We had a rocking night out last night.
A preview of Beware of Mr Baker at the Hospital Club in Covent Garden.
This 100-minute feature documentary by Jay Bulger is powerful, imaginative, candid, exciting and, by the end, very poignant.
It uses animation is a clever way to illustrate some of the action in a story that needed to be told before it was too late.
Ginger's wartime childhood explains a lot and we're told about his first meeting with Phil Seamen, a junkie. It's all here: the Graham Bond Organisation, the ultra-expensive tour by Airforce, living in Hawaii and Nigeria, playing with Fela Kuti in Lagos, playing polo, his love of horses and dogs.
And a lot of wreckage.
I hope under-40s have the sense to check out a savagely truthful and informative film about the greatest drummer ever to play in a rock group.
The music is magnificent.
Cream's riff-songs were sophisticated AND very ballsy and the music rocks even more dramatically today than it did in 1966-68.
Blind Faith and Richie Havens in Hyde Park gave me one of the best days of my life.
When we wandered in early for the 9pm screening we had a choice of all 120 seats and we sat down in row 3 and stretched out our long legs.
Then two guys came in and sat next to us on my left and we chatted to them.
John, a big man, amiably noted that I was sitting where he always sits. He said he sits there because he'd built this cinema.
His friend was Peter Van Hooke, so I told Pete I'd met him at Knebworth when he played with Van Morrison, Jerome Rimson on bass and Pete Wingfield on piano.
We talked about Van, Tanita Tikaram, Dave Stewart and Annie Lennox, and when the film was about to start John said, "Move up one," so my mate Miran moved along and I then sat in Miran's seat, so that John could sit in his usual seat in the cinema he'd built.
When the doc finished we were all buzzing and glad we'd been here together.
When I said the trailer for Mud looked good, John said, "It's on tomorrow night, if you want to come down."
A rocking night out and a bonus to meet two guys on our wavelength.
