'Bill Drammond is a cultural magician, and

WHERE'S BILL?

12 January 1999

There was a story that I was going to write for this book. A story that I never got round to writing, one I wanted to be the penultimate story in this book. The unwritten story involved a Mr Best Left Unnamed v W. E. Drummond and Others legal case. It is a case that has hung over the writing of all these sto­ries, from first to last. Whatever the final outcome, it will only be of any consequence to those directly involved with the suit, and personally I found the constant threat of a case being found against me inspirational. I originally thought that 'My Modern Life' was to be the closing story but, while waiting for the case to be closed, all these other stories kept forcing themselves out of my pencil, demanding to be written down and included in this volume. It kind of destroyed the bleak purity of me getting on the Leighton Buzzard bus and being gone, never to return and all that - after a week or so, I was back at my table in the library, and back in Beatties for my three cups of coffee. I've got over the waitresses knowing my name. They even gave me a Christmas card. There are a couple of things that have changed at Friars Square Shopping. The lift in the multi-storey car park now has a computer-controlled pre-recorded voice informing lift-travellers 'Doors closing, doors closing, going up. Level Five. Doors opening, doors opening.' Some days I hang around on Level Five as the three lifts arrive at random; their doors open, their doors close and then they return to Level One and the process starts again. Before the lift arrives at Level Five, you can hear the muffled pre-recorded voices informing the as yet unseen lift-travellers that they are approaching Level Five. On their arrival, but before the doors open, you hear the less muf­fled 'Doors opening', and as the doors actually open, you hear in all its clarity 'Doors opening'. Then the first of the 'Doors closing' starts.

So there I loiter, listening to the rumblings and crankings of this trio of lifts as they come and go, the rise and fall and the pre-recorded voices calling out and responding to each other. A lost-and-found tone poem dedicated to life in a modern satellite town. Years ago I would have wanted to record this and use it in a record. Jimmy and I used the 'Mind the gap' voice from the London Underground on our first LP together back in '87. But these days, every last sound that the world has on offer has been sampled up and used on a record somewhere. If you're interested in hearing what I'm talking about and feel like a bit of hanging about listening to a triptych of lifts chattering their lonely lines to each other, you know where to go. Or better still, find your own song out there that soothes the suburbs of your soul.

As for Bill, my fellow long-service, medal-wearing user of Aylesbury Reference Library, he's no longer there. I put off asking one of the librarians if they had seen him come in lately. Today I plucked up the courage, but although I was able to fur­nish them with an extensive description they were afraid they didn't know who I was talking about. Every year he made it to the Cenotaph for Armistice Sunday. I never did get to know his surname.

Just another Bill

In another library

Reading the papers and falling asleep

Ah well

Another boat across the morning harbour.

W. E. Drummond, 12 Jan 1999

FORWARDS TO THE FOREWORD

Nobody reads forewords, or at least that's what Sallie told me. She then qualified her statement by saying she may read a fore­word after she's read the book, if she liked it.

Do you read forewords?

When the paperback edition of 45 was first mooted, my editor at the publishers suggested I might consider writing a fore­word for it. I considered it, then told her I didn't want to. But then an idea struck. I had recently found a small art book called The Collected Works of George Orwell & Other Paintings by Simon Morley. There was an introduction to this book by a Neal Brown. The opening paragraph went like this:

A catalogue essay, such as this one, is usually a eulogy. Simon Morley is a suavely able, intelligent artist, whose works are paradigms of painterly sophistication. I myself am clever and erudite. The Percy Miller Gallery is an exceptionally advanced centre of artistic excellence. And you, the reader, are not bad looking yourself. Were anyone to dispute these truths, they might reasonably be assumed to be either a grunting cretin, or one of the commonly embittered persons of the art world - jealous and vengeful - whose opinions may be safely disregarded.

I liked this.

The closing two paragraphs went like this:

It is difficult to read a catalogue essay about the contemporary fine arts which does not gain stature by invoking the name of a - usually French - philosopher. I do so here for readers who prefer this: Bataille, Baudrillard, Deleuze, Derrida, Foucault, Lyotard. I would also mention the psychoanalysis of Lacan and, as it is prudent to do so, the German philosophers Hegel, Heidegger, Rant, and, probably, Nietzsche.

