BRYAN COONEY ON WHY HE AIN’T GONNA LIVE IN MAGGIE’S BARN NO MORE

IN some human beings there lurks a sometimes a worrying capacity for acts of flagrant stupidity. This week I was reminded of my tendency towards such behaviour.

BBC 2 had launched their hybrid programme, Escape to the Continent, and there stood Nicki Chapman looking inordinately pleased with herself whilst expounding the myriad benefits of living in Poitou Charente.

In one moment of malice, I considered TV companies’ remarkable propensity for reinventing so-called celebrities, and wondered how the hell Nicki Chapman had effected the transition from pop music aficionado to homes guru in such a modest passage of time.

Unjust? Possibly. But, by presenting this particular programme, Ms Chapman was belabouring me with a metaphorical baseball bat, and I was inexpertly attempting to cauterise the wounds she seemed intent on inflicting.

To proceed to this sorry tale: in 2004, after much vacillation, my wife Margaret and I decided to buy a second home in France.

We had moved house on 23 occasions in our 29 years of marriage, survived countless renovations and counted fingers fatigued by dirt, dust and disaster. We imagined we’d built up an immunity to reckless behaviour, so we agreed on a prerequisite for our de facto holiday home. It needed to be in pristine condition.

Oh, yeah? Typical of two people occasionally driven by impulse and irrationality, we bought a beautiful, if dilapidated, agricultural barn in the Vienne sector of Poitou Charente. There were no windows, an earthen floor and enough holes in the roof to satisfy the exacting requirements of a latter-day Galileo.

Worse, it was situated four feet from a busy D road at one end of a deserted hamlet that advertised decay and the occasional flight of tumbleweed. The one factor in its favour was a countryside view for which a man might have volunteered his life. Few barns in France have the luxury of such vistas.

Anyway, did we attempt anything approaching due diligence? Did we consider the noise or danger factor generated by drivers who obviously believed that one day they might be equipped to compete at Le Mans?

Did we investigate the somewhat depressed local area, its strengths and frailties, none withstanding its capacity for regeneration? 

Did we indeed investigate the locals, who had an endless fascination with the Euro?

Did we for one moment wonder if integration into this rather reactionary piece of real estate was feasible?

The sorry answer to all these questions merits a two-lettered response. No, we were comprehensively seduced by the aroma of rural France and the view that stretched to the south east.

Why Poitou Charente? We were in fact searching the vast acreage of Normandy when one of the owners we visited told us he was moving 300 kilometres south because of the microclimate. He had, in reality, just applied a shotgun to his right foot and talked himself out of a certain sale.

The Poitou sounded like an even more inspired bet, so off we went, all cylinders firing in the old Mercedes, brains decidedly disengaged. How bloody stupid can a couple get?

This, however, was only the genesis of our folly. Within a couple of days, we had purchased a barn for 30 grand. Our agent, taking ten per cent of the proceedings, recommended an architect who looked antiquated and indeed thought antiquated. His plans, which incorporated walk-through bedrooms, were necessarily jettisoned on our return, but not before they had cost us plenty.

The insanity continued apace with the proposed renovation works which, I’m afraid, bore the stamp of our own inadequacy. We’d taken three quotations from builders and these all hovered around the six-figure mark and beyond. We believed we could do better.

On the last day of a three-week trip, having failed to reach an accommodation with anyone, we lunched at a local restaurant and decided to shed the calories by walking through the main thoroughfare of the nearby town.

Suddenly, I became aware of Margaret talking to someone in a doorway. It was an English voice, a helpful voice, a builder’s voice, damnit! My uplifted spirits flagged temporarily on seeing him, however: here was Fred Flintstone come to life; an Anglo Saxon John Goodman.

But when he accompanied us to the barn and estimated it would take £50,000 to complete the work, those spirits were restored. Now, knowing that the authorities insisted on foreign workers being registered, we quizzed him about this and he claimed he was in the process of securing his registration. Deal done.

