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I've Got a
Horse
(Memento Mori/Billy Fury)
What is it anyway this nature thing? Is it that bit of green you
see between stations on the train? Is it the park, remembered play
space of childhood now the dark gothic hinterland of dubious souls?
Is it the rustle in the hedgerow, or Tom Archer's sausages or the
bloodthirsty countryside alliance or the horse slasher? Is it nicey
nicey biscuits from the Duchy of Cornwall? Is it the overpriced
cut flowers at the tube station or the roses sold by the side of
the road by Eastern European immigrants? Or is it the soya milk
that makes your tea taste like cardboard (Jesus, how un-natural
is that, milk made from soya beans, lactose intolerant, gluten free
bollocks!)? And is Prometea the genetically manufactured horse natural
or unnatural? Does it matter? I don't know. Nature makes me uneasy.
What I do know is that once in some obscure other world of repressed
sexuality and homo erotically charged kitsch there was a glorious
crooner with a damaged heart called Billy Fury. Poor Billy, a shy,
winsome, bequiffed bit of rough from Birkenhead with a moody James
Dean look. He sang Halfway To Paradise and released a thousand camp
fantasies - falling like flowers - into the heart of his gay manager
Larry Parnes and his ‘stable of boys’. The boys’
names read like some latter day list of punk pseudonyms: Vince Eager,
Johnny Gentle, Dicky Pride. Archaic and dangerous, resonating with
the reverberations of illicit sex.
Billy however preferred animals to people. In 1961 he made the ludicrously
titled film I've Got a Horse. "I like animals, I've
got a horse" declared the film’s poster. I've never seen
the film but the very thought of it fills me with a curious mixture
of amusement, melancholy and happiness. By 1965 Billy had had enough
of being the poor man’s Jacques Brel, and he began to take
time out to indulge his love of wild life. Always frail, an early
bout of rheumatic fever had left him with consistently bad health.
He resurfaced briefly (and gloriously) as Stormy Tempest in the
seminal film That'll be the Day. As Stormy he was playing himself,
a washed out, camp 50s crooner, and even though he is on screen
for barely 5 minutes his incredible presence (the golden quiff now
silver grey, his once elegant cheekbones now skeletal) takes your
breath away.
In 1971 after open heart surgery (which he had to have on the NHS
because he was by now bankrupt) Billy moved to a farm in Wales where
he raised horses and sheep. On 7th March 1982 he collapsed suffering
from partial paralysis and temporary blindness, he made a good recovery
but eventually died at 2.10pm on 28th January 1983 he was 42 years
old.
"Billy
Fury is virtually the same as James Dean. He was entirely doomed
too and I find that quite affectionate. He was persistently unhappy
and yet had a string of hit records. He was discovered working on
the docks in Liverpool, was dragged to London, styled and forced
to make records. He always wanted to make very emotionally over-blown
ballads but he found himself in the midst of the popular arena.
He despised almost every aspect of the music industry and was very,
very ill from an early age. This album (of his) is the rarest I
have. It was his first… I was really quite poor so whatever
record I could buy was like a piece of my heart. Something I couldn't
possibly exist without. Billy's singles are totally treasurable.
I get quite passionate about the vocal melodies and the orchestration
always sweeps me away. He always had such profound passion."
Morrissey interviewed by Ian Birch
Smash Hits, June 21 - July 4, 1984
Alex Michon
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