IT WAS my birthday. I have one every year, you know. I don't celebrate it much. I believe it was a sad day when, destined to live on a pleasant planet full of nice people, a mix-up occurred and I popped out by mistake in this psycho-haunted dump.
Still, we make the best of it that we can. Or at least the Burd does. She was taking me somewhere for a birthday surprise.
This entailed getting on a bus, which I always find distressing, though I've become more used to it of late, as the mortgage
makes taxis a luxury once more.
It was evening. We passed pub after pub, till we came to the centre of town. Even though it was a Sunday, the place was full of revellers. Do the churches not provide evening services any more? Then we arrived at the Liquid Room. Ah, a music venue! Two bouncers stopped us in our tracks. "Tickets?" they inquired.
The Burd looked as flustered as the Burd ever gets, ie not very much. "I didna ken du needed a ticket, du kens," she said, in the dulcet tones of her native Stormlands.
"Pardon?" said one of the black-clad men.
"We don't have tickets, you know," I said, in my best Sunday Leithish.
"Oh, that's all right," they replied pleasantly. "You can buy them at the desk." And, gallantly, they made way for us.
Tickets acquired, we descended towards the wall-shaking beat. What could it be? I opened the door and instantly felt the blast of Led Zeppelin. A tribute band! Oh boy, this was the goods. And there was a bar. Selling Staropramen beer, from Prague. Had I died and taken the stairway to heaven or what?
The band, Whole Lotta Led, were excellent, though I felt for the Burd, who is more a Sound of Music person. Selfless soul, she took a seat as I remained standing, to facilitate the Prince Charles-style tapping of my feet, which is as near as I get to dancing. Prince Charles, I'm sure, would also have snapped his fingers in a markedly rhythmic manner. But he was ever one for making an exhibition of himself.
I hadn't been to a rock concert for ages. I think the last two had been here, at the Liquid Room, with my contemporaneous mate, Aidan. We'd seen the remnants of Hawkwind and Gong. Gong, in particular, were excellent. In my experience, you can't beat a bit of jazzy psychedelia for expanding the mind-lobes.
At Zep, there were punters of many ages, from 18 to 65, though my generation dominated. Many were bald and paunchy, though some were still living the dream, with their long hair tied back. I admire men my age who still have long hair. They didn't give up flying the freak flag, as I was forced to, some years ago now.
The singer, who looked about 30, caught my eye occasionally, and that always wiped the smile off his face, as it does with others. I've seen people laughing with great gaiety, then they catch sight of me and stop immediately. There's something forbidding in my exterior. The Burd says I look stern. But I know the truth is that I look angry and bitter, having been ill used by a world I was not meant to inhabit.
Ah, so what? I was having a good time, though I did detect something sinister in this recreation of the past. Somewhere along the line, it reminded me of old folk ballroom-dancing to music from the 1930s or '40s. You see them, on telly, like cobwebbed mannequins, gliding to tunes from an era lost in time. The time of their youth, before all the muggings and the short skirts. But there's something not quite right about pickling yourself in aspic.
As for recreated rock, obviously it lacks that adventurous feeling of entering uncharted waters. Rather, it is treading water. Speaking of which, I enjoyed going to the lavatory. Hearing the bass thud louder every time the door opened took me back to my youth. I enjoyed the solidarity too, as fellows beside me struggled manfully with middle-aged bladders not micturating as well as once they did.
I was doing well at the other end, though, bunging Staropramen down the hatch to quench the fires of my youth. Later, the Burd accused me of staggering on the way home, claiming she had to hold on to me, otherwise I'd have ended up in a hedge. I told her that, if I was trying to stick my head into a hedge, it was purely out of horticultural interest and did not necessarily indicate I was squiffy. Besides, it was my birthday. I'm entitled to bung my bonce into a hedge once a year.
• Read Robert McNeil every Tuesday and Friday in The Scotsman.
The full article contains 825 words and appears in The Scotsman newspaper.
