THE LOWEST CLASS/THE URBAN KIDS

Outside the science lab at Parkfields secondary school Wolverhampton is where it all began for The Lowest Class sometime in late 1977. Dave Newton had a dream and his first unsuspecting recruit was Dee Dee, a scruffy looking kid who had the then look of a front man that Dave had in mind to spearhead his fledgling band. The rest as they say is HISTORY. First a tug of the blazer and then the immortal words "Orite mate, d'ya wanna be in a band" to which came the reply "Ar orite"(for those of you not familiar with the black country twang, that meant YES). Newt was the cool owner of the guitar.......and two chords!! Hey rock'n'roll man, as for Dee "ov gorra great idea, ol order a mike awt me muthers catalogue". We were up and running, no stoppin' us now, we just needed to recruit a couple of new members. One of Dee Dee's mates Gray Clarke was drafted in on bass. Blonde hair, a no care attitude(to the world) and an ability to play made him perfect for the position. Newt then called on one of his best muckers Lee Thomas to join in on rythm guitar, the stage was set but still no drummer,"are they that hard to find"? The name The Lowest Class was adopted purely because of our council estate backgrounds, all of us came from working class stock, so i suppose if we'd have seen it through we really would have been "working class heroes" one and all. Early rehearsals were at Grays home in Lanesfield. His parents must have wondered what had hit them but as black country folk go, they were bostin people and his mum features on the tape, bless her. Eventually, with a bit of persuation we leant on a certain Mr (dandruff) Bruntnell the poor unfortunate pin stripe suited leader of Parkfield youth club to let us rehearse in the main hall and use the halls P.A system to boot. Let it be known "wot a gwate man 'e was" . He played his part in the history of this rock 'n' roll adventure. Equiptment was limited so all plugging in to the P.A system i.e 3 guitars and mikes caused no end of technical faults and abrupt endings to rehearsal nights and a hell of a lot of grovelling to Mr B to let us practise again the following week but practise we did and songs of our own where being composed in a strummer/jones way in the shape of Newton/ Davies(Dee). It was very early 1978 and time to unleash ourselves on the unsuspecting public or at least Parkfield Youth Club. Dave somehow had managed to obtain some quality gear for the occasion courtesy of a fella by the name of Harry who ran Playback studio's i think in Worcester Street Wolverhampton. We'd tried to set up a demo there a couple of weeks previous but 40 quid was hard to come by in those days so the demo never happened, anyway i think the band were infighting on who would actually play Roy Woods drumset which resided in the studio's. The line up for that debut gig Dee Dee/ vocals, Dave Newton/lead guitar, Lee Thomas/guitar, Gray Clarke/bass and Stu Dugmore/drums. This was the one and only time Stu Dugmore featured who's previous bands included.......well er that well known outfit who used to wear black uniforms and white belts...no not Devo, The Boys Brigade, well all that behind him he pulled it off and kept beat well on borrowed drums. Wolverhampton were always a little bit behind the rest of the country and news had not got through yet that gobbing had stopped 12 months earlier and as Dee Dee strutted across the stage the crowd showed there appreciation with volley after volley of mucus emptied from the back of there throats." This ones called Maximum Security" greeted with a huge greeny, "missed me ya bastard" as Newt breaks into an A chord.The next tune was "who is our leader" in keeping with the times because the then unelected by the public prime minister was James Callaghan and his Labour party was on the slide according to the British public and this was epitomised by the Tory advertisement showing an ever increasing dole queue with the words Labour isn't working. Next up was Crime and Corruption another parrallel with todays times and a swipe at the ever increasing lawlessness and the apathetic nature of sections of society that had been written off. a close link to this song was one called Takin' Orders a very Pusey/Parsonesque type tune co-written by Newton/Davies. The set wouldn't have been complete without a teenage frustrated love song in the shape of Sexual Atraction and a cover, this being The Skids' T.V Stars. After this gig came a change , the band invested in a junior set of drums for 30 quid which was a huge investment in those days, lost a member in Lee Thomas and took on board another member by the name of Mark Aero Alexander and a change of name for the band. Initially Dee Dee thumped out a beat on the drums but with his charismatic style rock star persona and ability to co write with Newt he stopped up front and Aero was employed to keep the beat. The new name was "The Urban Kids"