Through the Stargate
Ryton & Crawcrook Albion 1–1 Redcar Athletic
This isn’t the first time I’ve been to the Ryton & Crawcrook Albion ground. The first time was the night before. Nearly ninety minutes of bus travel from Gateshead, through the astronomical transit routes of Stella, Stargate and Blaydon. I got my days mixed up, realising all too late as I approached the black void of Kingsley Park — I was a full 24 hours too early.
I’d been out of the house only once since New Year and my error didn’t matter so much. I was outside. My body clock is all over the shop and I’ve been on annual leave for over a month. My dopamine levels depleted after a busy and exciting New Year’s Eve. I rarely drink much these days but my nerves got the better of me and I hit the rum after midnight. As a result I’ve been in a slump for the last week. The Northern League has helped. It’s forced me out of my pit. We’re half way through the season and my goal of visiting every league ground, both divisions, is looking tight. 16 weeks of the season remaining I’m going to have to attend a match every weekend and at least half a dozen midweek fixtures.
Kingsely Park is another Northern League ground underneath a Newcastle Airport flight path. Celestial guideposts and the dense black night sky remind me of more complicated times. The memory of amphetamine fuelled final years in Salford before the forced move up to Newcastle. The nights arriving home at 6am waking my mother and sisters to show them unidentified lights in the sky. Fuelled by speed, amyl nitrate and gin from Thursday through Sunday I was so absent I might as well have been in orbit. I recall the final arguement before I was expelled from home — “YOU’VE BEEN SEEN!”
There was an assortment of people who I could have been seen with. Any opportunity and invitation to expand the weekend was taken. The London band, who I wrote about previously. A gang of lads, some of whom I worked with at the supermarket — the A1 Discount Store — goth types with docs and flecktarn jackets. Sons and daughters of supply teachers and social workers who listened to Sisters of Mercy, The Chameleons and Ozric Tentacles. People on the art foundation course; a pair of red haired young women from Prestwich and Bury called Anna and Suzie — I ended up briefly going out with one and having a longing for the other.
Anna, with whom I dated, lived near the Ostrich Pub in Prestwich. Like myself she was from an Irish Catholic family. I remember the familiarity of the St Theresa prayer cards, Virgin Marys and papal pop culture from my own relatives in the North Manchester suburbs. That and the oppressive and relentless offer of food and tea. Like many baby boomers from the 1950s Irish diaspora their house was immaculate. I was a scruffy, drug addled and uncomfortable presence amongst the polyester and pink chintz. The amplified horror of late night teenage fumbling within a relatively religious household, combined with contraceptive misadventure and excitable ejaculatory mishap meant the relationship was short lived.
Now don’t you know you’ll stain the carpet.
Sister Ray, Velvet Underground, 1968
Two others I befriended from the foundation course were Jona and Andy from Leigh. Jona looked like a Lancastrian reject from The Small Faces complete with layered mod haircut and velvet trousers. Serious about his Psychedelia he had a deep thick Leigh accent and gave me tapes of the Future Sound of London — Accelerator — Pulse State. Early Pink Floyd — Piper at the Gates of Dawn — Intersteller Overdrive. Both dubbed A & B Side over a Now That’s What I call Music compilation cassette. Andy was a tall talented lad with a ponytail who I think ended up doing photography at Napier. From memory very sound, solid, unpretentious lads.
I’d irregularly go out with two close friends from school . Chris and Steve. Chris lived with his parents in Salford and rarely left the house. He worked at Shopping Giant off Bolton Road and was studying computing in Bolton. Steve had started university in Newcastle and would come back to Salford out of term. On very rare occasions I’d hang out with other old school friends. These were the lads I used to score Speed. Lads on their way to becoming gangsters. Lads who would kick the shit out of anyone that looked sideways at them. Clad in outdoor pursuit Gore Tex these lads would be sent into the Hacienda on a Saturday night to cause trouble.
I would hang around with all these people but kept them all compartmentalised and separate. I was far from a chameleon though, I had too much deluded and enhanced self confidence. I’d go to early Hardcore nights in town suggested by the radio and Stu Allan. Acid Rock at The Phoenix. The Man Alive Club. The Ritz — at least two nights a week. The Venue. 42nd Street. Jilly’s Rockworld. Yellow at The Boardwalk and probably most important Bugged Out at Sankey’s Soap.
It was with Chris and Steve with whom I had the most transformative and enjoyable nights. Chris was very introverted and we’d been close since early teens. We made music together. Rudimentary and sample heavy techno on the threadbare memory of the Amiga 1200. Learning hexadecimal and the OctaMED tracker into the small hours. Over the years we avidly taped the Tuesday night 808 State show on Sunset 102. The Orb and King Tubby CDs loaned from Central Library were on heavy rotation. We listened to Derek and Clive, his brother’s soundtrack vinyl collection. Watched John Carpenter and Stanley Kubrick films, bought Belgian Techno from Eastern Bloc, played Sensible Soccer and made bontempi cover versions of Joy Division songs on a Yamaha PSS. We watched New Order’s Pumped Full of Drugs VHS continuously for maybe 3 years. His parent’s house was a haven.
Chris and I hardly ever went out out together into Manchester. He was an uncomfortable genuine weirdo. Quiet and socially awkward he was my polar opposite. I was a weirdo with a big fucking mouth, a social butterfly who knew when to cross the road. Manchester City Centre was violent mid-90s and it shames me that I was embarrassed and fearful of Chris being a target. We did venture out together in the end, towards the end of my life in Salford. We went to parties like Acid Rock and Bugged Out, joined by Steve when he was back home. Chris’s wonderful Dad wondering where we got the energy from to be going out so late. On rare occasions we would start the night at my house. Preceding one late night excurision into town my mother made Chris select some new age tarot style divination cards, the kind that have dolphins on them and phrases like Release Your Body. As sure as not the dolphins foretold, as Chris with complete abandon and new found confidence hit the dance-floor first. Of course it was the mystical power of the cards that did this, what else could it be?
Back in the present I’m on my second Bovril. The only low frequencies to be heard tonight come from the ascending jet engines across the Tyne Valley. It’s 0–0 in Crawcrook and the temperature is dropping. The game is a vast improvement on the car crash, kamikaze style of play last weekend in Bedlington. The football is good tonight. In the end the score is 1–1 with two late goals.
