EOTL17: Long ago, outside a chip shop in Walthamstow...

[David Scott]

Pictures

You might recognize this month’s title as the opening line from Ann and Joe, a song by The Barron Knights. Critical theorists have suggested that this song might be loosely related to Angelo by The Brotherhood of Man with its opening line: “Long ago, high on a mountain in Mexico…”. Whatever the merits of this argument you don’t have to spend much time on Wikipedia to realize that popular music owes a very great deal to Walthamstow: our most recent EOTL destination.

 

The Wikipedia entry for Walthamstow in fact has a section exclusively dedicated to “Walthamstow in Popular Music”. As well as marking Walthamstow out as a uniquely pop oriented EOTL destination this makes writing my blog a lot easier. Some things you might not be aware of:

 

• Damon Albarn’s dad once taught at Walthamstow Art College.
• A photograph of Damon standing at Walthamstow Stadium with his pals and some dogs appeared on the back of Blur’s Parklife album.
• Sir Paul Mc Cartney name drops Walthamstow in Old Siam, Sir  where he reveals that “a lady who lost her way…. She waited round in Walthamstow”. Don’t worry if this doesn’t seem to rhyme. Or make sense. Sir Paul also says “Oh Yeah” a lot and rhymingly reveals other stuff that she did. Admittedly the interesting stuff seems to have happened outside Walthamstow.

 

Even if you only knew some of the above, one thing you must surely know about Walthamstow is that the boy band East 17 come from there. You might also know that they had an unhealthy obsession with the place.

 

East 17 of course were named after Walthamstow’s postcode and in case anyone was still in any doubt about where “The grittier alternative to Take That” came from they called their debut album Walthamstow. Throughout the mid-90s the band produced hit after crappy hit, however having to spend so much time outside of NE London placed an enormous strain on the young chaps. In 1997 the perceived failure to win a debate with John Major over whether Ecstasy did or did not make you a better person proved too much and the band split. When some of them got back together again they rebranded as E-17. Sadly the hyphen proved confusing for many fans and doubts about where they came from led to reduced sales. Since 2006 the original members have reformed as East 17 at least twice but many listeners now seem to have no idea where this is.

 

I hope you don’t mind me spending time on Walthamstow’s musical background but I feel it's important. When Biggs and I visited Walthamstow the other day we found the place confusingly metropolitan. We  thought this might be connected in some way to its gritty musical history.

 

There are other potential factors of course. For a start Walthamstow, like New York frequently uses numbers for its avenue names. There also seem to be a lot of posters advertising boxing matches. For me however the most strikingly urbane thing is that when you exit the Victoria Line at Walthamstow Central you are still underground. An EOTL underground station should of course be overground. If you’re still underground it’s because you’re basically still in London.

 

Biggs and I drank some beer at the Queens Head, which is a pleasant enough place. The constant jostle of greyhounds did get to us after a bit though. Biggs suggested we should try to find the chip shop mentioned by The Barron Knights. Rod Stewart’s favorite chippie had after all proved to be a great success in Epping. We wandered round for a bit and spotted some candidates but without any real clues other than the fact that Ann and Joe had once been there, gave up in the end and opted for a curry instead.

 

On the way back to the underground we stumbled across The Victoria, a pub that offered “A Warm Welcome” outside and (despite being almost empty) a rather threatening atmosphere inside. Biggs and I slapped each other on the back. This was more what we’d been looking for. We celebrated inside with a game or two of pool and a few more pints. Walthamstow had certainly proved to be more urbane than we'd expected, but this threatening little pub had offered us a link to the wider spirit of EOTL. Perhaps its forthcoming Glam Jam and Titti La Camp nights could also be viewed as represented a link between Walthamstow’s rich musical history and that of EOTL.  

[Ruth Scott]

Good writing young bruv - you may have East 17 fans on your case though - if there are any left x

[David Wright]

I need to find this Barron Knights song.

[Janet Feenstra]

I need to find this Macca song.

[David Wright]

I actually found the Victoria to be a welcoming establishment.  The elderly alcoholics propping up the bar were perfectly charming.

[Eleanor Dowling]

You should reconsider your criteria for drinking venues, quite frankly...