Who remembers the drummers name?

Looking through my book When Bradford Rocked, you can see our local groups on stage for that perfect publicity photograph all suited and smart.

The vocalist, lead guitar, rhythm guitar, and bass guitar all in unison, and oh yes, what about the drummer? If you're lucky you may see part of a drum kit, an arm holding a drumstick, or nothing. However, he is there somewhere at the rear of the stage, and we know he is there also because he can be heard, in most cases the sound of teenage girls screaming, not for him, but for the front stage group members.

Drumming is described as one of the most stressful and energy-sapping instruments to play. He also had to sort out how to arrive at the venue, be it practice or a booking, there and back. He may be lucky and have a father, uncle, or a group member with transport to help. Drum kits had many items large and small, bass drums two or three snare or side drums, plus cymbals, and foot pedals. It is recorded that some used the luggage compartment under the stairs of the double-decker buses, although not including the bass drum, keeping fingers crossed that no pushchair was in situ.

 I can vouch for this as Keith Artist my drummer, (Four Dukes), his father had a small car which he helped bring him and a drum kit to Unity Hall to practice and pick him up. A couple of times his father couldn't make it, but rather than miss it, Keith would with a bakelite case containing a snare drum and a stand for two cymbals, catch the bus at Bankfoot to town and up to Unity Hall, Rawson Square. They were quite heavy as I carried them with him to the bus when he had no lift, such was his commitment.

After all events the the drummer would have to dismantle all the kit into bakelite cases, not a five-minute job, while the vocalist would hand the mike in, and the three guitarists would pop their guitars in a case, not to forget the amplifiers.

 This is a tribute to our drummers most of whom  I knew during my group and DJ days, the likes of Johnnie Casson, Ken Hickey, Colin Houghton, Irvin 'Smudge' Smith, Dave Marshall, Dave Murgatroyd, Alfred Nurse, and the many others. I salute and thank you.

'Dal'