Prove It All Night

By Stephen B. Charles

Can there be anything more uplifting than a great rock concert?

A concert where words like brilliant, fantastic, superb, amazing and incredible can never do it justice. They don’t even come close.

If you are blessed to have seen that one special gig that actually changed your life, a gig that you wished had never come to an end, then maybe, just maybe, you’ve been in the presence of greatness.

A night to remember that will never fade from your memory, however long you live. It’s as fresh today as it was all those years ago. It was a rock and roll epiphany.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Austin Macauley Publishers
• Release date: Nov 30, 2022
• ISBN: 9781398442351

Stephen B. Charles

Stephen grew up beside the seaside in Lancashire, England, with his younger sister and three older brothers, where their parents ran a family guest house and he attended the local grammar school. When not working as an IT contractor in Central London, he enjoys playing the piano, the guitar and the drums, writing songs, playing Bridge, learning Italian, listening to music, travelling, gardening, bird watching and jogging. His ambition is to cruise around the world writing best-selling novels, inspired by the fascinating and amusing people he meets along the way.

Book preview

Prove It All Night

Stephen B. Charles

Austin Macauley Publishers

Prove It All Night

About the Author

Dedication

Copyright Information ©

Intro

Chapter One The Motors

Chapter Two The Clash

Chapter Three Bob Marley and the Wailers

Chapter Four David Bowie

Chapter Five Doctor Feelgood

Chapter Six The Jam

Chapter Seven Alberto Y Lost Trios Paranoias and The Police

Chapter Eight The Who

Chapter Nine Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band

Chapter Ten The Rolling Stones

Encore

About the Author

Stephen grew up beside the seaside in Lancashire, England, with his younger sister and three older brothers, where their parents ran a family guest house and he attended the local grammar school.

When not working as an IT contractor in Central London, he enjoys playing the piano, the guitar and the drums, writing songs, playing Bridge, learning Italian, listening to music, travelling, gardening, bird watching and jogging.

His ambition is to cruise around the world writing best-selling novels, inspired by the fascinating and amusing people he meets along the way.

Dedication

To the fans and the musicians who share the same dream, breathe the same air, and for two or three hours, escape to a better place.

Copyright Information ©

Stephen B. Charles 2022

The right of Stephen B. Charles to be identified as author of this work has been asserted by the author in accordance with sections 77 and 78 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior permission of the publishers.

Any person who commits any unauthorised act in relation to this publication may be liable to criminal prosecution and civil claims for damages.

The story, the experiences, and the words are the author’s alone.

A CIP catalogue record for this title is available from the British Library.

ISBN 9781398437173 (Paperback)

ISBN 9781398442351 (ePub e-book)

www.austinmacauley.com

First Published 2022

Austin Macauley Publishers Ltd®

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E14 5AA

Intro

Elvis Presley was, and is, my all-time hero. In 1991, my girlfriend and I travelled to the USA on holiday. It was different to the regular ones we took as it was split into two mini holidays within the same country. The first part was spent on the West Coast sightseeing in California and the second we spent travelling through the States of the Deep South.

Having landed in San Francisco, we hired a maroon Buick Regal at the airport and over the next seven days drove around 500 miles from San Francisco to San Diego, mainly along Pacific Highway One. Our route took us through some beautiful towns with breath-taking scenery including Santa Cruz, Carmel, Big Sur, San Simeon, San Luis Obispo, Santa Barbara, Ventura, Santa Monica and Long Beach before finally arriving in San Diego.

In San Francisco, it was a thrill to zig-zag the car down Lombard Street (the crookedest street in the world made up of eight steep hairpin turns), then to drive across the Golden Gate Bridge to the Muir Woods National Monument where we marvelled at enormous Californian Redwoods and Douglas Firs. We spent the evening in the largest Chinatown district outside of Asia, then the following day rode on a cable car from Union Square to the historical Fisherman’s Wharf district, strolled along Pier 39 and took a ferry ride across San Francisco Bay to Alcatraz. On The Rock, we stood in the cells once occupied by Robert Stroud aka The Birdman of Alcatraz, Al Capone and Alvin ‘Creepy’ Karpis. The latter was the last Public Enemy No. 1 to be taken in during the gangster era and served twenty-six years on The Rock. He was the longest ever serving prisoner on Alcatraz.

