Who's Next-The Who

 Well the rain's finally stopped and I'm not feeling much like making the most of the day so, fuck it, I'll just sit in the confines of the boat I'm living on and listen to my past

I didn't have an older sibling to provide me with guidance when I was growing up in the seventies but I did have a wealthy older cousin who, for reasons I could never fathom at the time, liked to come over to our council house with his new LP records to lend them to my dad to tape

As a result I had access to a shit ton of tapped music to explore

I'd sneak a tape or two out of the unit my old man kept them in a hide away in my bedroom, headphones on and get an education

One stand out albums was The Who's Who's next

From the opening chords of  'Baba O'Reilly' to the call to arms of 'Won't get fooled again' my mind was blown (man)

I'd heard early Who stuff and it's influence on me was strong

It would later lead to my involvement with the Mod revival at school and the divisive nature that that had on familial relationships and youthful rebellion changed everything but for now I'm just a kid taking my first steps into a wide world of music as art form

The album has no duff tracks on it and stands out as a The Who getting their shit together as they mature both as individuals and as a band

The crossover from Mod band to rock band is pretty much complete now and meant when I waxed lyrical about it to my friends at school there was a cross tribe appreciation of the music, well mostly the Smash Hits kids didn't understand but why would they?

We added the record to the list of 'if you don't have this in your LP box you're not a real music fan and not worth talking to' and it become a legend for our small part of that lucky generation of kids, the ones with all the great music

Break times most important question really was who's next?

The Bridge

 

Those of you who have read my stuff before will have a pretty good idea about the kind of grumpy, curmudgeonly guy I am. Not unpleasant but, you know, just a bit awkward, particularly if I don’t know you. This has never stopped me from helping people though in fact, for such a miserable bugger, I seem to spend a lot of my time doing favours for others.

There was a time a while ago that someone did a favour for me that turned out to be not quite as it seemed.

I was out riding on one of those clear cold nights in December that you get. I like to ride whatever the time of year, not because I’m some kind of hero but just out of habit, I guess I don’t know any better. If you’re a cheapskate like me, you tend to ride bikes that don’t get ruined by bad weather and so you get to enjoy stuff that the cosseted bikers of today miss out on. It was one of those silver nights with a full moon and no cloud. I decided to set out late-ish from the pub to do a circuit of some of my favourite back lanes. You know no traffic, quite, a man can let his mind wander and get back in touch with the simple pleasure of riding his bike.

The route took me about twenty miles out from home and one part of the road went over an old pack bridge. It was the sort of place that you don’t get today. The road followed an old trade route that drovers used to bring cattle along and the bridge was on a bend were the road had to narrow to single-track to get over it. It had never been widened or improved over the centuries and the route had been replaced in the late sixties by a better road further away.

It would have been a little before midnight when I got to the old bridge and the bike just died on me. I mean, no warning, just blackout, dead, just the whine of the tires in crisp frost on the road. I’d got very little money as a youngster so had learned the hard way how to fix bikes, so I wasn’t really concerned that the old wreck had stopped and I’d got a lot of tools and odds and ends with me so, having pushed the bike onto the grass, started to get stuck into finding out what was wrong. I’d been at it about ten minutes when I heard the sound of another bike coming from the opposite direction. I could see his headlight swinging around the twisty road and could tell from the exhaust note that the bike was a British twin of some description. This was not unusual around here, there were a lot of diehards who refused to ride Japanese bikes and stuck with the old stuff and fair play to them. I could relate to the way they thought, I was riding a Czech 250 so who was I to talk.

The rider slowed as he came to the bridge and downshifted to come to an idle alongside me. He was decked out in full on rocker regalia from the 1960’s, again not a particularly strange thing, there were still balding teddy boys in town and was riding an old BSA.

“Alright mate”. He said

“Yeah, bloody thing just cut out on me”. I replied.

“What is it, Villiers”? He asked

“No, CZ, from Czechoslovakia”. I answered.

“Never heard of it”. He said.

He seemed a little nervous, glancing around and about, well, maybe more lost than nervous.

“Listen mate you want to get that fixed and get movin’, it’s goin' get bloody cold tonight and you don’t want to be stuck out here on your own”. He said.

I’d just found the problem, the fuse cable had been trapped under the battery and had cut through shorting out. A bit of tape and the whole thing was back running.

“Working”? He asked.

“Yes, no probs”. I said “I’m going to press on”

“Better head back the way you came mate. It’s getting late”

I wanted to tell him to mind his own business, you know thanks for stopping and all but I ride where I want to, but something in the way he looked at me chilled my soul and stopped me, the words half formed.

“OK, right”. I mumbled and started the bike.

I set of to follow him but there was no way I was going to keep up, he rode a lot faster and corned a lot harder than I was comfortable with in the conditions and pretty soon he had lost me.

