and there was a certain esoteric prestige associated with listening to say, Lindisfarne

This is my Lindisfarne story, fraught, as you will see, with esoteric prestige. I shall call my tale...

The Thing in the Fog on the Tyne

Some 18-20 years back it was my custom to commute the twenty miles or so into Newcastle-upon-Tyne by means of public transport for the purpose of general drudgery and humiliation in respect of work. On Wednesday nights I would visit a friend in Fenham, one who had a peculiar penchant for practical jokes which made my visits all the more entertaining - just as long I was not the butt of same. It was, as I recall, darkest and coldest winter, and I'd be coming in from the sticks after tramping a merry rustic mile over hedges, ditches, brooks and bridges to get to the nearest bus stop, sensibly wearing my trusty old Barbour, which, upon my arrival, would be hung up on said friend's Victorian coat stand whilst we banished the foibles of the late 20th century around a roaring log fire, smoking fine briar churchwardens (Petersons of course) and listening to the very latest in avant-garde Industrial Noise, or else choice Field Recordings of Eastern Europe Folk Music, all the while sipping the finest brandy, and tucking into our Weekly Game Pie made with the spoils of our respective weekend endeavours. Our night at an end, I'd pull on my Barbour, and we'd bid one another a hearty farewell before I set off into the sleet of the night, East along the West Road, back into town to catch my last bus back out to the sticks, where, it must be said I lived a good deal more urban life than my inner-city friend. Anyhoo, this one particular night, I was waiting for my bus in a freezing fog with my faithful Walkman blasting my numb brains with the latest waxing from The Fall (I fancy it was Extricate, which dates the episode to around 1990-91), and zipping up my Barbour the blood freezes in my veins to see there... a glinting in the street light as though of a... can it truly be? Yes... I rather think it is... it's... a small enamel badge... bearing the legend... Lindisfarne... and... a deep dread horror as I realised the truth that the unspeakable thing was pinned to the corduroy lapel of my jacket!

Forgetting about my bus, I ran in a blind panic back up to Wingrove Road where I hammered upon my friends door. Upon answering, I grabbed the scoundrel by the neck, pinning him to the wall. 'How long has it been there?' I demanded, as said friend choked, spluttered, wide eyed at this unprecedented outburst, and obviously as innocent as he was clueless. But who else could it have been? ' - The badge, Sir! The damn badge! How long?'
'You mean you've just noticed?' came the reply. ' - I'm afraid I rather forgot, old man - '
'But - how long?'
'It was - I'm afraid it was last year, old thing - the week before Christmas - '
'The week before Christmas? B-but it's - February now,' I stammered, tears in my eyes, releasing my hold on said friend's windpipe as the horrible truth dawned on me, resulting in the idiot passivity known as a state of shock. ' - That's - five weeks - almost six - all that time - all that time - '
'Come on through into the study, old boy,' counselled my by now seriously concerned friend. ' - I'll crack open a bottle of Amontillado - and - I must say - looks like you need it.'
'But - the thing, Sir! The badge - six weeks you say?
'Yes, yes - six weeks - but - it's gone now - we'll not see that again - '
'But - six weeks - oh no - oh - no - no - no - '

That I can even write of this episode now is the result of some eighteen years serious counselling on the matter. I've seen the best psychologists money can buy, and undergone courses of therapy as extensive as they were expensive, but even so, for all that, I know that I'll never be truly rid of the ghastly trauma that tore a sizeable chunk from my soul on that foggy winter Tyneside night all those years ago.

And yet, so glibly you say and there was a certain esoteric prestige associated with listening to say, Lindisfarne...