After San Francisco, we travelled south towards Los Angeles. In LA, we spent a day visiting Disneyland and another day at Universal Studios. The next day we drove down to San Diego, visited the famous Zoo, then caught a Delta Airlines flight to New Orleans for the second part of our holiday.

On our first morning in the Big Easy, we went on a tour of the Superdome which is an incredibly impressive building. It’s a huge indoor stadium with a seated capacity of 75,000 for American Football games and also hosts Basketball, Wrestling, Soccer, Gymnastics and Baseball. It was at the Superdome that many people took refuge and were temporarily housed after the devastation of hurricane Katrina in August 2005.

Down on the huge floor area of the indoor stadium, hundreds of workers were in the process of transforming it for a Computer Sales convention that was due to start later that week.

By the end of our two-hour tour, we seriously needed to sit down and were grateful when it finished with all thirty of us sitting in the stands about halfway up. The tour concluded with a question-and-answer session, where all of the questions being asked of our tour guide were about American sport. We were actually the only British people on the tour so everyone was asking about American Football, Baseball and Basketball.

Sitting at the back of the group, I had my hand up for several minutes in a very British polite kind of way. All to no avail though, as the tour guide totally ignored me to answer the questions being shouted out by everyone else in a rather random manner.

I was hoping that the guide would’ve mentioned the topic of my, as yet, unasked question, because I thought it was a major event in the history of the Superdome, but it wasn’t going to happen. I needed to take the bull by the horns as I was now panicking that the tour would end and my question would go unanswered forever. I thought if you can’t beat them, join them. So, with my hands cupped around my mouth for maximum volume, I shouted, What about The Rolling Stones?

As soon as I’d shouted, I realised that I’d shouted far too loudly. It all went quiet and everyone turned around to look at me as if I was some kind of demented idiot.

Sorry, can you repeat that question? The tour guide said looking around, not knowing where this superb question had come from.

I waved my hand in the air so he could see me and said, When did The Rolling Stones play here and where was the stage located? I asked my brilliant question.

His answer was somewhat brief, rather vague and unhelpful.

Yes, many big rock concerts have been held here over the years including The Rolling Stones, The Eagles, Stevie Wonder, Earth Wind and Fire and Johnny Cash. When he said ‘The Rolling Stones,’ he nodded in my direction as if that was enough to answer my question. He then looked at all the American people on the tour when he name-checked the other bands that had played there. He was trying a classic fob off, but I was onto him.

He seemed keen to change the subject and added, Any more questions? as he clapped his hands together and looked around.

I was hoping he’d been present at the gig and could give me a detailed review plus the set list. My next question, if he’d been at the gig, was going to be, What was on the set-list and which guitars did Keith play? But I thought better of it.

Surely, my supplementary question would glean some really valuable information. I’d hit the bar and needed to follow up quickly to slot the ball home. I had to be quick though.

Where was the stage situated and how many people were here for The Rolling Stones concert? I asked before anyone else could jump in with another sports related question.

The stage was at this end, he said pointing down below us, and the capacity for concerts now is about 60,000.

Thank you, I replied, none the wiser, really.

No one on the tour was in the least bit interested that The Stones had played there and it seemed that the tour guide wasn’t either, otherwise he’d have mentioned it.

It was as if it was such a minor happening in the history of the Superdome that it didn’t even deserve the tiniest of mentions. However, for me, it was the only reason I’d wanted to visit the Superdome, because I knew that The Stones had played there three times in 1978, 1981 and 1989 and I just wanted to experience it for myself. To me, The Stones’ gigs were the most important events ever held there, even surpassing the recent Superbowl game. When The Stones played the Superdome in December 1981, they were supported by the Neville Brothers and George Thorogood & The Destroyers. That concert set a world record for the largest ever audience at an indoor venue with 87,500 fans being in attendance.

It would’ve been a fantastic place to see The Stones and I was thinking how brilliant it’d be if they were playing there this week instead of the boring Computer Sales convention, especially if we had great tickets right at the front. Wishful thinking on my part, though. I was trying to picture in my mind’s eye how the stadium would look with The Stones playing there, but couldn’t really visualise it.

