A move to North London
The demise of Reset coincided with a move to live in North London.
I decided to change my musical direction away from angsty punky ditties. I’d written some mellower songs that didn’t fit within Reset and I started working with my friend Laura Fudge who wanted to be a vocalist. We dumped most of my previous material and started writing together. After an advert in the Melody Maker we were joined for a while by another bass player called Richard and then a drummer called Kevin Moore.
We knew that Richard was moving away from London so we didn’t play any gigs with this lineup, but his last role with the as yet un-named band was to help us demo some of the songs we’d been working on – recorded in the icy December of 1984 at Camden 8-track. The tracks were: ‘Batman the Caveman’, ‘Penguins Egg’, and an early version of ‘Smooth’.
A new bass player
After Richard’s departure we auditioned for another bass player and teamed up with Gary from Tottenham. Laura and I were never convinced that Gary was really into the music we were writing, but he had a go and stayed with us for a few months during which time we started gigging but didn’t do much else. At one point we decided that we were going to be called ‘Birdy Num Num’ (a Peter Sellers character) but it didn’t stick – probably just as well.
Yet another new bass player
The Aviators playing at Dingwalls in Camden. Note my beautiful twin-neck guitar.Eventually Gary decided that we weren’t the right band for him and he left. Back to the auditions again. This time we came up trumps and recruited Glen Bishop who had been in ‘Flesh For Lulu’ and so had had a record out!
Glen loved our songs and we all gelled really quickly. Spurred by his energy and enthusiasm Laura and I wrote a collection of new songs with Glen’s help. Laura also wrote lyrics for one of Glen’s ideas – ‘Around The Table’. We played loads of gigs with this lineup supporting some reasonably well-known ‘indie’ bands.
Demos
In early 1986 we decided to record another demo so we booked into Strand Recording Studios in Kew for a weekend in March 1986. Resisting the temptation to overfill all 16 tracks we successfully recorded three songs – ‘Around The Table’, ‘Sweet Shock’, and a better version of the gentler ‘Smooth’.
Unfortunately as a band we never seemed to be getting anywhere and later in 1986 we split up to go our own separate ways. Laura is still singing and is currently occasionally gigging with her latest group ‘Breathing Space’. Kevin popped up again in my musical history when he became the 2nd drummer in my next band…
Follow this link to go to the next page – and read about The Silent Blue.
Aviators Gallery
