SPITE BOYS: an Arab Strap interview, 1998

 

An interview with Aiden Moffat at the Charlotte, Leicester, 1998.

Originally prepared for potential fanzine publication, this interview later appeared on the Arab Strap fan website, Disco Boys, which has long since disappeared. 

Twenty-five years after the release of their album Philophobia, Arab Strap are on the home leg of their Philiophobia Undressed tour in Scotland. With a photocopied collage put together with photos of the then four piece band from earlier shows and two photos from the night in Leicester, here is the interview with Aiden, unedited and undressed from how it was written - GN. 

The Bastard Band Of Falkirk

Giving out unapologetic recollections of an ordinary precious youth addled by alcohol, ecstasy and bile; Arab Strap give up nothing that you couldn't find on top of a dance club podium or inside a pub cubicle.

But having poured out their lives prior into the low budget, bare structured Chemikal Underground LP, The Week Never Starts Around Here; 1997 saw a dramatic turn up in the prospects of the potential job club journeymen and a progressive development in their work. While the music for the off the top of / out of their heads First Big Weekend single, was used as backing (with added dubbed, audibly authentic, ethnic accent) for an Irish beer advert, they've since doubled their numbers to a proficient touring 4-piece, reworked the same song in a remarkable, feel-good, gospel style (Hey! Fever) and remixed David Holmes to glorious effect (The Holiday Girl).

"Well that's what happens when you break the NME," drawis the singer non-plussed. You broke them down? "No. What it is, if any of 'em like you, you'll be alright. But if they don't, then you're fucked. One person at the NME and suddenly you can get a nice wee tour and sell some records." Surely though it took a bit more than that? "Well that and the fact that we're all remarkably talented in all walks of life!"

One Day, Before the Gig

A nondescript East Midlands' dressing room with no ready breakables in December. Not the most likely of places to break down / beat out any fresh insights into men's psyches with six Scotsmen including their tour manager and driver) who've been touring in a transit for the past week.

"Money. And fame. And pop music," states the singer, declaring his intent. "That's why we're on this tour. Fame and money." And then what? "And then we'll get really, really drunk and take a hellish amount of drugs."

"I'm going to give it to charity," protests the guitarist. "Awright, Malcolm's gonna give his to charity," corrects his modern day, minstrelling partner who himself has merely acquired just a beard and the flu so far. "We all," says Aiden indicating everyone else, "have a good time!"

And so it follows that the musician, zipped up in a green parka, remains content in interview to let the man who provides the spoken word commentary continue doing the talking. Quietly Malcolm rolls a joint to pass round. Aidan doesn't partake but claims the whisky for himself when it arrives.

Aiden Moffat, Arab Strap, the Charlotte, Leicester 1998 

The Boys of Winter

They could be a confused, mullet coiffed, cod metal act, or worse, an ill-disguised, twee indie ensemble. None too promising admittedly and earlier even their driver expressed reservations over the puerile tendencies of Aidan Moffat's self-centred hangover / comedown confessionals. A prime example being the disagreeable sentiments expressed by the bitter ditched boyfriend in One Day, After School.

In this latest episode our hero, having found his ex "with her hands in someone else's pants," goes on to get his head kicked in for his troubles by another of her admirers out "to impress her 'cause he was trying to poke her." Singly failing to shine a decent light on any of its subjects it ends with his mother threatening to choke the heartbreaker herself.

Nice. But like the woman who stitched her former lovers names inside a tent or the English football hooligans trotting out their misty eyed memoirs of off pitch mayhem, Aidan's lyrics relay close and personal encounters from his previous. Friends, Mums and Dads and casual accomplices pass past a backdrop of distant memories and mundane daily events painting a biographic landscape coloured by cultural landmarks, warped by chemical imbalance and battered by his own perspective. Though often they're just nightmares about women as I Work In A Saloon describes literally; "A pub full of all the girls I've ever shagged or tampered with or kissed. Or even just fancied."

And while his musings have attracted an audience of admirers, such praise has come accompanied by a chorus of objections against the main perpetrator's perceived prejudice. The fact that such heart broke on sleeve accounts inherently acknowledges the author's awareness of his own shortcomings seemingly lost on them. Not that Aidan claims to be all that bothered.