And thus our 200-year relic came to life, piecemeal, over the next six months. There were additional tariffs: a new roof; extensive electrical work; the kitchen and bathroom units; the application of cream cement to the exterior stone walls; double glazed windows for the gargantuan doors; and the installation of a septic tank - all of which drove costs towards the skyline.

The latter bill caused particular consternation because the nearby town council had agreed to extend the mains water system to our hamlet, charging our new neighbours roughly £400 each. Incredibly, this offer was refused.

The £50,000 promised to “John Goodman” had grown exponentially and we’d arrived at a figure considerably north of that. But the more encouraging news came when we were summoned by our builder/project manager and told that the barn was finished and fit for inspection.

We touched base on Friday night when the light was fading. We were sorely fatigued, but this had no longevity. Maggie’s Barn, as it had been christened, was a sight for eyes made sore by over a thousand miles of driving.

It had cost the best part of £150,000, but it represented itself as a million dollars, with one room flowing freely into another, chic floor tiles from Provence, a fireplace anchored by an oak bressumer, countless ceiling beams, and an expansive entrance hall and feature mezzanine.

But, being a serial mover - remember the 23 homes we’d owned - you are rarely satisfied with the end product unless it has a price tag. Some time later, we asked the local estate agents to give us his best estimate.

He was a man of few words, but the one word of encouragement I picked up was“superbe!” Less encouraging was his final fiscal analysis. Eighty-five grand. Sacre bloody bleu! With our chins dropping towards the exquisite tiling, he reminded us that we were in a relatively poor area.

I don’t know whether it was at this precise moment that my vision of Poitou Charente began to colour. I do know that little things multiplied my frustrations: those auditioning for Le Mans were starting to pound in my brain, for starters.

There were 50 kilometre per hour signs at either end of the hamlet, and yet these were summarily ignored as drivers thundered by. Perhaps irrationally, I would race into the road, screaming “cinquante!” at the miscreants.

With our grandchildren arriving on holiday, this obsession with the reckless intensified, and I began to take pictures of number plates. It lasted only for one morning. Then I was visited by two gendarmes, who had responded to a complaint.

In France, you are apparently violating a person’s privacy by doing this. I told the police that I had in fact been capturing the extremely photogenic countryside, Was there a law against this, I asked? They smiled conspiratorially.

While this good humour was still in place, my fractured French permitted me another rejoinder. “Why are people allowed to drive like devils through this place? Is it normal?” They failed to answer.

My concern over aberrant driving strayed, I confess, into other wider areas, and gradually the joy of French living began to dissipate.

I objected to the infernal bureaucracy of the nation and the copious amounts of forms for inconsequentialities; the exorbitant charges of tradesmen when they suspected (wrongly in my case) a rich foreigner was on their doorstep; the insouciance of shopkeepers who’d totally ignore you while they exchanged small talk with locals; the utter arrogance of the belief that the only way is the French way.

Leaving such negativity aside for a moment, we loved the weather, the scenery, the fastidious maintenance of major roads. We further enjoyed the good restaurants that provided value for money (finding them is not always easy, in spite of French propaganda); and delighted at meeting some really nice locals away from our hamlet of doom, where only one neighbour talked to us on a regular basis.

There is inevitably a coup de grace in any fraught situation, and ours arrived in 2013 when three caravans, two cars and a Dormobile, a squad of young men, women and children, two dogs and a goat took possession of a disused house and over grown garden to the rear of our property.

Our wondrous view was speedily compromised by the new backdrop. Then, the side access to our barn was blocked by a six-foot wall. I reminded one of the new owners - he sported a hairstyle which a Mohican would have gladly endorsed - that we had the right of passage. Our heated exchange proved unproductive.

Indeed, it was counter productive. The minatory dogs, a Boxer and a Jack Russell, arrived each morning snapping and snarling at the boundary fence 15 feet short of our front door. Such intimidation only abated when I visited the gendarmerie and registered a strong protest.

