A true tale by Harry Whitewolf


The Libertines are one of the few remaining bands I’ve always wanted to see live but never have.

Therefore, I was hoping Lady Luck would be on my side and I’d be able to get my mitts on one of the four hundred tickets that were up for grabs at the local haunt they’re playing as part of their small venue tour for the new album launch in 2024.

But it wasn’t to be. Even though I clicked the ‘Buy Tickets’ button at ten a.m. on the precise dot – the time the tickets went on sale – I was instantly number five-thousand-something in the queue. I figured I might as well wait for the queue to go down just in case I could still somehow miraculously be allocated a ticket. But at the end of the ten minutes of waiting, all I got was a ‘Bad Gateway’ error.

I was disappointed. But I already knew it would be a lottery getting tickets.

Maybe in another universe, I got lucky and I go to the gig.


As the day wore on, I started thinking in detail about the night from many years ago when I might have met The Libertines’ Pete Doherty.


***


During the last summer of the twentieth century, before my final year of university, I sublet a small room in London for a few weeks, somewhere near Finsbury Park. I was in the city to do work experience at Camden Arts Centre.

Although I’d been to London plenty of times before, as a shy and awkward young man who suffered from anxiety, it took me a while to get used to the day-in day-out big city life of grimy smog, blank faces, crowd-crushing-business-suits, rattling tube trains and espressos-on-the-go.

Still, the longer I spent there, often running errands from one side of the city to the other, the more I acclimatised.

Outside of working hours, in the evenings and at weekends, I made the most of my time in the capital. I strolled the streets, listened to buskers’ songs, chatted with homeless people, drank in bars, ate at cafés, visited museums and galleries, watched old Orson Welles films at the Curzon cinema, went to theatre productions and attended gigs. I even got to see Billy Bragg perform at a free festival.

One evening, as a newly-evolving poet who had only shared his work with a select few friends, I decided to find the well-known Poetry Café in Covent Garden.

The upcoming poetry events advertised in the window were too expensive - as it was towards the end of my stay and I was quickly being drained of funds - but there was a free open mic night on in a couple of evenings’ time. Having never attended an open mic poetry event – or indeed, any poetry event – I figured I’d go along.

Of course, I had no intention whatsoever of taking the stage! I was far too self-conscious, depressed and anxious to be able to do something like that. Besides, my poetry was sure to suck compared to that of the other poets performing.

As soon as I entered the premises on the night, the arty cosiness of the smoky soft-lit Poetry Café instantly felt like a haven for beatniks, hippies and outcasts; the sort of place I’d only imagined before, when reading the likes of Baudelaire and Ginsberg.

Though, its charm was doubtless mostly due to my inexperience with the wider world and it probably didn’t look the same way to the other patrons as it appeared to my early-twenties bohemian self.

The joint was about two-thirds full. I acclimatised to my new settings with a strong lager and a Cutters Choice rollie by the bar. Then, it was time to move into the other room for the performances.

While all were interesting, I was surprised that the quality wasn’t higher. I’d been expecting to be blown away by some of the seasoned pros who delivered their performances with the gusto of Brian Blessed on speed. But the quality of their works didn’t match their theatrics, I thought, and it was often the shyer types who shook with nerves and didn’t look their audience in the eye who had more to say.

Though, the only performance I clearly remember was by a rough-faced old cockney bird who was caked in makeup, clinking with gold jewellery and wearing a loose red dress; trying – but desperately failing - to make herself look younger.

She stepped up to the stage vigorously, clutching the mic like it was the last hardon on earth.

The woman then told her audience that she was a close friend of Mad Frankie Fraser, the notorious gangster and known associate of The Kray twins, and she went on to violently deliver a poem about how her dear Frankie had been hard done by.

It received some noticeably slow claps from the crowd.

After an hour, there was a break, so I went to the bar, ordered a pint and found a table.

Two guys who looked about the same age as me – maybe slightly younger – sat down at the next table. They soon started chatting to me.

One of the guys had a remarkably interesting face. It was the kind of face that you’d want to paint if you were an artist. That’s not to say it was beautiful. But the pale boyish face undoubtedly contained beauty.

His distinctive bagged round eyes were shining brightly, accompanied by flickers of twinkling eyelashes. And the charming cheeky grin above his drooping bottom lip indicated a mischievous and creative spirit. His scruffy dark hair poked out from beneath the brim of a porkpie hat. Or maybe it was a trilby.

The three of us got on well. Well, it was mostly me and the guy with the interesting face that were chatting.

“Are you a poet?” the guy, whose name may have been Pete but I can’t remember, asked me.

No one had ever asked me if I was a poet before.

“Well, I write a few poems, yeah,” I said, embarrassed.

“Are you going to perform?”

