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30.11.2007: Our friends Mark Worden and Alfredo Marziano
has just published their book "A Pink Floyd Fan's Illustrated
Guide to Cambridge", 96 pages in english language with a
lot of photos and maps of the town. In this book you'll find an
explanation of all the places related to Pink Floyd that you can
find in Cambridge. Published by B. Damned Publishing, ISBN
9780953249121, price UK£ 7.99.
Interview by Mauro Fagnani (Heyou)
What are the books' contents? How is it structured?
Mark Worden: Barrett, Waters and Gilmour all grew up in
Cambridge and this is simply a guide – with maps and photos – to the
town of their youth. There are entries on the 50 or so locations:
houses, schools, pubs, cafes, shops, concert venues, you name it. In
geographical terms, it starts at the centre of the famous university
town and works its way southwards. In terms of sources, obviously we
used the books that have been written about Pink Floyd, but we also
conducted a number of interviews with their contemporaries, some of
whom even showed us the places in question. Indeed special thanks go
to Clive Welham, who played in David Gilmour's early group Joker's
Wild, and who still lives in Cambridge, and to the legendary album
cover designer, Storm Thorgerson: not only did he provide plenty of
information and encouragement, he also put us in touch with some of
his contemporaries, who in turn put us in touch with others and so
on.
Is there any particularly curious fact that you discovered while
researching the book?
Mark Worden: Well, a favourite place would probably be the
impressive house where the Ummagumma cover was shot. This is not for
the house or the cover, so much as the fact that it was the scene of
a surreal 21st birthday party in 1965 for which the line-up included
three unknown acts: namely, a bunch of architecture students living
in London who called themselves the Pink Floyd Sound, the
afore-mentioned local band Joker's Wild, and last, but by no means
least, a young American guy who was travelling round the UK at the
time called Paul Simon. He went home shortly after that and recorded
a song called "The Sound of Silence" and the rest, as they say, is
history. None the less eye witnesses say that the evening was not a
great success but, when time travel becomes commercially viable,
this will be an event worth checking out. In more generic terms, our
research involved a lot of "legwork," i.e. walking around Cambridge
and accosting innocent bystanders and asking them for information.
Two things struck us here: the first was how many of the places from
the 1950s and '60s have disappeared. The second was the gradual
realisation that we ourselves were a little eccentric. When you
think about it, going around a town in 2006 and asking people
whether they can remember the exact location of a place from the
1960s is like going round a town in the 1980s and asking people
whether they can remember a small local detail from the Second World
War. That said, just about everybody we spoke to was polite and
helpful, in a very English way.
Where is the book available?
Mark Worden: Selected Cambridge bookshops, Amazon.com and eBay.
Why Pink Floyd? How did you "get to know" them?
Mark Worden: We were both teenagers in the 1970s and Pink Floyd
was a big part of that: we grew up to their music. In my case, there
was an added dimension: I grew up in the Cambridge area and so a lot
of these places were familiar. For example, I used to go to concerts
at the Corn Exchange, but I was a bit too young to attend the
disastrous Syd Barrett show there in 1972, which was probably just
as well.
Which is your favourite Pink Floyd album and song?
Mark Worden: Without wishing to appear unduly dull, the album
has to be "Dark Side of the Moon," which really is part of "the
soundtrack of our lives." Not only that, it still sounds great –
three decades and three thousand listenings later! In terms of a
song, I'm going to go for Grantchester Meadows, which is a
wonderfully nostalgic piece about growing up in Cambridge.
Can you tell us about what you're working on at the moment?
Mark Worden: We both have several projects that we'd like to
pursue, including a "work in progress" that we'd let slip while we
completed the book. It's a series of interviews with people who
reminisce about the 1960s. We freely admit that it probably isn't
the most original of ideas, but it's great fun to work on and that's
the main thing.
Info: Nicola from Heyou |
Links:
Hey You
Amazon.co.uk
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