We are all subject to inevitability. The trick is identifying that inevitability. It was time to leave Maggie’s Barn and the land of our holiday dreams.

Over there, house sellers can employ more estate agents than you can shake a French stick at. We settled on four agencies and eventually such a concentration of manpower worked: a French couple seemed willing to put up with the veritable circus that had moved in next door.

The price in Euros had not improved, but the currency’s strength against the pound meant that we would receive approximately £105,000. An initial elation was quickly cancelled with the revelation that fairly draconian tax deductions were on the way.

Consequently, we left Poitou with just over 90 grand - some 60 grand less than our initial outlay. This was partially the responsibility of “John Goodman”, who had failed to register his credentials. There was no recourse: well, would you argue with John Goodman?

Please don’t interpret the message here as a recommendation for people to ignore Poitou Charente, or indeed the highly seductive tones of Nicky Chapman. We simply urge them to be prudent - in the fervent hope that no-one repeats our stupidity.

Meanwhile, I have a message for the BBC who, judging by the lack of variety in their programming, rarely lead the field as regards innovation. May I suggest another property programme, one perhaps with a bit of caustic bite?

So how about Escape from the Continent?

WE'RE STILL WAITING FOR BILLY TO SEE THE LIGHT

By Bryan Cooney

WHEN I once suggested that Billy Davies possessed the requisite skills to become a great football manager, one of the game’s most respected soothsayers dismissed it as being highly unlikely.

“The trouble with Billy is that it seems he can manage down, but not upwards,” he said, referring to the fact that Davies’s diligence in handling players sometimes failed to extend to his associations with members of the boardroom.

“You can’t go around telling the chairman to eff off,” my advisor continued. “Until Billy accepts that the word discretion deserves to be in the English language, there is always going to be a struggle.”

Davies’s struggle against life’s changing fortunes continued on Monday when a ribbon of breaking news on Sky Sport declared that he had been sacked for a second time in three years by Nottingham Forest.

It had all gone quite splendidly until a few weeks prior to this. Davies had virtual autonomy of the club. The often absent owner, Fawaz al-Hasawi, was in raptures. Nine million pounds of his money had been spent - but the Premier League was shimmering like a mirage. Who cared?

Then an injury-weakened Forest went eight Championship games without victory, were trounced 5-0 by Derby at the weekend, and filtered out of contention for a play-off place.

There was only one recourse. So, if you take into further consideration Davies’ abrupt dismissal by Derby in 2007, you are reading a rather repetitive narrative.

This particular departure was more damaging then most, however. If Davies had gone without seemingly a murmur of protestation, the recriminations became the property of others. Notably the Daily Telegraph.

In my days as Daily Mail Head of Sport, the Telegraph were considered to be the champions of the soft-shoe newspaper shuffle. But here they were applying hobnail boots to the retreating backside of the Scotsman.

It was reported that “the Billy Davies circus had been run out of town, after more than a year of drama, fall-outs, multiple sackings, conspiratorial messages - and sometimes football matches.”

Ouch! A man hoping to retain a foothold in the football world could do without that attached to his c.v. But the Telegraph weren’t finished. “Davies was given sole control, working closely alongside his cousin and agent (and former lawyer) Jim Price. But it seemed at times they were more preoccupied with settling personal vendettas than winning three points on a Saturday. Davies is now battling to save his own reputation.”

You didn’t need a forensics department to identify that a schism had developed between that particular writer and the pugnacious little Glaswegian. But is such a withering opinion justified?

Allow me to consult my personal history with the man. First, let me say that I like him, but add that there’s an undoubted schizophrenia in him: one minute he’s charming your ears off with brilliant chat, the next he’s removing them by force. This version of split personality is not uncommon in football managers, as readers of this site will know.