Are you going to perform? No one had ever asked me that before either. Well, not with regard to poetry.

“No! No, no, no…” I immediately responded. The thought had never entered my mind.

But fuelled by encouragement from maybe-his-name-was-Pete and his friend and the beer I’d just downed, I somehow found myself signing up for the second half of the open mic night.

If it hadn’t been for maybe-his-name-was-Pete and his friend (who could potentially have been called Carl) I may never have performed my poetry in public – which I went on to do many times over several years.

In fact, only a few months after taking the stage at the Poetry Café, I was performing at a literature festival and being personally introduced to the Poet Laureate Andrew Motion.


***


I have no idea whether the guy I met was actually the yet-to-be-famous Pete Doherty.

All I know is that when I first saw a photo of Pete Doherty in the NME, around 2003, I exclaimed to myself, “He looks exactly like that guy I met at the Poetry Café in ‘99!”

And the more I looked at pictures of Pete Doherty and watched him on telly, the more I became convinced that my maybe-his-name-was-Pete and the famous musician, vocalist and wordsmith from The Libertines were one and the same.

However, I was never fully persuaded. After all, faces can look similar and memories can play tricks. In fact, I’m generally not very good at remembering faces of people I’ve only met briefly. But at the same time, that only reasserted the possibility that I was recognising Pete’s face correctly because that face I had met at the open mic night was one of the few that had always stuck in my mind so clearly and vividly.


***


I knew five of my short poems off by heart, so I recited those.

I couldn’t believe how well my poetry went down with the crowd! After all, I was clearly shaking and not used to speaking in public. But I arguably received the loudest and longest applause of the evening.

My poems, which I believe were Hungoverboard, Living Suicide, Smoker’s Bruise, Happy Head and Jigsaw Angel (which can be found in my books Primordial Youth and Propaganda Monkeys), seemed to be a hit.

After the poetry performances were over, I lounged in the bar for ages with my new two buddies, who were really excited by my poetic rhymes and so happy I had taken the stage. As we celebrated with several beers and lots of smokes, I felt like I’d made friends for life.

They started telling me about their band.

Let’s-call-him-Pete said, “We’ve got a gig on Thursday night. You should come along and perform your poetry before we take the stage.”

“What? You’re not serious!”

“I’m deadly serious!” He gave me a flyer for the gig and said, “Come down an hour or so early, mate. Just ask for me on the door.”

“I dunno…” I said, feeling incredibly anxious at the idea of taking the stage again so quickly – and in such a different setting.

“Look, just think about it. But I’d really love you to do your thing at our gig.”

“OK, I’ll think about it.”

I never went. The gig was the night before the private view for the art exhibition I was working on for Camden Arts Centre. There was loads to do. It was an early start. And I needed to be on the ball. I didn’t trust myself to not get wasted the night before – like a “two bob cunt”. Plus, I was feeling anxious at the idea of taking the stage. I was also fuelled with doubt that the Pete guy would even remember asking me. Maybe it had just been drunken talk. So, I never went.


***


In another universe, I went to the gig.

That quantum version of me recited his poetry and was such a success that he started regularly performing as the band’s opening act. The band gained more and more popularity over the next couple of years and it wasn’t long before they were signed. And while my other self didn’t climb quite to the giddy festival-headlining heights of the band – they became the last truly great British guitar band, after all - he did enjoy much success; releasing volumes of poetry, being featured in the NME and The Guardian, appearing on Never Mind the Buzzcocks and even reciting his poetry on a single-release by the band.

He was on track to become a cult John Cooper Clarke-like figure and he started hanging out with all the stars who frequented the scene. He even shagged Kate Moss before she and Pete became an item.

After a while, he started hanging around places like the infamous Hotel in the Sky, the creative crack den owned by Pete’s literary agent.

It was there that my other self tried heroin for the first time; believing that it could act as a tool for creativity. After all, Pete used – and he was one of the most gifted artists of his generation. Lou Reed and William Burroughs had used too. My other self was convinced he wouldn’t get hooked.

The habit didn’t take long to devour my other self. Within two years, he was broke and homeless – thieving to feed his addiction.

Before three years had passed, he was dead.


***


I can’t know for sure whether the guy I met on that memorable night at the Poetry Café was actually Pete Doherty.

Maybe I don’t want to know.


***


I wonder if that let’s-call-him-Pete I met ever wondered what became of the skinny long-haired poet he met back in ’99. Then again, maybe he was just sloshed and didn’t even remember meeting me the following day.


Whether you were Pete Doherty or not, thank you (and your friend) for encouraging me to perform and liking my words. You helped me to believe in myself.

The course of my life could have been very different if I hadn’t taken the stage that fateful night.

Maybe Harry Whitewolf books wouldn’t even exist.




“What became of the dreams we had?”

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fuXMv...