He was wearing the oldest T-shirt I’d ever seen; it was a faded blue, tattered around the neck and sleeve ends, and had holes everywhere. The almost obliterated letters across the chest read CREDENCE. His thin, nicotine-stained fingers flew across a couple of thousand buttons and switches, then he sighed and poured himself a cap full of Jack Daniels Tennessee whisky. He tossed the drink off, capped the bottle and picked up an electric guitar.
‘What’s he doing?’ I whispered.
‘Rhythm track,’ Vance Hill said. ‘Shh.’
I shushed and watched the strong fingers dance along the frets as he strummed; his long black hair flopped as he jerked his head convulsively. After a few seconds he nodded, flipped a switch and the studio filled with the music. He strummed and jerked for a few seconds and the jumpy chords he was hitting seemed to sit in the air in front of him. I wanted to tap my foot but kept it still. After a few seconds he said ‘Shit!’ and hit a button. The music stopped.
He took another drink and lit a menthol cigarette. When he turned around to face Hill he looked about five times older than his fifteen-year-old T-shirt.
‘You hear it? Nowhere near blappy enough. I can’t get it. I try for more blappy and I just get blah-balah. We need Tim.’
‘Easy, Con, we’ll get him. This is Cliff Hardy, he’s a private investigator-finds people. Right, Hardy?’
‘Sometimes,’ I said. I nodded to Con, who acknowledged me with a double puff on his cigarette. ‘You seemed to be doing all right to me.’
He shook his head. ‘I was doing lousy. I’m a keyboards man. Without a good rhythm track this’ll sound like shit.’
‘I just brought you in here to give you the feel, Hardy.’ Hill said. ‘Let’s go outside and talk. Don’t worry, Con.’
‘I won’t breathe either,’ Con said. He pushed some more buttons and we went out of the studio.
The place was packed into a high, narrow-fronted building in Annandale. Outside the studio door there was a narrow passage leading to a narrow office and reception area. Hill waved me into a chair and lifted his hand to a young woman who was answering a telephone behind the glass panel. She grimaced and made a throttling motion with one hand.
‘Want some coffee, Hardy? Drink or anything?’
‘No, thanks.’ I got out my notebook and balanced it on my knee. The denim under it was fashionably faded but unfashionably thin and non-stretch. ‘Tim Talbot’s his name. That real, or nom de stage?’
‘Real. Tim’s a studio muso, I doubt if he’s ever been on a stage.’
‘Introvert?’
Vance Hill looked as if he’d heard the word before but couldn’t quite remember what it meant. The young woman came to his aid. She’d slipped out from behind the glass and into a chair near mine.
‘Yes,’ she said. ‘He is.’
‘Hardy, this is Ro Bush. Ro, Cliff Hardy.’
We nodded at each other. She was a brunette with very white teeth, lustrous brown eyes and an athletic figure. I was nodding in approval as well as greeting. She wore a white sleeveless top and jeans, no jewellery, short fingernails and an intelligent expression.
‘Tim’s shy,’ she said, ‘withdrawn even. He doesn’t get on with many people. He’s also tremendously talented.’ She shot a look at the door that led to the studio which I interpreted as saying that not everyone on the premises was equally talented.
Hill leaned forward in his chair. ‘Like I said on the phone, we’re working on the theme song for The Dying Game. Great song, sure hit. Tim wrote it and started on the recording with Con and a couple of others. The vocal’s fine and we can probably do something with the bass track, but there’s some mandolin to go on and a rhythm track needed. Tim’s the only guy who can do it. Jesus, just the rough demo he laid down sounds a hundred times better than anything else we’ve tried.’
‘When’s the last time you saw him?’
Hill looked at the woman. ‘Week ago?’
She nodded. ‘Week and a day.’
‘Why’d he leave?’
‘He had a fight with Sport and Con,’ Ro Bush sighed. ‘And me and Vance for that matter.’
‘What sort of fight?’
‘Artistic,’ she said. ‘Tim didn’t want strings and choir, he wanted a smaller, rougher sound.’
‘Won’t do,’ Hill snapped. He was about my age or a bit younger but his energy seemed to have run out. He wasn’t fat, but tired and slumped he looked it. His skin was greyish and his eyes had an unhealthy, fishy look. ‘This is for a movie, a big movie; it opens with wide shots, we’ve gotta have the treatment on the song.’
Ro Bush shrugged the way you do when you’ve heard something twenty times before. ‘Tim argues the opposite-big visuals, small sound.’