I’ve been texted by him, talked to him on the telephone a couple of times - once with the receiver held at arm’s length to protect myself from the invective that was pouring out of it - and met him twice, where he’s been most agreeable.

We had lunch on the second occasion which was back in September of 2011 - three months after he’d been initially sacked by Forest. I didn’t anticipate we would have the company of Jim Price, but I was presented with a fait accompli. No matter. Here is a sample of what I wrote back then:

INTERVIEWING Billy Davies is a complex affair. There’s a lawyer at his shoulder, three tape recorders on the table (one belonging to the said lawyer) and enough off-the-record interludes to constitute a Downing Street briefing.

But, according to my companions, this is the anomalous shape of football, circa 2011. Managing a club in these impatient times goes beyond difficult. The game has a foothold in Whitehall farce, so a man needs a team around him to assess the authenticity of the cast-list and determine whether the greasepaint is kosher.

Even, evidently, when that manager is out of work. This guy from Govan qualifies on that count, Nottingham Forest having divested themselves of his services just over three months ago.

But what’s with the lawyer and the tape recorder? Surely these precautions are indicative of suspicion in Davies?

“I’m protective of me and my family. This is the world we’re in now. I think you need to be a professional. A football manager needs a team - an accountant, legal advisors and agents because of what you’re dealing with.

“There are websites, fans forums, phone-ins and all these access points to creating stories, claims and counter claims. I don’t have an agent as such, but what I’ve got is a very good family member, an excellent contractual lawyer and an advisor who’s second to none.

“You talk then about the big animal (within) that the manager has to deal with: there are chief executives, general managers, football consultants, there are transfer acquisition committees. Yeah, there’s a big monster out there. That’s why a manager’s job is now so precarious.

“I know I’m simply a temp. Every manager is. I’ve got this short window of opportunity. Forget building a team over three years. You’re looking at three and four weeks before people start calling for your head. The good, old days of team building have completely gone. So what I know now is that I’m a temp manager who’ll go in and work for a period of time until it’s time to move on. Then the club brings in a new face and a new voice.”

As it was, that window of opportunity closed on Davies on Monday. By staying 13 months, he’d taken temping to new levels of longevity. But, it is alleged, there was a tempest forever raging within the club.

So, what lies ahead of him? He is already an extremely wealthy man with all these financial settlements, but you wonder if he will ever learn discretion and whether, having mastered the technique of managing downward, he’ll ever learn to manage upwards.

The suspicion is that he needs football to survive. We shall learn in time whether football needs him.

Rapha misses an important date with Gerry Rafferty - By Bryan Cooney

UNLESS there has been a seismic shift in relationships, one notable name will be missing from the cast of singers and musicians celebrating the life of Gerry Rafferty in Paisley next month.

The colourfully named Raphael Ravenscroft, it seems, continues to occupy the role of bete noir with the Rafferty camp, and you imagine even the diplomacy of a United Nations peacekeeper would struggle to soothe minatory brows.

A couple of years ago, Radio Four made a documentary about Baker Street, the most famous, if not most accomplished, Rafferty composition; the one driven by Ravenscroft’s mesmeric alto saxophone riff.

And yet there was a significant omission in that 30-minute programme. The BBC producer later told me that, try as she might, she couldn’t persuade any of the contributors to mention the sax player by name. Rab Noakes merely dismissed him as The Saxophonist. It was difficult to believe anyone could be so childish.

We return to 1978 - when the haunting pop song initially hit pay dirt - to discover the genesis of the rancour. Ravenscroft, as a young and fairly impecunious musician, was called to the Chipping Norton Studios, where Rafferty’s City to City album was being assembled. He was a replacement for Pete Zorn.

His rags were transformed into riches: not long after his stint was completed (he was paid £27.50 but later claimed the cheque had bounced), he was enjoying international recognition by playing for such luminaries as Pink Floyd and Marvin Gaye. His session fees rose astronomically as a result.

