I have an addictive personality, and ever since I can remember I’ve been addicted to being famous. This addiction was additionally fueled by the gradual realization of where I lived. Birmingham... England ... The Midlands of 1952 to 1970.

You have to understand that the Birmingham I grew up in was far removed from the Birmingham of today. There was no ultra-modern, Europolitan city center – just a miserable collection of dour, smoke-blackened Victorian buildings. There were no fax machines, no cell phones, nobody had walked on the moon, no color TV, no CDs or ipods, no Walkmans, no Starbucks, no com satellites, no Google, no Internet, and precious little exciting music.

The pubs shut at 10.30pm, the last bus was at 11.30pm and the whole miserable place was pretty much shut down, locked up, and asleep by midnight. It also seemed to either rain or be overcast the whole sodding time.