My ’15 Seconds’ with Andy Warhol

In my previous vocation as a London police officer and more recently as former member of a foreign Embassy for 26 years, I have met all kinds of famous people and celebrities from royalty, presidents, politicians to film producers and music stars, but the one meeting that sticks in my mind is that of meeting Andy Warhol one day in London as a teenager……….

T’was 2 August 1971 & I was working in my teens selling hot dogs for pocket money outside The Roundhouse in Chalk Farm Road where I lived in North London, just up the road from Camden Town (check the video promo of our ‘Les Paul’s’ (The Paul’s) song Camden Town Blues).

The Roundhouse was and still is a mega artistic cultural center putting on concerts and shows (I first saw Ian Hunter, first heard Hawkwind & saw many others there), & on this night it was the grand opening of Andy Warhol’s controversial play called ‘PORK’, and no-one knew if he would fly in from New York or not for the grand London opening of his show.

My grandmother and her sister, who was up visiting from Wales decided to protest against the reported sexual content and nudity in the play and were among a small crowd of people waiting outside.

Lo and behold but who should come skipping along the street but Andy Warhol himself on the arm of his boyfriend Jed Johnson. My grandmother and her sister went up to Warhol and shouted at the top of their heavily accented Welsh voices, ‘PIG, PIG”! Warhol, almost without blinking an eyelid, stopped, looked at them, put his hands on his hips and said, ‘Oh no my dear, I think that you’ll find that it’s called ‘PORK’ as he minced away with a smirk on his face.

He then came towards me and I immediately spoke and apologized to him for my Grandmothers disrespect and rudeness to which he looked at me and smiled and said ‘Oh, I quite enjoyed it actually’ gave a little laugh and a wiggle and then hand in hand with Jed climbed up the stairs to The Roundhouse. Anyway, that was my little 15 second encounter with Andy Warhol:)!

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Watch our promo video called, Andy Warhol – Room 222 from our ‘Les Paul’s’ (The Paul’s) 4 volume anthology The Chelsea Hotel Collection (Volumes 1 – 4)

You can listen to our song I Met Andy Warhol – the track appears on our ‘Les Paul’s’ (The Paul’s) album England, Once My England

Visit Paul’s updated Landing Page and Paul’s Bio

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Postscript: Andy Warhol would die aged 58 in a New York hospital on 22 February 1987 from heart failure during his sleep following a gallbladder operation that he had put off because of his fear of hospitals, the injury had been the result of his near fatal shooting by a radical feminist in 1968, during which he had been declared clinically dead for a short period.

Jed Johnson and Warhol’s relationship ended in 1980, and Jed tragically died aged 46 in the explosion and crash of TWA Flight 800 near Long Island on 17 July 1996.