IN THIS ISSUE ...

1 - THE EDITOR WRITES - Latest news and information in brief

2 - SUGGS SOLO AGAIN - On Wednesday 22nd November the legendary Suggs
    was the guest on Mark Lamarr's reggae show, "A Beginners Guide to
    Reggae". Here's Andy Clayden with a short review...

3 - MARCH OF THE GHERKINS - Following last week's announcement that 
    Suzie Wilkins is currently teaching her school recorder group to 
    play the classic "March of The Gherkins", she has sent me an 
    update.

4 - SATURDAY MORNING MADNESS - Ace cub reporter, JASON MARTIN, grills
    MADNESS mercilessly after an under-16's only gig at the
    `ammersmiff. Taken from The Record Mirror, 23rd February 1980.

5 - TIME FOR BED - Thanks and closing words.

[1] - THE EDITOR WRITES

Evening all,

Well, I managed to return home from a rather frantic weekend away
slightly earlier than I expected, meaning that a Sunday release of
the MIS was on the cards. So, without further ado, here's this weeks
edition of the bulletin.

Fancy joining a few like-minded fans in a pre-gig drink before the
Blockheads/Phil Jupitus gig on Monday 4th December at Camden's 
Dingwalls? If so, please get in touch with one of the moderators of
the Ian Dury Mailing List at; grimsdale_2000 at yahoo.co.uk for further
details. The plan is to meet in Dingwalls Riva Bar (upstairs) from
6pm.

If you're going along to the pre-gig meet and the gig itself, try not
to drink too much, as we'd appreciate a review for the following
issue.

Many thanks to Simsey for the info.grimsdale_2000 at yahoo.co.uk for 
further details.

Calling all German and German speaking Maddies. Lars Vogelgesang 
tells us that he is starting to put together a new Madness related
website. Lars decided that as there were so many English Madness
websites around he decided to make his site German (in most parts).
Please surf along to: http://www.madnotmad.de and once you've had a
good look around, drop Lars an e-mail (vogelg at rumms.uni-mannheim.de)
with any feedback you'd care to give.

Some Stateside Madness news now, courtesy of MIS subscriber, Doug
Holmes;

     "Recently the baseball World Series was being contested 
      by the New York Yankees and the New York Mets - as a 
      resident in nearby Connecticut it was difficult to not 
      get caught up in the excitement (I am an avid baseball 
      fan too). Well, during the coverage of one of the games, 
      Fox (the TV station) had put together a little film 
      entitled'The A-Z of the Subway series' - the music to 
      accompany this was Return of the Los Palmas 7 no less!!! 
      Bought a lump to my throat-and surprising to hear a 
      Madness song other than Our House (or at a stretch One 
      Step Beyond) in the US of A"

Many thanks to Doug for the info - much appreciated!

Fancy going along to see the almighty Bad Manners? If so, you may be
interested to know that they will be playing at The Dome, Whitley
Bay, Tyne and Wear on Monday 27th November. Many tanks to Jeff Sharp
for the details.

And with that, lets get underway with the articles.

Enjoy the read, 

Robert Hazelby (MIS Online editor)

[2] - SUGGS SOLO AGAIN?

On Wednesday 22nd November the legendary Suggs was the guest on Mark
Lamarr's reggae show, "A Beginners Guide to Reggae". Here's Andy
Clayden with a short review;

Hi,

Anyone catch Suggs on Lamarr's reggae show?

It wasn't a bad show, although Suggs didn't bother taking any of his
own records along so they picked from Lamarrs selection. At the
beginning Lamarr played Buster's One Step Beyond and the Wailers
Wings Of A Dove, saying that Madness had covered both - although 
this Wings Of A Dove is a completely different song!

At the end Lamarr asked him what was happening musically, and Suggs
said he's thinking of doing some more solo stuff in a reggae style.

Suggs concluded by saying that Cecilia had killed the Lone Ranger off
as it had too much candy floss on it.

All the best,

Andy (django at hilltop61.freeserve.co.uk)

[3] - MARCH OF THE GHERKINS

Following last week's announcement that Suzie Wilkins is currently
teaching her school recorder group to play the classic "March of The
Gherkins", she has sent me an update.

The first rehearsal was last Wednesday, but unfortunately Suzie was
unable to be there for the monumental occasion. On the plus side,
Suzie points out that the group will have a chance to learn it 
properly before she hears it.

On a technical note, Suzie tells me that the tune is very close to
the original, but she has had to change the key up one semitone and
some portions of the piece had to be changed. Apart from that we are
assured that it is very close to the original.

With any luck the song will have its first public airing at The
Eastbourne Music and Arts Festival.

If you would like further information regarding the festival, please
contact Suzie Wilkins at: Wilkins.Family at btinternet.com

Many thanks to Suzie for keeping us up-to-date with this!

[4] - SATURDAY MORNING MADNESS

Ace cub reporter, JASON MARTIN, grills MADNESS mercilessly after an
under-16s only gig at `ammersmiff.

Were we going to make it? I was taking my cousin, Denise, to the 
Madness concert for under 16 year olds. She was at the top of the 
stairs, showing us her Madness T-shirt when she fell from top to 
bottom. She went all white and passed out.

