Time to bring the retro pub crawl to an end now, so I thought I'd finish the sequence with an amusing quote by Tayside Bar manager, Brian Sinclair. When the pub's Xmas party was in full swing in 1981, he came out with this little ditty - "I want to see The John Cooper Clarke's here."A slip-up that I'm sure JCC himself would find amusing!
I like to have fun with words, so does John Cooper Clarke, a poet who cropped up on the scene the same time as punk and so found himself dubbed "The Punk Poet". Some of you may recall him performing at the Caird Hall as support to Elvis Costello in 79.
Talking about having fun with words, this is a good time to put up this excellent illustration of JCC done by graphic genius, Ian Wright, who's art career also began around the same time punk started. He first became known with the stuff he did in the NME in the late 70's. This example is actually one of his early ones from his NME days. Not only a great likeness to JCC, but the image, made from a rubber stamp of his name, also reminds you that the man is a bit of a wordsmith.
The perfect portrait of him!
Was there in '79 Seeing Richard Hell was a huge thing for me, but JCC was great too. "where william Hickey meets Michael Caine, again and again and again and again, Margret Thatcher is stunning yes, but you never get a nipple in the Daily Express"
ReplyDeleteThe 1966 Dundee directory has the Tayside Bar owned by Mr D Sinclair, while the 1970 & 74 directories have it listed as owned by Mrs C Sinclair.
ReplyDeleteKeep it in the family!
Brian was brilliant. Brave, always paid the bands, still had the legendary Bill Stott and his singalong on a Saturday night. Really weird sometimes during the week when you had loads of old geezers at the bar next to punks, mohicans, etc. Had my first "legal" pint there with my cousin Stewart.
ReplyDeleteI remember getting to the Tayside Bar early one night, way before the music was due to start, and so decided to have a couple of pints at the bar while waiting on the place to fill up. Billy Connolly was on TV live in concert and there was this old pensioner guy took a dislike to him. He was F-ing & C-ing all the way through it, as if he was a heckler at a show in Dundee, shouting at Billy to fuck off back to Glasgow and reminding him he wasn't funny!!
ReplyDeleteIt was difficult to tell who was funnier, Billy or the drunking old guy screaming abuse!!