"It usually hurts for about the first 40 seconds and then it's just (shrugs) 'Don't give a fuck.' What was the thing in the NME that really pissed me off? (prompted) Oh right! Accusing me of being a pedophile. That pretty much upset me! Aye, and wife beating! I'm nae into that."

That said, unlike the loveable, unlovable rogue I'd imagined, Aidan seems quite prepared to play to the press' impression of being beyond reform. A previous description, "He's all front and back - he has no sides," draws a smile of recognition from the former pop star aspiring adolescent. Admitting to another 5 years worth of material available, clearly there's a fair deal of unresolved conflict still swilling around here.

"It wasn't that many times!" he replies incredulously, unwilling to be drawn into any vague counselling efforts to unravel his subconciousness. "C'mon, fuck! It's only been about four!" Have your views subsequently d rani n changed? (Abruptly) "Yes!" Have you joined the rest of the world? "I was always herel I assume that's why people liked the records."

True, people have always enjoyed watching others suffer but the closest Aiden comes to an explanation is admitting; "I think it's just because I'm a fucking idiot and hung about with the wrong people. That's about it."

Though whether he reflects reality or is just a stroppy bastard reciting soppy bollocks, there are songs in their repertoire that genuinely appear to celebrate life. Rites of passage like the Girls of Summer, getting off yr. face, coming over all emotional, wanking... Ever the spoiler, Aidan won't even admit to any pleasure in that. s

"I don't know if I'm actually celebrating, I think I'm wondering why I fucking bother in the first place."

"It's just N-Joi n' that," dismisses Malcolm of what is ultimately just pop music. "It is a bit like N-Joi!" perks up the singer considering this new direction. "Happy hardcore, here we come!"

Arab Strap: David Gow, Malcolm Middleton, Aiden Moffat, Gary Miller 

Not Dead Yet

Despite this intriguing idea it's the actual combination of Aiden's reflections with Malcolm Middleton's melodic accompaniments that makes them work. Like the inanimate sex aid from which they take their name, when properly applied, Arab Strap can have my attention gripped, breath taken and punching the air in recognition of their having tapped the essence of man's frailty.

Songs like Deeper whose subtle, sympathetic soundtrack not only ably serves the author's fictionalised nervous seduction by a mate's elder sister in the woods but is also opened up physically by its dramatic sense of timing. And then there's The Holiday Girl remix of Don't Die Just Yet which retains the contradicted optimism of Holmes' songtitle as it witnesses our comrade struggling to grasp defeat from the jaws of victory; "Her naked elbow touched mine. And she smiled. But I couldnae say a thing."

At this moment though what's true to say is that our Caledonian correspondent's not really into being pseudoanalysed or rocking the Charlotte. I always say how much I hate the fucker," he reflects in homesick fashion, "but I really would like to be there tonight."

But to assume that his nature is derived from the traditions of British tribalism would be wrong. It's precisely in response to a flippant suggestion that there might be an additional attraction to making money from English audiences that he offers the first evidence of any altruistic motive.

"No! The appeal is people enjoying the music and communicating. It's nothing to do with selling it to the English!" Demonstrating the cross band support, a rogue voice pipes up, "I love the English."

So with his back turned to the audience, crouched over a souped-up Casiotone and subject to an endurance of technical failures, Aiden subsequently proceeds to express himself on stage. While his mumble remains mainly inaudible throughout it nevertheless holds half its audiences attention - which says plenty about the appeal of a man attempting to articulate. Not forgetting the moving support provided by a band that can crank out a thrilling run of majestic interludes to drink beer to as the punchline sinks in.

But it's the bearded bard who has the final word. Asked after the gig whether he would ever consider writing from another person's perspective (as had been suggested earlier by their driver), Aiden replied; "No, ah don't see the point."

To be fair though, he was signing autographs at the time for a couple of women who themselves were in no doubt about Arab Strap's appeal.

Twenty-one years of When I Was Born for the Seventh Time

Cornershop at the Charlotte, Leicester, 1995

Cornershop - When I Was Born for the Seventh Time (1997)

In the early 1990s, Cornershop were an incendiary, rough-edged, Indian-Anglo indie band based in Leicester; an historic city with a medieval king buried under a car park and a more modern history where middle England and British Commonwealth families met and lived (sometimes uneasily) alongside each other. 