I grinned at her. ‘Who’s right?’
‘Tim,’ she said.
Hill groaned. ‘The money’s right, like always, and the money says give it the treatment. Christ!’
‘That’s it,’ she said. ‘Back and forth for a few hours, then Tim storms off-this is around dawn you understand-and that’s the last anyone’s seen of him.’
I scribbled. ‘This is Tuesday, a.m.? Right?’
Hill nodded.
‘How much booze?’
‘In who?’
‘In everyone.’
‘Lots,’ Ro Bush said. ‘There always is, they were all drunk except me. I get sick if I drink very much.’
‘Drugs?’
Hill shrugged. ‘Sometimes, not that night I don’t think.’
‘Talbot uses drugs?’
‘They all do,’ she said. ‘Tim’s no different.’
‘Terrific. Okay, well I’ll need the names and addresses of all the disputants, picture of Talbot, some ideas about his friends, how he spends his time and so on. Who can give me that?’
‘I can.’ She got up and went behind the glass. I thought there was something shifty about the look Hill was giving me and there was no point in just noting the fact in my notebook.
‘This doesn’t quite hang together, Mr Hill. The police could look for him, or his Mum or someone. What do you know that I don’t know?’
Hill made a face like a man having wind trouble. ‘You said it before-Talbot’s heavily into drugs. He’s supposed to be clean at the moment but this could’ve set him off. If the cops find him they could have something on him-he’s no good to me in Long Bay.’
I grunted. ‘Exactly who is who around here?’
‘I’m the boss of the record company, independent outfit-Centre Records. I’m the executive producer on this movie theme. Ro’s the manager of the studio here, smart girl.’
I’d been around long enough to ask the right question. ‘ Executive producer, who’s the actual producer?’
Hill looked even more uncomfortable. ‘Not settled,’ he said. He handed me a card and a plain door key. ‘Can I assume you’ll do it?’
‘I’ll take a look, sure. A hundred and twenty-five a day and expenses.’
‘My number’s on the card. That’s a key to Tim’s place.’ He took a deep breath and tried to straighten his shoulders. He went back towards the studio and the shoulders had slumped again after the first step.
‘Here you are, Mr Hardy.’ Ro Bush handed me a typed sheet and a magazine clipping. The photo showed three men lounging against a big convertible which was full of musical instruments. The car had STEAM CLEANING stencilled on the side. One of the short fingernails touched the faces. ‘That’s Sport Gordon, that’s Jerry Leakey, don’t know what happened to him. Here’s Tim.’
Talbot looked ill at ease in the company of the others; he was hanging on to the neck of a guitar sticking out of the car like a boy holding his mother’s hand. He was thin and young with a lot of hair; the thinnest part of him was his nose which was long and looked to be scarcely wider than my little finger. A crease ran across Jerry’s face which was perhaps symptomatic, but Sport Gordon presented full face and full force. He was muscular in a singlet and tight jeans, looking like young building workers do before the beer gets to them.
‘Steam Cleaning were pretty big a year or so ago. Sport did the vocal for the theme song by the way.’
Ro Bush smelled of something good and as she didn’t come much above my shoulder it was easy to sniff without being impolite.
‘Hill said that Talbot wasn’t a performer.’
‘He’s not, not really. Steam Cleaning were more of a studio band. They did some gigs, a few big ones too, but Tim played with his back to the audience most of the time.’
‘I’ve never heard of them,’ I said. ‘But that doesn’t mean much, the last live band I saw was the Rolling Stones.’
It wasn’t the way to her heart. ‘We call them the M’n M’s around here.’
‘What’s that mean?’
‘You know-the little sweets, like smarties.’
I shook my head.
‘Also the multi-millionaires. See?’
‘I suppose so. What happened to… Steam Cleaning?’
She shrugged. ‘They broke up. Nothing unusual-problems between Sport and Tim. They were the writers.’
I couldn’t resist it. ‘Like Lennon and McCartney? Jagger and Richard?’
‘Mm, I don’t think they’d be flattered by the comparison.’
‘How come Sport’s singing now, then?’
‘Oh, that’s not strange. Tim’s the writer and the producer, and he picks the vocalist. Sport’s got a great voice.’
I stored away the difference between Hill and Bush on the producer question and looked at the sheet. There were half a dozen names and addresses including Sport Gordon and Ro Bush. She studied me as I studied the list.