My mum called an ambulance. Luckily they said she was OK and we made
it for a Saturday morning of Madness.

Playing with Madness at the Hammersmith Odeon in London were the 
Mo-dettes who took the place of the Dolly Mixtures because one of 
them was ill. The lead singer was quite a good dancer but I didn't
like them much except when Madness joined them for their last number,
`Twist and Shout`.

While we were waiting for Madness to come on we were shown some 
cartoons.

As soon as Madness got on stage lots of fans ran towards the front,
and the nutty dancer, Chas Smash, said "Don't watch that, watch this,
this is the heavy, heavy monster sound", and they started playing 
`One Step Beyond`.

The songs that I liked best were `Stepping Into Line`, `My Girl`,
`Tarzan's Nuts`, `George` and two new songs, `Young and Old` and
`Pete's Beat`. Chas was very funny doing his dances.

Madness had to come back three times because the skins didn't want
them to go. Suggs said "You've had your tenners worth", as they went
off stage. The drummer, Dan Woodgate, didn't want to leave, and Chas
had to carry him off.

While we were waiting for Madness to change for the junior press
conference, TISWAS, the TV programme asked us come questions.

Then Suggs was the first member of Madness to come dancing his way
up the stairs. All the group sat on a big table in front of us. They
asked me to ask them the first question. It's difficult to work out,
with seven of them, who is answering, but here are the questions and
answers.

 Q - "Have you ever been in another group apart from Madness?"

 A - "No", they all shouted together

 Q - "How many gigs have you played?"

 A - "Hundreds, but none as good as today's one".

 Q - "How did you all meet?"

 A - "Chris, Lee and Mike were all friends, then we met Suggs and then
      we all got together, but it's mainly all friends".

 Q - "What job would you like to do if you weren't in a group?"

 A - There were many different answers, but the main ones were a
     reporter, a bank manager, and a gardener.

 Q - "What other music do you listen to?"

 A - "Elvis Costello, Ian Dury, reggae, and Kilburn and The High
      Roads".

 Q - "Do you make a lot of money?"

 A - "No, but hopefully we will, but we haven't got any yet. Why,
      would you like to lend us a few quid?"

 Q - "Did you write `My Girl` because you had a row with your
      girlfriend?"

 A - "Yea, I had an argument with her, then I wrote the song", said
      Mike Barson.

 Q - "Are you still all nutty?"

 A - "Without a shadow of a doubt. We're the nuttiest".

 Q - "Why did you sign for Stiff?"

 A - "We were never on 2-Tone, we were only asked to do one record.
      We went to Stiff because we couldn't make the records 
      ourselves."

 Q - "Did any of you get A-levels at school?"

 A - All different answers came up but in the end they said they
     started the band before they had a chance.

 Q - "What's the message behind the new song `Pete's Beat?".

 A - "It's about a copper who never gets a promotion and has to stay
      on the beat. His name is Pete".

 Q - "What do you take before you go on stage?"

 A - "Make-up, massage, hair-cuts. No, we don't take anything".

 Q - "Why did you do this gig for under 16 year-olds?"

 A - "The reason we did it was we were playing places like The Lyceum
      and younger kids couldn't get in because you were drinking. We
      wanted to do a sit down gig so that the younger kids wouldn't
      get squashed".

 Q - "What about the future?"

 A - "We're going to America again and when we come back we'll tour
      Britain, but at smaller venues".

 Q - "Why do you call yourself Madness?"

 A - "Well, you know it's one of the songs we do, and we used to be
      called `The Invaders`, but some other group with the same name
      got signed before we did so we had to change it. Chris thought
      of it, and it fitted in with what the group was about".

 Q - "What's your favourite song?"

 A - "The ones I wrote", said one of them.

 Q - "What about the rest of the band?"

 A - "The ones they wrote.", they laughed.

 Q - "Will you change your sound?"

 A - "If it changes, it changes. If it doesn't, it doesn't matter. We
      We'll just go on making songs and hope people like it".

 Q - "What's your favourite football team?"

 A - "Arsenal. No, England. Suggsy likes Scotland and Chas likes
      Ireland, and Mike said he doesn't like football"

 Q - "How do you always look so handsome?"

 A - "Well, Suggs has had plastic surgery. No, it's just natural, he 
      says. We all have arguments about who's the handsomest".

 Q - "What are your hobbies?"

 A - "Ooh, just don't talk about that. Making money and laughing all 
      the way to the bank. Making models and British motorcycles".

One of their cousins, a two year old boy, was lifted onto the table
and he did a Madness dance. Everyone laughed. Then they were asked
what colour underpants they wore and some of them showed us - mainly
striped ones.

The last question was "What do you wear in bed?". Some said "nothing"
one said "Brut 33" and I decided it was time to go. So did Madness.

[5] - TIME FOR BED

That about wraps it up for this weeks MIS Bulletin. A big thank you
to everyone who has provided information for this issue - it's really
appreciated!

If you would like to submit material for a future edition of the MIS,
please get in touch. Remember, the MIS can only exist with your
contributions as I don't have the time to type up everything for each
issue. If you come across anything Madness related in the press, your
own collection, or on the TV/radio, please send in the details so 
that I can pass on the news.

Until next week. Take care.

All the nutty best,

Robert Hazelby