Candy and the Firestorm I might not quite be ‘blue eyed murder in a size five dress’, but I'd definitely ‘hit the ground running’.

1981 was a great year to be in a heavy metal band, but not in our town. Every local lad seemed to be wearing an Iron Maiden or Saxon T-shirt, and sporting the beginnings of a mullet to match, so the audience was there. Unfortunately, every venue that wasn’t tied up by cabaret acts, catered for university students who were trying to convince themselves that our provincial high street was the King’s Road circa 1976. The sole exception was the ‘Coach and Horses’, a biker dive where flares were making their last hurrah. If you could convince its legendarily terse landlord, your band was good enough to grace his basement, you still had to fight your way into the regulars’ affections; tough venue, tough crowd, and for most bands tough luck.

My first guitar came via my older sister, who in 1978 decided she wanted to be a rock star. That notion lasted about six months, after which I became the de facto owner of a truly awful guitar — a Kay Strat’ copy with an action you could limbo under. After a few weeks of Burt Wheedon, I gave up on black dots and turned elsewhere for inspiration. My Friday nights were spent propping up a tape recorder in front of the radio, and it wasn’t long before I lost my heart to Eddie Van Halen. Emulating his every note became my grail quest, each tap, each squeal painstakingly tracked down and replicated. The onset of puberty was nothing compared to the day I cracked ‘Eruption’. Today I’d be called a ‘shredder’, but back then the names for someone who spent all their free time in their room with a guitar were far less complimentary.

Christmas 1979 found me the owner of an Aria Flying-V, and an amplifier that had once been a Vox AC-10. After that I was banished to the garage, unless no one else was home, but those times were special for another reason. When I wasn’t throwing shapes I was rummaging around in my sister’s closet, or playing with her make-up; as Bethany considered the world to be her dressing up box, there was always something new to try on when an opportunity arose. The names for boys who did that were even less complimentary, so it goes without saying that secrecy vied with guilt as the main emotion of my early teens. Worse still, we got on really well; Bethany began to join me in the garage, singing along to my guitar. I loved her voice, it was quite deep for a girl, but she could shriek when she needed to — the Carpenters had nothing on us. My sister decided we should form a band.

By then Bethany had moved to the local tech where there was a ready supply of wannabe musicians, and a few drummers too. She coaxed a couple of boys to our garage to hear her little brother play, neither of whom looked terribly impressed at first. Understandably, at thirteen I wasn’t impressive, I’d just starting my growth spurt, not too spotty but skinny, and weighed down by a mop of unruly curls. No one outside the family had watched me play - the neighbours had merely heard me — so shyly I picked up the guitar, dropping a few notes at first, but when I finally looked up I realised I was in a band.

Big Sis kept us hard at work — no one had any illusions about whose band it was - until she told us Firestorm was ready to appear in public. We started with a fundraiser at the tech, just three songs, but they seemed to go down well. After that we played wherever we could, a few more gigs at the tech, scout huts, school halls, and pretty much anywhere that would have us. We even picked up a few fans, although our sound was more American than the fashion, and quite soft when you compared to most British metal; the solemn warnings given at school gigs that headbanging would result in brain haemorrhages didn’t really apply to us. After a few months of this the time had come to try booking a slot at the ‘Coach and Horses’, as intimidating a prospect as that was.

Mike Price’s ‘office’ was the space behind the bar not filled with kegs, and boxes of crisps. Few of his regulars had paid us any attention as we trooped in with our tape, and asked to see the manager, which was fine by us as they looked a rum bunch. Rummest of all was Mike, whose tattoos held a hypnotic fascination for me, or at least something else to look at besides his grizzled face.

“How old are you son?” it took a while to realise he was talking to me, “are you in the band?”

“Nah,” Bethany butted in while I was untying my tongue, “my little brother just helps move the gear.”

“He’s the smallest roadie I’ve ever seen,” Mike shook his head, “but he can’t come in here, I’m on my arse with the licensing board as it is.”

“I’m sure we can manage, so does that mean we can play here?”

It did, we were booked in for the next Thursday. Outside we all looked at my sister, wondering just how the band would manage without a guitarist. “I’ve got an idea,” she said cryptically, and neither Dave, Phil nor I was going to press her any further.

