maureen tucker | valentines day 1992

in 1989 maureen tucker's "life in exile after abdication" came out on 50 trillion watts records.
i loved maureen - she was always my favourite velvet undergrounder - she and sterling morrison always had a cool that i didn't see in lou reed or john cale.

anyhow, i got the record home and played it again and again - songs like "spam again" and "hey mersh!" were instant hits.
on the back cover was a contact address.
it can't be her personal address i thought - she's moe tucker!
but i thought i'd write anyway. just a polite letter to say hello and
stuff.
two weeks later i got a letter back.
it was from maureen herself.
we corresponded for a year or two, and up until 2000 i still got christmas cards from her.
in fact i probably still do but i've moved so many times since then.
i really ought to get back in touch.
she was always a great letter writer - funny, gentle, friendly.



anyway, in 1992 her band were set to come over to the UK for a small tour - london, manchester, liverpool, i forget where else.

i was put on the guestlist for the liverpool show and duly turned up, a couple of friends in tow.
the gig was at a small club that was then called mardi gras.
or was that just the name of the night?



i don't remember who supported - in fact i don't remember who was in maureen's band apart from sterling morrison, who was an absolute gentleman and was happy to take time to speak to everyone who wanted a word.
you know, that could even have been one of the last times he was in the UK - or was he involved in that velvet's reunion?

if anyone out there knows who maureen's nband was for that UK tour i'd love to know - her backing band on record was mainly made up of various members of half japanese.

the band were super.
crunchy clean guitars and falling apart drums playing 3 chord pop, maureen playing a gibson SG and singing from lyric sheets on a music stand in front of her.
absolutely the coolest thing i'd ever seen at that point.

i've recently dug the records out again - not heard them for a long time - and i've fallen back in love with the grand dame of female drummers, the patron saint of stand up drummers.