This was where I first met and photographed the band during their early abrasive gigs as they progressed from their initial statement of intent singles to creating eclectic, pick ’n’ mix albums that referenced and challenged the orthodoxy of western rock n’ roll. Sometimes they did so wittily (a compilation album of their first two EPs was entitled Elvis Sex-Change) and at other times, Cornershop didn’t just want to bury the King of Indie, but to set a funeral pyre, as they did to a poster of Morrissey in response to his increasingly blatant racism. 

Like their records, reactions were mixed and sometimes disparaging, which made for a tense dynamic regarding their perception within the UK, particularly by the then influential, weekly music press. However, by the time of their third album, 1997’s When I Was Born for the Seventh Time, Cornershop had gone beyond making ripostes to Britain and were unexpectedly reborn as a multifaceted and globally aware phenomenon. Even among their supporters, I wasn’t alone in having failed to imagine that they could have created an album that continues to startle in its originality, ambition, breadth and delivery. 

Some context for this transformation comes from how the album was midwifed by their original independent Rough Trade backed record label, Wiiija, with added international backing from David Byne’s Luaka Bop label and co-production by rising hip-hop producer, Dan the Automator. However, that doesn’t take anything away from the album’s cohesion and diversity that continues to sound timeless, contemporary and even anticipatory. While the amusing song-sketch, Funky Days Are Back Again took its inspiration from New Labour’s then rise to power, its vision of dungarees and worker’s strikes backed by a primitive casiotone soundtrack might be even more suited to post-Brexit Britain.

Like Cornershop themselves, When I Was Born… has been somewhat overshadowed by the success of its second single. Their tribute to vinyl culture and Indian cinema, Brimful of Asha, cleverly referenced all the band’s genre mixing and globetrotting musical influences but in a post-modern twist, it became a catalyst to itself and an astonishing international hit, courtesy of an unsolicited Big Beat remix by Fat Boy Slim. On the album though it’s preceded by the strangely hypnotic, sloping album opener, Sleep on the Left Side, which acts as a perfect foil before giving way to the deceptively simple, Richman-esque riff that announces Brimful’s joyous arrival. 

clockwise from top left: 
Tjinder Singh, 
Ben Ayres, 
Peter Bengry, 
Nick Simms, 
Anthony Saffery

From there the double-album’s fifteen tracks dovetail into each other, including a number of instrumentals featuring looped samples and sitar breaks. There are also some rather special guests but before that, Cornershop have some star turns of their own. In particular, We’re In Your Corner, which starts gently enough with Anthony Saffery’s sitar and Ben Ayres’ tamboura before a sharp Punjabi “Hanji” greeting marks the entrance for Nick Simms’ drumming and Peter Bengry’s percussion. With Cornershop’s main figure, Tinder Singh now singing assuredly in Punjabi, the band hit their stride and have the confidence to let the song rise, fall and rise again on this epic, hypnotic track. On the album’s closer, Singh returns to his mother tongue on an otherwise faithful cover of the Beatles' Norwegian Wood. 

In between more multilingual voices appear as Lourdes Belart counts in Spanish from uno to quatro on Good Shit, followed by a duet with American country singer, Paula Frazer, on Good To Be On The Road Back Home. While the former extolls the joy of being on the journey as Singh describes “feeling good behind the wheel”, the latter lists an increasingly number of dislocated places (Tokyo, London, Chattanooga and New York City), that lie between the narrator and his home. 

According to the album’s credits, such references nearly match the number of locations where When I Was Born… was written and/or recorded in, including Singh’s bedroom on London's Holloway Road. And if that wasn’t enough global locations, when Good Shit was released as the album’s first single (with its title appropriated for public consumption as Good Ships), the cover featured an African-American astronaut - without helmet but with full afro - enjoying a space walk above Earth.   

Two American poets of rather different kinds complete the album. On Candyman, Justin Wharfield provides a hip-hop delivery over a looped Larry Coryel guitar riff alongside Singh’s declaration to be the song’s returning protagonist. The track itself has remained so fresh that a decade later it was dropped untouched into multi million dollar global marketing campaign to sell footwear. Meanwhile, in one of Allen Ginsberg’s final recordings, the original beat-poet provides a reading on When the Light Appears Boy, as what sounds like a carnival parades past, several floors down on the street below. 

Over twenty years on and in a world that’s become increasingly compressed and polarised, When I Was Born…continues to describe the experience of global citizens from multiple origins with their own histories, loyalties and soundtracks. It might even just be that wherever you are now, the sound you hear outside your own window was foretold on When I Was Born for the Seventh Time.

