For nearly a quarter of a century you have been a part of my life. From Colchester you came, you young beautiful thing, to Northampton, the home of Bauhaus and Goths!

Music wove it’s way through the veins of our friendship. Our paths criss crossing. At MVC you worked and through Nic we became friends. Our conversations of music and culture. And, as of course did many, many more, I fell in love with you.

To Spinadisc, or back. No better time to work in an independent record shop, vinyl and gigs galore. Your crimped hair, make up and unwashed ripped t-shirts, that I can still to this day almost taste…

The time we shared in the house in Shakespeare Road. Discussions about class and culture morphed into your thesis and eventually your first published book. I’ll never forget that upside down cat of yours, Hephzibah? Those two strange type witches cats that would gang up on my lovely hippy cat TigerLily, bless her. And of course you turned me on to Nick Drake, playing me his music as we sat on the edge of the creaky bed you had made from old, damp, wooden pallets, as is the way of the Goth!

I remember taking the day off work to go and support you at your first lecture up Boughton Green Road. And it was obvious that academia was always going to get you, Professor Nathan Wisefellow, you were a natural, a showman, a thinker, a romantic, ever the sharer of your vast knowledge on popular culture. With words longer than I could spell or ever know the meaning of.

I saw you play in bands, and sometimes I did so with toilet roll in ears.

We holidayed in Wales, and camping with children together. Spent many a Hallowe’en trick or treating around Moulton. Gosh, my children adore you. The photos of our families visiting the church yard in Tanworth-In-Arden still among my favourite.

I was over the ‘pink’ moon when you asked me to do the photography for your Nick Drake book, I was very cheap, and our odyssey began as we journeyed to places most relevant. An absolutely wonderful few days. Poshest of Marlborough, you fitted right in, and store rooms to see memories of Nick few had seen before. Booked in for a night at Danny La’Rue’s hotel?! Ha ha. We rested and laughed. But I wasn’t laughing for long as we shared a twin room and very little sleep I got as was woke by your snoring!!! A night spent reading your manuscript on the bathroom floor was my payment for a hard days photography shoot.

And to Nick Drake’s Cambridge. Walking the same steps and over bridges.

We looked in awe at the building that was Sound Techniques Studio in Chelsea, and drank beer in the pub opposite. Joe Boyds Witchseason office in Charlotte Street where we were accused of being Jewish undercover agents; my nose and your name didn’t help matters, but eventually we were invited in for a cup of coffee and look around.

The iconic alley in Hampstead Heath, a morning that ended on a tube train and a beautiful girl opposite unbeknown blew our minds, as she pulled out of her bag a Nick Drake CD, and smiled our way. We turned to each other with hairs on hairy necks standing, the serendipity of the moment, You with grin said ‘Well, that’s got to be a good omen’

Our lives got complicated, the romance and dreaming swallowed by the realisation on how fucking hard it all actually is. Decisions, make waves on other peoples lives and the darkness seems to swallow the light.

I didn’t see so much of you this past year, which never meant you were forgotten. You’ll be my friend forever. Never again will I take for granted a thing so precious as something as special as you. I’m not saying you never annoy me, ha, of course you did you bloody fool! But I love you. I’ll miss you. I’ll cry for you. And I’ll laugh too. And as if Nick Drakes music wasn’t melancholy enough it now takes on another sodding dimension, so thanks for that!

There will be a hole for ever in all of us. Hope you have found your peace my beautiful friend.

Just one last musty hug would do

“Now we rise / And we are everywhere.”