Toerag

Liam's Toerag studio became well known when he recorded the Elephant LP by the White Stripes. By that time the studio had moved to Holloway but when I first visited it was located on French Place in Shoreditch. I must have been introduced to Liam through Daniel who had recorded quite a few singles there and and had recently finished recording the 'I Was a Mod' Television Personalities LP.

Stuck for a place to live, I took a spare room in Liam's place. It was more of a closet. About the size of a double bed with a ceiling too low to allow you to stand upright. A few wooden steps led up to it and on them, painted in pink, were the words 'HMS Fairy Cake.' It was only a temporary solution. Josh, who financed the studio, used the space to build huge, gaudy, neon models for his club night 'The Fratshack,' and so I lived amongst giant papier mâché American football players, dinosaurs and grotesque go-go girls.

Liam is famous for owning no recording equipment manufactured after the late sixties, and the same went for his possessions. From the black and white television set to the basil brush doll to the clothes that he wore, it was all from the middle of the last century. And the same too went for all of the people who would hang around the studios. Garage rock bands, surf bands, none of it really my thing but it was fun to be there. I made a few friends, I'd walk Bruce and Holly from the Headcoats/Headcoatees' dog to Hoxton Square now and again.


Shoreditch then was completely different to today's Shoreditch. No one seemed to know where the place was, it was derelict and empty. The pub 'The Barley Mow' did exist, but in those times its interior was full of cricket photographs and greyhound illustrations. The only customers would be bands recording at the studio and policeman from the old Shoreditch Magistrates Court. The Bricklayer's Arms, just up the road, was even emptier. The greasy spoon café on Rivington Street was around then and there was another on the corner of Shoreditch High Street and French Place. Today Shoreditch is not unlike the West End, full of bars and restaurants, places to see people and be seen and a couple of small music venues, and it is a nice enough place, but there was a point in between those two extremes when Shoreditch was really a great place to be.