A chat with Alan Davey's former partner in crime - Nigel Potter

Recently Nigel has contributed a great deal of quality material to the site and seeing as he's not only Mr Davey's cousin but also the fact that he played with the fledgling Bass Assassin in his formative years I thought it would be good to get Nigel's side of the story, it goes without saying that a big thank you goes out to him for taking the time to answer these questions and I hope like me you find them interesting reading.

So Nigel thanks for taking time out to talk to the museum, now down to business, you and Alan are cousins so how did you come up with the idea of being in a band together? was it Sunday afternoons around each others house dreaming of platinum discs and world domination whilst your parents talked about "boring" grown up things?

Apart from the family ties, which meant we saw each other fairly often, the real meeting of musical minds so to speak, was pure coincidence.
Alan's mum came over to my grandmothers, where I lived, just as I had bought my first electric guitar.
She said something like: "Alan's just bought a bass guitar, I'll have to bring him over so that you two can get together".
We clicked straight away, we learned our instruments together, and thought alike on just about everything.
We turned my bedroom into a rehearsal room turned up and wrote our own material from day one.
World domination and platinum discs, were small fry to us.
We wanted amplification and speaker stacks the size of a small moon.
We did think about world domination once, but we'd always end up side tracked in fits of laughter and chaos which ALWAYS involved my room getting totalled.

Now am I right in thinking that the first band that you both played in was Chainsaw? if so can you remember who else was in the band?

No actually the very first band that Al and myself formed was STALLION. I mean I didn't even know what a bar-chord was then (Sorry for technical term). We just wanted to play, so we did, with what we knew.
The line up was:
Alan: bass
Me :Guitar
Mark Whymer: guitar
John Yartin: vocals
Andrew (can't recall last name) from Often : Drums
When the drummer couldn't make it one time , Steven Davey sat in on drums, with a broken leg!

Second band we formed was STORMBRINGER. Line up was -
Alan: bass and vocals
Me guitars and vocals
Grasshopper: Drums.
Alan and myself were writing continually and the new stuff we were writing, was more menacing and faster, so quick name change to CHAINSAW, same line up.

How would you describe Chainsaw's musical direction?

We doubled everything we had done before..
Power. volume, speed, alcohol, hair length and attitude. Al was already on fists full of chords and I was discovering the aural delights of the power chords.Chainsaw was us finding our feet, it came natural to us, we finally found what we were looking for since day 1.

What was yours and Alan's main musical influences around this time?

There was all the back catalogue of stuff: Zeppelin, Sabbath, Rush,
But the core of our influences was Hawkwind and Motorhead.
They were on wherever we were 24/7. I used to fall asleep with the head phones on, and I used to wake up first thing in the morning and start right where I left off, and I know it was the same for Al.
We lived,breathed and ate music every day all day.

How and why did Chainsaw come to an end?

Chainsaw never ended, not really, It just evolved into Gunslinger. Somehow we parted ways with the old drummer and was in search of a new one. One who would share an even meaner incarnation of Chainsaw. By rumour we got to hear of this drummer who sounded just right for us, He hit things REALLY hard and played as fast as he could - His name was ANDREW LAMB.
We finally met each other at a Motorhead concert (well... where else!)
Within days he was behind the drums playing with us.We changed name to GUNSLINGER and the definitive Gunslinger line up was born.
Alan Davey: bass and vocals.
Nigel Potter: guitar and vocals
Andrew Lamb Drums and vocals (despite not giving him a microphone!).
So we had the line up, Me and Al turned up the amps, Andrew hit things hard, we turned up some more and he hit them even harder, until everyone and everything was flat out. We used to get complaints from pubs half a mile away, asking us to turn down. We even had the police come into rehearsals one day, they said that we were a traffic hazard! Apparently the volume of our rehearsals was such that we were distracting passing vehicles, there-by posing a danger to traffic.(hahahahahahahahaha)
Now that's legendary loudness!
But loudness wasn't all we had, we had power and we were one tight three piece.

Now by this time we're talking early 80's were you big Hawkwind fans by this point and if so what were your favourite albums and tracks?

Yes all three of us were.
We'd all come by Hawkwind on our own, since before we had started to play together as a band.
Even before we could play an instrument.
My personal favourites: Hall of the mountain grill: Psychedelic Warlords and You'd better believe it.
The other was Quark strangeness and charm: Hassen I sahba and Damnation alley.
Hassen I suppose was my most favourite, I still get a buzz out of it now, especially with Alan.
We used to play cover versions of Hawkwind and Motorhead in rehearsals, without ever really thinking about it.
We all knew our separate parts and just played them.

Had you been to see them live at this point (I would assume at the Ipswich Gaumont) and if so do you have any memories of these shows?