‘I consider myself a friend,’ she said.
‘We all need them. Thanks Miss Bush.’
‘Ro.’
‘Okay.’ I tapped the paper. ‘Music and cars?’
She nodded. ‘Tim builds them, modifies them, drives like he plays-excellently.’
‘How much looking has anyone done?’
‘Not much. Vance called in at his flat. Nothing there. I rang Sport and Ian-they’re on the list. They hadn’t seen him. His family’s interstate, Brisbane I think.’
‘You’re the only woman on the list.’ I looked at her enquiringly.
She shook her head. ‘No to what you’re thinking. He’s shy.’
‘I really need to know the economics and politics of this. This record’s important to who?’
‘Everyone: Vance needs a hit to get his label moving; Tim and the other session musos all need the money; Sport’s doing all right solo but he could use a hit single; the movie needs its theme.’
‘What about you?’
‘We get paid for the studio time. Doesn’t hurt to have nurtured a hit but there’s nothing riding on it for me, really. I’m worried about Tim, though.’
‘You sound like the only one who is. Hill’s worried about his hit and Con’s worried about his blaps.’ I looked at the paper again. ‘Con’s not on it.’
‘Con’s a creep and he’s out of his depth. I’m sorry, I have to get back to work. There’s more than one bloody record being made here although you wouldn’t know it sometimes.’
I took a card from her too and went out onto the street. It was 11 p.m. an unusual time to start on an investigation but Hill had told me when he’d phoned in the afternoon that the musicians didn’t start work until night fell and kept at it until dawn. He’d wanted me to get the feel and I suppose I had: booze, drugs, temperamental outbursts and blaps all being recorded on thirty-two tracks. I couldn’t help thinking of post-1970 pop music as a sick combination of adolescence and money; I didn’t feel comfortable with the matter but then, I’d once found a missing Jamaican marriage celebrant who’d specialised in Rastafarian weddings and I hadn’t felt comfortable with him either.
Talbot’s address was in Glebe, handy to home. I drove down towards the water and took the last turn to the right. The street was dog-legged, with big buildings on either side. Talbot’s flat turned out to be a bed-sitter in the back of a house that had no water view. I picked my way down the dark corridors where one light in three worked. The key turned easily in the lock and I stepped into a room of stale smells.
I have a friend who claims he can tell how much time has elapsed since anyone farted in a room. He says it’s never very long in a lived-in place. I’d have bet on a week here. The room had a bed, some books, three guitars in cases, a saucer with a few roaches in it and a pair of jeans, three T-shirts and a zip jacket. The guitar cases were the only items that got a regular dusting. The kitchenette had a half-loaf of green bread and a lump of ant-covered butter on a laminex table and a few basic bits of cutlery. There was milk in the fridge and some cans of Country Special beer.
I opened one of the cans, sat on the bed and drank it. No letters from Brisbane, no suicide note, no ripped mattress, no blood. The room was neither cheerful nor depressing; there’d be some natural light in the daytime and it seemed quiet now. The carpet didn’t stick to the feet and nothing big scuttled in the corners. I finished the beer and belched-that’d have to do for occupancy. I let myself out and drove home.
The next two days’ work was just as unprofitable. I tramped around the addresses Ro had given me and used the phone like Billy McMahon. In a city restaurant I talked briefly to Sport Gordon, whose chief amusements seemed to be flexing his muscles and shaking his head. I listened to impossible jargon in shops that specialised in gear for customising cars.
Talbot’s own car was said to be a silvered Mazda with many refinements which he kept in a parking bay at a big block of flats near his rooming house by arrangement with a non car-owning resident. I located the resident and was shown the empty parking space. As with the room, the rent for the space was paid up until the end of the month. I reported the car stolen, giving my name and phone number, and expected a call on it about as much as you expect the good news from the lottery office.
I went back to Talbot’s room, drank some more of his beer, and found some papers in a guitar case. He had a couple of hundred dollars in a savings account and a bit more in a cheque account. He had ninety dollars in USA currency which was increasing in value just sitting there in the dark-or so they tell me. Telephone numbers were scrawled on the back of a sheet of music, and I rang them, drawing blanks every time. A guitar shop, more mag wheels, a dentist and his mother in Brisbane, I pretended to be a record producer and asked for news of Tim.
‘Timothy?’ the stiff voice came back. ‘I’m afraid we’re not in touch. How did you get this number?’
