Memoir
As Tears Go By
This is an older story, true, but for those small bits that aren’t. You’ll work it out.
In my early twenties, I felt I was doing okay financially, and bought myself a Jenson Interceptor. I did so because my favorite drummer, Ginger Baker had one, but I didn’t follow him to the point of wearing snakeskin boots.
This car was quite the eyecatcher in its day, and still doesn’t look past its prime sixty years hence.
I mostly slouched when I was driving, my right elbow comfortable on the car window, fingers tapping lightly on the steering wheel as I listened to rock radio.
Motorways were beginning to happen but only in the south. I used the A1 that stretched north. The first time I took it to the island, the men, mostly fishermen, looked at it, touched it, and forgot it.
When in London, however, well, it was a real eye-catcher. Being the owner was seen as being someone. Once inside it felt like an impenetrable barrier.
What drew me to London was the rich and bountiful entertainment industry. The car was a cluttered mess. I had a Marshall amplifier taking up
half the back seat. At the time I was listening to Radio Caroline, Led Zepplin, Pink Floyd, Cream, Credence Clearwater, that stuff.
The A1 route was famous for hitchhikers, heading to Birmingham, or Leeds, or occasionally to the Borders. It wasn’t unusual for me to pull over and offer a ride.
On one particular trip, I drove on past the first two I saw thumbing, a couple of grubby looking guys. Half a mile farther, close to the famous biker's cafe, I picked up a slim girlish figure standing alone clutching a small pack to her chest, almost as though it were a teddy bear. The wind was blowing her long straight blonde hair, that hair not under her turquoise knitted hat, wildly around her shoulders. She wore a pair of flared, faded, and somewhat tattered blue jeans, a loose-fitting shirt, long sleeved, with a dragon boldly embroidered on the front.
Pulling up, I could see she was just a kid, seventeen at most. She struggled to open the passenger door, being young and fragile, and put her bag on the floor next to her feet.
“Thanks,” she said in a near whisper, managing a shy smile before self-consciously putting her hands into her lap.
“How far you going?” She asked.
“Scotland,” I said.
“Is Leeds on your way?”
“Yep, is that where you’d like dropping off.”
“That would be amazing, thank you.”
It was mid-June, the countryside was in full of sumptuous greens, emeralds, and golds. I put on the music, had the occasional surreptitious looks at the girl beside me. She, for her part, was absolutely silent but her eyes watched the passing scenery with something akin to reverence.
After an hour or so, I was pulling into a petrol station, fill up, and get a drink and a Snickers Bar.
“I’m going to get a drink and a bar of something, want anything?”
She glanced briefly at me and shook her head. “Something to read?” I asked. She said nothing, shaking her head again as a response. “Okay, if you need the loo, this is the best time, we have about three hours' drive once we leave here.”
When we left the petrol station, I had placed a brown bag on the back seat, holding some drinks and a couple of different bar snacks. When I was young, I said no to everything a stranger might ask.
“There’s a drink and a bar on the back seat should you change your mind.”
She seemed to warm up to me. “My name is Marianne,” she said softly.
“Hi, Marianne. I’m Harry.”
“That’s a lot of magazines on the floor in the back. They are all about music.”
“Yes, I’m in the industry.”
“I’m hoping to be,” she said.
“Is this, you know, to do with you going to Leeds?”
“In part. I’m a singer songwriter.”
“Is that so, how’s that going for you?”
“It’s hard to break into, there are so many people trying to make it, but did you say you were in the music industry?”
“A bit, here, and there, bit of this, bit of that.”
“Do you know people in the business?”
This girl looks seventeen, I’m wondering if she has run away from home.
“How old are you, Marianne? You wanting to get into the recording business and everything.”
“I’m a lot older than I look,” she said.
“Eighteen?”
“Nearly, in a month or two?”
“Please assure me you are not running away from home.”
She laughs aloud, her shyness falling away.
“I’m not running away, Harry. I live in Hampstead, and I will be hitchhiking back after the concert.”
“Oh, okay. You’re going to a concert. Who are you going to see?”
“The Rolling Stones.”
“That’s an expensive ticket!”
“Yes, twenty-five pounds. I couldn’t afford the ticket and the train.”
We drive on for fifteen minutes in silence.
“Do you know anyone in the Rolling Stones? I mean, if you’re in the music business,” she asked.
“They are not with the label I work for, Marianne. But I’ve met them, I wouldn’t say I was a good friend, but we would recognize each other in the street.”
“I think anyone would recognize Mick Jagger, Harry.”
That put me in my place, she was right, of course. People walk past me, and don’t avert their eyes.
“Can you sing something you’ve written? I’d like to hear it.”
The girl goes into her bag and pulls out several sheets of A4 paper full of writing and scribbles and poetic lines.
For the next hour, Marianne treats me to a dozen songs she has written. I have a dilemma. I think the girl is good enough to strike a recording deal, she has this amazingly soft voice, quite different from say, Dusty, or Cilla. I think it would be very recordable and quite commercial. But I’m on my way home to celebrate dad’s birthday.
Before Marianne leaves the car in Leeds Central, I give her a card.
“Find the stage manager, give him this card. Tell him to give it to Mick, okay? It’s a shame we are not traveling in the other direction. Look don’t take no for an answer. The stage manager will want to brush you off. Tell him, if he doesn’t give this card to Mick, Chris Wright will get to hear about it.” On the card is scribbled my home phone number, “if you have any trouble give me a call.”
“Why are you doing this for me, I cannot believe it.”
“There are no guarantees in this business, Marianne. Don’t be shy. Push and push, tell Mick you sang for me. Don’t tell him it was in a car. Tell him I heard you in a recording studio, okay.”
“Lie to him?”
“Absolutely. The bigger, the better,” I said.
“Thank you so much, Harry. I’ll do my best,” she said.
I gripped the steering wheel a little tighter and muttered under my breath something about dad being too important to make time for a bright new young star. It wasn’t quite like that: Dad, you’re costing me a fortune!
I honestly didn’t know if she would have enough spunk, maybe after all she was old enough to be out on the road. The car sped on eating up the miles of road. An hour farther up the road I stopped for something hot to eat and a break. I ordered baked beans on toast and a couple of fried eggs on top.
I couldn’t get one particular song out of my head though all the lyrics were fogged away, something like this: the evening of the day, watching children play, but not for me, I sit and watch as tears go by.
I tuned into rock radio for the rest of my journey, all the way to Oban.
When I arrived home, there was dad, smelling of fish, salt, and grease, with the biggest smile all over his wind cracked face. Whatever I had given up for him was more than worth it, I thought.
The girl I had picked up on the A1 was Marianne Faithful.
Marianne’s #1 UK hit was: As Tears Go By, arranged by Mick Jagger.
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