The Outside Of Everything

Chapter 32
The New Shoes

We called it the white economy. It sounded better. It was a way of life, whatever you wanted to call it. Those were strange times. The Government chose to turn its back on anyone who was not interested in getting on, in the conventional sense. At the same time it also turned its back on an awful lot of people who were skilled in one thing or another but were deemed to be redundant and surplus to requirements. For these groups there was little option to enjoy the benefits of prosperity. So, necessity being the mother of invention, alternative means of getting by were developed.

One of the interesting by-products of the Government’s economic policy was the advent of boot sales. They actually started round our way at the start of the ‘80s. Up till then it had been all jumble sales and bazaars. For charity. Then things went private. The enterprise culture. People started selling their own things. Out of the back of car boots. I remember the first few times we saw car boot sales being advertised. We were bemused. Why on earth would anyone want to buy a car boot, we wondered? Then the name became truncated. To boot sales. Which I suppose made a little bit more sense. People did buy boots. People did wear boots. But it seemed a little bit odd to go right out into the country to buy boots. Hey ho.

Then boot sales started to take place closer to home. Not just right out in the country. Our barber used to tell us about them. The wife, you see, she was hooked. Anyone’s old rubbish, he’d moan. She’ll buy anyone’s old rubbish. Ah, we thought. Well, one person’s old rubbish is another person’s unearthed treasure. And before long we were hooked too. We had somewhere else to go other than charity shops. We found lots of local schools were hiring out their fields of a weekend to host boot sales, the parents’ association, or whatever, raising money for this and that in the process. We found all sorts of people getting out and about bright and early of a Saturday or Sunday morning to wander round, looking for their particular thing.

The sellers were up and out even earlier. Trying to make their few bob. Tax free. Before ebay drove everyone inside. And it was astonishing what these sellers had. Some clearly clearing out their own lofts, lock ups, and whatnot. Others you really wondered where on earth they’d been hiding what they were hawking. The funny thing is I would say back at the start very little of it was stolen, bootlegged or pirated. Oh admittedly some of the items you would have a few issues proving provenance. And sometimes it didn’t pay to ask too many questions. But in most cases it would have been more awkward than anything to return an item to its original home, and would have undoubtedly entailed unnecessary paperwork, so better to sell the surplus stock surely?

That was a golden age. An embarrassment of riches was often on display. And it hurts looking back, remembering what was left behind. Like? Like one week round the local field there was a guy selling loads of old African 7” EPs. 40p each. Or something equally ridiculous when you stop and think of it now. Loads of them. In fantastic picture sleeves. These big African guys in full get up, robes and hats, and all that, with the biggest Gretsch-type guitars you have ever seen. King Sunny Ade and so on. Maybe before he was even a king. Very early recordings. All of which looked fantastic. But I didn’t buy any of them. Hard to believe now. But the simple truth is that finances were limited. And one of the pitfalls with boot sales was that you took your chances when they cropped up. If you saw something appealing early on, you had to get it. It wasn’t like, oh well, that looks interesting, I’ll pick it up on my way out. Oh no. Some other treasure seeker might just have beaten you to it. So that particular day, I’d spent out by the time I got to the African EPs. Possibly on that set of latin soul compilations that a lady was selling. She whispered to me that she adored all these records, but her new husband wouldn’t have them in the house. Grounds for divorce I’d have said, but hey ho.

Then there was the occasion this middle age black couple had a huge tarpaulin sheet laid out by their car at some boot sale. And the tarpaulin was filled with sleeveless old reggae singles. But the singles. Oh dear. You have never seen records in such a state. There were all these beautifully rare roots reggae rockers whatever 7”s. And they all looked horribly maimed. Not just scratched. But massacred. To put it politely. How on earth did they get in that state? Heaven only knows. And the owners weren’t telling. Just sitting there reading the Sunday papers as if this were the most natural thing in the world. There were so many beautiful records, and perhaps half a dozen were salvageable. Johnny Clarke. Wayne Wade. I remember getting a couple of their old singles. You could just about play those. Just about. But trucks must have been driven over the others. I just sat there and wept. The couple looked so unconcerned. It hurt.

We never got into the selling side of boot sales. That would perhaps have taken too much effort and enterprise. Anyway we didn’t have any transport. I am sure we could have found a way if we’d really wanted to. Our Friend Stan, for instance, who had the lock up next door but one to us, always had connections if they were needed. But the selling side wasn’t really for us. I suppose it would have been a good way to earn a few bob, but it would have meant missing out on the treasure seeking. The other thing we never really got too into was the selling on game. You know, you’re walking round a boot sale, see an item going for next to nothing, and know you can sell it on somewhere else for a nice tidy mark-up. No, that wasn’t really for us. We did know people who made their living doing that sort of thing, but it wasn’t for us. It would have taken too much effort and enterprise. And it didn’t seem strictly ethical. As in not really playing the game. Daft as it may seem we were big believers in karma. What goes around comes around. That sort of thing. Nothing too deep. Just something about doing something for the right reasons.

Nevertheless there were times when necessity came knocking on the door. And then we might be forced to find something to sell on. But here karma also came into play. For example, for one reason and another, through contacts and acquaintances, we often came into the possession of promos. Deadly dull new groups with terrible shoes whose fans danced round plastic bags filled with fanzines. Ordinarily we’d find some sadistic use for said promos, but occasionally these items would suddenly shoot up in value as the shameful spotlight of fickle fame shone in a particular direction, and some tenuous link would pay dividends, literally. So our Redhead loves to tell the tale of the white label 7” he found down the back of his wardrobe, which he had no intention of keeping, a record that momentarily became valuable because it was on the same label as some underground gone overground group of no-hopers who were briefly in the spotlight for their use of feedback and surf melodies copped off someone else. Well partly out of curiosity as if this were all meant to be our Redhead took this promo into a shop round the back of Oxford Street, caught the bus up to Camden Town, went in the shoe shop next to the Rock On record emporium, and bought a new pair of Dr Martens suede shoes which were then rather sought after. This, said our Redhead, showing off his new shoes, beautifully proves the point that everything in this world has some worth, and that to everything there is a purpose. Amen to that.