camperfanatic

 It wasn't the Whiskey a Go Go in LA, but deserves better than this... The story of the Worcester Gaumont cinema and the music legends that appeared there...  It was a sad looking building when I took this picture (above), one cold, damp morning in 2024. I had not ventured around the rear of this imposing structure for the best part of forty years. There was a somewhat strange feeling to be back in the spot which I had visited many times in my youth, as I was trying to catch a glimpse of  various singers and musicians. I had been more used to seeing the area in darkness, filled with excited teenagers, armed with autograph books, and roadies busy ferrying equipment between the stage door and their tour van. The venue had been unused for several years when I visited, with a plethora of weeds and shrubs growing beneath its exterior, the entrance strewn with litter, ivy growing rampant up waste pipes, but with the stage door still visible. The rear entrance to this once famou...

 My association with motorhomes and campervans stretches back to the late 1960s, influenced to a large extent by my fathers Rootes Commer Maidstone campervan ownership, and later his home-built ex-Co-op mobile butchers van. Like the majority of teenagers during that period I discovered music, at a time when the hippy trend was giving way to heavy metal, Glam rock and the tail end of the Beatles. I was a huge fan of bands such as The Kinks, The Small Faces and rock 'n' roll in general. I was a bit miffed when the Small Faces broke up, with Steve Marriott going off to form Humble Pie and the rest of the band becoming The Faces, with Rod Stewart as lead singer. Although a big fan of Marriott, I was never taken with HP, opting to follow the rest of the band and the Faces music. The stand out member for me was always Ronnie Lane, who with Steve Marriott in the Small Faces co-wrote such hits as Itchycoo Park, All or Nothing, Here Comes the Nice, Lazy Sunday, My Minds Eye and many mor...