The next morning, following a hearty traditional American breakfast of eggs, bacon, hash browns, grits, pancakes, maple syrup, orange juice, toast and coffee, we checked out of our hotel on Canal Street in the French Quarter. We hired a white Mercury Sable and set out on the second leg of our road trip which would take us from New Orleans in Louisiana, up to St. Louis in Missouri, a distance of about 670 miles.

Heading north out of New Orleans, we followed the meandering Mississippi River as much as possible over the next seven days, staying overnight at motels wherever we happened to be. Our planned route from Jackson Square, New Orleans, took us through Baton Rouge, Natchez, Vicksburg, Greenville, Clarksdale, Memphis and finally St. Louis, just in time to catch a flight back to London.

Most of these smaller towns I’d only ever heard of in songs. There’d been loads of songs written about Memphis and St. Louis including ‘Memphis, Tennessee’ by Chuck Berry, ‘All the Way from Memphis’ by Mott the Hoople, ‘Meet Me in St. Louis’ by Judy Garland and ‘The St. Louis Blues’ by W. C. Handy.

I’d heard of ‘The Natchez’ because it was the name of a steamboat that travelled along the Mississippi, so assumed it was named after the town. I also knew that Clarksdale was the hometown of John Lee Hooker so I wanted to call in there. Baton Rouge is mentioned in loads of songs including ‘The Heart of Rock and Roll’ by Huey Lewis, ‘Memory Motel’ by The Stones and ‘I May be too Young’ by Suzi Quatro.

It’s extraordinary to think of how many great popular songs have been written about, or have mentioned, US towns and cities over the years. Some that spring to mind are New York, San Francisco, San Bernardino, New Orleans, San Jose, Vermont, Memphis, Oklahoma, Galveston, Kansas City, Chicago, Amarillo, Jackson, Las Vegas, Kentucky and Phoenix.

With a week to spend on the journey, we’d be able to take in all the sights and sounds from the Deep South. The route of the mighty Mississippi would take us through some amazing scenery as well as many historical and beautiful towns. If we’d had a couple of extra days, we’d have diverted a bit further to the east from the river over to Nashville, Tennessee, to visit The Grand Ole Opry. That particular trip I still have to make, along with a visit to see where Elvis was born in Tupelo, Mississippi.

The key destination for this trip however was Memphis, Tennessee, and a visit to Graceland and Sun Studios to pay homage to Elvis Presley, aka ‘The King’, my all-time hero.

We were so fortunate to be visiting Graceland during the off-season in early April when it was very quiet. There were only six of us on the Graceland tour where normally there would’ve been hundreds of fans being rushed through the house. As it was, our guide said we could take our time in each room since there were no groups behind us. To be allowed to remain behind for an extra minute or two in the Jungle room, the TV room, the pool room and the bar, when the other visitors had moved through, was an unexpected privilege that made the tour extra special.

On leaving the beautiful mansion, we headed next door to the classic car museum to see Elvis’s superb collection. This included his 1975 Dino Ferrari, his pink Cadillac, his red MG from the film Blue Hawaii and his Harley-Davidson motorbikes. Then we climbed on-board the luxurious Lisa Marie 1960 Convair 880 jet, complete with double bed, dining room, television lounge and fully stocked bar.

As I sat on a wall close to Elvis’s grave writing postcards, ‘Don’t Cry Daddy’ was playing throughout the estate. My mixed emotions were of great sadness, great poignancy, great memories and great admiration for ‘The King’.

