" Stylusboy’s “enchanting lo-fi folk” is the creation of Coventry
Redwood Photography
chap Steve Jones and Northern lass Rachel Grisedale. With arresting melodies and poignant lyrics Stylusboy bring their particular brand of warm lo-fi folk to life."
"Their music is deliberately tripped-back, purposefully honest, capturing raw emotion at its heart. Jones’ delicate guitar lines and Grisedale’s sumptuous harmony work create gorgeous melodies that bring to mind the first rush of love, the warm summer air and the English countryside bathed in sunlight."
Stylusboy are a current act and so have an excellent website so i won't duplicate too much here but refer you to their site http://www.stylusboy.co.uk/which has info on their gigs, discography, photos and much more. The are also on Facebook https://www.facebook.com/stylusboy
If anyone has the script to this play please get in touch - Pete Willow and CVfolk are interested in putting this on again with remaining members of Dando Shaft.
About 1970, the Theatre in Education team at the Belgrade Theatre, Coventry produced a play which, in Paul Spaven (the Deputy Stage Manager), in a communication to Dave Cooper of Dando Shaft, "portrayed the harsh reality of the bicycle industry of the 1800's and the modern car industry of the then present 1970's.".
the words of
Paul said " Each night I stood in the wings and watched as Dando Shaft, onstage, wove the musical story that the actors verbalised......man it was magical."
I too saw the play, but not as a member of the production team like Paul and it made a lasting impression. later in 1976, while working as a Welfare Rights adviser for the Coventry Unemployed Workers Centre, Bardsley House, I attended my first WEA (Workers' Educational Association) tutored by members of Coventry Workshop - A trade Union research Unit and the course looked into the economic and social history of Coventry and its industries. Among the books / resources we had to look at, the syllabus said "we shall also use transcripts of a play - You Must be Joking - on the history of the Coventry car worker, produced 5 years ago by the Belgrade Theatre.".
Dave Cooper recalled "I remember while we were rehearsing the Coventry Toolroom Rate rose to an unimaginable staggering £1 an hour! The title song had the lyric "£40 for 40 hours making motor cars, up and down the country we're the engineering superstars"
However by 1976, Coventry was transitioning from a perennial boom town (it had even survived the depression in 20's and 30's) into a 'Ghost Town'. The Rootes Group (Humber, Hillman, Sunbeam, Singer etc) was sold to Chryslers between 1976 -78, eliminating many of the Rootes brands in favour of imported brands with resultant job losses and moving of the industry abroad. Later they sold the company to Peugeot.
I remember in 1976 lots of car workers coming in for welfare Rights advice, confident that they would be back in a job within the week. They had never known unemployment. Back then you could walk out of a job and into another and because of the rates the shop steward movement had achieved for them, many had mortgages and financial commitments they would no longer be able to afford on benefits.
It was sad, therefore, to see the same blokes come back in 6 months later, when their Earnings related supplements had ceased and their NI contributions, pushing them on to the lower Social security rates. These guys looked crushed - the jobs were no longer there, their finances and marriages were suffering. it was wasn't going to get any better but a lot worse!
The contrast between Dave's comment about the rate in 1970 and the decline in 1976 was stark. Callaghan "the end of our cosy world" and the gutter press went into overdrive (like now) attacking the unemployed as if it was their fault.
announced at the Labour Conference that year that it was "
We were studying this course and read the script to You Must be Joking against this background. I had seen the play back in 1970 and so was familiar with it.
The flyer for the WEA course -
Because of the course, i had a copy of the script but unfortunately can't find it now, except for the cover picture of Dando Shaft, who wrote and played the musical score and the last page of the play. So I can't share the script with you or tell who wrote the play. Maybe the script will turn up in some hidden corner but I've searched the house!
The final page of the script for You Must Be Joking.
Dando Shaft's music and lyrics reflect the dialogue in the play and Paul Spaven remembered some of the lyrics -
Coventry City of Cycles and Slums, Everywhere in the air is the winding and grinding and factory hums, and the men in the town making bicycle wheels whirl around. There's Standard and Singer and Hillman and Humber Riley and Rudge and a very great number, of bicycle makers that work in the City, side by side, it would be a great pity if business should die...................
[lone worker enters stage left]....
To earn enough they work you off your feet, no time for the wife in a factory workers life, but at least we had enough to eat, and the good times seem a long, long time ago.
Friday's coming 'round again, I haven't paid the rent, Pay day is Saturday but each day seems like Lent. Thinking of the future all the time, Thinking of the young men who are wasted in their prime...and the good times seem a long, long time ago......
Of the music, Dave Cooper has said
" With regards to "You Must Be Joking" somewhere there was/is an in-house recording we made of the songs(6 or 7) we wrote for the production."
If anyone has any further comments or information on this production - please let us know.
Here are some tracks from some Dando Shaft - not related to this play but excellent quality -
"About September 1973, I was doing a gig for the Birmingham Streetpress in Moseley (Birmingham) at Fighting Cocks and after the gig started to hitch my way back to Coventry. Most of the buses had finished and i walked into the center of Birmingham around Digbeth and hardly a car went by. This was Birmingham right. Tired and despairing of a lift home to Coventry (or even part of the way), I sat down on the curb strumming Vanity Fair's Hitchin' a Ride. Out of the blue came a car - I never expected it to stop but when I got in, I noticed a guitar in the back! It was John Golding, the Daventry folk singer who had also had a gig in Birmingham that night and was travelling back to Daventry and so passing by Willenhall in Coventry. How neat was that! I didn't know John up til then but we had a good chat and I went to see him perform in Coventry at the Antelope Folk Club in Coventry. John had just made an album and I gave it a plug in Hobo Magazine." Trev Teasdel
About 1994 John Golding was getting nowhere with major record companies. They liked his material and gave him studio time but said his songs were just not commercial enough for general release. So John set up his own production company - Cottage Records and launched his first album Discarded Verse.