The following list is offered in the context of Simon Morley's work; neither oppositionally, nor as an alternative to those names above, but simply as some kind of a furtherance of possible understanding: William James, Brahms, Iggy Pop, St Augustine, St Thomas Aquinas, The Flaming Groovies, Meister Eckhart, Elisabeth Rübler-Ross, U-Roy, Zen Buddhism, Jesus of Nazareth, the anonymous author of 'The Cloud of Unknowing', Lao Tzu, Subway Sect, Nelson Mandela, John Coltrane, Plato, and Joy Division.

This was even better, not that I have ever read a French philosopher but because 'Shake Some Action' by the Flaming Groovies is one of the most uplifting 45s ever cut and for a few months in 1978 The Subway Sect were the greatest pop group in the world.

Now if I was to have a foreword I would like one that was to read like the above. Neal Brown had had no previous involve­ment with my work, which I also liked.

My editor was keen, in principle, on the idea of a foreword by this Neal Brown. So I sent him a copy of 45 with an invitation to write a foreword. A fortnight later he sent me his copy. I read it. And now you can read it.

INTRODUCTION

by Neal Brown

i

Contained within Bill Drummond's creative vocation are cer­tain advocacies of wholesome and pure moral betterment, the fires and brimstones of their obliquely expounded righteous­ness qualifying him as a kind of missionary - like his father (a Scottish Presbyterian minister) and great uncle were before him; both once missionaries to Africa and New Guinea respec­tively. 45 collects the essayed testimonies of Drummond's beliefs, testimonies I sincerely commend to the reader, and about which I will - using the Bible as my infallible guide to eternal truth - seek to correct misrepresentations made against the author by the slimy-tongued Satans of abominable com­mentary.

II

In 45 we learn of 'a rare golden day' when 'sunlight danced on the river'. A day when, with two companions, the young boy Drummond - in the spotless lambhood of his youth - preferred to seek the mortal danger of an unexploded bomb from the Second World War, believed impacted in a local hillside, rather than dally with the dappled trout found in a stream, or other innocent pleasures.

Drummond, by the many digressions of his reminiscence, somewhat understates the compelling attraction of this bomb -a bomb which was never found, its actual and metaphorical power hidden by the actual and metaphorical plant growth obscuring its resting place. For our purposes, however, Drummond's search for something inherently unstable and explosive serves as representative of his creative themes, such as (orphie) mystery, innocence, Odyssey, and the duties and justices of actual or symbolic power - what might, in terms of a moral psychology, be seen as a sacrificial willingness to a great or wrathful providence. Crudely systemised, these themes may be described as 1) uncertainty of objective, 2) expedition, and 3) a (hem, hem) reckless grandeur, so effecting a magico-religious atonement or merit - the author heralding with the pure tones of his prophetic musical trumpet the .. . KA-BOOM.

Ill

To the Shores of Lake Placid was the title of a book Drummond began, but which he never completed. 'I wrote and wrote,' Drummond says. 'It was rubbish.' In 45 this book is salvaged, abridged, and retitled From the Shores of Lake Placid. It is no longer rubbish. An Ovidian meta-story, Drummond's relation­ship with the demigod 80s bands he describes - whether they are known to the reader is not the point - is a compelling mythology, with a theme of transformation. This is clearly represented in the title's slight change. '7b' becomes ⁱFrom\ so offering a clue to the nature of Drummond's creative task in 45 - a task in which everything that was previously a going 'towards' now becomes, upon meditative reflection, a returning 'from'. In this way, Drummond's life's travel - his often absurdist expeditions, jour­neys and explorations - is transformed through the act of writing, so that an epic chaos becomes an ordered universe.

IV

Bollocks.

As well as an exceptional travel book, 45 is a description of a spiritual journey, a history, and a wry self deprecation. A work of comic - sometimes tragicomic - transformations, 45 invokes Ovidian digression, Montaigne, Patrick Reiller, Ian Sinclair, Boswell and Johnson, Terry Southern's Magic Christian, James Hogg, Ecclesiastes, Diogenes and Sergeant Bilko. In terms of Drummond's relationship with art, though, he seems to have more in common with Quang Duo, the Buddhist monk who immolated himself as a protest during the Vietnam war.

