Ed Bicknell: “Everything I learned at uni came into play, even the degree”

The bands and the bargains

Once I took over the Ents Committee (a fantastic, very organised and supportive bunch), I made one defining decision: I would put on the bands that I liked and somehow sell them to the student audience, which included a technical college next door and a teacher training college nearby. About 10,000 to 12,000 students in total to draw from. Time wise, it couldn’t have been better.

Ed Bicknell with Nile Rodgers

Many artists who’ve gone on to huge and sustained success since were literally surviving off the college circuit, which was extremely vibrant. Plus, we had the good fortune to be close to Sheffield and Leeds universities, and I managed to arrange for bands playing there to come over to Hull and vice versa.

This was long before motorways, bypasses and bridges over the Humber and getting acts to even consider coming up from London was difficult. In fact, one or two simply never made it.

Readers might be interested in how much those who did get there were paid. I know the value of money has changed a teeny bit, but here we go:

• The Who (£250, £350)
• Jimi Hendrix (£350)
• Pink Floyd (£150 Union and £300 at the Lawns Centre)
• Muddy Waters Blues Band (£350, very chuffed to get them)
• John Lee Hooker (£250, and him)
• The Kinks (£350)
• Jethro Tull (£400- top 3 single)
• Geno Washington (£250, £300)
• John Mayall and the Bluesbreakers (£300)
• The Moody Blues (£110, £125, £150 - 3 visits)
• Joe Cocker and the Original Grease Band (£40 – yes! Came over from Sheffield)
• Ten Years After (£250)
• Family (£175, £250- in my opinion the best band we had)
• The Alan Bown (£125, £150)
• Ralph Mctell, (several times £50-£75)
• Al Stewart, Bert Jansch, John Renbourn (same)
• Jimmy James and the Vagabonds (£200)
• The Action (£75)
• The Pretty Things (£125)
• Jon Hiseman’s Colosseum (£125)

A golden era for live music

I kept all the contracts, and I can’t remember a bad show.

Actually, there was one – Manfred Mann, who we put on at the Beverley Road swimming baths with a wood floor over the pool. Don’t ask. They had a bad night (not that bad) and voluntarily sent back £75 of the £300 fee. Amazing. Would never happen now.

With that exception the rest were all great and it won’t surprise anyone to know The Who were deafening and duly smashed everything at the end of My Generation. Moon’s drum kit ended up in the audience and when they’d finished nobody applauded and no one left. Too stunned. Brilliant.

Pink Floyd did a bit of “performance art” at the first show. During one piece the roadies came on and boiled a kettle. The whistle in the spout produced exactly the right note at the right point in the song.

We had two local bands who I’d regularly pay £50 to support. Mandrake Paddle Steamer from Scarborough who had a singer called Robert Palmer (RIP), and a blues band called The Rats.

Ed Bicknell with Mark Knopfler

Mick Ronson, Trevor Bolder and Woody Woodmansey. They became David Bowie’s Spiders From Mars. Great musicians and even better guys who I stayed in touch with right up to Mick’s sad passing in April 1993. Fitting that there is a Memorial Stage in his name in Queen’s Gardens.

Mandrake Paddle Steamer had the dubious honour of following Hendrix at a Skyline show in March 1967. Particularly intimidating since at the end of Wild Thing he stuck his guitar in the ceiling tiles and as it howled with feedback walked past me on his way to the dressing rooms (actually the kitchen).

“F****** great,” was all I could say, which solicited a big grin.

A night out for 25p

To put those fees in context using current currency - a regular Saturday night gig in the Union would cost about 25p. The Union Ball in Feb 1968, which featured Julie Driscoll and the Brian Auger Trinity (number 4 single from memory), Bonzo Dog Doo Dah Band, Blossom Toes, disco, steel band and a meal was priced at around £1.25.

Very different times in so many respects.

When some of the acts sold too many tickets for the Union building, we had to move them into either the Mecca Ballroom (Mayall/Tull/Kinks, capacity about 1800) or the Skyline (Hendrix/Geno, capacity 1500 on top of the Co-op) in Hull itself.

Ed Bicknell with the Manager of Led Zepplin Peter Grant

Those shows were open to the public. Student Union gigs were not due to restricted capacity (about 900 packed in) and the licensing regulations. No one, least of all me, took any notice of fire limits. I don’t think I even knew what a fire limit was back then and certainly no fire officer or anyone to do with Health and Safety ever visited the Union. Very different times.

In fact, not one of those acts ever had more than two road crew, no one had a truck bigger than three tons, no one brought any lights, no one did a sound check, no equipment arrived before 5pm and no one went on later than 8.30pm. Sets were either 2 x 45 minutes or 75 minutes.

As I say, very different times.

Managing Dire Straits changed my life

In closing, I must add that the entire University experience could not have been better in terms of the career I eventually fell into.

After failing utterly as a “professional” drummer and being sacked from an embryonic Average White Band for not being Scottish (in truth I wasn’t good enough), I accidentally bumped into one of the agents who used to try and sell me his crappy bands on Oxford Street in early 1970.

“I can’t pay you anything, but you can have half of everything you earn for the office,” is stamped into my mind as if it were yesterday.

Ed Bicknell with the Notting Hillbillies

So with no money, no immediate prospects and in spite of the fact he had no acts, I took up his offer and some years later had the good fortune and huge luck to be asked to see a new band looking for management playing in a tiny London club for £25 whilst renting a PA system for £75.

The band was Dire Straits and that night changed my life.

I went on to work with them, Mark Knopfler, Bryan Ferry, Gerry Rafferty (RIP), Scott Walker, Paul Brady and The Blue Nile over the next 30 years and everything I learned at university came into play, even parts of the degree (the law and economics bit).

Lesson one: If you can’t read a poster from the top of a double decker bus it’s not going to be worth diddly squat. Who it is, where it is, when it is and how much is all you need.

It took me three years in Hull to learn that and I had the best time. The best!