When I Was Born for the Seventh Time was released on 08 September 1997 by Wiiija 

An edited version of this review appears on the Corneshop website 

All photos © Greg Neate, neatephotos.com

More photos of Cornershop gigs are collected here 1992-94 and 1995-98.

Have You Guys Got the Internet Over Here?

A brief interview with Drive Like Jehu (1994 / 2016)

 Drive Like Jehu at the Charlotte, Leicester - 1994 © neatephotos.com

The opportunity to see Drive Like Jehu play live at any time would have been close to being essential. In late 1994, it could hardly have been more timely, as the enigmatic melodic hardcore four piece from San Diego toured the UK with Yank Crime, the second of their two legendary albums. Within a year they effectively disbanded and their charismatic guitarist, John Reis, became better known as 'Speedo', the frontman of the flamboyant, good-time, rock & roll review band, Rocket From the Crypt. The sense that an era might well have been ending would later be emphasised within the title of the 2014 documentary film, It’s Gonna Blow!!! San Diego’s Music Underground 1986-1996.

Reis and singer/guitarist Rick Froberg would later resume their musical alliance between 1999 and 2005 in the just as vital but more direct, Hot Snakes, whose live set referenced a shared history (one that predated Drive Like Jehu in their earlier band, Pitchfork) with the inclusion of Luau from Yank Crime. However, it wasn’t until 2014 that Drive Like Jehu reformed and in a gesture of civic support towards their Californian home town, played their first show in nearly 20 years accompanied by the world's largest outdoor pipe organ.

Back in 1991, it was through the portal of John Peel’s radio show that I’d first heard and recorded individual songs from Drive Like Jehu, the band’s self-titled first album. While the immediacy of the dynamic, jagged guitars on songs like Good Luck in Jail and O Pencil Sharp was thrillingly apparent, the chopping and syncopation of Mike Kennedy's bass and Mark Trombino's drums completed song arrangements that were filled with palpable tension and sheer release. And when all parts converged and galloped with barely contained abandon - as on Bullet Train to Vegas, a 7” single released between their two albums - it made for a breathtaking, breakneck ride. 

Intertwined with this startling musicianship were the simply worded but evocative lyrics of Froberg, a man who was just as able at delivering a scream with remarkable precision. Comprehension of the lyrics wasn’t always necessary to appreciate their intensity but within Froberg's words there was often an existential black humour as typified on Atom Jack;     

Yeah, you should be happy to see me 

be glad that I'm not dead. 

I took your bullet, anyone notice? 

No one was thrilled to see me again.

***

As a student in Leicester in the early 90s, I distracted myself by photographing gigs and had previously made a collage based fanzine, Quality Time. While the photography came naturally, my experience as a writer was painfully laboured and even more so as an interviewer. Still on the night that Drive Like Jehu played our local pub venue, the Charlotte, as well as packing a camera, I brought along a tape recorder as... well, you never know.

In keeping with the irresistible intensity of the songs from both albums, the gig was always going to be an energy-charged experience. Filled with enthusiasm afterwards, I approached Reis as he packed away their gear about the possibility of an interview. Unexpectedly selfless, he advised that I ask Froberg, who was alone in the Charlotte’s upstairs dressing room and graciously agreed with minimal negotiation only minutes after the show's ending.

If only I had prepared something intelligible! In my desire to seek more than a mundane account of the band’s history, I suggested trying something creative using what I could remember of Froberg’s lyrics to create a chain of words for use in a future collage-based feature. After patiently hearing my proposal, the singer politely, and not unreasonably, declined stating that he preferred conversations.  

Fifteen minutes later when the interview ended, I knew I had made an excruciating embarrassment of myself; so much so that I dared not to transcribe the cassette, let alone play it back. Yet, despite my fear, I knew that there was one potentially significant exchange that was worth retrieving. 

Rick Froberg, Drive Like Jehu at the Charlotte, Leicester -1994 © neatephotos.com 

Thus, if Drive Like Jehu could reform over 20 years later, the least I could do would be to listen to my 23 year old self and find out what that was. Somehow within my floundering performance, I unwittingly asked a question that in hindsight prompted a revealing answer from Froberg about how our world was on the verge of being transformed. That question had been grasped from the title of Yank Crime's second song, Do You Compute, from which I then asked the singer about his view on computers and technology. 