I got home about an hour or so later, cold and not a little bit grateful that the fire was still burning in the grate.

A few weeks later I was in the pub with the rest of the crowd I rode with, it was near Christmas and we were all looking forward to the party season. We were talking the usual crap about the great times we’d had over the summer and arguing about what the best bikes were, when the subject of Brit versus Jap came up, as it inevitably did.

“Jap bikes are more reliable”.

“Brit bikes have more character”.

“Brit bikes break down”.

“Yeah so does your old nail”.

The last comment was aimed at me and reminded me about the breakdown I’d had at the bridge. I went of into a yarn about it and everyone listened and laughed and I got a pint out of it. All but one of the old guys who was there.

“What did the bloke look like”? He asked.

I described him.

“A Rocker, you know, silk scarf, boots, leather jacket covered in studs and badges, riding an old BSA”

“And you were by the old pack bridge”? He asked.

“Yeah”. I said “Why do you know him”.

“Well, yes and no, ‘cause the guy I think it was, you can’t have seen”.

“Why’s that”. I asked.

“Cause he crashed into the bridge in 1962 and froze to death. He wasn’t found until the new year”.

Long term test Cagiva Navigator

 When is a road test not a road test?

When it's written by the guy who spent his own money on the bike in question.

I mean how can you be objective?

Well here goes nothing.

I paid a just over two grand for this Cagiva based on things like it looked cool. had a Suzuki TL thousand lump in it, was sort of rare (in UK) and I like oddities.

The previous owner was buying a KTM and couldn't get a good part exchange so we did a deal and I rode away

I could see is girlfriend's unhappy face in the mirror as I rode off down the lane, she loved the bike and didn't want to part with it. 

I genuinely think it wouldn't have been hard to take her with me if I'd wanted to, she was so enamoured of the bikes comfortable seat

First impressions were, well not disappointing just, I don't know, sort of ordinary.

It was fine, it worked as it should, there was nothing to pick up on, it just worked faultlessly.

Don't get me wrong, it wasn't boring just really competent.

It did the back roads, dual carriage ways and motorway work just fine and I got back home with no muss no fuss.

I parked it up and stood staring at it.

What the fuck had I bought?

I was confused, again not disappointed, just something was missing.

Time passed and I rode it a lot and it did everything I asked of it.

It was really good around fast back roads and galloped along motorways comfortably eating up the miles.

The build quality is okay, not up to BMW or Honda standards but good for an Italian bike with a few miles and years on it.

The bikes equipped with Suzuki electrics so all the usual faults associated with their sparky stuff apply

My bike had been sprayed black and it was a decent job so maybe better than the original paint would have been

I had a seventeen inch front rim instead of the standard nineteen which made it turn real quickly which was helpful at Rockingham Motor Speedway when I took it for a track day.

Evening track sessions on a Friday are a great way to end a week of work a day bullshit and set you up for the weekend.

On track the Cagiva soon showed the limits of it's basic suspension but it didn't matter because I could ride around them.

It gripped well on Michelin Pilot sport 2's and even in my hands (I'm no racer) managed to stick to some far superior track tackle, especially in to and out of Tarzans as the wide bars lets you muscle the bike around the hairpin and the torque from the TL engine propels the ungainly, tall, insectoid looking thing up the hill at a rate of knots.

Insect like is a good description of the style of the bike. 

It has a sort of praying mantis thing going on and although it looks tall even a short legged (I'm barley thirty inch inside leg) tall midget like me has not trouble keeping it upright at the traffic lights.

It has odd 'eyes' as it's got a normal and projector light in the array which adds to the whole insect vibe.

So it looks weird, it just works, it has a few potential electrical issues, did I get what I paid for?

Yeah I did, I expected a bike with a lot of 'personality' which it sort of has, certainly in respect of the styling but not in the breaks down and has to be treated in a particular way or it won't work typical of small manufacturer runs.

I was glad to own it and would have bought it again if time was reversed.

If you want a cheap, slightly weird, stand out bike you should buy one

A footnote, everywhere I went where other bikers were, there was always someone telling me if I decided to sell it they'd buy it off me.    

In the beginning

 

Faltering steps and words swirling around in a maelstrom of half remembered conversations, whispers on a breeze from the past, colours and fragrance and ….... maybe kisses.

I was a child, we all were. I grew and in growing I saw patterns and shapes. I learned what was expected and I learned how to make people believe that I had learned what was expected and then, what?

Conform, maybe, maybe not but conform enough.

Then find a way out. Two wheels meant escape. I flew, I swooped and soared all within the confines of the chains that the establishment shackled me with. Sixteen, fifty cc, thirty mph, it was enough, for a while.

