city baby

At last, it’s done.

The autobiography I’ve been working on for the past couple of years was handed over to the printers just before the end of June. You might think that after all that time there’d be no need for a last-minute panic in order to meet a (largely self-imposed) deadline, but that wasn’t quite the way it worked out, and I found myself shoehorning a few more hours editing into my weekend while I was living in the van at a festival in Cornwall. Officially, I was being paid to work. Unofficially, I was being paid to hide near the amp racks, plug my laptop into a power point, shuffle the elements of the book cover into something cool and sexy, and hope no-one noticed.

I think it worked. And it’s kind of apt that the finishing touches to the book were made hunkered down amid a PA system, because music, and gigs, and life on the road are central to the book. ‘City Baby’ is the autobiography of Ross Lomas, bass player with legendary UK punk band GBH, and you can read more about it here. Or even buy it here. It’s packed with great tales which make me chuckle just to think about them, and is quite possibly the first and only book in existence which offers walk-on parts for the Pope, Prince, Neil Sedaka, the massed cavalry of Argentina, and half of Birmingham. Among others.

Personally, I think it’s every bit as good as the Steve Ignorant book I worked on a few years back. Possibly even better. We’ll have it back from the printers on July 11th, and I really can’t wait. Given that people from the US, Canada, Sweden, New Zealand, and the UK have already placed advance orders, it seems I’m not alone. Which is reassuring. Deferred gratification has never been my strong suit, and even though I’ve got reconciled to it – more or less – and realise it’s unavoidable, it still seems like a bloody stupid idea. Would you like fun now, or fun later? What a ridiculous question. I’ll have it now, and I may very well have it later too, thanks very much.

Which is my way of saying I can’t wait to see the book. And yes, I know I’ve got to. But right now, I’m like a kid watching the clock countdown to Xmas so he can open his presents. And the clock’s moving way too slowly, and I can’t wait.

I really can’t wait.