Dyslexia Blog - One sausage short of a barbeque?

those of you who haven't read my dyslexia blogs before, here is a little preamble and introduction, so you know who I am and what I do and why I write this stuff. For those of you who know the story, skip to the end of the paragraph for todays installment. Let me give you a bit of Background so you know who I am and what I do. I was born in 1962. I didn't start talking until I was 4 years old (at all, not a single word). My parents thought I was deaf. My reading age at eleven was 5. When I was fifteen I started a rock and roll band called the False Dots, the band is still going strong. When I was 16 I started a business called Mill Hill Music Complex (although then it was simply called the studio), a rehearsal studio, as we had nowhere to rehearse. The business has grown into a very successful enterprise, one of Londons biggest and most well respected independent studios. We now have 16 studios and a music shop and also have a photography/video studio and a dance studio. I also have done IT work, mostly on a freelance basis since 1983. In 2012 I also moved into film production, producing two highly acclaimed documentary films, both of which had screenings at the House of Commons. When I was 31, a friend suggested I had a dyslexia test. To my surprise I was told I was moderately dyslexic. This made me interested in the subject. To my amazement, what I have learned over the years is that my lack of educational aptitude, my feelings of anger and injustice and the core of my personality have been formed by the fact I cannot read words in a linear fashion. In 2013, I have set one of my objectives to use this blog to let dyslexics know they are not alone, to suggest that people who think they may be dyslexic to get an assessment and toget people who have dyslexic children or siblings to understand the issues that they face.

As the Barnet Eye blog draws ever closer to it's millionth hit, at the current rate this will happen sometime towards the end of May, I can only chuckle at the career advice I received at Finchley Catholic High School back in 1978. Schooling in the 1960's and 70's was a cruel place for the dyslexic bretheren. Over the course of my schooling, my teachers seemed to be in competition to find the wittiest jibe to humilate me as homework or classwork were reviewed. "Tichborne, are you one sausage short of a barbeque?", "Tichborne, is there an village somewhere which is missing it's idiot?", "Tichborne, are you struggling to complete the application form for the national society of imbeciles?" were just a few that stuck in my memory.

Did this inspire me to be less dyslexic? I think you can imagine the answer to that. So what did inspire me? What did give me self belief? There were two things and the answer may shock you. The first was the lyrics of punk rock music. Minimalist lyrics such as the Ramones, made me realise that you could get the message over in two lines. Given the choice between a nine minute classic with all manner of  "interesting" words and lyrics, such as Bohemian Rhapsody by Queen or "I don't want to walk around with you" by the Ramones, I'd pick the Ramones every time.

I don't wanna walk around with you  

I don't wanna walk around with you  

I won't wanna walk around by you  

So why you wanna walk around me?

I don't wanna walk around with you 

I don't wanna walk around with you

 
I won't go out with you  

I don't wanna walk around with you 

I won't walk around by you  

So why you wanna walk around me?

I don't wanna walk around with you 

I don't wanna walk around with you

I don't wanna walk around with you  

I don't wanna walk around with you 

I won't walk around by you 

So why you wanna walk around me?

I don't wanna walk around with you  

I don't wanna walk around with you Alright

I won't go out with you  

I don't wanna walk around with you 

I won't walk around by you 

So why you wanna walk around me?

I don't wanna walk around with you 

I don't wanna walk around with you

Whilst the Ramones song only contained two lines, you knew exactly what the song was saying. It did what it said on the tin. Bohemian Rhapsody is nine minutes long and to this day I haven't got a clue what it's about. It may be very clever, it may have lots of interesting bits in it, but I have no connection at all with it.

At school, I'd been force fed a diet of poetry I couldn't relate to and couldn't understand, books which I didn't enjoy and didn't really seem to say anything and subjects which bore no relation to my daily life. At age 14, when taking my O level options, I chose Building Studies - Decoration and Design. The only reason I chose this was it allowed me to spend half a day a week out of school, at the curriculum centre in Byng Road, Barnet. It was the only lesson where I actually learned anything which earned me money.