Read more in this Coventry Journal cutting from March 15th 1974
And the follow on in the Coventry Evening Telegraph when Decca took an interest.
Rod Felton's advert in Hobo Magazine mentioning John Golding (although spelt incorrectly)
I Might Change - John Golding
Sleep Easy
All My Words Were Taken Away
John Golding appeared on Whispering Bob Harris late night show for BBC Radio 1, along with Barclay James Harvest from 1974, here's I Might Change.
Its True from Photographs Album produced by Bob Harris
Another - John Golding produced by Bob Harris
Do You Really Need To Keep On Asking2:23
Getting Over You3:25
All My Words Were Taken Away4:21
It Only Hurts When You Laugh2:31
Loner5:09
Believe What You Feel3:31
Here's To The Sunnier Day3:15
Bad Gigs2:36
Photographs2:05
All Gone2:45
I Might Change
Acoustic Guitar – Dave Doddington
Acoustic Guitar, Electric Bass, Concertina – Bernard Wrigley
Backing Vocals – The Virgin Choir
Banjo, Electric Bass – George Ristel*
Double Bass – Mike Hadley
Engineer – Bob Young (4), Nic Hatton
Producer – Monty Bird
Vocals, Acoustic Guitar, Tambourine, Songwriter, Producer – John Golding
Bird Sound Studio - 2000 copies pressed.
1974 album
Good Luck And Love To You2:51
Home3:01
The Coalman Song2:50
It's True3:17
Sailor James4:03
All My Words Were Taken Away4:13
Oh Boy2:57
Those Blue And Golden Sunny Skies3:38
The Man Who Sells The News3:43
Loving Is A One Sided Thing2:01
Loner5:04
Another
Acoustic Guitar, Bass Guitar – Pete Cosker
Acoustic Guitar, Dulcimer – Dave Doddington
Banjo, Mandolin – George Van Ristell
Engineer – Paul Tregurtha
Harmony Vocals – Roy Webber
Keyboards – Paul Garrett
Mastered By – George Peckham, George Peckham
Percussion – Roger Narraway
Photography – Barry Roberts
Producer – Bob Harris (6)
Saxophone – Jimmy Jewell
Sleeve – John Golding
Steel Guitar, Bass Guitar – Paul Middleton (4)
Tape Op – Georg Nicholson
Violin, Bass Guitar – Pete Sage
Vocals, Words By, Music By – John Golding
Issued on green and orange Atlantic labels; includes an insert with full lyrics and credits.
Recorded at Morgan Studios, London, August 1974.
Pressing and mastering credits derived from matrix.
Single 1970
Tracks on Discarded Verse
John Golding in Brinklow 2005
English singer songwriter John Golding. From the album Photographs released in 1974 on Atlantic Records and produced by Radio 2 DJ Bob Harris.
1976 album on Cottage Records
Tracks Another John Golding Album
Those Being Far Away From You Blues Sleep Easy Tonight What They Say (About You) It Only Hurts When You Laugh Floor Singers Blues Why Don't You Let It Be Me Nothing At All Discarded Verse I Was Dreaming Whither Away And Die Getting Over You The Good Times Always End
This post is not a specifically Coventry one, except in that I sent off for some copies of New City SongsterPeter Seeger has recently passed at the age of 94.
Peggy Seeger and Ewan MacColl
in the late 70's and lived in Coventry at the time but I thought it would be an interesting post, especially as
I had read about Sing Out in Greenwich village in Scaduto's biography of Bob Dylan in 1973 and saw an ad in Melody Maker for New City Songster. "New City Songster was almost entirely the work of Peggy Seeger (who chose, edited and notated the songs) and David Scott (the artist for all but one of the issues). It featured songs by Peggy Seeger and Ewan MacColl and songwriters from all over the English-speaking world. It ran for 21 volumes, 1968-1985." as it says in this site about about the New City Songster. http://www.wcml.org.uk/contents/activists/ewan-maccoll/music/new-city-songster/
The site tells " NCS began in 1967, when there were nearly 2000 folk clubs in Britain. The reason for its formation was to circulate new songs before they became historical pieces, for communications between clubs in different regions was and still is fairly undeveloped. So truly speaking, NCS is a product of the folk revival, that invigorating resurgence of interest in our native music and song." Read more on the above link.
The American Sing Out
New City Songster
Peggy Seeger and Ewan MacColl's note that came with the copies of New City Songster -
Here are some assorted folk club ads and flyers from the 70's -
c1974
c 1974
c 1974
From Hobo Magazine Coventry - advert 1974
Hobo advert Feb 1974 - designed by Rod Felton
Advert from Foks Magazine c 1978 / 9
C 1974 / 5
Martin Jenkin's One Day Thomas c 1973
c 1974
c 1974
c 1974
c 1979
c 1970 / 71
c 1974
Advert from Hobo Magazine c 1974
1960's
Advert hobo Magazine 1975
Advert Hobo Magazine 1975
Paddy ran a folk club at the Lanchchester Poly, Coventry.
This one's not Coventry related, but I met them playing in folk club in Weston Supermare c 1973 and I included a mention in the small ads of Hobo Magazine.
