I had known Don Murfett for quite a while. He was the king-pin of concert security in London, and hired out some of his boys for the touring bands that needed extra personal security. Don had his office at a place called Nomis Studios in Sinclair Road, in West London, a great building with multiple rehearsal rooms, offices and a very good recording studio, as well as the Fender guitar shop. I didn't know he was Adam Ants' manager until he gave me a call and asked me to come see him in Nomis.
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This was a tour that had as many TV shows as it did live performances, which in a way was a shame. The band were fantastic, and with two drummers it really was a great show. Adam was genius, he just became something else on stage. I only wish he'd been a bit more laid back off stage. I think the band were a bit scared of him in a way. However my working relationship with him was fine. There was a mutual respect so I ended up getting quite close to him in a sense.
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Chris Hughes was a huge Frank Zappa fan, like myself. I remember going around to his flat and seeing THE most amazing collection of bootleg Zappa albums. I wonder if he still has them. Chris became a very sought after record producer after this tour.
Gary Tibbs the bass player was already a friend. I knew Gary from his previous band The Vibrators, and they were managed by one of my best mates at this time, David Wernham. This was to be the third band I'd known him from as when I'd been in Australia tour managing Flowers (Icehouse), we'd done a few shows as a support band for Roxy Music. Gary was the bass player for Roxy Music on that tour.
A picture above of Marco and Terry in some airport. Marco of course co-wrote most of the songs for the Ants, he was a charming man.
I recently found this little film shot on Super 8 and posted on YouTube that a fan took of us landing in Guernsey in June '81. We'd just arrived from Jersey and this was the last night of the tour.
Adam signed autographs and met some of his fans on the edge of the tarmac before I escorted him to the waiting car....
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If you look at my datesheet there were a couple of great concerts I went to in June. Also I attended a couple of weddings in the same weekend. After the tour had finished and I had completed my duties and handed in my cash float receipts etc, I was at Earls Court to witness Pink Floyd and The Wall. My brother was in charge of the merchandising, which was phenomenal with a variety of t-shirts designed by Gerald Scarfe, the famed cartoonist. But the amazing event went quite wrong towards the middle of the show as one half of the Wall fell down before the interval. The remaining time before the second half, one side of the stage was being reconstructed really fast to catch up with the other side as the Wall had to be built by the interval!!!
The double wedding was my brother Anthony to his first wife Tanya, they had a reception on the Thames on a large boat which docked at the Tower of London. I got off, hailed a cab to the airport and flew to NYC. The following day my friend Eve Chatellier from Montclair, New Jersey was married to Scott Purvis, both to this day lifelong friends and still happily married. I love them both dearly xxx
The day after their wedding I went into the city with Danny, Eve's brother and caught the Men at Work gig at Pier 84. I knew a couple of the crew there, after having spent over 4 months in Aussie over the last year.
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