Rick Froberg: I guess I'm a technophobe or something like that. I worked at several art-based jobs where all the stuff that was done manually is now done with computers. I don't like computers that much but I figure that I probably have to learn to use one. There are some really cool things. Have you heard of the internet? Have you guys got the internet over here?

I confirmed some awareness though in 1994, it was as alien to me as learning a second language - GN.

RF: The internet is amazing! Information from anywhere in the world. You can have a conversation with anyone and to see all these other conversations [going on] is amazing.

GN: Does that stuff overwhelm you?

I asked this in part from my own frustrations with computing at the time, while unaware that Froberg was an accomplished visual artist and illustrator whose work included the band's cover art  - GN.

RF: That doesn’t overwhelm me. I thinks that’s a really cool aspect of computers. [However] the idea of a perfectly good but more arcane technology being phased out in favour of the newest, hottest, digital, whatever... CDs are a good example of that. Having vinyl completely passed out in favour of CDs because that’s what the industry says is going to happen and they make happen, just pisses me off. I think records sounds better. I like big art work and all the stuff that comes along with putting a record on a turntable.

If you look at any magazine [now], they’re all done digital on a computer screen. When I worked for a skateboarding magazine four years ago, we did it all by hand. There’s little things wrong with it but it’s just better to do things with your hands. You can do things faster with a computer and more efficient but what’s the hurry? I don’t understand what the hurry is? Everyone wants things to look perfect and clean and sterilised or something.

***

Such a sentiment could well have described the mindset that I wanted to bring to my cut and paste fanzine and though I had dared not to go back to my recorded interview, Froberg's answers would have suited my zine's second issue when it went to print two years later.

In 2016, Drive Like Jehu had their own car crash moment in April when their curated three day festival for All Tomorrow's Parties - which was to feature their first post-reunion appearance in the UK, alongside Hot Snakes and Rocket From the Crypt - was cancelled with less than a week's notice. As disappointing a blow as that was for all involved, in a sign of the times that was unimaginable a generation ago, the band stole a march on the tight lipped organisers by confirming the news in a memorable social media post that described their situation as a "uniquely cruel hoax".

Two months and one almighty false start later, Drive Like Jehu played their first shows in continental Europe in over 20 years and within 24 hours posted a decidedly more triumphant announcement from Primavera that could then be seen "anywhere in the world". All of which now begs the questions, just when will Drive Like Jehu appear in the UK again and will that travel bill with Hot Snakes and Rocket From the Crypt ever take place?

Neate at ATP - Exhibition summary

With all the preparations involved in putting together All Tomorrow's Parties' first photography exhibition at ATP Terminal in London, I've overlooked updating my own photography blog.

Today, 13 July, is the last day to view the exhibition though my print portfolios will remain on site for sales. ATP Terminal Shop is located near Rough Trade East at 12, Dray Walk, London E1 6NJ.  Opening times are Monday – Sunday 11am - 7pm.

In the course of the exhibtion there were a number of online features which are collected here as separate links. Here is ATP's page, a self-penned preview for the Quietus, a feature in Umbrella magazine blog and a feature / interview with It's Nice That.

With the help of Roweena design, the neate photos website continues to be overhauled.  Other social media links for neate photos are here: Facebook, Twitter,  Instagram.

 
Thanks to all at ATP for their offer and help with putting together and everyone who visited and pitched in to share the details. Cheers all x

Recovering from TB to run a marathon

Post-marathon drinks with Sheila Thackwray, mother of Seonai Gordon.

I was running when I first noticed something wrong. A week after moving to London’s East End, I had gone out jogging to explore the local area. Ten minutes later though, I had to slow down and then walked back along Regent’s Canal. 

Days later during a joint house warming and birthday party for my girlfriend, I faded again. I should have been celebrating myself, having completed my basic psychiatry training weeks before. However, feeling increasingly tired, I excused myself and retired to bed early, only to be kept awake by my new onset cough and the party underneath our mezzanine bedroom.

The next day we left by car to visit my girlfriend's native Netherlands. My cough continued while visiting friends in Kent and Belgium. I had a brief run of night sweats but these settled and I expected my flu had passed. I wasn’t really in the mood for an outdoor three-day festival though I tried to keep going and stocked up on lozenges to stop this relentless cough.

