At the beginning of 1980, I moved up to Manchester. I contacted the Manchester Musicians Collective who were at the height of their activities. Within weeks I was playing bass with the Diagram Brothers. Another band active in the collective – Dislocation Dance – heard that I also played the trumpet and invited me along for a blow.
Manchester was on a creative high at the time with bands everywhere. I felt very lucky after struggling in London, I was suddenly involved in two bands that were gigging regularly, playing on John Peel and making records. I re-discovered the trumpet with Dislocation Dance and found myself battling out alone against guitars and drums. I started adding effects (Roland Space Echo and distortion pedals). We released records on New Hormones, which was one of the first punk indie labels run by the Buzzcocks manager Richard Boon
By 1982, some of the initial creative drive got eaten up by the desire for “pop” success. Dislocation Dance got a deal with Rough Trade Records, the Diagram Brothers split up and I joined Liverpool’s Pale Fountains who i met when they supported Dislocation Dance. Liverpool is only an hour away on the train and the Pale Fountains got swept up into a big record deal with Virgin Records.
I was able to get a brand new trumpet and build a home recording studio in Manchester based around the 8- track fostex machine. It was my first experience of the big record business (invited to dinner on Richard Branson’s barge) and working in big record studios (virgin manor studios and others) with top engineers. The promised chart success however didn’t arrive.
It was a constant fight with the music business to keep the Pale Fountains true to our original spirit. They wanted to mold us and style us and get Mick to use session musicians. We all stood our ground – and managed to release two amazing albums, that although not successful (in major label terms) have stood the test of time. I left in 1985 feeling disillusioned with the whole “pop” music scene.
In the mid 80s, I got more into experimenting in my studio and playing jazz and improvising with local musicians. I played regularly with musicians from bands like “A certain ratio”, “Biting tongues”, “Kalima”, “the Jazz defektors”, all based around the infamous Factory records. I also ended up playing and touring with Nico (velvet underground) who was living in Manchester at the time.
Some friends started a cassette label called “bop cassettes” and we put together a mix of all the various jazz /improv projects under the title “Bip bap Bop – the jazz edit.” However I was missing the intense collective feel of a band so with Richard (Dislocation Dance drummer)and two saxophone players formed the Honkies…. playing a free jazz crossed with very tight brass arrangement.
Richard Harrison (Dislocation Dance drummer) was a constant through this period playing with most of the jazz groups as well as the Honkies and the Mud Hutters and Nico tours. When Dislocation dance finally split up in 1987 we continued to experiment in our studio (Richard was living in the studio with me at the time) and put together an idea for a duo – Spaceheads. We put a 12 inch vinyl record together with handpainted sleeves and a cassette album for Bop cassettes -“Ho! fat Wallet”
My friend Cliff (Sax player with Kalima) was running a very successful T shirt printing company. His biggest client was “James”. The famous T shirt with “Ja” on the front were everywhere. James were expanding their line up and asked him if he knew any good brass players. The next thing I knew I had Tim Booth on the phone …………. 
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