Oh yes, at least twice by that stage I think.
My best memory is the Levitation tour, Ipswich Gaumont (back in the days when the Gaumont was a rock venue)
Alan and myself were there drinking it all in.
Tim Blake was with them on that tour and he played New Jerusalem in it's entirety.
Then there was Who's Gonna Win The War, where this huge great pink laser floated out over the audience.
The strobes of Brainstorm, I suppose as musicians we were making mental notes on techniques and chord progressions, but I think we were mostly just Hawkfans that night.

So back to Gunslinger, I presume that you mainly gigged in the Suffolk area, what sort of venues were you capable of playing size wise?

The two biggest gigs Gunslinger played was Ipswich Corn Exchange, and Ipswich Gaumont (both of which Hawkwind have of course played).
They asked us to turn down there too, but we said no.
We hired in a special 4 kilowatt P.A for that day , and the guys on the mixing desk end up taking us all off the mixer because of what we were chucking out on stage.
The only thing that actually went through the mixing desk was the vocals.
We would play anywhere that would have us.
Village halls (good for the bikers), to night-clubs.
I think a lot of places were scared of putting us on, firstly because of our reputation for being a tad loud and secondly the age old prejudice of people in leather and denim jackets.
Personally speaking, I've been insulted and threatened more often by people in suits than I ever have in leather jackets.
No doubt about we had to look hard to find the gigs, and when we couldn't find them, we put our own on, like the Manor Ballroom in Ipswich.

Now it was Alan's brother Steve who managed the band, did he do this as a favour or is he involved in the music business?

Steven Davey was the fourth member of Gunslinger.
He ploughed his own time and money into us.
Ran himself ragged getting us gigs and publicity.
He learnt the ropes the same as we did by just going for it with total commitment.
He was without doubt central to everything Gunslinger did.

Moving on, so was Gunslingers demise solely down to Alan joining Hawkwind or was the writing already on the wall as far as the band was concerned?

I think the writing was on the wall.
We were all on the verge of the next step, but reluctant perhaps to let go of the old ways.
Alan was talking about doing an audition tape for Hawkwind, at more or less the same time I was doing an audition tape for Motorhead (following Eddie Clarke leaving).
But we were all still the best of mates, I helped Alan do his audition, and Alan and Andrew helped me do mine, so were were all hoping the best for each other at the time, and willing to do whatever we could to help each other on the way.

Now correct me if I'm wrong but I believe that you played on the audition tape that Alan sent Hawkwind that first brought him to their attention, can you tell us a little bit more about this recording?

After many conversations, Alan phoned me one summer's day and said he was going to do the Hawkwind audition tape, and would I come and do the guitar parts on it.
I jumped at the chance.
Doing the guitar tracks was really kind of strange, it's was initially like; Dave Brock is going to be listening to me playing guitar, but then I quickly put that to the back of my mind and concentrated on doing what Alan needed me to do so that Dave Brock would listen to HIM playing.
We did the tape in two or three sessions during a summer's heatwave, in a third of fourth story flat in Ipswich.
There was this ex-Scots guard and his wife who had a little four track machine, how Alan came by him I'm not sure.
We went in there and recorded in his bedroom and they fed us Tea and onion soup to keep us going.
It didn't feel strange to be doing it there, it was kind of hard to connect Hawkwind with the location, but at the end of the day, the recording was what mattered not the location.
All the songs we did Alan had written fairly recently, apart from Lord Of Light.
We had to D.I everything, that means no amplification, straight into the recording machine.
We didn't even have a drum machine, but by that stage after years of playing together, you are in sync anyway, with a telepathy you only find between musicians.
Some of the songs I knew, the ones I didn't we ran through a couple of times.
Alan would say: "This bit goes like this... and then into this", and we would just do it.
The last session we did Alan got his hands on a keyboard, and Alan being Alan, within ten minutes he was adding it to the recording.

So Alan gets the gig with the Hawks, who lets be honest whilst not household names were still pretty big in the 80's so what was your and the rest of the families reaction to having a "Rock star" amongst it's ranks?

When Alan finally got the call, it was like living in a waking dream, and that's how it felt for me, so times that by a million for how Alan felt.
We spent a lot of time together, talking through the night on many occasions, just talking how things were going to be...magical.
It felt like one of those defining moments, and you just knew that you were living it.
Alan was already IN Hawkwind, I was midway through the Motorhead audition thing.
It felt like you had been coming to this point since the day you picked up a guitar.
At the start of the process, where we were waiting to hear from Dave Brock, I was thinking if he hears Alan playing like I have heard Alan playing, then he's in, and then suddenly he was.
Andrew Lamb was also spending lots of time with Alan and I think we all knew it was going to happen but you didn't dare say it, or even really believe it.
Everyone in the family was excited...
Alan in Hawkwind...
Nothing like this had ever happened before, but at the same time I think there was a feeling that sooner or later, be it as part of Gunslinger or Andromeda (Alan's own band) or in some other project, Alan was going to be something.
Looking back I suppose Hawkwind should have been seen as an obvious target.
But we were just like everyone else growing up with music in your life, your idols are your idols.
Hawkwind is Hawkwind.
Suddenly Hawkwind becomes family business and everyone now can only see Alan's place there as completely natural.