In my mind, I was taken back to the beautiful summer’s morning of Wednesday 17th August 1977, when I sat down at the breakfast table and saw the headline, ‘Elvis is Dead’, on the front page of the Daily Express. I’d recently left school at eighteen following my ‘A’ Levels and had a summer job working on St. Annes-on-Sea pier. It was simply the best job I’ve ever had. I was in charge of the Crazy Golf, which was situated at the end of the pier, where there was a small wooden kiosk with a sliding glass window from where I dispensed the clubs and golf balls. The golf course (windmills, slides, bridges, barriers and bumps actually) was enclosed by a white picket fence that stretched down the pier for about thirty metres. Mondays through to Saturdays, from 9:00am to 9:00pm, with a one-hour break for lunch and a one-hour break at teatime, I sat outside the kiosk in a deck chair listening to Radio One and chatting to all the beautiful girls who came on the pier. I only ventured back into the kiosk when the boss was doing his rounds, once in the morning and once in the afternoon. For the whole day, Elvis’s greatest hits were played on the radio and the girls in the pier café had, ‘Kentucky Rain’, ‘Moody Blue’, ‘Memories’, Way Down’, ‘In the Ghetto’, ‘My Way’, ‘Always on my Mind’, ‘The Wonder of You’, ‘Polk Salad Annie’ and ‘Suspicious Minds’ playing on a seemingly endless tape loop.

Our afternoon in Memphis was spent a couple of miles away, across town at Sun Studios where Elvis started his recording career with Sam Phillips on the Sun label.

To stand in the original studio, surrounded by photographs of Elvis, Jerry Lee Lewis, Johnny Cash and Carl Perkins taken in that studio, was something else. We listened to the original recording of the first meeting between Elvis and Jerry Lee that happened in that same studio, where they shook hands and Jerry Lee tells Elvis he plays the piano and Elvis tells Jerry Lee that he’s a singer. It was here that the four of them met on the 4th of December 1956 and jammed together for the first and only time.

The Million Dollar Quartet, a title given to them on that historic day in 1956 by Sam Phillips in order to promote and market Sun Records, has a special place in the history of American Rock and Roll.

Books were written about that day and a terrific West End and Broadway show brilliantly captured the atmosphere and youthful musical exuberance of the day. I saw the show shortly before it was due to finish in London on Christmas Eve 2005 and again in Las Vegas in July 2015.

Seeing it for the first time, it had such an immense impact on me it was like being taken up inside an Oklahoma twister.

Full of inspiration, the very next day, Christmas Day, I wrote a song imaginatively called, ‘The Million Dollar Quartet’, mostly while walking around the back garden waiting for Christmas dinner to be served up.

The second verse goes:-

Well, it was Sam Phillips who brought them together at the famed Sun Studio

And a history page was written that day in the annals of Rock and Roll

We’d never seen their like before and we’ll not see their like again

But the music they made on that winter’s day, made legends of those young men

Chorus

They were the Million Dollar Quartet, that we could never ever forget

Man, how those boys did play, on that December day

When Elvis, Carl, Johnny and Jerry Lee came together that day

As great as visiting Elvis’s home and the Sun Studios were, there was something else that I witnessed, which was totally unplanned and out of the blue, that far exceeded any other experience on the whole trip. It happened and it somehow put everything else into perspective as if it was a summation of all the parts. It made the holiday for me.

On a beautiful spring morning, we were driving along a country road, still adjacent to the Mississippi River, heading towards the scenic town of Greenville. It was so quiet and peaceful. With our windows wound right down, there were no sounds to be heard apart from the birds singing and the crunching of our tyres on the red soil dirt road. Looking in the rear-view mirror, I could see we were creating a small dust cloud as we tootled through the cotton fields at a very sedate 15 mph.

In the distance, we could see a small settlement of white and lime green timber-clad houses on either side of the road where the cotton fields stopped. It seemed like we’d passed through a space-time continuum and were now back in the mid-1920s.

Out of reverence and politeness to the local community, I slowed the car right down to a crawling pace as we approached the first property. I couldn’t believe my eyes at what we saw on the veranda of that small, single-storey, white timbered house. I gently took my foot off the accelerator until the car was now moving at a snail’s pace. A very slow snail, at that. We were so honoured to witness a scene from the real Deep South.

There was an old, grey-haired black man gently rocking to and fro’ in a rocking chair. He must have been in his late seventies or early eighties and was wearing blue dungarees, a white shirt and was bare footed. As he sat on the porch, gently rocking in his chair, he was strumming away on a beat-up acoustic guitar and singing the blues.

He sounded like the scratchy old vinyl recordings I had of the Delta Blues songs by Robert Johnson. The old man was singing from the heart and he was singing about his life. Could it be that there was a Hellhound on his Trail?

