A story about 70’s Rock, memory, distance, and becoming someone you can no longer imagine.
***
“What do you feel when you watch concert footage from those days?”
“I wonder how he felt that night after the concert.”
“When you say “HE”… do you mean yourself?”
He nods.
“Mm.”
“Don’t you remember?”
“I can’t imagine.”
***
As 70’s Rock Was Born
The Second World War had just ended, and England in 1945 was in ruins. Aerial bombardments had devastated countless cities. The country needed rebuilding, yet there was neither enough capital nor enough labour. In the midst of this vast absence, people longed to cling to life, to root themselves again, to believe that normality would return. And so, inevitably, a great baby boom followed. The future generation—those who would later reshape culture and rebellion—were already taking form, one by one, in their mothers’ wombs.
He was among them.
He was born to a Romani mother and an English father. Much later in life, he would say:
“In that post-war England, stripped of glamour, I had to find a way out. And I did.”
What he found was music. And singing.
His mother’s dark, thick Gipsy waves transformed as they passed on to him—changing colour, becoming dense golden curls. He was a strikingly beautiful child. Even at a very young age, riding his bicycle through the streets of his neighbourhood, he drew attention: the golden curls, the wide mischievous smile that would stay with him for life, the face adorned with dimples. That was when the character trait—later described as “swagger”—began to take shape.
He quickly realised he was different from other children. Privileged. And he understood that this difference carried advantages. A schoolmate would recall years later:
“He was incredibly handsome and always at the centre of everything. There was something about him—charisma, I suppose. He wore the same school uniform as the rest of us, yet somehow never looked the same. He’d walk into class with those curls falling over his forehead, his collar turned up, and you could literally see teachers’ and students’ eyes light up.”
From an early age, he absorbed—accepted, normalised, even expected—the state of being admired, desired, wanted, placed at the centre of attention. This would follow him throughout his life. That was simply who he was. How he had been born. How he would live. To be desired felt as natural as breathing. And he carried that certainty within him, always.
Post-war England may not have been flamboyant, but from the late 1950s onward it could not resist the sounds arriving from across the Atlantic. Through radios—the main source of entertainment then—and later televisions, which expanded to three channels in the 1960s, Blues and what was often called “the child of Blues”, Rock ’n’ Roll, poured into British homes.
In his early teens, he, too, fell under the spell of those voices and sounds. He would take any object at hand as if it were a microphone, hide behind a curtain, and sing Rock ’n’ Roll songs to his family—half performing, half shy. Over time, his devotion shifted deeper into the Blues.
Much later, a fellow musician would say:
“His roots were always in the Blues. If you talked to him about it, you realised how deep his knowledge ran. He knew everything—artists, histories, nuances. You couldn’t argue with him. You’d just wonder how someone could absorb so much.”
Another would add:
“He was obsessed with music none of us even knew existed. He could talk about Blues endlessly.”
In time, he became aware that his difference was not only physical but intellectual. His mind moved fast—far faster than most around him. His humour was sharp, his joy expansive. Few could keep pace. So he turned inward. By fifteen or sixteen, his free time was spent immersed in Blues records and the writings of Kafka, Camus, and Sartre. The symbolic language of existentialism would later surface unmistakably in lyrics that blended mysticism, philosophy, and spirituality—lyrics that would echo across the world.
Lines such as:
“The pilot of the storm who leaves no trace, like thoughts inside a dream,”
or
“As we wind on down the road, our shadows taller than our soul,”
or
“In my thoughts I have seen rings of smoke through the trees,”
or
“If you listen very hard, the tune will come to you at last—when all are one and one is all.”
Despite his beauty, intelligence, charm, warmth, wit, and devotion to music, he began studying accountancy—his family’s wish. At the same time, he sang as a soloist at school events, backed by orchestras. A friend from those years would later recall:
“I first saw him at the petrol station where I worked. His father had bought him a Morris Minor he adored. He was unbelievably friendly—and the most charismatic person I’d ever met.”
At seventeen, he moved beyond school performances and formed his first band. The drummer would become his closest friend for life. They met at a school concert. He later told the story himself: a young man approached him with an almost arrogant confidence and said,
“You’re a phenomenal singer. If you find the best drummer, you’ll be unstoppable.”
He replied,
“And are you that drummer?”
That was the beginning of a bond he would later describe simply as: “The drummer was my brother.”
Music became the axis of his existence. He knew—without doubt—that he would be a star. That he had been born for it. Around that time, he met a lady he really dearly loved. Two great loves now defined him: music and her. Until one day she asked,
“Right. It’s me or your fans?”
For the first time, he felt helpless.
“I can’t stop, I’ve got to keep going.” he said.
And the great love ended.
