BETWEEN ROCK AND A HARD PLACE.

Chapter One.


The East Barclay Music News magazine showed a glossy picture of The Golden Guitar Rock Club with a young woman dressed all in black, in a rock n roll style pose. She had long flowing auburn hair, with sunglasses on and an electric guitar slung over her shoulder. She was looking up at the clubs famous sign. Beneath, the headline read,
'GOLDEN GUITAR CELEBRATES 30th ANNIVERSARY OF SUCCESS.'

The editor's note said, 'in this months issue East Barclay celebrates the 30th year of the famous Golden Guitar Rock Club with an exclusive interview with Maxi Leigh Valentine, ex-singer from 'HARLEY' the towns most famous and missed rock band who dominated the club from 1990 to 2000 when they split. Pamela Carlton finds out why the band split after their ten year succession and asks if they were part of the clubs on going success to the present day.............'

Dean Tully was sat at the breakfast table drinking his tea and preparing to tuck into the bacon sandwich his brother Reece had cooked.
'Have you seen this?' Bob Murray asked entering the kitchen holding the magazine, sitting down at the opposite end of the table.
'Seen what?' Dean asked, taking a bite of sandwich.
'This!' Bob pushed the magazine across the table to Dean.
'What is it?' Reece asked joining them at the table.
'Exclusive interview with Maxi Valentine to celebrate the anniversary of The Golden Guitar Club.'
Reece glanced at his brother looking for any reaction.
Dean was silent while looking at the magazine cover and then he turned to page five where the feature article was and began to read it aloud.

'The band 'HARLEY' was born back in 1990 and originated from a band called 'the lads' consisting of Dean Tully on vocals, his older brother Reece Tully on guitar, Bob Murray on bass and Eddie Cassie on drums. All local lads had grown up together going to the same school. They shared a passion for rock music and formed their first band together in 1984 doing great cover versions of their favourite rock songs.

After six years of working their way around the local pubs and clubs of East Barclay and the surrounding areas, the lads became bored with cover versions so they began to pen their own songs, but they felt there was something missing.

When they walked into the Golden guitar Rock Club on East Barclay high street, having
secured a gig there for the first time, they came face to face with the rest of the line up for 'HARLEY'.

Maxi Leigh Valentine was then 23, the daughter of Daniel Valentine an ex session musician and the proud owner of the Rock Club. A singer in her own right, she sang at the club with Gayle Towner. Together they made a powerful duo and were the top female act in the club at the time.

Adding to the line up was Melanie Walsh a solo artist looking for a new direction to head in and Matthew Boyd, a part time bar man at the club looking for a keyboard spot in a band........'

Dean glanced at the small photograph of the line up and smiled. It may have all gone horribly wrong, but he had some very fond memories of the year that this photo had been taken. 1991 and they were posing outside 'the den' studio's for this shot. It was not a warm day, in fact the girl's were freezing cold, and this was how Maxi came to be huddled up between Dean and Reece to keep warm. A place that she found herself in emotionally as time went on. Dean had put his arm around her and it was from this day
that their relationship went from friends to something more deep routed and complicated.

Un-aware that Dean had stopped reading, he looked up through his fringe that covered his eyes at Reece and Bob.
'Read on,' Bob insisted, squirting tomato sauce into his sandwich.
Dean cleared his throat and read on.

'Tell me about the early days of 'HARLEY'.

'It was a very busy time for all of us in the band. We all had jobs outside the band. We spent a lot of time rehearsing for our gigs that suddenly just rolled in one after the other.
We had a Friday night spot at the club every week. We were friends and we did a lot of partying. It was great fun at first. Our friendships went from strength to strength and led to romantic relationships for some of us.'