I take it that you went to see him plenty in those early days, if so did you get to meet the rest of the band and if so how did you find them, also do you have any amusing anecdotes concerning either your cousin or Hawkwind?

Strange as it may seem, once Alan had moved from Ipswich to Hawkland, we saw each other very little.
Alan had suddenly come into this new world, and I thought the last thing he needs right now is me tagging along for the ride.
So consequently it was on Alan's visits back home, or strange communications via post and phone that we kept going, we're just two old mates, keeping in touch anyway we can.
The only Hawks I have met is Danny Thompson, who I had played with once or twice before Hawkwind, and Huw Lloyd Langton, when Alan,Huw, and Danny Teamed up for a gig under the name of SNORKWIND.
My band Merchants Of Sorrow was support for them on that gig.
I can't tell you how surreal it felt to have Alan, Huw and Danny in the audience watching us play!
I was due to go backstage on the Chronicles tour, but the person I was with that night was just too nervous to go there and I couldn't really just leave him at the door so to speak, so it never happened.
One of these days I'm gonna get to meet Dave and all the others, and I'll probably just shake their hands and stand there grinning like an idiot, unable to speak.

Now moving back to you Nigel, how did your musical career go once Gunslinger disbanded?

Well the Motorhead Audition thing obviously came to nothing, otherwise you"d all know me.
I was shortlisted, Alan met Lemmy a while after and he remembered the tape.
Wanna bet he remembers Alan playing Stay Clean's bass solo note for note?
Can you imagine trying to replace Alan?
Myself and Andrew Lamb carried on from where Gunslinger had then started to go when Alan left.
Motorhead plays Rush some have called it.
We found a new bassist by the name of Dave Meecham, ex Panorama In Black bassist and long time friend of Andrew's.
We found a new direction, did the obligatory Demo, weeks and weeks of rehearsals, and the odd gig.
Things hadn't got much better for rock bands in Ipswich.
Supported Snorkwind at Cindy's Night-club.
And Spent Two days locked away in a basement studio recording 3 solid hours of back catalogue music.
By this stage the band had problems and was already suffering, one more straw and the band folded not having achieved one tenth it's potential.
On the Alan front, Alan and myself got together over the phone one day and talked about releasing a CD of the stuff me and Alan had recorded just prior to him joining Hawkwind and some of the Gunslinger studio recordings.
This eventually came out with the name of ALIEN HEART, a recording I am very proud to have done with Alan.

How do you rate the Albums that Alan has played on for Hawkwind as opposed to the one he hasn't? (if it's possible to be objective about such things)

I think pre-Alan comparisons would not be right or fair on anyone.
But the Two Hawk albums I have where Alan is absent are Distant Horizons and In Your Area.
Perhaps it's my objectivity that's at fault, but I felt they were not as good as they could have been.
Alan brings power and melody.
Listen to the bass on Mask Of The Morning off Electric Tepee.
Listen to his bass solo on Sputnik Stan from the double live Love In Space.
Everyone can make up their own minds, objective or not, most can recognise when a musician becomes one of the best in his field.
Alan is that, pure and simple.

Now a few years ago Alan took a break from the hawks to concentrate on his solo career, most notably Bedouin, were you ever in the frame to be a part of this?

This is the most difficult question for me.
In short no, I don't think so.
I think Alan knew what was going on in my life and knew that I was not in service, so to speak.
But then again, perhaps Alan needed something different.
It's not something we've ever talked about, so I can't say for definite.

So bringing things right up to date, a couple of quick questions to finish, any chance of a Gunslinger reunion and last but not least have you heard any of the new album?

I don't know...(Shrugs shoulders and smiles)
I'd certainly like to do something along the lines of Alien Heart again.
Me and Alan have started speaking about it just lately, computers being what they are these days,
distances and time schedules don't matter quite as much as they used to.
If we do decide to do something together HAWKWIND MUSEUM will be the FIRST to know.
As far as the new album goes, no I haven't heard it yet.
Alan did sort of did go track by track with me the other day and I think judging by our conversations that we are in for sonic satisfaction.
Like you all I cannot wait.
With the guest and collaborations on the album I think it's going to be excellent.
For me I'm double excited; first Alan's back, secondly new Hawkwind album...
Put the two together and like all of us I WANT IT NOW!

That was in essence the end of the interview although Nigel was kind enough to also share a couple of amusing anecdotes regarding his cousin

The black and white Gunslinger photo displayed on Alan's page. Alan is standing on two or three yellow pages because he was so small at the time. I mean he was playing in pubs and clubs where Legally he wasn't even allowed to be, he was only 15 or 16 at the time.

Alan was alcholicly incapacitated one night so we just loaded him into the back of the van and piled the gear around him, when we'd finished loading all you could see was the soles of his cowboy boots.

Once again Nigel I thank you!

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