years or has been part of his early life.

He just cut them out. And I think he needed to do that in order to move on and some people might have said that's not nice, or you know, especially probably Woody woodman Z of the you know, the Spiders might have they had reasons to feel quite but because they've been out of his whole his whole life where they've been there, you know, helping him carry on. But it was always his show. So if you're the

boss in the show, then it's your poor other. If you didn't want to cut someone out or drop somebody, that's that's what you do if you feel you need to do it. So um, it was just sad to see it ending, but he obviously needed to do it to move on, and he moved on in rather strange places. I mean he made was it the Low album and you know when he was in Burley and then so he had to do major changes. He had to break

with everybody. But I think the one who probably the two that suffered the most was obviously Anglie for a while, but then Bronson, poor old Rono, I mean he'd given

up everything his life up north of England. O Tech was only being as into gardener in a you know, he but wasn't doing much, but you've given up his dream to help David and then he tried to follow his own dreams once David didn't seem to want him anymore, um, and it didn't really work out as big as he you know, people thought he was going to step right in and be the guitarist version of Bury, and it didn't work out like that. He was far too nice

a guy. You have to be ready to crawl over anybody in order to get to the top, if that's what you want. And I think Ronald had almost too much heart in a way. That's not to say that David didn't have heart, but his ambition was phenomenally big, and he he was on a straffchaffis the journey that he had to do what he had to do, you know. And as I said, for the music, if your if your passion is to create, you have to give up everything and everybody, if that's what it takes in order

to get to where you need to be. And he did it. But for him. And what's weird is that when he died, what was it five or six years ago, I already forgotten, you know, I couldn't believe that the people were saying, oh, it's so dreadful, you know, the world come to the end people who had never even message. It's like, this is awful, and you know, I'm going to go out and kill myself. But it wasn't awful.

You know, he did what every musician dreams of. He brought out a new album three days before his death. He managed the stage manage his end game even then was done wonderfully. So that's off to him, just for him. Do you have a memory of David that always makes you laugh? Um, You've got a few kind of She's frames in my head. I mean, he used to look

at himself quite a lot in the mirror. I remember wance him to sort of standing naked looking at himself in the mirror, and then sort of looking at his back. He was very wide that the lower bit of his spine was slightly protruding, and he was thinking he was going to grow Lucifer's tail, the devil's tail was going to grow out of the low the lower cockets of his back. I mean, don't forget he'd probably been away

for a week. There might have been somewhat rambling, but you know, there were a lot of times when it was just fun to hang out with him. But you know, these are early days and I can't say that I wish I could talk more about the other times of his life, because I don't indulge in with wishful thinking that I'm sure you know he had some marvelous times, but I you know, he had some great musicians so

with him as well. And I was lucky enough to work with some nights with Michael Cayman, who said you no longer on this planet, whethers or Earl Slick his guitarist, and so yes, seeing him on stage was one thing, but just hanging out with him as a person was He was just like any other fellow. I mean I went with him and DeFries. The three of us went to Glaston Breeze. I think it was the second time Glaston Breed ever existed. And I can't remember what year.

It was, maybe seventy three, and I can see him now and he addressed him in these strange wide baggy Oxford bags, typical British weather. Um the friest had known straight away that he wasn't going to be in a tent, so he booked himself Hotel Rumber. David was sort of wanting to be independent on this and when we get to the station, we went by train, I mean with him with his guitar. It was just him on his own carrying his guitar, and there was no transport to

get from the station to the actual venue. We had to walk about three miles u in the hot sun because it was sunny at that point him and he had a big floppy hat on. We get to the massive area of Glastonbury, which was not as massive crowd wise it is as it is now, and there was that huge still of the pyramid that they performed him. It had just been erected and he was due to performance.

Let's say it was about seven o'clock at night. By eleven o'clock at night, he still wasn't on because the sound had problems, and of course um it also it also meant that half of people on on the stage, you know, the workers and the sound guys and everything everyone was on asked it's amazing, innothing kind of ever got on. So rather than missed the event, David sort of stayed up all night or hung out in somebody's tent. I went and slept in De Fruce, his room in

the hotel. And so David was told, oh, well, the only slot we've got that you can go on stages at five in the morning. He said, I'll take it. So he comes out and he's singing his lineup of songs and when he gets to that line, the sun machine is coming down. We're going to have a party year. Yeah. At that point, the sun was just coming over and it hit the still of a pyramid and it was truly magical. The people were calling out of their tents covered with munds and what's the fus on stage at

this hour? And there was this one solo guy with his yellow hair up on the stage strumming away. Magical, totally lovely and magical. You couldn't You couldn't write a sort of scenario like that. Well, speaking of writing these amazing scenarios, you just finished your memoir Weren't Born a Man. That's such a huge achievement. It has to be such a great feeling sharing all these stories with fans. One of the things that I'm very proud of in the book.

First of all, I'm proud that it's even out, because, um, people don't seem to realize that I've actually made seventy albums and I just finished my seventy feet and I'm about to start in ten days time, my seventy second album. This is what I do. I make albums. I'm I make recordings, but I haven't really been blessed with them.

Timing and as much as maybe I had one album, then I had an album out all the methods of release as the Drummers Simple Minds based there from Sink Floyd, the second retires from Pink Floyd and the Amazing People, and literally the weekly album came out. The record company is kind of folded. These things have happened to me a lot. But I've always felt that probably I'll have to die for anyone actually get all the music I did.

But I was so lucky. I was there at the best of the times when he was honorable to be a musician. And now you can have a hit record, but six months later nobody even knows who you are, and you don't get second chances. You did have chances in those days because not so many people were doing what I was doing. I was lucky. Plus that again, I was lucky enough to be a good looking chicken a time when you know, people did care about look.

And I learned very early on that if you had your top button and your shirt and um, then you're going to get the newspapers. One didn't have to be wearing nothing Alah, Miley Cyrus or these days people just have to be dressed in them four cloth in that you're away. But we had different values in those days. And if you wanted something, if you wanted to better, stave up for your latest single or your latest LPs.

And nobody would have given a ship and be seen dead in something like a pair of trainers and the nets. Low life as far as I'm concerned. So values have changed, and I'm quite happy to be old school. And I wrote a song on my last album called under My Bed and it's called old School and it definitely sums up how they feel about life because I was at the best of times. It really was. The sixties and seventies were fabulous. Wouldn't spot it for anything, Arthur. It

is a production of I Heart Radio. If you liked what you heard, please subscribe and leave us a review. For more podcasts from my Heart Radio, visit the I heart Radio app, Apple podcast, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.