Years later, at the height of the stardom he had always known awaited him, he would sing for that lost love:
“Did you ever really need somebody?
Did you ever really want somebody?
The best love you ever had…
Did you ever remember me, baby?
Did it feel so good?”
There came a moment when clarity struck: he wanted only to sing. Nothing else. He told his family. His father’s answer was absolute—no. Education first. Music could only ever be a side pursuit. That refusal could not contain him. He left the keys to the Morris Minor on the table and walked out.
He would return years later—driving a Rolls-Royce.
Within a short time, everything accelerated. Rehearsals turned into concerts; concerts into tours. One night, after a performance, he married his partner at the very same venue. They were expecting a child, and the baby was born just twelve days after the wedding.
In less than six months, his life transformed entirely. He had become part of a band destined for legend, married, and a father. From that moment on, life rushed forward at relentless speed—studio sessions, rehearsals, endless travel. In that whirlwind, he spent very little time with his wife, who had just given birth. Years later, he would thank her through song:
“If the sun refused to shine, I would still be loving you.
When mountains crumble to the sea, there will still be you and me.”
A completely new universe now stretched beneath his feet. He was finally stepping into the stardom he had always known was his. As time passed, he blossomed—like a flower exploding open when it meets the sun—becoming even more radiant.
There were journeys, tours, concerts, studios, records, celebrations. Large venues became larger ones, then stadiums that could not contain the crowds. Audiences like oceans—“singing to an ocean, I can hear the ocean’s roar.” Tickets sold out instantly; new shows were added. Private jets. Entire hotels reserved. Parties in hotels, wilder parties, parties in the air. And always—girls, girls, girls.
That polygamous instinct, present in almost every man, awakened in him with ferocity. The press described his stage presence as “sexy, provocative, flamboyant.” He loved to be seen as seductive. He always had. Now he could display it openly, before tens of thousands. He was happy. He had arrived where he believed he belonged.
His golden curls crowned him with a new title: the Golden God. Once, standing on a hotel balcony with arms outstretched, he shouted it into the night:
“I am the Golden God!”
During tours, lines of women waited outside hotels. He would choose—“you stay, you go.”
The era had a name: Sex, Drugs & Rock’n’Roll. He was too intelligent, too informed, to fall deeply into the drugs—but he indulged fully in everything else. When not touring, he returned to the English countryside, to life as a devoted husband and father. Four years after his first child, a second was born.
Amid the chaos, there were retreats—moments of withdrawal with the guitarist, away from the world. Songs were born there, works that would echo across generations.
Then came the interruption.
In the summer of 1975, while on holiday with his family on an island, he was involved in a serious car accident. He was twenty-seven—standing at the edge of the infamous 27 Club. He survived, but spent a year in a wheelchair. He recorded the next album in pain, seated. Two years later, he was ready again—new hopes, new stages.
In 1977, tours resumed. At the first American show, he addressed the crowd:
“We’re sorry we’re two and a half years late. We’ll make up for it—with a little talk and a lot of music.”
The tour began in April. The audience was euphoric. Additional dates were added. Cities blurred into one another. The pace was meant to last until autumn.
But life had other plans.
One evening before a concert, an urgent call came from his wife. Their younger child was gravely ill and being taken to hospital. Two hours later, the second call came.
They had lost the child.
Time stopped.
He returned home and did not leave for a year. Music was abandoned. He decided to become a teacher—to compensate for not being there for his own children by being there for others.
It was the drummer—his brother—who refused to let him disappear. Slowly, after a year of living inside grief, he emerged again, like a child learning to crawl.
A new album followed. A song written for the lost child carried the line:
“All of my love… all of my love to you.”
Another child was born soon after—a new sun in his life. Preparations for touring resumed, but with one condition: he would never again be away from home for so long.
Rehearsals began at the guitarist’s estate. One night, the drummer drank far more than usual and was carried to bed. The next day, when they went to wake him, they found him dead.
He could not endure it.
He lost his brother. He came to despise the entire process that had led there—the fame, the excess, the life he once believed was everything. He wanted to erase the last twelve years.
For the first time, he cut off the Golden God’s curls at the root. He stripped away the jewellery, the symbols. For two years, he could not listen to the music that once flowed through his veins. It would take decades to make peace with that era.
More than thirty years later, he attended an honour ceremony with the guitarist and bassist. From a balcony, he listened as other legendary musicians performed his songs. When the drummer’s son took the drums for their most iconic piece, two tears rolled down his face.
⸻
Forty years later, on a television set, a famous host asked:
“What do you feel when you watch concert footage from those days?”
“I wonder how he felt that night after the concert.”
“When you say “HE”… do you mean yourself?”
He nods.
“Mm.”
“Don’t you remember?”
“I can’t imagine.”
***
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