Big Big Train: Between The Lines – The story of a rock band.

Author:Grant Moon

Books about bands usually fall into one of two camps. There is the Motley Crue camp, and all that comes with that story. Or there is the earnest, tedious trawl through a band’s past, usually when a band has no personality.

Between The Lines builds a new camp, delving into interesting lives, the struggles of a young band, changing personnel and unbearable sadness.

With an admirable lightness of touch, author Grant Moon makes it a page-turner, even though he doesn’t have drug-fuelled orgies or outrageous tour-rider requests to work with.

This is Big Big Train, after all.

“Evergreen and a mug of tea,” as the lyric to their song, ‘Uncle Jack’ goes.

Moon has managed to speak to just about every major character in the 30+ year story of the band, which makes for an excellent flow to the narrative and gives the story the integrity which the band’s work demands. The stories of the early days will be enjoyed by anyone who has ever been in a band, at any level. The first rehearsals, the struggles to get everyone together in the same room, at the same time, the band newsletter, the first tentative footsteps into a recording studio, all of it is universal and all of it is here, beautifully told.

Dedicated fans, (they are called Passengers, and there are thousands of them,) will be delighted at the amount of detail which Moon reveals, especially about the period “pre-success,” when singer David Longdon and Prog drummer-God, Nick d’Virgilio, appeared on the scene. The band set about recording their 6th album, 2009’s The Underfall Yard and, with Longdon and d’Virgilio in the band, along with guest musicians like XTC’s Dave Gregory and a four-piece brass section, the band produced a record which is now recognisable as the birth of the Big Big Train sound which has now made them ‘famous.’

The next album, the two part English Electric project, brings keyboard ace Danny Manners into the fold. And there, down the list of guest musicians, is Stackridge violinist, Rachel Hall.

The mug of tea is poured, various parts of the jigsaw puzzle are on the table, and we’re just getting the edges in place.

A bit of context…………..

It is February 1971 and I am four and a half months past my 14th birthday. With a 16 year old elder brother, my musical taste is very much driven by him. I am into Peter Green’s Fleetwood Mac, (followed by Danny Kirwan’s Fleetwood Mac,) Deep Purple, Led Zeppelin and Free, and have yet to venture through the back of the wardrobe, into The World of Prog.

It is a school-day and Kev, (the elder brother,) is late home. Suddenly, he bursts through the front-room door. He has a bag from Harlequin Records in his hands, (so, that’s where he’s been,) and is pulling an album out of it, while trying to lift the lid on Dad’s big mono gramophone at the same time. He puts the record on and settles into the chair opposite me. He turns the album cover over, to read the details on the back, and I can see a strange design on the front. I can make out three people standing in front of two others, one of whom is seated next to an empty chair and has a bandage around one foot. There is also the white head of a shop-dummy in the picture but I cannot make out if someone is holding it, if it is suspended or is just ‘there’.

The music has started and it is urgent, loud, physical, exploding out of the speaker. An organ sounds like a guitar, a guitar is way off in the distance, (stereo? What’s that?) and the bass growls like some snarling dog, coming to get me. And then the most glorious harmonies kick-in and I’m completely lost in a world that I will never properly come out of. My neck and arms are cold with goosebumps and my right foot is tapping, madly, trying to keep up with the insane drumming.

Of course Mum comes in and yells at Kev to turn it down; of course she does. But, for those few seconds it’s like a window has been opened into somewhere, or something, else. I have never felt so alive, so aware of every one of my senses, yet so unaware of the world around me.

My passion for music has never waned, through thousands of albums, hundreds of gigs and trips to see my favourite bands. I have stood on my seat in front of Springsteen, have cried with joy and loss at Springsteen, sung until I’m hoarse at The Saw Doctors, danced with Hall & Oates and stood, open mouthed, six feet in front of Todd Rundgren. I have rushed home to play the new Genesis album, the new Paul Brady, a second-hand Rare Bird, the new live album by Man and a treasured remaster of Frankie Miller. And I love them all.

Yet nothing has made me feel the way I did for the first few seconds of Yours Is No Disgrace from The Yes Album.

It is forty-three years later.

Big Big Train came into my life, like so much good music, via The Afterword website. The track was just there, with the comment, “This is rather good. New U.K Prog,” or something similar. I clicked ‘play’ and liked what I heard, instantly. Harmonies, guitar, adventurous playing and a voice which nestled into that place in my ear which feels comfortable and comforting, like it’s always been there. I bought the album, English Electric Full Power and loved the packaging and the booklet which came with it. It seemed to me that here is a band which cares about the look, feel and detail of an album, just as much as the listening experience. As the album played I made mental notes for tracks to go back to until, slowly, I realised that I can hear the distinctive voice of John Betjeman and there is an instant echo back to school-days and an English teacher who inspired me. During Creative Writing lessons he would put some classical music on a battered record-player and, just occasionally, then play a tape-recording of Betjeman over the top. The sound of that voice, lilting quietly over something by Holst, Debussy or Rachmaninov, was so evocative. So, I was instantly back in that wooden hut of a classroom, staring out of the window, thoughts drifting through my mind and bursting to write.

And I began to cry. Not just tears but sobs. I cried for all the years of depression, of anxiety, of unhappiness, of hiding away and of loss. After a few minutes the guitar on the track began to play a solo and the tears fell anew. And the hairs on my arms and neck stood up and I found myself laughing with joy, and crying with sorrow, at one and the same time.

When the song ended, I played it again, and again and again. I discovered that the song was called The Permanent Way.

And I discovered that I was fourteen again.

This book is a faithful run through Big Big Train’s more than thirty-year history, so my journey with the band is just the final third of a book which is an honest, funny, sad and devastating trip through the life of a musical group. It is a story of friendship, camaraderie and musicianship, of break-ups, upsets and a typically English lack of communication. The honesty of some ex-members of the band may well have come as a surprise to Greg Spawton, the only surviving original member, but author Grant Moon does not hold back, shedding light on some fairly dark corners. As fans, we are always curious as to why a band changes personnel. We want it to stay the same and we never believe the ‘musical differences’ statements so, to get behind the stories is fascinating.

Founding member, Andy Poole left when he felt he was becoming surplus to requirements in his own band. The band lost three crucial members shortly after the end of their triumphant first tour of 2019. Dave Gregory, Danny Manners and brilliant violinist, Rachel Hall, all left, the latter two during the early months of the Covid-19 pandemic, when us fans were so confused and worried about life in general that, for some of us, the disintegration of our favourite band was almost too much to take.

The final part of the book, added after the original manuscript was ready to go to print, deals with the tragic, accidental death of singer David Longdon, at the end of 2021, and how the surviving members dealt with it. The announcement that it was David’s wish that the band should continue, a view endorsed by his partner, Sarah, (who designs the band’s beautiful album covers,) is included in the final pages and gives the book a happy, hopeful ending which it might not otherwise have had.

This is a tremendous book for existing fans of the band. For the casual fan, it is also a great way to catch up with the story of the band.

However, if you know someone who would like a band which writes songs about trains, Romans, shipbuilding, Winchester, the Voyager space probe, childhood, a pigeon, and so many other subjects, then buy them a copy,

You never know, they may just feel like they did when they were fourteen years old.

And that’s never a bad thing.

Length of Read:Medium

Might appeal to people who enjoyed…

Being in a band.

One thing you’ve learned

Never play The Permanent Way on the train.

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