We didn’t stop to take any photographs or distract him in any way but slowly drove by, watching him all the while and listening to his plaintive cry. He didn’t acknowledge us or look our way at all. It was as if we weren’t there. It was a wonderful moment in time when everything came together and everything in the world seemed just right. Ten minutes either side and we could’ve missed him and not witnessed that once in a lifetime experience.

For a second, we thought it might’ve been a set-up. Maybe he saw the car coming, saw the dust cloud, hopped out onto the veranda and started to play the blues for the passing tourists.

But what would’ve been the point of that? No, I don’t think that was the case at all. I’m convinced what we saw was one hundred percent genuine and authentic Mississippi Delta Blues being played by an old blues man.

When I think back to it, I’m reminded of a similar rare sighting a few years later that occurred while I was driving close to home through the country lanes of London Colney in Hertfordshire.

I’d turned sharp left at a corner and was driving fairly slowly, when from behind a hedgerow, about thirty feet in front of the car, out stepped a large bird that started to walk very slowly across the road.

I knew instantly what the bird was. It was a Stone Curlew. Now any bird-watcher worth their salt will tell you that a Stone Curlew is a very rare bird in England. However, it is also a very distinctive bird and easy to recognise close-up. It has huge yellow eyes, light brown plumage with white stripes on its flanks and very long, thick yellow legs. It has the air of a reptilian about it.

So, even though I’d only ever seen a photograph of it in my bird books, I knew instantly what it was. It’s about the size of a large crow and is mostly nocturnal, hence the large yellow eyes for locating food in the dark. It’s a summer visitor to England, confined to a small area of Wiltshire and Norfolk. So, what was it doing crossing a country lane in Hertfordshire in the middle of the day? I have no idea, but I know it was very special.

Put it this way, it’s such a rare bird that I don’t expect to ever see another one, even if I go out specifically looking for it.

These two rare sightings of the old Delta Blues man and the Stone Curlew, just go to show that sometimes in life, something can happen that is totally unexpected, truly remarkable and absolutely unique. When it happens, all you can do is stay calm, relax, take it all in, marvel in awe at it, respect it and enjoy it while it lasts, because you may never see the like of it again in your lifetime.

A great gig is a one-off special occasion. It is a rare sighting just like seeing an old man playing the blues on his veranda in the Deep South or glimpsing a rare bird for a few seconds on a country lane.

What makes a great gig even greater is when you are seeing the band or artist for the very first time, because the moment that you hear them sing or play the guitar for the very first time can never be repeated. It is the unknown revealing itself. You can see your favourite band play hundreds of times, but no matter how many times you see them, the excitement of seeing them for the very first time can never be beaten. After you’ve seen them for the first time, so many questions are answered immediately. What they look like? How well they play the guitar? Can they actually sing like on the records? Subsequently, all that can happen at future repeat concerts is to hear different songs or new material, go to different venues and maybe see new band members. Seeing the bands again only allows you to watch them grow old as you also grow old with them. You can recall how they looked when you first saw them and here’s the sad part, remember how you looked, too.

I was born exactly one month minus one day after Buddy Holly, The Big Bopper and Ritchie ‘La Bamba’ Valens died in a tragic air crash at Clear Lake, Iowa, USA on 3rd February 1959.

I share the same birthday with Karen Carpenter who was born on 2nd March 1950 and Rory Gallagher who was also born on 2nd March in 1948. Tragically, Dusty Springfield died on my 40th birthday on 2nd March 1999.

There’s nothing that exceptional in sharing birthdays with pop stars, but the fact is that prior to their untimely deaths, I was a massive fan of Karen Carpenter’s and Dusty Springfield’s. I remain a huge fan of them both now. Their talent was immense and their music and voices will live on forever in all the great songs they recorded.

Rory Gallagher happens to be one of my all-time great guitar heroes and singers. I just have to listen to, ‘Tattoo’d Lady’, ‘Shadow Play’, ‘Brute Force and Ignorance’, ‘Bad Penny’, ‘Philby’ or ‘Messin’ with the Kid’ to recall just what a supreme singer, guitarist and bluesman he really was.

Buddy Holly was a huge inspiration to me and his songs sound as good now as they ever did. When I was very young, I would tell my family that I was the re-incarnation of Buddy, as I stood in front of them playing my