(c)David Zax 2009.
The meeting described below takes place in a Tuscan restaurant of some note in the spring of 1986.
The major distraction to such a wonderful evening came from the more vocal of one of the four diners who had been invited to join the chef's table for the staff after hours wind down.
Turned out the disrespectful lout causing the disturbance was a pop star from the city of Newcastle, a grim hard core industrial area where men were at that time, arbiters of family disputes.
The city had been built on the back of the shipbuilding trade and was located on the river Tyne.
Frank had never heard of String.
The songwriter had introduced himself to Frank. He thought the name unusual and asked the performer his real name.
The pop star told Frank his parents had christened him Gordon but for the rest of the evening while in conversation with anybody around the table, he would prefer to be referred to as String.
Frank and Carla had been having a pretty good time until this self important loudmouth had tried to take over the evening with his showing off, Frank got that the guy was a fake inside a minute.
String insisted on telling the rest of the crew who were gathered hoping to enjoy themselves that not only was he a world famous pop star, he was also a master of the ancient art of Tantric Yoga.
He asked if anybody there knew what Tantric Yoga was.
Frank and a couple of the kitchen staff who were sat around the table told him they knew what Tantric Yoga was.
The singer then went on without a pause to explain to them what he thought Tantric Yoga was, and how he practiced his particular form of the yoga.
According to the three chord pop singer, the practice of Tantric Yoga, had thousands of years of history behind it and was a lifestyle that had millions of practitioners.
He said this sexy pop star Yoga had been handed down through generations and was the science of a perfected body that could be obtained only after pushing oneself through hideous physical contortions that would drive weaker men than a man of String's physical stature and mental toughness, completely insane.
The harnessed sexual power, combined with periods of sexual abstinence and the right diet could build within a Tantric yoga devotee, a pair of massive volcanic busting gonads that could effect the Chi of the rest of the world.
String went on to tell Frank and the rest of the diners' what Chi was.
He was quickly sucking all the fun out of the room.
The practitioner of tantric yoga he claimed, could tap into the stored energy at will and fuck the living daylights out of a loved one for days on end while achieving spiritual enlightenment at the same time.
String Frank found out from listening to his bragging was an oportunistic hustler.
He had spent five minutes explaining to Frank a brief outline of the problems caused due to excess logging in Brazil
Frank guessed the popstar and his publisists knew that when he set about on his quest to convince the general public he was clever and to increase his fanbase, that by picking relatively obscure and safe topics, such as deforestation of the Amazon rain forest and the practice of Tantric yoga the majority of people listening to him wouldn't have any real knowledge of what he was talking about and they would accept any crap he served up as fact simply because he was famous and appeared regularly on television.
Camp String could also be certain that nobody would come out in public and actively encourage out of control deforestation of the Amazon, with such a safe argument he already had everybody on his side.
He could then appear to be a sage to anyone who knew nothing of his deluded rantings, and they wouldn't question him about Tantric sex or the raping of the Amazon rain forest, subjects the public had only two views on, they either supported his view or had no view at all, there's no reason for anybody to take a stand against his view that chopping down trees is bad.
Nobody is going to organise a demonstration in support of chopping down trees.
The rest of the population, people who know he's a fool include politicians, career diplomats, academics and people who like to read.
The politicians, they know that this String is an idiot who talks out of his arse but they are wary to mention his lunacy when questioned because to voters, they have to be popular, particularly young voters.
Indeed politicians can't get enough of being photographed alongside celebrities pushing a cause no matter how deluded they are.
Coming out live on TV as a politician and telling your constituents that String and his management are playing you for a chump and you are an idiot for listening to him is not a vote grabber.
So String gets a free pass, even endorsements from politicians.
Frank didn't need to know who String was, the tactic he was using to sell his music was a common one among pop and film stars.
The more obscure the cause, the more people of his ilk can claim to be experts, and the longer these phonies' drag it out, the more exposure they have in the press to talk about their real passion, themselves.
The save the planet singer who loves flitting around the world in his carbon footprint nightmare lear jet; then went on to tell his bored audience, that the spiritual journey he had undertaken in his present incarnation could take many lifetimes to perfect and that his was merely a humble soul an imperfect soul in progress.
Fortunately for him, he had been introduced to an Indian Swami who was at that time down on his luck living in his uncles' basement in Fresno California.
The eastern mystic had fast forwarded String into the express check out counter to Nirvana after ten days spent with him at a house the Swami had borrowed from a friend in Laurel Canyon.
String went on and on boasting of his sexual powers and how, when during periods of sexual abstinence; when he took time away from being the greatest lover in the world, when after meditating before the sun rose to read classic Greek poetry and pacing the grounds of one of his several stately homes around the world he pondered deeply the terrible problems of the more desperate inhabitants of the third world.
Frank had spent plenty of time on the fringes of darker regions of the third world and he knew this String was a fraud who popped into poverty for thirty minutes at a time with a film crew in tow to capture him on film caring and beefy security, he then raced back to The Hilton with the film in the can where he would scrub away the filth from his body in the shower and then soak in the Jacuzzi.
String never spent time around poverty without having a camera crew along.