Being something of a natural showman, unlike Rafferty, Ravenscroft embraced first fame as he might a beautiful woman - and history suggests there were plenty of them in evidence at the time. He was Mr Showtime: they say he would sweep imperiously into his workplace, accompanied by two Irish wolfhounds and an entourage fit for royalty, and nominally take charge of proceedings.

Significantly, even if his ego had found a niche market of its own, he insisted on repaying old friendship. He signed for Portrait Records of America (a subsidiary of Sony) and made a solo album, Her Father Didn’t Like Me Anyway, in 1979. It was a Rafferty composition, suggesting at the time that both men were on equable terms (although, allegedly, this later would change).

Rafferty didn’t feature on the album, but he was perhaps about the only man in Britain who didn’t. An incredible 60 session musicians were called upon and paid for, presumably out of the Ravenscroft purse. That makes any fair-minded person believe that perhaps he wasn’t such a bad guy, after all.

It’s now just over three years since Rafferty died. So why does the stench of hostility linger after all this time? In the eyes of many, Rapha - as he favours being called - had committed the cardinal sin of claiming at least some responsibility for the composition of that saxophone riff, which propelled an already wonderful tune into the Tin Pan Alley stratosphere.

In an interview with The Times in 2006, he recalled being presented with a song that contained “several gaps.” And he added: “Did Gerry hand me a piece of music? No, he didn’t. In fact, most of what I played was an old blues riff.”

But when a re-mastered version of City to City was released months after Rafferty’s death, it included the original, electric guitar version of the song, confirming his authorship. And yet the hostility refuses to go away.

When I began writing the ebook, Gerry Rafferty: Renegade Heart, I resolved not to allow my allegiance to the musical genius to obliterate objectivity, and thus I contacted Ravenscroft. There again, we shared common ground in that I ’d also assumed potential bete noir status with some factions of the Rafferty family for having the temerity to become a biographer.

Rapha was suffering from a serious heart complaint at the time, so the matter went into abeyance. When he had recovered sufficiently, we re-engaged last Christmas and he agreed to do an interview on the telephone. I recorded it for this website. It was a lengthy conversation and he went into considerable detail about the contested riff, his relationship with Rafferty and the rancour directed against him.

Unfortunately, as a mobile phone was his sole means of communication, the quality of the recording was wholly unsatisfactory for website reproduction, so I determined that instead I would rewrite a new chapter of my ebook, alongside further disparate revelations.

Hereabouts, matters took an unexpected turn. Ravenscroft declared himself less than satisfied with events and asked if we could film the interview. A whole new ball game was in town and an expensive one at that. I agreed to fly down to meet him in his adopted home town of Exeter, but for some obscure reason he insisted on coming to Glasgow.

In retrospect, perhaps that decision was not so obscure. A date was settled and it was the wholly appropriate one of January 4 - the third anniversary of Rafferty’s death. I secured the services of a film crew to film at our flat, made the requisite airline bookings and secured him accommodation at a hotel which would meet his exacting standards: ie: the Central Hotel.

More disruption was on order, however. Rapha fancied having what he termed a “blow” on that Saturday evening (at least that‘s what I think he said). Feverishly, I began to explore the possibility of securing him a jam session that would satisfy his requirements. By now, I was experiencing the travails of a much put-upon roadie. For reasons too complicated to reproduce here, this was almost impossible.

Eventually, the Central Hotel generously agreed to stage a musical interlude in their Champagne Bar. I reported the news to Ravenscroft on another bad mobile phone line, but imagined that he was unimpressed. “I’m more into jazz,” he said. “They’ll be wanting me to play the Girl From Ipanema - and that’s not on.”

This somewhat distorted my best-laid plans: previously, I had contacted a television company and a big newspaper group about the arrival of a famous musician on their Glaswegian patch. I didn’t reveal his name, nor the relevant story behind it, but they were sufficiently intrigued and awaited confirmation of his arrival.

