GOFFA FROM THE BLOCK

We decided to do another one of our walk up “can we support you type gigs”.   This time at the Newcastle House pub in Park End.  The pub has long since gone the way as lots of estate pubs in Middlesbrough (i.e. closed down and then burned down in an arson attack) but at the time of the concert it was still a thriving part of the community.    Without an ounce of exaggeration or hyperbole I can only describe the event as Tick Tick's attempt at communal suicide.  It was a benefit/memorial concert for a young punk who'd gone missing and was presumed dead after going down to London to follow Crass.  I can't remember the name of the band playing the concert but I do remember they were a local punk band from the next estate and my neck of the woods, Berwick Hills.  We'd actually gone to their first gig, a couple of months before and walked out midway through the first song, bizarrely for a punk band, a cover of...

All over, no shouting Next up in the drum chair was Morgan Duffy who lived in the outskirts of Stockton.   He was previously drummer in our friend, Lee Gibson’s band, The The And.   We’d heard him drum and he wasn’t bad.   Happily, he also had a car and lived in a big house where we could practice (a trend I don't think we saw at the time).   And my brother Russ joined the band so we were back up to a 5 piece.   Russ was into pop music and loved the Jam, he was also an excellent guitarist having the ability to come up with great tunes and hooklines.   As mentioned earlier he actually co-wrote Mythical Bedsprings.   He was only 16, quite a bit younger than the rest of us but he played his part.   He brought  freshness and melodies back to Tick Tick that we hadn’t had since Richard left.   One particular great tune he came up with was for lyrics written by Ste called Timpani which became a live favourite.   Russ also played a...

4 Piece (The Maid’s Neck) and Peckover - live shows   Arguably this was our tightest line-up musically.  Possibly because we introduced the keyboard and were able to tune up properly, most of the time anyway.   We played 2 great performances over the space of a couple of weeks.   One a triumphant return to Marton College.  There were 5 bands on and we played third.  Local punk band The Filth were on after us and some heavy metal band were top of the bill (probably because they supplied the PA).  I can’t remember their name.  But I can remember we played one of our best ever sets.  We were all in tune and went down really well.  We were still buzzing as we were walking out of the venue with our gear as reports reached us that fighting had broken out just after The Filth started and the concert was abandoned.  That was amusing enough but who was coming swaggering towards us?  This was just too good to be true. ...

We booked another studio session.   We decided we were going to bring out another single (see the introduction) and Pete Farrell set it all up for us and Paul took us up in his car.   I think he might have took us all which meant there were 6 of us.   No?   That can’t have been right.   Did Pete Farrell drive?   I’m not sure now.   I’m not going to go through the whole story so here’s my bulleted memories of the day I knocked up for the EP release.   Alas, not with the physical copy but in the PDF with the download.   T urning up without drums and cymbals. We were told the studio would supply the drum-kit. We didn't know Paul still had to bring cymbals. Pete Farrell looked at us as if we were idiots because we didn't know. Paul had to go back for them. Fatigued With Dub originally had chaotic conversation at the start but we were persuaded by Gav to edit it out. We didn’t call him Gav by the way. Car running out of petrol on way bac...

More Live stuff We must have played plenty of shows with Richard as a 5 piece but I can’t remember much about them.  We certainly rocked at times largely thanks to Paul.  We played another show at the Rock Garden.  The manager offered us support slots with either Pink Military or Echo and the Bunnymen.  Not sure why because I’m pretty sure we all liked Echo but for some reason we chose Pink Military.  Can’t remember much about it other than we had our gear nicked from the back of Paul’s car and Jane Casey being lovely with us and he feeling sorry for us.  Amazingly the gear turned up the same night in a phone box not far from the Rock Garden.  The police confiscated it but we got it back a couple of days later.   When I met up with Braz last year he recalled a really good show (his thoughts rather than my boast) at the Empire around this time.   He remembered us playing Dockland.  Alas I have no recollection of this show....

We found a drummer, Paul Fowler and it seemed to good opportunity to bring in our friend Ste to play bass and move Richard over to guitar.   People were disappointed and I remember Sav from Basczax telling Richard we should stick with the drum machine.   They were getting more popular and Teesside was catching up although we were still the only band in the area using one.   There was an article about the Teesside music scene printed in the national pop magazine Smash Hits and we (along with our drum machine) were mentioned.   Mind calling us “Tic Tic” really took the edge off it.   Paul and Ste brought so much to Tick Tick.   We knew Ste was a good bass player and would fit in but we didn’t know anything about Paul and I don’t think I’m over-selling this but our collective jaws dropped when we first heard him play.   Being a lover of short songs, simplicity and repetition I’ve never learned to appreciate the skills that conventional drummers need t...

I was going to plough on with the history and then recall what I could about the live shows but I think I'll break it up a bit and recall some of the live shows. So............   The Live Shows - 1 About September 1979 – We played 3 rd on the bill to Carl Green and the Scene and Drop at The Teessider.  Richard was still in Drop and we just arranged it with him.  The first Carl Green knew about it was when we got up on stage.  We played 3 songs before Gary and I left the stage for Drop to take over.  We played Respect, Mythical Bedsprings and another song, possibly My Present.  I’m not sure if we had the drum machine at this stage.   I was really nervous singing in front of a live audience for the first time but they looked more unsettled than me when I started doing my finger whistle in Mythical Bedsprings.   It was brilliant.   We were Tick Tick, we decided we were going to do it and we did it!   Think our next show was u...

When all is said and done So finally My Swelling Heart is released as I always knew it would be.  The original master tape went missing about 2 hours(only a slight exaggeration)   after we walked out of Guardian Studios, Pity Me back in the late spring of 1980.  Our plan was to release it as a single with Examining My Fear on the b-side but after the financial sting me, Gary and Richard took on our 12 inch EP “The Immortalisation of Tick Tick we were unwilling to stump up again.  It was a such a rubbish decision on so many levels.     ·          It would have been so much cheaper than the first time with no lavish plan to release it on a 12inch single ·          The recording costs were a lot cheaper than for our record.  ·          We were led by the nose when we recorded “Immortalisation”.  ·    ...