I laid it on the floor doubled over, sat on it, drew round my legs and cut it out and sewed it up.
Some guys whose surname was Anderson said it was their tartan: turquoise with coloured checks. I've still got that t-shirt somewhere, I think.
The guitar came from a guitar shop in Worthing. I ate nothing but sardines for weeks so I could save up to buy it. Later, after a fracas at a gig at Sussex University, some Hells Angels stole it when I leaned it up against Carl's mini (also turquoise) to go to sort out the fight. But I knew they had it and I went and stood outside their pub every night and stared at them as they stood outside with their beers.
One day when I had borrowed my brother's bass to play, I was sitting in the pub waiting to do our gig after the sound check, and my brother walked in with this guitar in his hands. He'd been walking home to get changed and a woman had been carrying it into the Police Station because she had found it when she was sunbathing in the park. He persuaded her to give it straight to him and rushed into the pub with it. I couldn't believe my eyes- I never thought I'd see it again. I think the Hells Angels must have (a) felt guilty and (b) realised that it's so distinctive (it's a Hofner President) that they would never be able to sell it. Later, its neck got snapped off in the Piranhas van on the way back from a gig and I took it to Jimi Hendrix's guitar mender to have it glued and baked back on again. Now it lives in Scotland; it has been re-homed, revived and revved up to play on many local recordings, most recently by the artist Dave Fleming.
It's a survivor, and that's a true story.
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