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Little Context of Social Change by Fred Garnett 
Chapter Eleven1963-16 Everything's Alright
2B1, So I am a B student then. It's official. But a first class class B student mindyou. 2B1; in with Dinky and Mike. I started in the top class and worked my waydown, Dinky started in the bottom class and worked his way up and Mike, in hisown solid way, started right in the middle and would stay there for his entireschool career. We even occupied those respective thirds within the class until Ileft. Just when they wanted me to move me up again and start me on Latin. Goodtiming there for a change.Since being turned into a B student by the Grammar School I had found myself aquiet niche in the top ten of the class, 6/34 in the Spring Term and then 5/34 inthe Summer Term. A nice safe place in the class where I wouldn't get noticed. Ireckoned fourth, fifth or sixth in the class were the best places to be. First, secondand third you got noticed for being a swot, but when you were in fourth, fifth orsixth place no one could say you werent trying and Dad was happy. Perfect. Youcan get on and do interesting things on your own and with your mates. Mind you Iwasnt going to stop winning races to avoid being noticed; winning races was aseasy as doing maths I couldnt help that. Anyway it was a family trait. Dad was arunner who'd had a chance at an Olympic place racing Gordon Pirie, who went onto win a Bronze Medal, Dave would win long distance races before becoming atriple jumper and my hero was Roger Bannister. Worlds fastest miler and a doctor.Or Stirling Moss; what a great name. Worlds fastest driver with a penthouse inMayfair. I couldnt wait for the day when a policeman would stop me and say “Whodo you think you then, are Stirling Moss?” One of those two was my hero, but itchanged from day to day. Soon it would be John and Paul.
 Ah little baby You know I've been away  Ah little baby You know I'm home today 
Home today? I wonder if he's come back from Germany then. I bet he's back inBritain after a tour overseas. Great piano and drum intro to it, just like TobaccoRoad in fact. I wonder why Dinky prefers Tobacco Road? It's by the Nashville Teens, so they have to be American, still who are The Mojos, what on earth doesthat mean? Are they from Manchester? Watford? Liverpool? Dunno. But they arebetter than the Nashville Teens; more joyful. Mind you Tobacco Road has greatqualities, like being a proper song about a road for a start. That makes a nicechange. Solid drumming from the beginning, the piano sounds wierd and it's noisyall the way through. Cant fault that.
 And dont you know that Everything's alright Everything's alright Everything's alright Let me hold your hand 
Little Contexts of Social Change; Chapters 11-15 – August 28th 2009 – fred.garnett@gmail.com
 
Little Context of Social Change by Fred Garnett 
Be your loving manLet me hold your hand Be your loving manLet me hold your hand Be your loving man
 They're right, everythings alright now, yeah, yeah, YEAH! Loads of Pop Musiceverywhere. And its so cheerful. Beaty, joyful and intense. Lots I can spend mytime listening to now that I've got school sorted.Listening to Pop Music was getting amazingly popular in late 1963. Everyoneseemed to be interested in it now. No more waiting for a single half decent song tocome on a jukebox, if we were lucky enough to even find one. No more relying onCliff and the Shadows to give us a decent break from all those syrupy Americanlove songs. These are the days aren’t they; lots of friends interested in Pop Musicand no trouble from school, no trouble at all. I'm a good B student and they dontmind that.Pop Music was simply everywhere. There was Saturday Club, Pick of the Pops,which was getting better and better as Mersey Beat took it over, Crackerjack, JukeBox Jury and Thank Your Lucky Stars. Even Two Way Family Favourites was mostlyplaying good Pop Music now. Well a little bit too much Frank Ifield and Elvis, butnot bad for Sunday lunchtime. You could hear Pop Music almost every single dayof the week now. Could it get any better than that?
 Ah little baby You know I feel so good  Ah little baby I never knew I could 
I never knew I could either. I smiled to myself as I played Everything's Alright backto myself in my head. From my satchel I surreptitiously took out my borrowed,battered, paperback copy of Live and Let Die, the James Bond novel by IanFleming that I was currently reading. This was shaping up to be the best of the lot,really gripping story with loads going on as always, but a little more mysteriousthan usual thanks to all of that incomprehensible voodoo stuff with Solitaire. I hadno idea what was going to happen next in the better James Bond stories like OnHer Majesty's Secret Service. I'd sworn by Biggles when I used to go to the JuniorSection of the wonderful Main Library in Harrogate but since someone lent meMoonraker at School I'd been racing through the Bond novels like they were GrandPrix circuits. Once I found an author that I liked I tried to read everything by them.Enid Blyton, Richmal Compton and now Ian Fleming. Ian Fleming was God. Thiswas writing for the 1960's. The Beatles and Ian Fleming, what a combination for ayoung boy to grow up on.We had to read James Bond novels in secret though as pulp fiction wasn’tapproved of then, so I devoured them in all sorts of places, like right now on theschool bus when it looked like any other second hand paperback, and duringbreak when they weather was too bad to play football outside on our own speciallittle bit of grass at the back of the School.
Little Contexts of Social Change; Chapters 11-15 – August 28th 2009 – fred.garnett@gmail.com
 
Little Context of Social Change by Fred Garnett 
 And dont you know that Everything's alright Everything's alright Everything's alright 
 That's a great chorus. We should have made that the theme tune for BiltonDynamos, we'd have won the league singing songs like that.
Let me give you lovingLike nobody canLet me give you lovingLike nobody canLet me give you lovingLike nobody can
What a great drum roll into the middle eight. They really build the song into it. Ohand it's on piano, sounds incredibly original; that will be why Dave doesn’t like itthen; very decisive Dave. Guitars, good. No guitars, not good. Simple. Still guitarsand drums are the best combination in Pop Music. I'm glad he's got a guitar.Here it comes again. Got that non-stop intensity of good Mersey Beat
Let me give you lovingLike nobody canLet me give you lovingLike nobody canLet me give you lovingLike nobody can
Well no one has sung a chorus more confidently than that, not even John and Paul.And look; there's the poster for the new James Bond film. From Russia With Love ison at the Odeon. I won’t be able to see it though. Certificate A and Dad will nevertake me. I didn’t even know that they were making Dr No into a film until I sawthe poster last year. It must have been a really big hit for them to make a followup. And From Russia With Love is one of the better stories, so it must be a goodfilm. I wonder if they'll make all of them into films eventually? Can’t wait to see OnHer Majesties Secret Service then, that’s the best James Bond story I've read sofar. The poster was at ground level by the side of the paper shop half way up KingGeorges Drive. The poster, as most film posters were, was a Technicolour marvel,lighting up the black brown stone of the wall it was posted on. I made sure Ilooked at the poster on the way to and the way back from school every day. Ichose my seat accordingly. They were full-coloured, sometimes even hystericallycoloured, windows on the future. Every time I looked down at a film poster fromthe bus and mused on its images my head was filled with ideas for new places togo and new things to do. Wonderful Land's, There's a Place's and Caribbean Liveand Let Die's. Come one September I'd drive a Rolls Royce and sing Multiplicationtoo. And kiss Gina Lollobrigida, or some other girl from Rome, for hours and hours.
Little Contexts of Social Change; Chapters 11-15 – August 28th 2009 – fred.garnett@gmail.com
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