HE to wokester prigs: 42 and 1/2 years ago I was hitting hip parties and bars in London and hanging with some Time Out pallies and listening frequently to Bow Wow Wow, who were fresh and explosive and kicking it in early December of ’80.
Three ex-Adam Ant-ers (dummer David Barbarossa, guitarist Matthew Ashman, bassist Leigh Gorman) plus lead singer Annabela Lwin — 13 or 14 at the time, currently 56 or 57.
A Time Out guy sold me a bootleg cassette that had, I felt, much better recordings of Bow Wow Wow’s early songs, including “Louis Quatorze.” And then I somehow lost the cassette and this (along with losing a nice leather handbag on the Underground) broke me.
“Louis Quatorze” is about a 14 year-old girl who’s into rape-sex with an older, gun-wielding hooligan boyfriend…perfect material for present-day Stalinists.
I was also occupied with interviewing Peter O’Toole for GQ and mourning the death of John Lennon and feeling the vibe of violent skinheads on the Underground…what an astonishing atmosphere it seems like now but not so much then.