Lyndon Nutkins: vocals, bass, guitar
Michael Kenton: keyboard
Erica Gordon: vocals
Julia Hopper: vocals
You never forget your first band.
I bought my first guitar in February 1994. I’d never been musical, although I had had a toy ukelele and a Bontempi organ in my childhood. I was useless at the ukelele but knew a few notes on the Bontempi. I couldn’t read music, but I must have had an ear for it. I knew what I was doing but my playing sounded awful. But in my mid-teens, I started discovering pop music, and decided I wanted to play guitar like my idols, Status Quo.
My other great idol was Kirsty MacColl. I was captivated by her ability to harmonize with herself, and I could sing and invent harmonies for most things I wanted to. Her singing reminded me of hearing acts like The Carpenters as a child. I was fascinated by the concept of vocal harmony long before I understood it properly. But I probably would never started singing in public if it hadn’t been for Kirsty.
In late 1993 I borrowed an acoustic guitar and, from watching my Quo videos, learned how to shape some basic chords. And then, quite unexpectedly, I met three amazing singers, Kim, Erica and Julia. We all had a dinner party one night, and I brought along my friend Mike, an amazingly talented keyboard player who put my limited talents to shame. The girls loved him instantly. He brought his keyboards with him and could play anything they wanted, standing on his head, with his hands tied.
When the jam session ended, we all resolved to start a band one day. Mike and I went out and bought my first proper guitar – a very cheap Korean Les Paul copy which I still treasure – from Monkey Business in Romford, and for that whole year that guitar and I were inseparable. I even badgered Mike into joining him on stage one night, when he was playing keyboard covers at a Greek restaurant.
Quite what the diners made of this I had no idea. They wouldn’t have liked it. I must have ruined any dinner ambience by crashing in with my ill-conceived rock and roll covers midway through Mike’s gentle covers set. It’s a wonder I didn’t lose him his job. I knew I sounded awful, and rushed my way through the set with no self-awareness whatsoever, and therefore no stage fright. I have never really suffered from stage fright but I now understand that I simply wasn’t reading my audience. I couldn’t even see them under the spotlight. It’s a wonder I didn’t get lynched. My last memory of that chaotic night was pleading with the audience to get them up to dance, only to realise I my pleas were directed into the face of a paraplegic woman in a wheelchair. How utterly awful. I’m so sorry.
But they say these things are character-building, and, undeterred, I resolved to form a band and play a gig before the end of the year whether people liked me or not. That’s the thing with being young, you think you can change the world and get it to bend around you. (It didn’t.)
I booked a gig at a bar called Fresco’s in Westcliff. It’s now called The Plough pub. I probably should have consulted the others first. Kim wouldn’t be able to make the gig – she was working that night – but Erica and Julia were happy to come along. Julia had sung in various bands, notably N-Joi, who released some singles in the early 1990s which hit the chart, while Erica had sung at all sorts of functions and was looking to make her mark.
We put together a little covers set, with me switching to bass on some songs. We rehearsed at Mike’s dad’s place a couple of times a week, a set including kd lang’s “Constant Craving” and the Carpenters’ “Jambalaya”, on which, revisiting the footage now, and despite my total lack of experience, our harmonies were really quite good! That aspect of our performance, I am still proud of now. My guitar playing, less so. The girls took lead vocals on the Eurythmics’ “Sweet Dreams” and Phil Collins’ “Easy Lover”. I murdered Jennifer Warnes’ “Restless”.
We made this debut at Fresco’s on a cold December night in 1994 which was memorable for all the wrong reasons:
(1) Not two songs into the set, my amp packed up, leaving Mike to fill time with his covers set and the girls standing around wondering what on earth to do.
(2) Amazingly, there was a guitarist in the bar that night, who lived just down the road and, instead of doing the decent thing by offering to take my place, he lent me a huge amplifier. It turns out he had been a guitarist for the late, great Roy Orbison.
(3) My leather jacket was stolen. One of the audience must have wanted to get some value out of his Friday night and taken it so he could get his money’s worth.
For reasons I would never understand, somehow, we got paid anyway. £150 to share between the whole band. That’s probably a good grand in today’s money!
This incarnation of the band never played again, although we got as far as writing an original number the following year. I went back, licked my wounds and resolved to learn my craft before inflicting myself on the public ever again.
Worst Case Scenario’s slight return
I revisited the Worst Case Scenario name again in 2000, after Lincoln had left Idiopathy.
Desperate to keep the band going, I booked a gig at the Grand in Leigh before we could find a new drummer, but one didn’t appear out of thin air as I had expected. I reluctantly offered the gig to Mike, who at the time was playing in an amazing functions band called Glitterball. They specialised in soul covers and brought a huge audience with them, and I offered to put together a band for a support slot. This time our efforts were better received, taking well over £1000 at the door, so everyone went home well-paid.
Other members of WCS that night included Martin and Richie from Idiopathy, my friends Emma Emmerton on bass and Isobel on violin, and highlights included a couple of my original compositions as well as a very, very downbeat version of Britney Spears’ “Baby One More Time” which saw Richie put his hair in pigtails. It went down a storm with the audience.
Worst Case Scenario will reappear in a third and final incarnation one day. You have been warned.
Next time: IDIOPATHY (1996-2000)
2 Comments