I ducked that and left my number in case she heard. I guessed she didn’t even bother to write it down. After putting it off for as long as possible, I rang Hill with the bad news.
‘Shit,’ he said. ‘An impasse?’ He pronounced it with a hard ‘a’ like the American he was working hard at pretending to be.
‘Looks like it. I’ve got a few connections to the junkie scene, but I got blank walls there too. What’s happening with the record?’
‘I’m stalling the producers is what’s happening. Con’s going out of his mind.’
I realised that Con was the only card in the pack I hadn’t paid attention to and I knew why. I’d accepted Ro’s assessment of him-not very professional. I told Hill there were still a few leads to follow and rang off. A call to the studio got Ro who told me that Con would be in around eight; she made him sound about as welcome as AIDS.
‘What d’you want him for?’
‘Just a talk. Would you have time for a drink a bit before then?’
She said she would and I was there at seven. At a quarter past we were in the bar of the North Annandale trying to hear ourselves talk above the country’n western band.
‘How’s their sound?’ I yelled.
‘Lousy,’ she shouted, ‘but who’s listening?’
She was wearing a black top and white jeans this time and looked just as good. I grilled her about the music business, because my feeling was that it was at the heart of the matter. Something about the look on Con’s face when he couldn’t get blappy, something about Talbot’s carefully maintained guitars and about Ro Bush’s intelligent, careful assessments of the musicians’ talents and potential made me feel as if I was in the presence of a sort of religious fervour. Hardy’s law is that religion screws people up as much as other things, maybe more.
Ro Bush was a business-like lady and it didn’t seem inappropriate to take a look at my notebook while we were talking. I ordered a second drink and she unloosened a bit.
‘Will this go on Vance’s bill?’
‘Sure.’
‘Good.’ She smiled and took a solid sip.
‘Is The Dying Game really that good?’
‘I dunno. Haven’t seen it. I doubt it, some old hack wrote the script.’
‘I meant the song.’
‘Oh, the song. It’s not called The Dying Game, it’s… Bloody Nose Blues or something.’
‘Doesn’t it have to have the film title in the lyrics somewhere?’
‘Evidently not; it doesn’t, I know that.’
‘Mm, when do they copyright a song?’
‘Depends, sometimes when the record contract’s signed, that’s if the song’s already written; sometimes when the record’s due for release.’ She finished her drink and smiled again. ‘Better get back-thanks, Vance.’
Con was in the studio wearing the same T-shirt and looking even more harassed. My arrival didn’t help.
‘Shit,’ he said. ‘I was hoping to do some work.’ He drank a cap of Old Grandad to prove his point.
‘You can work. Just tell me about the fight that went on before Tim Talbot left.’
‘I can do better than that. Had a mike open.’ He flipped and pushed things on the console and a voice filled the room:
‘Fuck you!’ the voice said. ‘I wrote the fuckin’ thing.’
‘You think you’re bloody God, Tim. I changed the fuckin’ lyrics as I sang it, you didn’t even fuckin’ notice and now you want the credit.’
‘I wrote every note, every word.’
‘Wrote! What d’you fuckin’ mean, wrote? Where is it?’
‘In me fuckin’ head.’
‘What a crap heap that’d be-have another hit, Tim.’
‘I’m straight, Sport.’
This was followed by some laughter, a few guitar chords and a strangled yell. Con cut the sound.
‘What happened?’ I said.
‘Sport punched him. Tim split.’
‘Who was in the right? I mean about the song?’
Con shrugged and a sharp bone stuck up out of a hole near the neckband of his T-shirt. ‘Who knows? Tim wouldn’t have written anything down at that stage. Sport’s right there.’
‘Play me the song and I’ll leave you in peace.’
The bony fingers began their console minuet again. ‘Rough mix,’ he said, ‘accent on rough.’
The studio filled with drums and guitars and a wailing chorus. All that stopped and a voice that sounded like it was coming from under a door croaked and muttered through some verses about blood and broken bones. The guitars cut in from time to time. The whole thing ended with a noise like a symphony orchestra falling into a snake pit.
‘Jesus,’ I said.
‘Great isn’t it? Or could be if we could get that rhythm track.’
‘Didn’t Talbot want it quieter.’
‘Yeah.’ He flipped and punched; I could see the big spools over in the corner of the studio spin and stop. The music was familiar this time-the jumpy sound Con had been trying to match his guitar to on my first visit. I tapped my foot and Con looked at me before taking another cap of bourbon. I got up.