The trouble is that he didn’t arrive that day. I was woken at 7a.m., Ravenscroft informing me that his connecting flight from Manchester had been cancelled. Cue the abortion of Glasgow plans. But consolation was at hand: our musical man revealed he still favoured an in-depth interview.

In fact, he insisted on it. He texted me that his work diary was filling up rapidly, but that he had Thursday, Friday, Saturday, Sunday and Monday free. We alighted on the next Saturday. I made all the necessary arrangements again and found everyone in an accommodating mood.

This time he would be flying into Edinburgh, so there I was ten minutes ahead of the appointed landing time of 9.40a.m. The flight arrived early and I espied a smiling Nicola Benedetti, complete with violin case. This was a good omen, I decided.

But omen are not always accurate. As the arrivals dwindled, there was no sign of the bold Rapha and suddenly my mobile began chirruping. A text message from Exeter read: “Bryan: following yesterday’s hospital procedure, I have now just been advised by the airport on call medic that in their view, I was presently unable to fly.”

Now, you cannot blame a man for being unfit to fly. But hadn’t he told me Friday was free? And why hadn’t he had the intelligence to inform the hospital of his travel intentions? And, crucially, why was he delivering a sackful of bad news 

almost four hours after he had been scheduled to take off?

Two people disappeared into meltdown that day. I phoned my wife. She’d experienced the idiosyncratic behaviour of sportsmen for the last four decades, but now was confronted by the caprices of a musician. She was muttering vengeance on prima donnas everywhere.

Me? I immediately texted Ravenscroft with breaking news of my despond and told him he had cost me the best part of 800 quid. When I arrived back in Glasgow, my wife admitted that she had texted my would-be interviewee and perhaps had even been more vituperative than myself. I shuddered and concentrated on cancelling the photo shoot for a second time and also the hotel booking.

Just as I had completed those embarrassing tasks, another text arrived. “Dear Mr and Mrs Cooney, I’m presently aboard the 7.30 from Exeter to Glasgow, arriving at 17.07. I’m currently into my journey: my phone has just recharged.”

Another humiliating request: I was obliged to ask the film company if they could reschedule for Sunday morning. Happily, they could. But this was turning into a marathon of first elation and then disappointment. And still a happy ending eluded us.

Throughout the day, texts came through from Rapha. One said he was carrying both tenor and alto saxophones as requested (cripes! By this time I‘d forgotten all about an evening gig). Two more came from Trainline carrying exact details of his nine-hour-plus journey; another saying that he was nearing Edinburgh.

I drove to Queen Street station with all the assertion of an undecided Referendum voter. If there was apprehension in me, it expanded when I received another message from you know who asking me to explain the text which excoriated him for his behaviour. Rapha declared that he wasn’t accustomed to being spoken to like this.

Suddenly, the cutting edge of confrontation had been added to our meeting, but there was no point in a response, surely? It was after five and Ravenscroft was on his way. Or was he? The appointed train arrived. A diaspora of Saturday night folk alighted: theatre enthusiasts, football fans, shoppers, a few drunks and comic singers. But no Rapha.

I waited for the next four trains which came in at fifteen-minute intervals. Not a glimpse of a man with the trademark curls. Not a sighting of a sax, neither alto nor tenor.

Had my wife’s admonishment proved so stern that he had turned back eight hours into his journey? Or, perhaps a more persuasive thought, had he never placed his artistic body on the train in the first place?

There was nothing left to do but return to a woman who wore that intensely infuriating look of distaff self-satisfaction. Again I was confronted by humiliation: I reached for the telephone to cancel all bookings.

It’s now almost two months since I talked to Raphael Ravenscroft and, although it’s fair to say there will be a significant revision of my ebook, it’s difficult to see where our paths will cross again.

Do I stomp my feet and gnash my teeth at the mere mention of his name? Hardly. Would I revert like some to calling him The Saxophonist? I very much doubt it. But I must admit that any thoughts of dealing with him again make me wince.