Mersey Murder Mysteries Collection

Chapter 8

Brendan Kane and his fellow musicians sat around the kitchen table in Brendan"s parents home, a small two up, two down red-brick terraced house, much like thousands of others in the city. The young men sat around Brendan"s Mum"s kitchen table, with drummer Phil, unable to keep his hands still, constantly fiddling with a bottle of Camp Coffee in one hand and another of Heinz Tomato Ketchup in the other. To one side of the room, a small coal fire burned in the hearth, adding warmth and a feeling of cozy security to the room. Near the fire, a load of washing stood draped over a wooden clothes horse, the smell of damp washing adding to the homely feel of the room. Despite the domestic warmth and atmosphere of his parents" home, like many others of his own age, Brendan nurtured dreams of being able to move up in the world, to leave behind the rather grim and humdrum workaday existence endured by his Mum and Dad and others of their generation. His father, Dennis, had spent his entire working life as a docker, a hard life, with much physical toil required on a daily basis. The years had taken their toll on Dennis Kane, and Brendan, despite having the greatest of respect for his father, wanted more from life, a house with a garden instead of a front door that opened straight onto the street, a few of the modern conveniences perhaps, like a dishwashing machine similar to those he"d seen in the shops in the city centre, and one of the new fangled automatic washing machines. Brendan knew his Mum was luckier than most, in owning her twin tub machine with the spin-dryer that took the worst of the water out of the clothes. Still, the washing draped on the clothes-horse was a reminder that his mother still did a great deal of washing by hand and dried it the best she could in front of the fire.

Like the rest of the group, he felt his best chance of achieving his dreams just might be through their music. He"d received his guitar, a second-hand but good condition twin pick-up Hofner, as a Christmas present one year from his parents, who were well aware of their son"s love of music, and who"d scrimped and saved for months in order to buy their son the instrument and a second-hand amplifier to go with it. Second-hand or not, to young Brendan, the guitar had been, and still was, the greatest gift his parents could ever have given him, and he was determined to pay them back for their financial sacrifice, just as soon as he could.

“Listen up lads,” said Brendan, as he pointed to a stack of papers laid out on the table in front of him. “Here"s the receipts for every gig we"ve done so far. We"re doing okay locally, but I think we need to try and branch out, you know, like, maybe get a recording contract.”

“Christ, Brendan,” Mickey replied, flicking back a permanently annoying lock of hair that always fell across right eye, “We"d all love to do that, man, but getting a recording contract isn"t as easy as that, and you know it.”

The others all nodded their agreement with Mickey"s statement.

“Yeah, look, I know that, but that guy Brian Epstein, you know, his Dad owns a furniture shop in town? Brian"s the manager of the music department and he"s started out managing some of the local beat groups. He"s signed The Beatles, and we"ve played the same stage as them, right? Someone told me they"ve got a recording contract already with a record coming out next month. They wrote it themselves, it"s called Love me Do. I heard last week he"s also got Gerry and the Pacemakers on his books and a couple of others, and they"re all local and doing okay under his guidance.”

Love me DoPhil Oxley joined in the conversation.

“Yeah, I"ve seen him around in some of the clubs, like The Cavern, The Iron Door, places like that.”

“But has he ever seen us and heard us play?” asked young Ronnie.

“Exactly,” said Brendan. “We need to make sure he"s there in one of those clubs when we"re on stage, make sure he hears and likes us. Then maybe we"ll get picked up by him, too.”

“Yeah, but he"s not the only manager in the business, is he?” said, Ronnie. “I know for a fact that a couple of groups have had demo recordings made at Pete Kemp"s studio in the city centre. Maybe we could do that and send copies of the demo off to Mr. Epstein and some of the big recording companies, you know, like Decca, E.M.I. and Polydor?”

“Sure, Ronnie,” said Brendan. “We could do that, spend a load of dosh we haven"t got on getting a demo made, and then buy enough copies to send around the industry, only for some producer"s assistant to listen to a few bars if we"re lucky and then throw the disc in the bin. We only get three pounds a gig man, and we have to pay Phil"s dad a bit towards the petrol we use when he lends us his van, so we ain"t got a whole lot of spare cash to throw away on a demo that hardly anyone will hear.”

“But how do other groups manage then?” asked Ronnie. “Surely lots of record companies do have people who listen to new talent when they get the demos in the post?”

Mickey chimed in.

“Ronnie, I think what Brendan"s getting at is that most of the groups whose demos get heard are probably sent in by their managers, who already know the producers and such like at Decca and places like that.”

“Yeah, exactly,” said Brendan. “That"s why we need someone like Brian Epstein to notice us. It doesn"t have to be him of course, but he"s local, and we"ve probably got more chance of being heard and spotted by him than by anyone else, and we don"t exactly know many managers of pop groups personally, do we?”

“Okay,” said Ronnie. “What do you think we should do then, Brendan? How do we get him to see and hear us? We can"t exactly go begging to him, can we? You know, "Please Mr. Epstein, we"re real good. Come and listen to us and sign us up."