‘I’m with Tim,’ I said. ‘I’m keener than ever to find him.’
Sport Gordon lived in Bellevue Hill, off Victoria Road. His house was well back behind a high wall with big iron gates that were standing half-open when I arrived. I parked further up the street and admired the water view in one direction and the glow from the city in the other. This was one rock star who’d apparently done all right. The house was a low, rambling affair, half-wrapped around a swimming pool and a pebbles-and-pot-plants garden. There was a lot of glass and polished wood, and a three vehicle carport.
There were lights on in the house but I couldn’t see any movement, although some of the drapes were drawn back. I went through the gates and took a routine look at the carport. A white Mercedes sports car was sticking out, front first and slightly slewed, from one of the spaces and the car next to that was covered. I went over and lifted a corner of the tarpaulin: the sloping shapes of a Mazda RX7 gleamed silver under the moonlight.
That put a different slant on things. I went back to the car and got my S I threaded the hip holster onto my belt and tucked the gun away at the back. I sneaked through the gates and went quickly to the side of the house and worked my way back in the shadows. I never heard of anyone who kept the door that led out to the pool properly connected to the alarm system and Gordon was no exception. I crouched down out of the light thrown up from the pool and tried to gauge the amount of movement in the house and where it was coming from. It didn’t take long; there wasn’t any sound and no movement either.
I stepped in and began a quiet prowl of the rooms. There was a lavishly stocked kitchen, a couple of opulent bathrooms and several bedrooms, big and small. One of the smaller ones was interesting-there were heavy webbing straps attached to the bed frame and slots for the ends of the straps to lock into. It looked newly installed, and a bit too practical for bondage fun’n games.
The signs were that three or four people were using the house but the place was as silent as the grave. I found the reason for that at the end of a passage on the side of the house away from the pool. The heavy padded door and glowing light above it meant recording studio.
Out by the pool again and round the back, bent low. I fetched up by the window into the studio and lifted an eye up to the bottom inch of the glass. Sport Gordon was there in his cut-off T-shirt along with another muscle man who was sitting at a console like the one in Annandale. Tim Talbot was hunched over a guitar, strumming hard and looking scared. He stopped; the console operator swore and flipped switches. Gordon took two steps and whacked Talbot across the face with a half-closed hand. Talbot’s head jerked back on his thin neck.
I ducked down and scooted back into the house. Sound studio doors don’t have catches, they just swing in, silently and smoothly. I took out the gun, pushed the door open and went in, side-stepping equipment and cables. Gordon recognised me and shouted something that was inaudible over the music. I told him to shut up and I gestured with the gun at the switch flipper. He cut the sound. Talbot had blood trickling down from his mouth and was the colour of old mortar.
‘Get up,’ I said. ‘We’re going.’
‘Like fuck!’ Gordon bullocked forward and I brought the gun up to level at the bridge of his nose. I didn’t move back.
‘Rock stars die young,’ I said.
Talbot threw the guitar down, shot up out of his chair and rushed under the gun. He bolted through the door, yelling, tripping on cables but staying upright.
Sport Gordon threw a good punch that got me on the shoulder and loosened my grip on the gun. But he didn’t have the combination and while he was getting set for the next one I clipped him with a light left on the ear. He yelled and covered it with his hand; I chopped him across the throat and he covered that with his other hand. Maybe he was thinking of his precious vocal chords. The other man didn’t move.
I ran out of the studio, jumping the cables, and skidded out onto the tiles beside the pool. I heard the car engine start, then the turning tyres screamed across the concrete and there was a bang as the sports car clipped the gate. It was heading up the hill as I reached the street. I belted along to my car and got it started and into a U-turn before I realised I still had the. 38 in my hand. I threw it behind me and settled down to follow the Mercedes that was fifteen years younger, 50 kilometres an hour faster and driven by a madman.
Talbot took streets that would lead to the short freeway and the city. He took the turns fast and tight, and terrorised any cars that looked likely to check him. I followed as closely as I could which wasn’t very, but I still managed to keep moving through the wake of stopped cars and irate drivers he left behind him.
He could drive all right, at least at first; at times all I had to keep in sight were his flashing brake lights. But something started to get to him and the Merc was weaving as it came off the freeway and roared down beside Centennial Park. I crowded up behind him after he hesitated at the Oxford Street turn. He dropped a gear and ripped past a taxi and through a red light.
