On Being The First Chickens In The Fox Den. Part 1
On this, our
first trip into town for a month since that fateful clash with Geoff (Or ‘That
Bastard’ as he had become known), Alan wanted a record from Virgin Records,
which lay in the shadow of that russet monolith. Sheffield had more than its
fair share of interesting architecture back then. Of particular note was ‘The
Hole In The Road’ essentially pedestrian underpass that allowed several
lethally busy streets to be navigated by the simple expedient of going
underneath them. Built in 1967 T’ Hole In T’ Road as it became known locally
was a roundabout at the junction of four main roads. The middle of the
roundabout had a hole in it like the summit of a volcano, which allowed light
to pass into the large pedestrian underpass below.
This underpass
contained shops, a large fish tank and even public toilets. It was a great
place to skateboard or in my case imagine I was deep in the dungeons of a fell
necromancer. I’ll not waffle on about it any further but make a search on the
web. It’s worth it.
Virgin Records was not the
shining ‘family friendly’ store it would become in later years. It was a dark
and foreboding place as I recall, where if rumours were true, a clean living
lad would meet a swift and sticky end at the hands of Mods, Punks and other
ne’er-do-wells. I never went in and had my parents discovered that I had
frequented a shop with such a ‘sexual’ name, I’d have been grounded for a year
or so. So, whenever Alan went in there, I just hung around outside and tried to
look moody and mysterious, but approachable and not in the least bit dangerous.
This was not easy. Well the mean and moody bit at least…
Thus it was, with
Alan in search of his record, this particular afternoon found us walking past
the Hagenbach’s bakery – long gone, alas, alas - when what should I see?
Whoops, it's almost teatime, so lest I be grounded for another month, I shall bid you farewell until next time...
TTFN
TTFN