“You want me to do what?” my voice echoed around the garage, “you’re not serious.”

“Oh come on you little perv,” Bethany poked me in the chest, “you’ve been in my closet often enough.”

“You know?” I managed to squeak.

“It was either you, Mum or Dad,” she laughed, “and I couldn’t see either of them in my tartan mini, so it had to be you.”

“But you never said anything,” I wanted to curl up and die, “you’ve not told them have you?”

“And spoil the fun?” she punched my arm, “I was just waiting for a chance to see you all dolled up!”

“Who’s your friend?” Dave asked as I clambered into the back of his van.

“Bloody Hell, it’s Martin,” Phil said watching me pull down the hem of the skirt with one hand while taking my guitar from Bethany with the other.

“Good innit, told you I had an idea, “it certainly was better than my fumbling attempts, though I was worried how we’d get the heavy eye make-up off. I had enough problems in school already without turning up in the morning looking like Dusty Springfield. Not that Dusty would ever have appeared on stage in fishnets, a denim mini and a pair of heels that would have been a challenge to anyone who hadn’t previously spent hours mincing around in front of a mirror.

“Well we can’t call her Martin,” Dave said, torn by the problem of whether to stare at me, or watch my sister get into the front seat, “ant ideas?”

“Candy innit?” Phil smiled, “Candy Rhoads.”

Keeping my balance was a problem, the Aria was a big old lump of a guitar and came close to pulling me over. That at least stopped me from dwelling on the fact that our handful of regular fans were staring at me. Bethany was milling around, quietly answering questions and asking everyone who knew us not to spill the beans.

We kicked off with Pat Benatar’s ‘Hit Me With Your Best Shot’, playing it pretty straight and letting Bethany take charge of the stage. People were wandering in from the bar to check us over, but quite a few of them were wandering out, it was time to step it up a notch. Good as she was on girls’ songs, my sister really excelled singing male numbers. For our second number we launched into Sammy Hagar’s ‘This Planet’s On Fire’; it had a killer riff that showed off my guitar playing, but the highlight was Bethany’s aggressive ‘burn in hell!’ during the chorus. The wanderers started hanging around, or bringing others in from the bar.

Mid way through ‘Eruption’ I glanced over at my sister to check she was ready to switch into ‘Unchained’, she winked and slid up to whisper in my ear.

“Someone’s having fun,” and I was. All the other times we’d played I’d stood rooted to the spot, but that night I was moving, grooving even. Terrified as I was that everyone would start pointing and laughing, stepping into someone else’s heels seems to liberate me. Skinny fourteen year old boys didn’t belong on the stage, they were there on sufferance, but a babe with an axe was so rock and roll. I might not quite be ‘blue eyed murder in a size five dress’, but I had ‘hit the ground running’.

For an encore — an encore! — we did ‘Devil Gate Drive’ with as many slides, taps, squeals and harmonics as I could coax out of my guitar. We had never played it live before, it was just one of the songs we would jam in the garage, but it went down a storm. We played on until the landlord pulled the plug on us — none too soon as we were running out of material.
Packing up a hand landed on my shoulder, the tattooed forearm announcing its owner.

“Cute trick kid,” Mike growled, “I should break your fucking legs for that.” Bethany dropped what she was holding and rushed to my defence, but he waved her away. “Best act we’ve had in for years,” he continued, “fancy a regular Friday night slot?”

We all nodded, wondering just how we could play there when he knew I was under age.

“Just make sure you bring the girl guitarist,” he barked over his shoulder, and left us to finish up.

author's note:

It's a bit autobiographical this one. I was in a band called Firestorm in 1981, but singing as I'd only recently taken up guitar. I still have the Aria, but not the amp which was sold on after it nearly electrocuted me. I was no shredder however, and didn't learn to play 'Eruption' until 1987. Back then my main aim was to start and finish a song in the same key :)

We wouldn't have been caught dead playing Pat Benetar, and couldn't have played Van Halen (though I was a huge fan of the latter - still am really, and my fingers are crossed for British dates in 2008). We stuck to Diamond Head, Iron Maiden and Black Sabbath in the main, and even wrote a few of our own.

Sadly I never got to take the stage in a skirt, but there was eye liner...