David
and Peter Quaife used to get on scooters and ride to the Seven Dials Club, in
Earlham Street – scene of next month’s launch – in the 1960s.
David, a
59-year-old army veteran, said: “We were a close family. I was 12 or 13 when he
[Peter] started off with The Kinks. I went on tour with them.
“The
Seven Dials Club was a great place back in those days. There were a load of
characters there and it had a local pub feel.
“I was
too young but they’d let me in. I had Cuban heel boots that made me taller.
“It was
a great place for us to escape from the police because there were seven roads
leading off it. We’d go down there on Friday nights on our scooters – Peter had
a Vespa 180 – and a whole crowd would turn up. Then we’d go off to the 100 Club
or Ronnie Scott’s if we had the cash.”
In later
life Peter suffered from renal failure and spent four or five hours a day on
dialysis machines for 16 years before his death in 2010.
David
said that, because of new sterilisation rules, for the last six years of Peter’s
life he was not allowed to take anything to pass the time into the clinic with
him.
He said:
“Pete used to like to draw cartoons or read a paper. But then he wasn’t allowed
to do anything for six years.”
This was
still happening today, he added. “They just plonk you down in front of a TV,”
he said. “That’s no life for a child.”
David,
who runs the Peter Quaife Foundation, is raising funds to buy children on
dialysis units things to brighten up their lives. “Like PlayStations or X-Boxes
but whatever they want really”, said David.
A new CD
of The Kinks covers, called Pass It On, is launching at the Seven Dials Club on
September 21.
There
will be a full meal and old-style DJs playing vinyl. To find out more, go to www.petequaifefoundation.com
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