VI

Much of 45 is a description of the making of art, or aspects of its appreciation or presentation, art being a subject to which Drummond is in an ambiguous relationship - he values it highly, but also defines himself oppositionally in his relationship with it. Although having an intelligent appreciation and under­standing of art, Drummond's contrary idealism prevents his having proper comprehension of the wickednesses and devilments occurring in art's translation into the world, passing as it does through the unholy dogmas of its conspiring priest­hoods. Of course, to say this of Drummond is only a compliment. The late-Duchampian, neo-conceptualism that characterises much art practice of the last ten years is less a meritocracy than almost any other area of human endeavour (even primogeniture requiring an honest sperm race), unlike that of popular music or writing, areas in which Drummond has unarguably excelled. Let us then tap Drummond on his shoulder, and gently draw his attention to the sad fact that in spite of (or maybe because of) these successes, the artworld has disallowed him a dispensation to practice art, and that he is denied access to the coded strategies and secret handshake plottings that determine artistic status.

At the time of writing, reviews are appearing for a show by the artist Michael Landy, who systematically destroyed his material possessions, in public, in the name of art. For his state­ment about ownership and wealth, Landy is receiving considered attention. A deserved attention, as he is a good and sincere artist, but received in a way that Drummond and Cauty's K Foundation, when they redistributed their wealth by burning a million pounds, were not privileged with.

Such art world benediction is not only withheld from the mis­creant Drummond but, even worse - like Ovid's banishment from Rome - the artworld is somewhere from which he has been permanently exiled, for an offence which remains unspecified.¹

VII

All through history, in the periodical conflicts of Puritanism with the don't-care temper, we see the antagonism of the strenuous and genial moods, and the contrast between the ethics of infinite and mysterious obligation from on high, and those of prudence and the satisfaction of merely finite need.

William James (1842-1910). 'The Moral Philosopher and Moral Life'. Selected Writings, Dent 1995

VIII

Actually, Drummond's offence is not unspecified, and holding up the Turner Prize to a fiscal ridicule in 1993 didn't help, either. And maybe Ovid deserved his banishment. But I prefer not to make pronouncement on these matters, as they are extremely difficult and complicated, and have many disputations.

... when Drummond dies, a thousand wicked demons from art-world hell will seek him, falsely claiming him as their own all along, the wild-eyed fiends salivating at his corpse, prancing their cloven-hooved dance around him, and seeking to drag his soul into the many circles of their foul suppurations . ..

IX

I am forty-six years old. Therefore, I've been there - been forty-five for exactly a year. Not as forty-five as Drummond was, but still not bad. I've also been Scottish, certainly prior to my par­ents removing me elsewhere, without my permission, in 1960. And I am the co-author of a truly terrible novelty record that got as far as number 22 in the UR charts. It is my considerable authority in these matters that qualifies me the privilege of writing this introduction. I am a proud man to do so [clears throat, adjusts bow tie], proud to be able to introduce you, ladies and gentlemen, to this clever, funny and brave book, by the clever, funny and brave Mr Bill Drummond.

BACKWARDS FROM THE FOREWORD

Do you think it's any good as a foreword? I do. I think it's great. Compared to (bar one) even the most favourable of reviews that 45 received, when it was first published, this was the only bit of writing about the book that made any attempt to engage with what I do at any level other than the most facile. Yes he hypes me up, makes claims for my 'cre­ative vocation' that I do not dare to claim for myself. I do not even dare to claim to understand the basis of the claims he makes.

I sent it to the editor. Things started getting difficult. She didn't like it. Why? She thought it gave the wrong impression of what the book was like. She thought it prescriptive, portentous and somewhat pretentious. I had to look up the word porten­tous. She thought it would put off potential readers. I was crestfallen. In the past I have greatly valued her input and judgement. What to do?

I gave it to Sallie to read. As well as her previously remarked upon thoughts on forewords, she tended to agree with the editor. In particular, she felt that it would only antagonise read­ers to have my name mentioned alongside the greats of classical and English literature and even the inclusion of Sergeant Bilko did little to debunk the prétentions.

She also wanted it made public that I wasn't clever, funny or brave. She lives with me, she ought to know.

I now hope to strike a deal with the publishers. They can keep the downmarket cover that the sales force like; they can keep the cheap use of edited review quotes that may entice the casual bookshop browser but cause me acute embarrassment in exchange for using the - adjectives of your choice - foreword by Neal Brown.

Bill Drummond, June 2001

Postscript: I have just spoken to the much-mentioned editor. A deal has been struck. Crap cover stays as do the review quotes in exchange for the Neal Brown foreword appearing. At the back of the book along with the 'Forwards to the Foreword' and this 'Backwards from the Foreword' by me.