Godfrey Old, Conrad Blakemore and Martin French – Mad Dog Bites, perform at the Parliament Hill bandstand on Sunday October 8, 1.20-3.30pm

IT’S Friday night in Hampstead’s William IV. The band is playing. A woman beckons to me to get up and dance. Her sequinned vest and trousers make her look younger than her 70 years. I hesitate. We fell out long ago and ordinarily only exchange the most cursory of greetings.

The band is Mad Dog Bites. They’ve been gracing the local pubs – the Wells, Duke of Hamilton, and old Bar Room Bar – for 25 years and Fridays in the William IV for eight. They’ve also just landed Saturdays in the Sir Richard Steele in Belsize Park.

Mad Dog Bites consists of Conrad Blakemore, Godfrey Old and Martin French, all in their 60s. Godfrey met Conrad at an audition in 1983 that was attended by members of the disbanded punk group Dead Fingers Talk. Conrad had taken his mum along and, ignoring the punks, she pointed dubiously at Godfrey. “Who’s that man? He seems a bit strange.”

Later, Godfrey told Conrad that Dead Fingers Talk frontman, Bobo Phoenix, already knew Conrad from the circuit and had mentioned him to Godfrey in passing. “I’ve got this bloke you might like,” he’d said. “He’s a bit stuck in the 60s but he’s all right.”

After that 1983 audition and meeting, Godfrey and Conrad worked as a duo for 15 years. In the late 90s, they advertised for a third member: a lead singer. Godfrey’s first impression of applicant Martin was of “a football fan in an anorak”.

Godfrey is a harmonica player but this came about by chance. After his bass equipment was stolen he bumped into the harmonicist Larry Adler in a pub. Larry chatted about the instrument and before he knew it Godfrey was playing it in gigs with the rock band The Pretty Things.

“There could be a future in this,” he began to think. “At least it’s portable.”

With a day job as a horticulturalist, Godfrey’s free time has always been spent not just in music but the broader arts. Today, he illustrates front covers for self-published authors and also helps his partner Léonie Scott-Matthews to run Pentameters, a Hampstead theatre that gives space to upcoming writers and performers. In 2019, Léonie was awarded a British Empire Medal for services to the theatre and local community.

Mad Dog Bites covers songs, putting its own twist on them depending on how it reads the room. The band members know each other so well that usually a nod suffices. There’s a lot of improvisation on the night.

“When things go wrong, which they do, I tell the band to concentrate on next week, next week, next week.” Martin says. It’s also what he tells the upcoming bands he mentors.

Martin himself came to London aged 16 to make his way in music. A father in the army had meant a peripatetic upbringing and he had been a shy child, “actually a weird child”. Arriving in the city, he set about scouring the New Musical Express and Melody Maker with a view to conquering his lack of confidence by going to as many auditions as possible. “I wanted to put myself in the firing line, a place where there’s nowhere to hide, where having thin skin is not an option. You realise you always think you’re better than you are. Then you realise you have to. Delusion is necessary.”

Mad Dog Bites

Conrad, the band’s guitarist, grew up in Hampstead. His father was Michael Blakemore, the theatre director who worked with Olivier to create the modern National.
“It was an interesting childhood, looking back, I suppose. I thought it was normal to have people like Anthony Hopkins and Peter O’Toole coming round.”

Conrad has worked as a BBC and Channel 4 documentary maker. He’s also been a professional photographer. But his first love was music and throughout his working life he never left it.

For 25 years Martin has been the band’s lead singer and “egg shaker” (tambourine player). He credits Jimmy McGrath, the landlord of the William IV and the Sir Richard Steele, with creating open, stage less spaces for music to flourish.

“There has to be no separation. The audience has to be part of the band. The Rolling Stones discovered that when they played their secret pub gigs. It’s about intimacy.”

As the music crescendos in the William IV, the tiny dance area is full. My sequinned, 70-year-old antagonist is beckoning and I leap up and join her in the spinning, ageless crowd.

The words of Born to be Wild sweep through the pub. Bar staff weave between the polished, rickety tables. Conrad bends towards his guitar. Godfrey’s harmonica sings. Martin stands up, microphone in one hand, the other reaching out to the crowd. Where band ends and audience begins is now no longer possible to see.

• Mad Dog Bites play Sunday October 8, from 1.20pm to 3.30pm, at the bandstand on Parliament Hill at the Conkers Challenge