"Please Mr. Epstein, we"re real good. Come and listen to us and sign us up."“We use our brains, Ronnie. That"s what we do. Look here,” Brendan said. “These receipts show we make a small profit on every gig, not a lot, sure, but enough to maybe get a few leaflets printed. My idea is to get them printed with a few of our "coming soon" dates, you know, when we"ve maybe got three or four bookings lined up and we make sure copies of the leaflet are delivered to his dad"s shop, to the music department and to his office. I"ve found out he"s got one in town, where he runs his management stuff from. Then we get that gorgeous sister of yours, Mickey, to help us out.”

“And what do we want Marie to do, exactly?” asked Mickey.

“Well, she"s a real looker, right, and she and her mates go out to the clubs regular to listen to the music, right?” They all nodded in agreement, apart from Mickey, who appeared unsure of just what Brendan was about to suggest.

“What we do is, we ask her to go to a few of the clubs where we know he hangs out and see if she can get to talk to him, just drop him a few hints about this really great group she"s heard, that"s us of course, and that he ought to go to The Iron Door, or wherever we"re booked that week, and listen to us. She can tell him lots of kids are following us and that we"ve got a great sound. What bloke can resist a really good looking bird like your sis, Mickey?”

“Sounds good,” Mickey replied, “but how do we know which clubs he"s going to be at so Marie can try and talk to him?”

“Yes, I know, that"s the one big problem with my plan. Maybe she could spend a week or two doing her best to corner him and then we get the leaflets posted, sharpish like, and distribute them so he gets copies just after talking to Marie, and we might get lucky.”

“Bloody hell, Brendan, there"s a load of ifs, buts, and maybes in there, don"t you think?” asked Ronnie.

“I know Ronnie, but come on fellas, don"t you think it"s worth a try?”

After another five minutes of discussion, with no-one having come up with a better idea to try to gain the recognition of the man they saw as a way into the recording industry, they reached an agreement, and Mickey promised he"d speak to his sister Marie, who he agreed would probably be pleased to enlist her friends in helping them to put Brendan"s grand plan into operation.

After another half hour of discussion and agreeing to meet at Brendan"s house at seven p.m on Friday night before going on to a gig at the newly-opened Pelican Club, the group went their separate ways, leaving Brendan to clear away the receipts and the mugs that had held their frequent cups of tea, leaving his Mum"s kitchen as clean as possible when she came home after her shift at the launderette.

The front door opened soon afterwards, and Brendan"s Dad walked into the house, having spent an hour at the pub, enjoying a pint or two with his friends. He made his way straight to the kitchen, where Brendan was sitting at the table, deep in thought.

“Hey, son, how you doing?” Dennis asked.

“Alright, Dad, Just thinking stuff, you know.”

“Aye lad, you do a lot of that there thinking, don"t you? I hope you"re going to stick at that new job of yours and not turn into too much of a dreamer over all that music stuff you and your mates are so keen on. There"s no future in that life, you should know that.”

Brendan sighed. He and his father had had this conversation many times in recent months.

“You"re wrong, Dad, really. There"s a real future out there if you"re good enough, and I know me and the lads have a real chance if we can just get spotted. That"s what we"ve been talking about before you came home.”

“Oh aye? And just what does Mr. Mason think of all this "beat music" lark, eh? He"s got some patience, I"ll say that for him, letting you have time off to go and play that so-called music of yours during the day.”

“It"s only the odd hour here and there, Dad, when we get a lunchtime gig, and then I"m only actually away from the shop for a couple of hours, and one of them"s me lunch hour anyway, and Mr. Mason says he thinks I should follow me dreams, we all should.”

Dennis Kane waved a dismissive hand in his son"s direction. No way would the hardened old dock worker ever understand the modern generation.

“Aye well, if you say so, son, if you say so. Now be a good lad and put the kettle on and make your old Dad a nice cup of tea, eh?”

Brendan nodded at his father, rose from the table and picked up the kettle from the cooker hob next to the sink unit, quickly filling it and putting it on to boil on the gas ring, all dreams of being a future pop star, for the moment, like the slowly boiling kettle, placed on the back burner.

One day, Dad, I"ll prove you wrong, and make you proud of me, he thought, without actually saying the words. He knew he"d never convince his Dad until maybe he and the group actually made it big, and perhaps even then his Dad wouldn"t think being a musician and singer was what he"d deem a "proper job.

One day, Dad, I"ll prove you wrong, and make you proud of me,The kettle whistled as it came to the boil and Brendan dutifully made the tea, and Dennis took his with a quick “Thanks, son,” and made his way into the small parlour at the front of the house, and turned on the small black and white television in the corner, the one Brendan hoped to one day turn into one with a glorious colour screen, like the ones in that big shop in the city.

Brendan took his own cup of steaming hot tea upstairs with him to his bedroom, where he turned on his small portable transistor radio which he kept permanently tuned to Radio Luxemburg, lay down on his bed and allowed himself to drift into his daydream of music stardom as the latest sounds of the pop charts assailed his brain, the tea soon growing cold as he became lost in the early sounds of the sixties.