String told Frank that without him, the dying had no voice.
Frank was reminded of the legend of Mother Theressa.
He said he felt qualified to comment on complex afairs of state and be champion of the underdog on the basis of being able to write a hit single.
He left the impression, this cliched String Fellow, that he was desperate to be seen by people he met as a man of great wisdom, a man of words, and a man of great compassion.
The singer became visibly uncomfortable when he was reminded that he was famous because he wrote popular songs and in Frank's estimation he was deluded to think this talent meant anything outside the pop charts.
Frank asked the strummer what his profession had been before he had begun writing the songs he was famous for and the hitmaker dragged up some of his past life; telling Frank he had formerly been an English teacher, son of a milkman, he told Frank that he was a summoner, a teller of tales.
"Do you know who Billy Fury was?"
"Yes of course I know who Billy Fury was."
"Halfway to paradise, that's one heck of a song.
That Billy Fury, he was a genius, Billy Fury dressed in a gold suit, now there was a sight. Girls' they could never get enough of Billy Fury.
What records have you made? I've never heard of you."
String mentioned the names of half a dozen of his hits.
Frank told him he had never heard of any of them.
String was absolutely furious.
"You've heard of me, I'm really famous! ask any of these people, they know who I am, tell him who I am, tell him who I am!"
Frank looked around the table, he could see in the diners eyes his popularity had soared five thousand percent,that night everybody hated String, somebody from String's crew giggled.
"I've never heard of you. I like Billy Fury, Billy Fury was the real thing, Billy Fury, I know him, he was a famous man, nobody ever saw Billy Fury being asked by a reporter from the Manchester Guardian, what his views on the Suez Crisis were.
Even if Billy Fury had tried to tell the world his take on boiling Middle Eastern tensions nobody would have taken him seriously, and he was Billy Fury for fuck's sake.
The idea would have been laughable, what did Billy Fury know of international diplomacy?
Maybe we should ask Woody, the tartan trousered platformed soled' bass player from the Scottish boy band the Bay City Rollers, his ideas regarding the Marshall plan.
Do you know who Bobby Farrell is?"
"No I've never heared of him."
"He's the little guy, the lead singer from Boney M, the German based supergroup, the glam disco dancer whose hair resembles a washed out old Brillo pad.
He's from Aruba.
He had number one hits all over the world. Studio hits he lip synched to on TV and never sang on during the original recordings.
He came from the same camp that later produced the duo Milli Vanilli, do you think that qualifies him to speak to the United Nations General Assembly on the subject of third world debt?
How come no reputable news agency ever phoned Little Richard in 1962 to get the flambuoyant rockers' opinion regarding Soviet missiles based in Cuba?
Jerry Lee Lewis was never asked by Carl Bernstien at the Washington Post, his opinion on who shot JFK, and if he thought that the event had been a coup that had taken place in front of the world live on TV.
This was because Carl Bernstien knew that Jerry Lee Lewis, although an admirable night club performer had no idea of an insiders view of Washington.
I don't see why being able to write a three minute pop song qualifies anyone to play the role of international statesman.
Do you know Bob Geldof?"
"Yes I know Bob, he's a close friend of mine."
"That's interesting, I was wondering about him and the place he occupies in rock and roll history alongside other rock legends.
Do you think his recorded work is as important as the songs that were written by John Lennon or David Bowie, or Bob Dylan?"
"He's not quite as influencial."
"Not quite as influencial? Bob Geldof is shit. If I brought some friends home and we smoked up some serious dope and I put on a Bob Geldof album, they'd beat me up.
Do you listen to Bob Geldof's music much when you're relaxing at home?"
"Not often, but Bob and his wife are really good people to be around and he's very sincere."
"That's right, Bob Geldof is married to that girl from The Tube, Paula Yates, what's she like, there's a rumour going round that she's Hughie Greene's daughter."
"Paula is a wonderful person."
"I'm sure she has a big future ahead of her, I believe the Geldofs' have a daughter."
"Yes, and with her genes she's going to amount to something in the future, I'm sure she will have a big impact, you should watch out for Fifi Trixabelle Geldof she will be massive."
"I will String. I can hardly wait to see how she turns out. I'm sure the girl will be huge. Does she take after her grandfather, does she resemble the sly gameshow host Hughie Greene at all?"
String ignored the baiting and went right on bragging about his influence on global politics but he knew the game was up that night and the diners around the table were laughing at him when they eventually broke up and left.
Frank figured that his own life had been fine without knowing who this balding heart throb big headed balladeer was; the last thing he needed then was to be around showbizz sideshow hucksters and the filthy indecent suggestion the Geordie pop boy had spit into Frank's ear after he had sidled up next to Frank in the bathroom at a urinal.
What an arrogant bastard.
Can you imagine latching on to a cause you know nothing about and then parading yourself around the world for years on end making a fool of yourself showing your ignorance while speaking alongside career diplomats and world leaders who know what they're talking about live on TV and having millions mock you, and still ploughing on with the charade?
Why does anybody need that level of attention?
To always be on center stage, posing as an expert knowing that you have long ago been found out.
Frank hoped he never crossed paths with that ego on legs again he was tired of him and his kind.