He’d been shitting on the speed limit for more than ten minutes and still there were no flashing lights or sirens. It couldn’t last. We were howling along through Paddington but there was no chance he could keep up the pace or the style further down. I flattened the accelerator and drew up beside him near the barracks; he glanced across at me and I thought he looked puzzled. He dropped off the speed a bit and I coat-of-painted him, sending the Merc screeching off half-left up the hill into Napier Street which is leafy and quiet.
He was a fast-reacting driver; he saw the barriers early and threw the car into a skidding, turning stop that tortured the steering and the tyres. He almost made it, too; but the right front light collapsed against a post and the engine stalled. I shoved the Falcon through a U-turn and jumped out. He was sitting bolt upright, staring straight ahead and fanning his sweating face with his hand. I yanked him out and half-carried him to my car. He struggled briefly and I almost broke his arm ramming him into the back seat. A few lights had gone on in the houses and I thought I could hear a siren in the distance. I got started and went into the maze of blocked-off and one-way streets until I thought it was safe to emerge and head for home.
I worried all the way back to Glebe about leaving him over the back with the. 38 floating around somewhere, but he stayed still and quiet, apart from doing a bit of muttering and groaning. I hauled him into the house and stuck him under a shower while I made coffee. I had a quick whisky while the coffee brewed and felt pretty pleased with myself.
He came out with a towel wrapped around his thin hips and plopped down in a chair at the table. I poured him some coffee.
‘Thanks.’ He eyed the Scotch and I added a bit to his mug. He took a few sips, wiped some drops of water off his face and started to look a bit better.
‘Who’re you?’ he said.
‘Hardy, private investigator. Vance Hill hired me to find you.’
‘That shit.’ He drank noisily. ‘Still, thanks, I’ll just finish this and I’ll be off.’
I shook my head. ‘No, I’m delivering you to Hill.’
‘Be buggered you are.’ He half-rose from his chair but I reached over and pushed him back.
‘Use your head. How did you like being strapped to the bed?’
‘Not much,’ he muttered. ‘Why can’t people leave me alone?’
‘You’ve got what they want. Look, son, I don’t want to heavy you but this needs straightening out.’ I dug into my jeans pocket, pulled out Ro Bush’s card and slapped it on the table. ‘She’s got your interests at heart hasn’t she?’
‘Ro? Sure.’
‘We’ll talk to her as well as Hill, don’t worry. Gordon was trying to pinch your song, right?’
He finished his coffee and I poured some more along with whisky for both of us. His fingers were long, thin and strong, like Con’s without the tobacco stains. He looked tired and washed-out. A bit of a talk, another Scotch and I was pretty sure he’d sleep for ten hours.
‘The song, yeah. Shit, I wish I’d never written the fuckin’ thing.’
‘You did write it, did you?’
‘Bloody oath. Sport’s shitting himself. You saw all that crap he’s got-swimming pool and all? He’s got debts up to here. Solo, he’s shit.’
‘How much did he get out of you?’
‘Bugger all.’ He grinned showing surprisingly good teeth. ‘I just couldn’t remember how it went. God, I’m tired.’
I put him in the spare room and locked the door, but he was still asleep when I woke up. We walked Lo Annandale through the cool morning air and he filled me in a bit more on what had happened. He’d done some drinking and dope smoking after he’d stormed out of the studio, but nothing hard. Gordon picked him up a few days later, got him drunk and made him the prisoner of Bellevue Hill.
‘Wouldn’t be the first time a song changed hands for a bottle. Or some smack. That’d have been the next thing.’ He whistled tunefully and grinned at me. ‘I’d had a lot of bourbon and practically no sleep when you barged in. I just saw the door and went. Wonder what Sport’ll do about the Merc? Probably owes a bundle on it.’
Ro Bush and Hill greeted Talbot as if he was Mick Jagger who’d just dropped by with his band to help out. He disappeared into the studio and I was left with Hill and the sordid business of my cheque. He signed with a flourish and handed it over.
‘Good job, thanks.’
‘Better keep an eye on him.’
‘Will do.’
‘Will he get his way with the production of the song?’
His eyes narrowed and all the money-worry lines on his face deepened. ‘Maybe.’
I heard the song when it came out; there was a different singer, less chorus and more mandolin, but it still lacked the nice, light beat I’d liked and sounded like bricks being dropped on a tin roof. I despaired for the younger generation, but then, so had my Dad when I got my first pair of pegged’ pants.
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