Every night through the winter. Out into the darkness. Back roads, anywhere where others were not. Miles and hours and crisp, silver darkness. The fields and woods paper cut-out silhouettes dancing in the moonlight.

Sometimes the sky was a velvet black robe studded with diamonds. My nerves jangled and sang. I longed for this to be all there was, dark, cold, tired, floating in a landscape that was a backdrop for movement and the sound of the inside of my head. I sang and spoke at length to an audience of me and then.......... street lights........ back to reality.

Time passed and age removed some of the chains. Seventeen, two hundred and fifty cc, speed, speed like a space craft that escapes the clutches of the planet that holds me to its breast. At least that's how it felt. Warm, sunny, first of spring. Past the graveyard, sobering but not sobered up, intoxicated by the way the world turned at my hand.

I found friends, we all knew how it felt on two wheels. No words, just the way you look, a way you saw the world. A tribe of outcasts. Unwanted we flocked together in places that accepted us and there we saw them, the older ones, the ones who never gave up, who kept faith and were the guardians of our world. Old men to our eyes, with the miles etched onto their faces. They wore their experiences on their sleeves, pinned to their chests and painted into their skin.

Time passed and regulations overcome and now the keys to the kingdom were ours. Nineteen, Unlimited CC, enough speed to cross the galaxy and cross it we did in groups manacled to the grind of the mundane tasks required by the grey and beige during the week, the weekends were ours to do what ever we wanted so we did. We raided the coastal towns, loud and aggressive, good humoured pillagers of candyfloss and paddling in the shallows. Fast run back to our towns inland for beer and loud music.

Then the riders fell, one by one. Taken by girls who didn't like the cold. Mortgages and family cars. The saddest losses were those taken by the road, the road we loved, that callous mistress, those called home to never leave the scene, to never grow old, to never.

Some of us remained and became the older ones, those who never gave up, with miles etched onto our faces, with experiences on our sleeves, pinned to our chests and painted into our skin. We became the guardians and keepers of our world.

The road goes on forever

 

Sometimes you just have to get out, get away and fly. 

It's still cold and the roads are cluttered with the get home masses but it's not a want, it's a need. 

Helmet muffles the traffic drone and the wup, wup, roar of the big vee twin Guzzi hits back at them like paired fists. 

Into first and the back wheel scrabbles for grip on the car parks loose surface. 

OUT,OUT,OUT, onto the road and sorry no manners, no quarter given.

I don't care about you and you're sensible, respectable life. 

The pain behind my eyes is dagger sharp and blunt force trauma heavy. 

Through the gears and in and out of the metal boxes, on, on , on, faster baby. 

The road clears and the bike leaps forward chasing the horizon. Nothing, just wind roar and the heavy engine heart beat. 

Chasing down a green and brown tunnel, flashes of sky and fearful faces, rat like and pinched from behind triple X safety glass. 

Lost in time and space, a few minutes at a hundred per feels like a lifetime. 

The pain subsides and the road becomes a snake writhing like a stripper, dancing for dollars. 

I smile and back off to a respectable speed. It's a drug and I'm a happy addict. 

The road goes on forever.

In the beginning there was the word

Beginning with a statement and quote

Quote first:

 The association of motorcycles with LSD is no accident of publicity. They are both a means to an end, to the place of definitions.

Hunter. S. Thompson

Statement:

You'll read a lot on here that may not be true, a lot that is true, a lot that's speculation, some of it will piss you off, some of it might be entertaining.

Know one thing from the start

If you like it that's great

If you don't, well don't let the door hit you in the arse as you leave, I'm not interested in getting into a pointless debate about how crap what you read here is, if you can do better write something and send me it I might publish it here and then you can be a part of the shit show

So, why that quote?

Many years ago I lived in a run down house that had an access road around the rear to get to where I had a workshop.

The yard around it was protected by a pair of sturdy wooden gates made out of the sides of an old shipping container.

It was summer and had been a stifling hot day so, after work I'd gone for a ride to get some air circulating and blow the fug out of my battered brain.

I got back as the sun started to dip towards the horizon and the heat was starting to drain out of the tar of the road and brick walls bordering the neighbouring properties.

I rode up the broken surfaced access, the boom of the exhaust bouncing back at me.

I stopped and killed the engine and sat for a moment in the sudden silence, just the ticking of the cooling engine like a clock breaking the quite.

Kick the stand down and do the putting away hassle.

That's when I saw it stuck to the gates.

That Hunter S Thompson quote pasted on the gate above the padlock clearly meant to be seen by me

I frowned and looked up and down the alley but there was no one around.

I never found out who put the quote there but it's mine and that's why that quote is here.

It's here because, if you've experienced something like this moment yourself ,then you too are a part of the great cosmic weirdness that runs like a glittering thread through the lives of those who choose to see it through the sidelong glance and the half seen flash in the corner of your eye.