However at the festival I had now gone off alcohol and food. The fact that everyone spoke English just made me more self-conscious. While it rained all weekend and the site flooded, my cough continued and for the next three nights I sought refuge in the barn-sized cinema tent. There was a medical tent too and as I passed each day, I considered checking in. Previously I had been a volunteer doctor at the Glastonbury and Reading festivals, though I doubted much could be done for an annoying cough.

Assessment

On returning to London, I explained to my GP that my sides were sore from coughing and I’d lost weight like never before.  After his examination, I was curiously surprised to hear there were sounds half-way down my left chest. I was reassured to leave with a prescription for the antibiotic, erythromycin and thought I’d soon be better. Over the next few days my cough settled, I could eat again and my plans to see my Dad and brother in Australia next week seemed on track. 

The night before my flight, I was at the theatre and felt a familiar need to suppress a cough. However, this one wouldn’t go quietly and I excused myself to run up the stairs. I made it through the theatre doors before releasing a cough that left fresh blood in my hands. I washed up in the empty bathroom and looked in the mirror to check if I was unwell. I wasn’t sure but not wanting to cause alarm, I returned after the interval to see the end of the play. On our way home, I then explained to my girlfriend that I better visit A&E.    

When I described the blood, my cough and the noise that the GP heard in my chest last week, the nurse who took my observations suggested that a chest X-ray would be arranged. I was then checked over by a young doctor who seemed more thorough with his physical examination than I might have been. As he heard no unusual sounds in my chest and recognising each other as fellow professional, white men, we mutually agreed that all would be OK and an X-ray wasn’t needed. When I mentioned my planned flight to Australia, he seemed more excited than I was and offered to write a medical note. I felt that was unnecessary, but as the erythromycin had finished, he gave me a week’s course of penicillin V.

When I reached Australia though, I was still coughing and with my Dad being a retired radiologist, a chest X-ray was soon arranged. On returning from the radiology department, I received a phone call to say that an appointment had been made for me, for the following day at the chest clinic. There, I finally saw the reason for my three-week cough, a 10p-sized cavity in the centre of my left lung, right where the GP had heard the coarse sounds.  

Diagnosis and Treatment

By now, I was intermittently bringing up sputum. Specimens were sent for microbiology testing and I started another antibiotic. However, days later, that changed again when the microscopy results came back positive for acid fast bacilli, the tell-tale sign that meant tuberculosis - TB. 

I had only planned to stay for ten days but now I was grounded and house bound until further notice. I started taking four different antibiotics, which after two weeks was reduced to three when my sputum cultures showed that my TB strain wasn’t antibiotic resistant. From medical school days, the combination of rifampicin, isoniazid and pyrazinamide was familiar to me by its grim acronym, RIP. However, since the 1970s, this standard triple therapy taken as a daily course over six months, has been the mainstay of successful treatment for TB. 

Australia in the springtime was nice but I wasn’t prepared for having little to do. Along with the advice about the importance of compliance and avoiding alcohol, I’d been warned about the medication’s side effects of orange urine (due to rifampicin’s pigment) and fatigue. I certainly felt tired but wasn’t sure if it was the medication, TB or the the long phone calls to explain the situation to my girlfriend. Six weeks later, I was allowed to stop the pyrazinamide and as I was no longer considered infectious, I returned to London with four more months of treatment to complete.

While I had been away, my girlfriend had been screened and informed the members of her family that I met in the Netherlands of their own potential risk. Fortunately, she had no signs of illness herself when seen at the nearby London Chest Hospital, where I was now booked into for follow-up care. There I met the respiratory physician who was undertaking a critical incident review into my care in A&E. That was reassuring because of the inconvenience caused by the advice I was given though I felt sure it was an honest mistake. My untypical profile for someone with TB and the circumstances of me flying abroad the next day had been an unfortunate combination of events.

I was keen to know about the source of my infection as previously I didn’t know anyone who had TB. While TB is more prevalent among migrant communities, I hadn’t been in the East End long enough to have contracted it there. I wondered if it came from my work as a psychiatrist in London during the previous two years. Certainly health workers are at increased risk but that meant it could have been anytime since I started medical school 15 years earlier in another TB hot spot, Leicester. Although I had received the BCG vaccine when 13, I now knew all too well that it didn’t provide full individual immunity. Identifying the direct source of my infection was futile though I was later told that my TB strain matched those of other infected Londoners.

