Coops and I were near-neighbours at this time. He lived in his Crapper mausoleum to Edwardiana - already well covered on this website - which looked out on Wandsworth Common, south-west London. I lived in a rather less salubrious road near Clapham Junction railway station.

My wife, Mary, and I harboured vague hopes that the increasingly fashionable area around the Junction - Lavender Hill, Battersea Rise and Northcote Road - would eventually embrace our own house in Plough Road. We watched gloomily as the years went by and the trendy bars and restaurants gradually spread throughout the region , totally bypassing Plough Road.

Coops and I probably looked an ill-assorted pair. He drove a left-hand drive Volkswagen six-seat pick-up truck and wore tweed suits, coachman’s topcoat and deerstalker hat. I dressed more in the fashion of the day in floral shirts, flares, long hair and my chops were always adorned with sideburns and “Zapata” moustache. Although there was only a decade between our ages I often felt we must have looked like grandpa and grandson.

Our drummer Ray, inherited from a former trio, was a shadowy figure and I can’t remember much about him except that he performed well and didn't get in the way.

For at least some of our three-year stint Coops used to take one of his art evening classes on a Friday and he would always arrive at the Rumboe late, surrounded by a throng of acolytes and students, all eager to buy him his favourite tipple at the time, barley wine and bitter.
Continued on Rumboe 3