I Know This Much: From Soho to Spandau

I Know This Much: From Soho to Spandau
Gary Kemp

I Know This Much – by Gary Kemp, Spandau Ballet's prime mover – is simply the freshest, most exciting and best-written memoir to arrive for years.Gary's story begins in North London, where the Kemp family rented a home with no bathrooms and chickens in the yard. After a couple of failed attempts to kill his brother Martin, his parents gave him a guitar for Christmas.From schoolyard battles between the Bowie Boys and the Prog Rockers to Mrs Kemp's firm insistence on net curtains, from acting for the Children's Film Foundation to manning a fruit and veg stall on Saturdays, Gary brilliantly evokes an upbringing full of love, creativity and optimism.As the Thatcher years begin, Gary's account of the outrageous London club scene centred around the Blitz and Billy's is just sizzling. Out of this glamorous mayhem of kilt-wearing mascara'd peacocks would emerge Spandau Ballet - the band that would define the era, and hold high the victorious standard of the New Romantics.Gary's thrilling journey with Spandau Ballet would see them record worldwide hits such as True, Gold and Through the Barricades, play the biggest stadiums in the world, and take to the stage in togas when their luggage gets lost in flight. Stallions, supermodels and dwarves would be hired for video shoots, and through it all, Gary records the wonderful friendships, and the slowly-building tensions that would eventually see five old friends facing each other in court.I Know This Much tells the story of Spandau Ballet, but it's far more than a book about being in a band. Whether it's meeting Ronnie Kray before filming The Krays, sketching out the fashions and subcultures of the day, or hanging out with Princess Diana, this book offers a story on every page. And all the more so because it's all written – brilliantly – by Gary himself.

I Know This Much

From Soho to Spandau

Gary Kemp

COPYRIGHT (#ulink_cad041ef-9fc0-5335-9aa8-c550064a4a1c)

First published in 2009 by

Fourth Estate

An imprint of HarperCollinsPublishers 1 London Bridge Street London SE1 9GF www.harpercollins.co.uk (http://www.harpercollins.co.uk/)

Copyright © Gary Kemp

The right of Gary Kemp to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted by him in accordance with the Copyright, Desgins and Patents Act 1988

A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library

All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, down-loaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins e-books.

Photographs not credited below have been supplied by the author. The author and publisher are grateful to the following for permission to reproduce their copyright material.

The Same Band—courtesy Ian Fox; first Blitz gig—Derek Ridgers; Steve Strange—David Johnson; Waldorf hotel—Herbie Knott/Rex Features; St. Tropez—Jean Aponte; HMS Belfast—Virginia Turbett; Botanical Gardens—David Johnson; Steve Dagger—Graham Smith; Casablanca club, Top Of The Pops backstage—Neil Mackenzie Matthews; at the Kemps’ house—Martin Kemp; New York—Neil Mackenzie Matthews; Ibiza—alanolley.com; Kemp family, Liverpool Empire, True tour—David Johnson; Parade tour Gary, ‘baroque ‘n’ roll’—Denis O’Regan; Barricades tour—Patrizia Savarese; Charlie Kray, ‘being Ronnie’—Richard Blanshard/Miramax; Gary and Lauren—Nick Harvey; Jonathan Ross show—Brian J. Ritchie / Rex Features.

While every effort has been made to trace the owners of copyright material reproduced herein, the publishers would like to apologise for any omissions and will be pleased to incorporate missing acknowledgements in any future editions.

HarperCollinsPublishers has made every reasonable effort to ensure that any picture content and written content in this ebook has been included or removed in accordance with the contractual and technological constraints in operation at the time of publication.

Source ISBN: 9780007323302

Ebook Edition © FEBRUARY 2016 ISBN: 9780007323333

Version: 2016-01-18

I stand opposite the house. I‘ve come here for something—ghosts maybe—but what can I possibly expect? Others hold the key. I feel hurt by its silent disregard. The old step, shaped from children‘s play, looks deserted now, unattended, no longer the stage it once was, and sadly smaller. Looking up, I can just see through the first-floor window, the window nearest the pub, the pub now gutted and boarded, empty and silent. There‘s a shaft of light on the far wall of the room that reveals its size, and suddenly the geometry unfolds and begins to take shape: the two single beds pushed against each wall; the large walnut wardrobe; the Arsenal scarf hanging like a smile on the moon-landing wallpaper; and the square hole my father made in the wall to keep a caring eye on his sleeping babes. To the left, a small boy with a new guitar now sits on his bed. I should know him but he‘s hard to see, hard to define, so many years have distorted him. But now I can hear the lively piano coming from the pub, the pub that spills people, all noisy and lewd with Christmas beer, into the cold street. I try to ignore them, to experience the guitar, strange in my hands, but the celebrations outside disturb my concentration. Laying it down on the bed, I cross over to the window to see what it is.

And suddenly, there I am.

To Finlay, Milo and Kit

‘I have nothing to say, entirely, simply, and with solidity of myself, without confusion, disorder, blending, mingling.’

Montaigne

‘The annoying thing is that critics in twenty years time will probably write a great, nostalgic, dewy-eyed retrospective on how good it was in these clubs in London and how these innovators were doing this that and the other.’

Steve Dagger (Sounds, 1980)

‘Time, he flexes like a whore, Falls wanking to the floor; His trick is you and me, boy.’

David Bowie

CONTENTS

Cover (#u8f461685-6096-5639-b9ef-3d839b061cd6)

Title Page (#u106b1317-e783-5eff-8da5-17cab4e55b56)

Copyright (#u80fea538-c640-51d5-a74f-7115b134166e)

Excerpt (#uce22b564-cf51-52f9-95b4-4724882edaa7)

Dedication (#ub6283e41-d53e-5c90-9a31-3106cfc68cf5)

Epigraph (#u3a4cac4b-b5c4-5a21-bd0b-7b5c25ad45f4)

London, 27 January 1999 (#uccdee6ec-63cc-58cd-b213-284f37fdbed4)

Chapter One: Wakey Wakey! (#u529a8608-8e56-582a-896b-6fe5652bf284)

Chapter Two: Home-made (#u27f0b726-99c1-5497-b1d8-e538d922a031)

Chapter Three: We Are the Boys and Girls (#u10fe9ab5-9395-5e7c-91d7-174d2e27142d)

Chapter Four: Waterloo Sunrise (#uf5f8f6d3-7f33-5e1d-b9d5-eeb66e081730)

Chapter Five: Twenty-four Frames a Second (#u39b17083-e2e4-57bb-bd70-6142519a7c7d)

Chapter Six: Fags and Beer (#u8ebeb81f-b4d6-55d8-a023-341d0586280c)

Chapter Seven: Following the Durm (#u457e623d-d159-5541-af1e-ebb075aba388)

Chapter Eight: Revolt Into Style (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter Nine: A Crash Course for the Ravers (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter Ten: The Journey Begins (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter Eleven: Soul Boys of the Western World (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter Twelve: Remake/Remodel (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter Thirteen: Leaving Home (#litres_trial_promo)