Reasons to be Cheerful, Part 2

I posted something quoting this Ian Dury song a couple of weeks ago, and it set me thinking about the man and his music.
Back in I think 1972, I became friends with the Edgar Broughton Band and their wives, girlfriends, roadies and families.
They had done a live on a lorry gig in Redcar, and had been arrested. A good friend and founder member of On the 8th Day in Manchester, Brian Livingstone, was their solicitor. He had a reputation as a sympathetic and radical man of law. At the turn of the year 1971 to 1972 he was invited to spend new year with the band and their friends and families at East Down Manor, just outside Barnstaple. The band were recording an album there. I'd had a bad time after leaving school. I had to take a gap year before I went to University (too young at 17), and I had found myself a very unsuitable drug dealing boyfriend. I needed a bit of rescuing, so Brian took me to Devon to meet the Broughtons, along with a couple of other friends from Manchester. It was a wonderful time. Gina Broughton and I became good friends, bonding over the coincidence of having gone to rival boarding schools in Matlock ( you thought this was going to be about rock 'n' roll didn't you?). There were other similarities in our respective fates at this stage of our lives, and we established a friendship which lasted over a number of years. I used to go and stay with them when they moved back to London. I took Captain Beefheart's tour manager round to meet them, taking a copy of their album back to Beefheart.
In the summer of 1972 they were appearing at the Rainbow, and as already mentioned, I had been part of a dance troupe in Manchester. I was asked to open the show as a broken down ballerina, and then myself and another dancer were at each side of the stage dancing for the rest of the set. I remember it being filmed, but have no idea if any footage still exists.
Backstage I was introduced to a friend of theirs, who had polio. It was Ian Dury.
Some years later I was at the funeral of the amazing Les Prior, star of 8th Day and Alberto y los Trios Paranoias. He had lost his battle with cancer. His funeral was held in Heptonstall, where he had lived. He is buried in the same churchyard as Syvia Plath. It was a snowy January day. And Ian Dury came to pay his respects.
The Albertos were on Stiff records, a family of extremely talented and rather eccentric artists. I saw Ian Dury and the Blockheads on the Stiff tour when it hit Rochdale, sometime between these two meetings. Wreckless Eric was on the bill too.
It all seemed so unremarkable at the time.Of course I don't mean that the characters and music were unremarkable, but that I took these adventures and opportunities for granted.