PiL bassist Jah Wobble on growing up with a poltergeist, and what happened after John Lydon told him he was joining the Sex Pistols (two extracts from Dark Luminosity: Memoirs of a Geezer). Plus: See Jah Wobble at the Idler Festival – details below

A bell rang loudly. My mum Kathleen was as alarmed as the bell. As if giving birth isn’t scary enough, she was now fearful that the bell signified that I was a ‘blue baby. In fact it merely indicated that I was a ‘witnessed birth. In those days every twelfth birth had to be witnessed by the student midwives and trainee doctors.

The bell was summoning all to witness my birth. So even then I had an audience. As was the practice then, the midwife held me upside down and smacked my bum, causing me to issue forth a loud and furious wail. She laughed and said, “This one got a temper!’

Well, she wasn’t wrong there. My entrance into the world was made at the East End Maternity Home on Commercial Road, Stepney, London, E1. The date was 11 August 1958. I was christened John Joseph Wardle.

My family were living in Locksley Street, E14. When I was still a baby we moved to Smithy Street, E1. The house had been home to a woman who was a spiritualist. She had held regular meetings there. The house had a very dark and weird vibe. My mum found that she was afraid there, especially when she was alone with me and my sister Catherine during the day. She was very unnerved. I now realise that what many would term poltergeist activity was occurring.

My mum’s resolve finally broke when my sister, who was about six at the time, told her about the conversations she was having with the ‘old man at the piano’ (the place came with an old out-of-tune pub piano).

That was it… my mum freaked out and got my dad’s brother Terry, who was a Roman Catholic priest, to come and bless every room in the house. He didn’t do a ‘full-on’ pukka exorcism (I think at that time the Catholic Church in the UK sort of unofficially left full-on exorcisms to a group of monks based in Highgate).

I recollect him going from room to room, splashing holy water about while mumbling prayers in Latin. I think the feeling, for my mum, was akin to having sorted out an insurance policy; a few evil spirits cannot argue with the cover provided by the Holy Ghost.

My most vivid memory of that house is of falling ill with a very high temperature (something that I was prone to throughout childhood). I started to hallucinate, seeing gaudily coloured snakes on both animate and inanimate surfaces. I was screaming, “Nakes!’, ‘nakes!, but could not be consoled, because those snakes were everywhere, even on the bodies and faces of my mum and dad.

They fetched the Jewish doctor from across the street where his practice was situated. When summoned, Dr Abrahams said, ‘If I didn’t know better, I would swear that this boy had the DTs. Well, funnily enough, years later I did indeed suffer from the DTs, but I never saw anything quite as powerful as that childhood hallucination. Decades later, when I looked at Van Gogh’s late-period paintings, his vibrant swirls of colour reminded me of that vision.

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In 1975 John Lydon announced to me that he was going to join a band, as a singer. Well, he may just as well have told me that he was going to open his own practice as a psychiatrist, or that he was running away to join a circus. I didn’t know anyone who had ever been in a band. At that time very few working-class kids would have considered forming a band. We all loved music, and most of us regularly purchased records; however, there was no prevalent culture of playing musical instruments.

The initial contact between John Lydon and the other Pistols has been well documented (the jukebox audition, etc.). I think it was Sid who had made the initial introductions. Sid was a bloke who would busy himself knocking about trendy shops and boutiques all day, and had become a regular at Sex. He was absolutely obsessed with clothes and fashion.

I think that Sid had mixed feelings about John getting the gig with the Pistols. I think he was excited that his mate had somehow got inside of what seemed an interesting scene, because he felt it boded well for himself in the future. Another part of him was simply green with envy.

John Lydon understandably ducked out of Kingsway not long after getting his break with the Pistols. I therefore spent a fair bit of time hanging around with Sid at that time. To be honest, I never felt entirely comfortable with him. I would often avoid him, or find an excuse to leave his company.

Without John Lydon to hang out with he was a bit of a lost soul. He would often end up playing gooseberry if I was with Margaux. He seemed unable to talk to girls, which was strange in a way because his prime interests were quite girlie – i.e., pop stars (Bryan Ferry, Bowie, et al.) and fashion. In fact he struggled to connect with anyone on anything other than the most superficial level.

It was like a large chunk of his personality was missing, or was at least very stunted. It was as if that part of us that empathises with people, and demonstrates and expresses compassion, was missing in him; then again, I could say that about many of the people that I have known in my life (especially those that inhabited the punk and post-punk scenes). However, with Sid that aspect was accentuated. Consequently at times he was too one-dimensional for me.

However, he was far from being an Antichrist, or from being a terminal bore, for that matter. And he did have a sense of humour, which is often a powerful redeemer in my eyes. Sometimes he was like a lost little boy. Predictably, though, as soon as he realised that he had your sympathy, he would try to take advantage of your better nature (normally by attempting to borrow 5p). You could say that he already had a junkie’s needy mentality.

These extracts are from Dark Luminosity: Memoirs of a Geezer (the expanded edition) by Jah Wobble (£12.99, Faber & Faber). Buy a copy from Bookshop.org here.

Or buy from Blackwell’s here.

SEE JAH WOBBLE AT THE IDLER FESTIVAL

Jah Wobble will be in conversation with Suzi Feay at the Idler Festival on Saturday 11 July. The legendary post-punk bassist will be treating us to tales from his rollercoaster ride of a life – from East End childhood to playing bass in Public Image Ltd (PiL) to his thriving solo career

The Idler Festival runs from Friday 10 to Sunday 12 July at Fenton House and Gardens in Hampstead, London NW3.

See who else is performing and buy tickets with our festival poster here. Click on the performer’s name for details.

See you there!

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