You may remember this video: Just over a year ago I was able to exchange emails with Mike Montez of the Velvetones. I then edited them down to one continuous interview. Then I lost it. Today I found it. It was then labeled as "a drop-in centre for the young unemployed". It still exists and now boasts loads of facilities including its own recording studio see Warren Records.
In those days I ran an art area with a darkroom and stuff. Often the room would just get full of lads just wanting to compare tattoos and play loud music. One afternoon this lad came in with close cropped hair, an armful of ink and an album by a band called the Oppressed.
On that album was a track called Skinhead Girl. This lad was really into the song. He played it to me four or five times that afternoon. As a result, the chorus got stuck in my head, and that night at a Velvetones rehearsal, I sang it to the rest of the lads. I was all for getting a tape of it and getting the band to learn it, but they were not keen on doing a straight cover of an Oi!
Dave Rotheray of Beautiful South fame said something along the lines of "you could write something much better anyway", so I took up the challenge and wrote my own lyrics, some of it was from bits I could remember of the original lyrics and tune, and I made the rest up. I never heard the Oppressed version again until I looked it up on the net a couple of years ago. Keith of the saxophone wrote the sax tag, and Dave and the band put the backing sound together around my song.
It quickly became a favourite at gigs, we would save it until the end, or do it as an encore. The audience used to dance and sing along. Mike was married last year and he performed Skinhead Girl at his wedding. The new version was done by someone at this website But once I got into it. It was surprising how soon I got the hang Not got any video or audio of me singing it as yet.. If you want to post the backing track on your site, feel free. It would be fun to think of other people having a go, and there's no copyright problems.
