Page 10 - BiTS_01_JANUARY_2025

GG: Yes, I've had several proper jobs, in fact, probably too many to count – 20-odd
proper jobs. My last proper job before I retired was as a trainer. I trained social
workers, but before that I had been a residential social worker myself.

BiTS: Had you now. That's an interesting job. In a long-distant life, I was a police
officer, believe it or not.

GG: Alright, I worked in a secure unit at a People Centre.

BiTS: Right, okay. Were you good at that job? Was that something you enjoyed doing?

GG: Ninety-five per cent of the time I really enjoyed it. The other 5% was a little

physical as you might imagine.

BiTS: [Laughs] Tell me something about how you found music. I mean, obviously
we’ll get onto that more in a moment, but how did you first find music as a kid?

GG: Well, listening at home, my dad played guitar. In fact, two yards away from me,
I've got my dad's guitar. I've
never played it for a long time,

but it's there. I can see it now.
He played guitar and used to
listen to a lot of radio. He knew

who the Irish singer Val
Doonican was before anybody
in England did because they

used to listen to Irish radio
stations.

BiTS: Really?

GG: So that's where my love of
radio came from as well.

BiTS: And why the Irish ones? I don't follow that.

GG: I'm not sure exactly why. I never got the chance to ask him. He was always
listening to something on the radio. He used to listen to people on trawlers, like ship
to shore radio as well. He always had a valve radio with some cables running around

the room to listen to all of this stuff.

BiTS: Oh, okay. Well, fancy that. Very interesting. And what about yourself, when did
you first start to learn the guitar?

GG: Well, I picked up the one that my dad used to play. He actually tuned it in a
different fashion, but I got my first own guitar when I was nine, which is also a long

time ago, and obviously I was influenced by The Beatles. I used to play the traditional
tennis racket until I got a guitar. I was George Harrison on guitar, and my brother was
Ringo Starr on drums, which was actually a biscuit tin and a biscuit tin lid.