Rockin’ All Over The Wolds

God gave rock and roll to you,
Gave rock and roll to you,
Put it in the soul of everyone.

Argent

By Les Smith

In the autumn of 2019 a unique social and cultural experiment was launched under the aegis of the Pocklington & District branch of u3a.

It sought an answer to a question which had nagged away at the brain behind the experiment for months. Could a collection of ageing beatniks, hippies, prog obsessives, metal heads, punks and rock chicks recreate the heady atmosphere of clubs and halls filled many years previously with sounds, beats and smoke of dubious provenance in the living room of a semi-detached house in a quiet street in a quiet town at the foot of the Wolds?

How would they respond collectively to music they had first heard up to seventy years previously?

Would tension between rival musical factions spill out onto the pavement, making the respectable cul-de-sac look like Brighton and Margate beaches during the Great Mods and Rockers Wars of the sixties?

Or would an aura of mellow contentment wrap itself around them as they nodded their heads listening to fifteen minute jams by The Grateful Dead?

Or would they drink tea and coffee and eat biscuits while chatting and laughing amiably about their shared love of the music and the foolish ways of their youth?

The experiment was given the title Rock Music Appreciation Group, and the research began in October 2019.

When the voluntary laboratory specimens gathered for the first time, nobody knew what would happen. There was a strange brew of tension, anticipation and apprehension. At first they couldn’t even agree what “rock music” is. At the first two or three sessions almost as much time was spent trying to arrive at a definition as listening to music. Eventually all that could be accepted by everyone was that if it ain’t got drums, it ain’t rock and roll.

Once a handful of the founder-members had sorted out that it wasn’t for them, a core settled in to a steady rhythm of monthly sessions, and new members joined piecemeal as the word spread on the street, until the signs went up saying “All Seats Sold” and aspirant rockers had to join the waiting list.

Then another set of signs sprang up saying “Keep Your Distance”, Cover Your Face” and “Wash Your Hands”, all of which are anathema to the rock credo. So the group went underground, communicating secretly by email, exchanging musical enthusiasms and discoveries. Once the controls were relaxed there were sessions

under a gazebo in the garden and gradually we came together again and realised the truth in the adage, coined by Neil Young: Rock and roll will never die.

What had started as an experiment had become a little community, an unlikely coming together of people with little in common apart from arthritis and an understanding that the invention of the electric guitar was as significant as that of the wheel, gunpowder and the printing press.

Members have come and gone.

One founder-member, Roger, brought an encyclopaedic knowledge of and devotion to Elvis Presley, and much more besides. If ever we wanted to know the make and model of a particular guitar we were listening to, Roger could invariably tell us. He only left us when he needed more time to devote to making music himself. Another, David, leads the u3a Enjoying Jazz group, and keeps us from getting stuck in a strictly rock groove. Pauline’s insistence on and persistence in breaking our only rule – it has to have drums – is indulged because her taste is impeccable. Richard is our self-appointed archivist, and can be relied upon to open our ears to obscure gems from the late 60s and 70s. Tony regales us with dark tales of shady London night spots, while Kevin and Bill sit sagely, inscrutably, side-by-side, saying little but dropping in nuggets of enlightenment from their astonishingly deep stores of rock knowledge. For a necessarily short while John expanded our horizons with his love and knowledge of soul music. Grahame and Rob are relative newcomers, but decidedly two of us.

Those of us who were there at the outset recall with great affection our late friend Menos, who left us suddenly in May 2021.

So here we are, five and a half years on. You’d think we’d run out of music to listen to and ramble on about, but there’s always something new – even if it’s old – and Neil Young was, as usual, right: Rock and roll will never die.

Jenny said, when she was just five years old
You know there's nothin' happening at all
Every time she put on the radio
There was nothin' goin' down at all
Not at all

One fine mornin', she puts on a New York station
And she couldn't believe what she heard at all
She started dancin' to that fine-fine-fine-fine music
Ooohhh, her life was saved by rock 'n' roll.

Lou Reed