“WHAT'S MY NAME?” I scream out for the last time into the studio mike. There are thumbs up from the gallery and control box.

”That’s it, that’s the one, this is THE sound of 1968!” some Transatlantic happy suit crows up in the box.

I slump down in a corner and light up a Players Senior Service and draw deep even though my throat is burning. June and it feels like August outside, here it’s too hot, my tie-dye is drenched in sweat. “Its hot as Hell!’’ I shout ‘’have we done yet?”

‘’Just doing playback, bear with us’’.

I call over to a young gofer boy coiling leads down here “Hey son can you get me a long cooooold drink?”

“Fuck you man get it yourself, what did your last servant die of?’’

“You what!” I choke.

“Come the revolution …” He shoots me an evil stare and goes off to get me one.

“And get me a fresh towel as well you spaz!’’


I’ve been talking a lot to Tariq. He’s pressing me to make this album the anthem for the revolution. I like him and he likes me. He doesn’t fawn like others do, and we like taking the piss out of one another. I say “You’ve got too much head and not enough heart”.

“And kids look up to you, you are a leader whether you like it or not, just don’t go off on all that hippie stuff”.

“You Tariq? Proletariat? You’re backgrounds even more middle class than mine. It’s all well and good but what can a poor boy do except sing in a rock and roll band?

“When the Revolution comes the proletariat will produce the leadership Man”, he says. “I know you dropped out of London School of Economics but you must have learned something in your time there when you weren’t screwing around”.

“Look man I was with you at the Grosvenor Square demo wasn’t I? Showing sympathy’’.

“Fuck you Mick” he laughs, “We need solidarity not sympathy. So what are you calling your masterpiece then?”

“Sympathy for the Devil”.

His big brown sad eyes roll upwards, and his big bushy moustache twistles.


The kid comes back with a coke. He flips me an autograph book. I guess the little creep wants me to sign it to impress his chick. “Fake it kid, like everyone else does. After the revolution we are public property”. Now he flips me a V sign, and its not V for Victory. They’re still farting around in the control room, something not right. I just want to get out of here and get some air.


Yesterday I was round at Johns at Virginia Water and he played me through the acetates of their new album. It’s hard. I didn’t know what to say. This is a band disintegrating, too much pulling them apart. I’d give them another year at most.

‘’What are you guys calling it?’’ I ask.

“We, are calling it ‘The White Album”, he announces like he’s expecting a round of applause. When he says we, I guess he means him and Yoko. Shite album, more like. Too many ideas, too strung out, not enough focus. It’s already got enough advanced orders to put it in the number one slot and it hasn’t even been released yet.

“Happiness is a warm gun? Helter Skelter? little piggies? It’s so open-ended John. Some nutter in the States will use this as an excuse for committing murder in your name’’

He laughs and blows smoke rings. “And you’re calling yours ‘Sympathy for the Devil’. Sheeeit! I had enough hassle in the States with the Jesus thing!”

“One day some mother is going to pop you out there. I always go tooled up when we go Stateside”.

He smiles and the sun glints on his granny specs. “I feel safer in New York than in London. All I’m saying, is give peace a chance”.

“John, you crazy tosser, you really do think you can walk on water don’t you? One day someone will drill bullet holes in your feet and you’ll sink’’.


I cough loudly. The control room has more people in. They’re talking in hushed tones. A bad sign. I’m getting restless, I need a toke.

Man its only nine months since I joined John and the other three Apostles with singing ‘LOVE, LOVE, LOVE’. We must have bitched some whore back then, this year’s been born with a stripe right across its back. Where’s all the peace and love? London, Paris, Berlin, Rome. Blam Blam, Martin Luther King. Riots in Watts. Burn Baby Burn. Next thing you know there’ll be riots in Chicago.
All the songs are predicting it. On the radio, that’s where you’ll hear it first.

I start to wake up. Where did it all go wrong? This is no political revolution. There’s no right and no left in this. Tariq and John are both screwed. Its just like the old grey men have declared war on a whole generation. Those fuckers will kill any Apostles with a message of peace. Send off the young to die in wars, if you can’t find any other way.

Andrew comes down to me from the control room. He plucks the lyric sheet off its stand. “Mick can you do another run through?’’

“Whaaat?””

‘’Just one change”. He points to the line.

“OK’’ I say puzzled.

‘’Í shouted out who killed John Kennedy?’ It needs changing”

His eyes are withdrawn behind his shades. ‘’They’ve just shot Bobby Kennedy. He’ still alive but it doesn’t look good. We better have another version ready. We’re going up against the Beatles with this album. Lets keep our integrity. Can you change it to ‘’Who killed the Kennedy’s? on the next run through’’ He writes over the sheet. He goes back to the box.

I look down at the next line after “I shouted out who killed the Kennedy’s”. The line reads ‘When after all it was you and me’.

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