And now for something completely different. At a convention last year, the
following article was handed to us in a plain brown wrapper, by a
distinguished-looking Queen's English-speaking gentleman who claimed to know, among
other things, the metaphysical implications of the Claude Degler's Cosmic Circle,
whether or not Roscoe is the one true ghod, and who really sawed Courtney's
Boat. Honest!
 This is a tale that has waited over 21 years
to be told. It happened over a long time ago and far, far away (nearly four
thousand miles), and I have only ever told it to a handful of fen until now.
However, it is now more than old enough to fend for itself, so it can now be
told...I should also briefly mention that all the
names have all been changed, not so much as to protect the innocent (there are none)
or to protect me from libel suits (this tale is true, although you probably won't
believe it). No, it is simply because after all those years I honestly can't
remember all of the real names any more.It happened during my mis-spent British
youth when I was very interested in flying saucers. It was because of this interest
that I ended up on a ghost hunt.The sequence of events was this: I met up
with a fellow named Dick, who had formed a local UFO investigation society. He, in
turn, had met up with a fellow named John, who had formed a local psychical research
investigation society. As neither group was particularly large (each consisted of
only one person), they joined forces. John's investigations had in turn brought him
into contact with The Roost, a rock'n'roll group that was B) having a spot of
trouble with a poltergeist, and A) about to release their first single. Does the
word 'publicity' mean anything to you?Now note that I said rock'n'roll group, not
rock. Even during the sixties "rock'n'roll" seems to have remained a comfortable
label on the U.S. side of the Atlantic (i.e., "...like trying to tell a stranger
about rock'n'roll" and "I dig rock'n'roll music" etc.), however, across the British
shore rock'n'roll was two four-letter words. It was also nine years dead along with
Buddy Holly (and Elvis Presley getting his call-up papers). The phrase envisioned
Bill Haley fans; near-extinct neanderthals in teddy-boy jackets, crape shoes, and
D.A. haircuts that oozed Brillcream.In the late sixties the music world was an
expanding universe reverberating with the sounds of Sgt. Pepper, "A Whiter Shade of
Pale," Jimi Hendrix, and Cream. And what was The Roost planning to conquer the
whole scene with? "Don't You Rock Me, Daddy-O!" To be fair, they did have their
sound together, and one of their songs had been recorded by Manfred Mann, back
before his Earth Band days. But that was simply it -- the song was recorded and
stored away in some can for possible use on a future album.The Roost itself was led by Charlie on
guitar. He, his wife, and two naked toddlers lived in a house of which only one
room had carpeting and looked halfway decent. This was The Group's Room, its walls
bedecked with mementos such as a poster for The Monkees' tour. The Roost had been
offered one of the supporting-bill slots, but had refused, because they didn't want
to be outshone. It's therefore a bit of wonder that they didn't have a poster for
the charity gig they turned down "...'cause there was no money in it," or the
summons they received when they abandoned their broken-down and unlicensed 'van' on
the side of one of the Queen's highways. The 'van' was a huge furniture truck with
'THE ROOST' in three-foot high lettering on the side. Charlie blamed their getting
caught on their agent.The rest of the house was not only devoid of
carpet, as I said, but almost totally devoid of furniture as well. There were also
several spray marks low on the walls, their heights suspiciously corresponding to
the heights of the children's inside-leg measurements. Someone called the place
"the sewer" and I got credited with the remark (erroneously, let me tell you).Charlie's younger brother, Steve, played the
drums and the fool (the latter somewhat constantly). Malcolm was the bass guitarist
and also a general dogs-body at a men's boutique; he was also into many a
get-rich-quick scheme, all of which had an 80% chance of being illegal. The only
'normal' member of the band was the lead singer, Ray; the rest of the group admitted
he was their only 'ace'. Ray was soft-spoken, articulate and friendly, he had an
immaculate home, a 'sweet suburban wife', and was just recovering from a nervous
breakdown.
As for dealing with their paranormal
visitations, their own research consisted of sitting around an ouija board which
would deliver messages from "the other side" only when Charlie's or Steve's pinky
was on the pointer. Odd to relate, the spirit world contacts were always atrocious
spellers and displayed a copious capacity for swearing, but as Charlie's and Steve's
conversations were chock-a-blockful of profanities, it wasn't too hard to theorize
where that phenomenon originated.On one occasion, the ouija board directed
us, conveniently on a Sunday afternoon, to go to Copped Hall, a once stately home
that had the singular distinction of having burned down twice. After the second
roasting it was left a roofless shell. Its inners were a maze of bare brick walls
and rubble floors; in one shaft a dumb-waiter's pulley rope slowly twisted, reaching
up three stories to nowhere. The lack of a roof admitted incongruous amounts of
bright sunlight, and when I commented to Dick that this was hardly compatible with
ghost hunting, he informed me that they had decided not to start the seance till
after midnight. Sticking around till the wee small hours just to play
phantasmatical pantomimes somehow did not appeal to me; it lost any appeal
whatsoever when I realised we had no food with us, so I left the intrepid ghost
hunters to their collective fate.Their fate, it turned out, was rather more
lively than expected (if 'lively' is a word to use about the undead). Ray had taken
my place, with Malcolm 'guarding' the exit (if you hadn't cottoned-on already... we
were trespassing). Just after the main team had started up with "Is Anybody There?"
Malcolm became agitated -- in fact, it's fair to say he became downright hysterical,
screaming like a man condemned and taking a swing at Ray with his flashlight, then
running off helter-skelter into the night.Eventually, the team managed to catch up
with him and calm him down. He claimed he'd been attacked by a phantasm which
looked somewhat akin to "... a flying fag machine." (Now, before you let your
imagination run riot, I should tell you that Malcolm was referring to a
cigarette-packet vending machine.)Later that week the ouija board was again
consulted, and it told us (between obscenities) that Malcolm had been attacked by a
vicious demon spirit that had disguised itself as a fag machine. This prompted one
of the smokers in the group to ask how one could differentiate between such a
demonic spirit and a real fag machine. The ouija board's advice might well
be taken to heart, especially if you are addicted to the tobacco weed yourself; it
decreed that whenever one buys a packet of Player's from such an apparatus, one
should always (and it did stress always -- as much as an ouija board can
stress, that is) always hold a silver crucifix up to the machine.# # # #
Postscript. A couple of months later,
The Roost launched their first single, which quietly glided down the slipway onto
the totally unpredictable waters of the pop charts, and immediately sunk without
trace. Dick (the UFO investigator) suddenly got married; when asked why, he said,
"For the size of her charlies." (The marriage lasted as long as you'd expect such a
marriage to last.) John (the ghost hunter) probably did better than most -- at last
report he was having conversations with God. All illustrations by Diana Harlan Stein |
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