JET BLACK
The Stranglers’ driving force
1938 2022
“W E were
immediately drawn to one
another,” Hugh Cornwell recalled of first meeting fellow musician Jet Black in Guildford in 1974. “He had a singular sense of purpose that I identified with. He threw everything in his previous life out, to dedicate himself to our common goal… The Stranglers’ success was founded on his determination and drive.”
Then known as Brian Duffy, Jet Black was already a successful local entrepreneur, owning an ice-cream business and The Jackpot off-licence. Previously a drummer in various jazz bands during the ’60s, Black had sought to reignite his music career by answering Cornwell’s Melody Maker ad to join Johnny Sox. Together they formed The Stranglers (initially The Guildford Stranglers) by recruiting Jean-Jacques Burnel and Dave Greenfield. Black offered the upstairs room of The Jackpot as their early rehearsal space and retained one of his ice-cream vans as a mode of transport to and from gigs.
“The most erudite of men”: Stranglers sticksman Jet Black circa 1980
Blessed with impeccable timing and feel, he was an integral part of the band’s progression from punk-era upstarts to something more nuanced, be it the more experimental tone of 1978’s Black And White or the conceptual reach of 1981’s The Gospel According To The Meninblack (1981).
His jazz-inflected time signature was a key element of The Stranglers’ biggest hit, 1982’s “Golden Brown”. “We were never a punk band,” he told the Oxford Mail in 2014. “What’s punk about ‘Golden Brown’, ‘Strange Little Girl’ or ‘No More Heroes’? The key is, we can play our instruments… We were the real thing.”
Also the author of two Stranglersrelated books, Much Ado About Nothing and Seven Days In Nice, Black continued performing with the band until health issues forced him to quit in 2015. Burnel lauded him as “a force of nature, an inspiration… The most erudite of men, a rebel with many causes.”
MARTIN DUFFY
Felt and Primal Scream “soul brother”
1967 2022
Martin Duffy on tour with Felt inSpain, October 1987
SEEKING a new Felt guitarist in 1985, band founder Lawrence had taken some ads – headline: “Do You Want To Be A Rock ’N’ Roll Star?” – along to Birmingham’s Virgin Records store. As he recalled to online magazine Perfect Sound Forever: “I’d put two up when this guy came up to me and said, ‘I know this keyboard player. He’s just left school. He’s a genius.’” The teenage Martin Duffy was duly installed as Felt’s resident keyboardist, making his debut alongside departing guitarist Maurice Deebank on that September’s Ignite The Seven Cannons album.