The other thing which inspired me was 2000AD, a comic which started in 1977, featuring Judge Dredd. This gave a glimpse of a future world, ruled by a fascistic and undemocratic state, policed by Judges, with the power of life and death over its citizens. The judges were pitted against such villains as graffiti artist Chopper, who's only release from a humdrum life was risking life and limb and a long sentence in the cubes to place his graffiti in ever more dangerous and high profile places. The glory of leaving his tag under the noses of judges who would cut him down in an instant, for simply spraying his name was a purpose in a pointless life.

As Thatcherism bit and the economic situation worsened, the storylines seem to reflect the mode of the time. The height of the Thatcher economic gloom was 1981, around the time I left school. I'd had enough of the UK and left London to live in Stockholm for six months. I felt I needed a complete change of scenery and a change of attitude. My plan was to spend six months writing a punk concept album, which I'd come back and record and this would make the bands name. Every day, I'd write a bit of a song. The story was in some ways a mirror of the theme of Quadrophenia by The Who, but sent with a punk backing. The story was one of alienation and redemption. Much of the story was autobiographical. The key moment was to be standing on the bridge over the M1 in disarray and distress and being saved by the love of  a friend who happened to be walking past. The end of the film would be the start of the band. For me, the moment my band "The False Dots" had their first rehearsal was the day my life changed. Up until then, I'd been pretty unhappy. Myself and Pete Conway spent three months writing songs, bought instruments and then recruited drummer Dave Edwards and singer Mandy Spokes. Our first rehearsal was the 14th Feb 1979. Although we were completely crap, it was the moment I knew what I wanted to do and that I could do it.

This was important. Knowing you can do something you want to do. Knowing you can enjoy yourself and being in a band is a fantastic feeling. Collaborating with a talented lyric writer was also great. It gave me confidence to write my own songs and develop my own capabilities as a lyricisit. Changing schools and finding myself in the more creative environment at Orange Hill Senior High School, surrounded by the likes of Boz Boorer (musical director of Morrissey and Lead guitarist of the Polecats) was a joy.

After an initial six months, the original False Dots line up split, following a terrible incident where Dave was thrown through the window of WH Smiths in Mill Hill Broadway, severing a tendon in his arm. Shortly after the band had a massive row and it finished. A couple of months later, Pete Conway and myself decided to give it another go. We threw out all of the old songs and started again. we recruited Hank Marvins son Paul and talented guitarist Paul Hircombe. We've been going ever since, Pete Conway departed six months later, Paul Hircombe stayed until 2008. Sadly he passed away ago from the big C a year ago.

Although the band never had any commercial success, it has been a fantastic artistic success and a brilliant experience for me personally. We've raised tens of thousands of pounds over the last 34 years playing gigs for various charities. Our songs have cropped up in the strangest places, most recently Spotlight was used by Manchester City TV as the theme tune for their November goal of the month show.

The band inspired me to start Mill Hill Music Complex. We now have 18 studios and we have helped all manner of artists over the last 34 years. Last week, Lee Thompson from Madness launched his new project, The Lee Thompson Ska Orchestra, with a video filmed in our brand new video studio. (Check it out here).


Which brings me back to how I started this blog. Back in 1978, my then careers teacher at Finchley asked me in for an interview. He asked what I'd like to be. I replied that I'd like to be an astronaut or a rock and roll guitarist. He replied that as I wasn't American, I couldn't be an astronaut and as I couldn't play guitar, I'd never be a guitarist. He suggested I work for the London Borough of Barnet sweeping roads or gardening for the parks service. What an irony as my blog heads towards the 1,000,000 hit that I spend my days writing about why jobs such as these should remain as part of the London Borough of Barnet and not be outsourced to private contractors.

When I consider all of these things, I can't help but laugh at the irony. Of all the people who went through that office, went on to University, went on to great things, it is the dyslexic who is one sausage short of a Barbeque, who ends up writing the most read blog in Barnet and running the biggest and most successful independent studio in North West London. It isn't a happy ending really, but there is a sense of cold satisfaction at the fact that despite all of the sh*t heaped on me, I feel I've done something useful and worthwhile.