The Independent
9/29/94
Our two minibuses have been stuck in a traffic jam on the Rainbow Bridge for almost an hour. It's a sweaty 92 degrees Fahrenheit, we've had a 12-hour flight and this is Friday night in Tokyo. Tired? Hot? Aching for a beer? Feel you deserve something better in life? Then you must be Martin Newell at the beginning of a Japanese tour.
In minibus No 1 are Kevin, Tiv, Garrie Dreadful and myself (smoking). In No 2 are Captain Sensible, XTC's Dave Gregory and Nelson (non-smoking). Tokyo is a 40-mile sprawl of Blade Runner modernity. It has a population of about 11 million, most of whom are sitting in their cars in an apparent attempt to prevent us from reaching our hotel.
We are extremely well looked after. Our hosts leave nothing to chance. In spite of this, Sensible still wanders out five minutes before pick-up time to graze at pavement noodle booths. Captain Sensible is one of life's strays. He gets to a foreign country, buys himself a bus and tube map and goes native. He often returns wearing strange clothes and smelling of exotic food.
We are to play our first two gigs at On Air West in Tokyo. The airline which flew us out here actually lost our guitars and stage-bags in Paris. They eventually turned up at the hotel two hours before our first promotion. Dave Gregory snarled: 'This won't be anything to do with the Japanese. This'll be the bloody French.' Dave is the quietest member of Newell's all-singing, all-dancing alien allstars. This is why I was surprised to see him being followed down the street by nine adoring female fans.
I gather this doesn't occur when he's home in Swindon.
People back home tend not to believe these stories, but it is absolutely true that English pop musicians in early middle years can still get mobbed by female fans in Tokyo. It's very polite mobbing, but it is still mobbing.
So there. It might be more fun if it wasn't all so terribly and tragically late. Captain Sensible's small flotilla of fans are nick-named 'Duck Patrol'. This is because Captain has taught them all to make quacking noises as he leads them in a clumsy twist routine in hotel foyers.
No, we don't understand it either.
By the end of the first gig, our 'crack fighting unit' has become a bunch of pantomime dames. Sensible does his favourite trick of falling over, mid-solo, then dragging the hapless Japanese roadie into a tangle of leads and mike-stands. By second night at On Air West, myself and Captain are wearing mascara, lipstick and beauty spots. Tiv is wearing a pink acrylic glam-rock wig and Nelson looks like he's still playing in New Model Army. Dave Gregory comes onstage to the strains of Jack Payne singing 'Make Yourself a Happiness Pie'. We go offstage with a stupid walk, then come back for an encore with a pop standard which we haven't rehearsed.
Sometimes we're lucky. The Japanese seem to like it.
Later in the week we take the bullet train south to Osaka. At average speeds of 150mph it's the fastest train in the world. It's so quiet you can speak in a whisper, which is what I'm reduced to doing as my voice is on the blink. I gargle with lemon water and drink plenty of fluids. I pray this will work because the alternatives are the Illegal French Throat Spray or the dreaded raw onion marinaded in raw sugar, which can give you nuclear flatulence.
Back in Tokyo, Dave's fans have clubbed together and bought him a 20th anniversary Fender Strat. British Customs will later charge him £95 in tax to bring it into the UK. Wonderful, isn't it?
At Narita airport, days later. Dave's fan club and a rather tearful Duck Patrol are already here to take photos of us and wave us off. Kevin comes back from the ticket desk. The good news? Because the airline lost our guitars earlier, we've had our tickets upgraded to Club Class. The bad news? We stop for re-fuelling in Moscow and change back to an airbus from Paris. At Heathrow I feel absolutely tip-top on Garrie Dreadful's 'Smoke and Drink Your Way to Health' method. I'm to spend the subsequent 36 hours regretting this.
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