So, we moved to Royston for my work but for Lucy’s also as it was undeniably quicker to get to Cambridge from there by train (where she was working at Addenbrooke’s Hospital) than from Haverhill by bus.
What can I say about Royston? It is not a bad place and in the past there’s no doubt it was once an important and historic market town but these days it seems disconnected from both Herts and Cambs by the major roads that have grown around it.
But I was there for work and work I did for Johnson Matthey Plc, refiners and purveyors of precious metals and their associated compounds.
I started in the analytic labs and ended up in the Fine Chemicals department as Technical Support.
All in all it was a good life- lots of interesting if ‘bucket’ chemistry to stick my head in, all the friends we had made at the farm lived locally and Cambridge was just up the road.
But dissatisfaction set in after a few years there; I just had a strong nagging feeling that I should be doing something else.
To try and find that something, Lucy and I moved for the first time into Cambridge. We certainly sought a richer social life than living in Royston could provide.
Now the seeds of 209radio start to become apparent; our group of friends were party-loving and gregarious, we moved socially in creative circles, our music tastes had broadened and deepened together.
We had started to attend the Dedbeat electro and hip hop festival, run by some Norwich boys annually on the Norfolk coast at various holiday camps.
These gigs were legendary; ask anyone who went about the guy who discharged himself from hospital with a broken leg and a overdose of partying because he couldn’t bear to miss Andrew Weatherall’s set. This hero was back on the dancefloor with a cast and a wheelchair within an hour of leaving the hospital.
I had attended many many trance parties when schooling in North Wales but the sounds we heard and the parties we attended during this time were something else. They made a huge impression on us all; they have left their marks on us still, truth be told.
Then in the autumn of 2002, it was announced a division of Johnson Matthey was merging with a division of ICI and jobs must be shed, albeit under a voluntary redundancy scheme at first.
I had been thinking a lot about retraining at that point, perhaps as a journalist.
I would get a pay-out so I applied to be let go. They didn’t seem to want to let me but that only strengthened my resolve.
In January 2003, 27 years old- I left chemistry and embarked upon the path that would lead me to 209.
But as anyone who knows will tell you, I was already there…