Recovery

Three years later on a Sunday morning in spring, Brighton’s first marathon went by my seafront window. After the elites there followed ever slower runners, joggers and then walkers who had yet to complete half the course. I admired their effort but thought, I couldn’t do that. Not because of TB, which I had recovered from, but as it was too damn long!  

Previously I had completed 10 kilometre races in my youth but the appeal wore off when my younger brother started beating me. I tried cross-country at senior school but similarly would lose interest and stroll back through the fields. At medical school and afterwards, I would run for half an hour to clear my head, though there was no interest in races, let alone investing in running shoes.

In early 2011, the Brighton based charity TB Alert asked for volunteers to run the next Brighton marathon on their behalf. I had been running longer distances to improve my fitness and thought I could do half the distance but didn’t think 26 miles would be possible within a few months. Yet it seemed the ideal opportunity to try and with two months to go, I ran my first half marathon in under two hours. My legs hurt afterwards but it was manageable and I felt more confident seeking donations to go twice the distance. 

As it was, having done a couple of 15 mile runs in the weeks before, I was reasonably prepared and finished the marathon in under 4 hours. While I was definitely wobbly during the last six miles in the midday heat, I was greatly assisted by the support of people cheering the name on my vest and who I wasn’t going to stop in front of. My legs were tired again though my greatest health risk came from not wearing sunscreen on the hottest day of the year. I also discovered why runners grease their nipples. 

Reflections

Having achieved something that I might not have done without my TB backstory, am I different? Am I even healthier? TB has likely reduced my lung capacity though fortunately, it hasn’t been noticeable. Through my training, I certainly have more stamina and while I don’t set targets, I do run comfortably for longer.  

In some ways TB has made me more determined as a person. During my treatment and while out of work, I realised I’d have to concentrate on my health and focus on things that I could achieve. Where previously I had been unsure about my career, I applied to resume my training in psychiatry and probably finished sooner than had I not been unwell.

My delayed diagnosis was inconvenient and the personal consequences were worse for being abroad. I fear for what may have happened to those who were close to me when I was infectious and wonder how the TB bug influenced my behaviour. 

In hindsight, the diagnosis for my symptoms of coughing, weight loss and tiredness seems obvious, but my lack of apparent risk factors appears to have distracted me and the first doctors I saw. The site of my TB cavity was also misleading, as while most pulmonary TB develops at the top of the lungs where oxygen concentrations are greatest, mine was at the top of my left lower lobe, which occurs in only 10% of presentations.

Even with my medical knowledge that coughing blood suggests either TB or cancer, in my mind I had ruled these out before I reached A&E. As my Australian physician explained, TB is the ‘great mimic’ that can resemble other conditions and often leads to wrong diagnosis and treatments with partial recoveries. That explained my own initial response to antibiotics, which likely treated coincidental secondary infections. However, had I not gone on to be diagnosed and adequately treated, I would have been vulnerable to relapses and developing antibiotic resistant TB.

I’m also aware that compared to most people with TB, I was fortunate. I received free health care, my TB strain wasn’t antibiotic resistant, nor did I have other complicating factors like HIV. Also relative to many who have chronic and debilitating TB, my diagnosis and treatment came early and improved my recovery. Fortunately, I wasn’t treating patients at the time and as far as I know, none of my close contacts contracted TB. I can only hope that’s the same for others I was in contact with then.  

In trying to come to terms with my illness, I was frustrated at how little I could say about it at the time. My diagnosis wasn’t something to share widely and after previous partial recoveries, I couldn’t be sure that I would recover as I have done. I therefore had to be selective in terms of who I told, which in itself was tricky to judge.

When considering how to tell my story and raise awareness, it was apparent that every TB story is different. For me, once my diagnosis was made, my recovery was straightforward. For others it can affect the stomach, bone, kidney or nervous systems and remain latent or prone to recurrences and without treatment can be fatal. That, along with the fear associated with TB’s reputation makes it a difficult message to explain, particularly without causing undue alarm. 

As a doctor, I’m continually aware of other people’s health. However, it was a disease from the past that was my first confrontation with my mortality but though TB, I learned that even a marathon wasn’t beyond me.     \

In memory of Seonai Gordon.

24 March is World TB day. For more details click here.

On 15 April 2012, I will be running the Brighton marathon again for TB Alert. Donations can be made here.


Updated 25 March for feature in Observer