John Cooper Clarke: brushes with death and other drug-related stories

I’ve always liked John Cooper Clarke.

Not enough, it’s true, to buy one of his albums or poetry books, but I have seen him live a couple of times and whenever I see him on TV part of me gives a little cheer.

The similarities with Keith Richards – someone else it’s hard not to warm to – go way beyond their former addiction to heroin.

One thing they share is a heroic refusal to play the victim card and blame others, or society, for their choices.

Here, for example, is JCC on bad management choices:

It’s my own fault for thinking for even one second that they were qualified to look after my affairs.

On his mother discovering via The Sun that he was being treated for heroin addiction, he writes:

I was pretty pissed off. Still, I didn’t go all Hugh Grant about it. It wasn’t Rupert Murdoch’s fault: I took some agency in my own predicament.

And here he is on state handouts – in particular an Art Council grant for a film about himself:

I’m not saying nobody else can, but I wouldn’t go to anything that had been financed from the public purse. Fuck off! Find some other patsy. Put it this way, if I had a pound for every Ken Loach film I’ve ever seen, I’d start watching them.

All these sentiments can be found in his hugely entertaining autobiography, ‘I Wanna Be Yours’, published last year.

I finally got round to reading it this week and it lived up to the positive reviews.

One criticism is that the jokes and sardonic humour paper over what I imagine must be the often grim reality of being a hardcore drug addict.

Not that he completely ignores it. Far from it. In fact, a substantial part of the book is dominated by the constant desire (and search) for his next hit.

Long-haul flights to Australia and the United States - and the urgent need for a supplier as soon as the plane landed - were a particular problem.

(Two domestic convictions for drug possession subsequently resolved the US issue because he was effectively banned from going there for 35 years.)

Financial problems caused by his addiction are another recurring sore. To this day he still seems unsure whether he has paid off the costs incurred by his record company when they put him in a rehab clinic in Chelsea.

He also mentions the three occasions he ‘died’ and was brought back to life, on one occasion by a nurse who just happened to be around and knew what to do.

Generally though his natural tendency is to make light of these and other incidents, which include a particularly hairy transaction on the 19th floor of a New York apartment block.

He went there armed with a gun that was given to him for his own protection and when he left the building, which had no elevator, his only thought was, "Thank God, thank God Almighty ... Fucking hell. That wasn’t terrifying or anything!"

Given his background you might think he would be on the left politically but several comments suggest this isn't necessarily the case.

Either way he’s not inclined to reveal his politics and he gives short shrift to artists and musicians who do:

To know any artist’s political worldview is unhelpful. It’s unhelpful for the artist, and especially unhelpful to an appreciation of their artistic products. That’s particularly true of actors.

On advertising however he writes:

I've always enjoyed doing adverts, though not everyone seemed to approve of me 'selling out'. There are certain artistic types who are very snarky when a poet makes money.

He even defends the controversial comedian and businessman Bernard Manning.

A hate figure for most Guardian readers, Manning gave Clarke one of his first opportunities to appear on stage. Not only is he still grateful, he notes that ‘Mr Manning’ always paid him promptly and without hassle, unlike many other club owners he had to deal with.

It might also surprise you to know that, for an urban poet born and raised in Manchester, Clarke has spent an awful lot of his adult life living not in a big city but in places such as Shaftesbury (Dorset), Stevenage (Hertfordshire) and, for the past few decades since his marriage to Evie, Essex.

In the Eighties (his so-called 'wilderness years') he did however spend a brief period in Brixton in south London and his description of sharing a flat with Nico and John Cale, formerly of the Velvet Underground and therefore two of his musical heroes, are especially vivid and, of course, funny.

The flat was rented by his then manager, Alan Wise, who also managed Nico. It should tell you all you need to know that in the film Nico, 1988 'Al' (or ‘Wisey’) was played (very well) by John Gordon Sinclair, best known for Gregory’s Girl.

To the best of my knowledge it has never been given a cinema release in the UK but it can be purchased on Amazon, which is how I managed to see it a couple of years ago.

Anyway, I mentioned that I have seen JCC live twice.

The first time was on the Be-Bop Deluxe tour in 1978 which he devotes a whole chapter to in his autobiography.

Having established himself on the punk circuit playing small and sometimes violent clubs, this was his first opportunity to play larger venues.

Reactions were mixed. At the old Glasgow Apollo he was booed off after just four minutes. “Let’s call it a draw” he told the audience as he walked off.

I saw him in Aberdeen and I don’t remember any animosity. Curiosity, certainly. Then again, anything was better than having to listen to some loud and anonymous support band. A wise-cracking fast-talking punk poet? Bring it on!

Almost 40 years later I saw him again, supporting Squeeze in Harrogate. This time he was received like the living legend he is.

A subsequent appearance on Would I Lie To You is worth watching because it highlights his quick wit and amiable charm.

You can tell too that the other guests liked him. They’re not alone.

John Cooper Clark: I Wanna Be Yours. Warmly recommended.

PS. Someone I used to work with had an adult son who was a heroin addict and by all accounts it was absolute hell.

The son was unable to hold down a job and would often have no money to pay his rent or buy food.

Rather than see him sleeping on the streets his parents would invite him back home whereupon items including jewellery would go missing and they realised he was stealing from them (and others) to maintain his habit.

They would ask him to leave in the hope it might bring him to his senses but the cycle went on and on and on.

Eventually, in desperation and as a last resort, they reported him to the police and he got a prison sentence.

They hoped he would be clean by the time he came out but he was not much better because there were more drugs in prison than outside!

I don't know how the story resolved itself because I lost contact with this chap 20 years ago. But I do remember the agonising sorrow in his voice when he first told me about his son.

As a family they were quite well off – large house, even a Rolls Royce at one point – but you could tell he was trapped in a living nightmare because they loved their son but felt there was nothing more they could do to help him.

It also split the family because one of his other children refused to have anything to do with his brother.

Shocking, really, and as much as I enjoyed JCC's book this was a side to heroin addiction that was largely glossed over.

Comments

[Manx Gent]

I have a tobacco-related JCC story that might make readers here smile - at least, any who still remember cigarette ads on TV.
I saw him supporting Elvis Costello in 1978. When he finished he said "Might be a while before Elvis and the band come on. They're all outside sharing a bit of a Hamlet moment!"
Incidentally, Mike Harding also speaks well of Bernard Manning. He gave Mike quite a break in his early days when his only other gigs were tiny folk clubs.

[Simon]

He writes about the Elvis Costello tour too. Apparently his reception in Glasgow on that tour made up for his earlier experience!