Skeletons : Early Songs: (Early 90s): 'Not For This Boy'

'Not For This Boy' was the first MM song that ex Haircut 100 bassist Les Nemes played on.
We had already been introduced to Phil Smith (sax) by our then A&R man at Zomba,  Mark Fox (ex H100 percussionist) and those boys were pretty tight back then; rallying against Nick Heyward and the disappointments of the Haircut's enforced split just before the potentially money spinning 2nd album was about to be released. The music was in the can; Nick only had to commit his vocals; he chose instead to go solo; producing the very fine 'North of a Miracle'. Mark Fox threw his hat in the ring as lead singer briefly, before realising he best rest with his bongos; the album never saw the light of day, which was a shame; I heard a few of those mixes and they elaborated on the early sound of Pelican West with an urgency that reminded me of a poppy Talking Heads.
Here's a Nickless promo shot of the boys at the time (seemingly caught on CCTV) waiting for a bus.

Les and Phil recorded with Miracle Mile extensively and stayed with the gigging band , working not only on these early demos, but also on the debut 'Bicycle Thieves' and the follow up 'Candids', both leaving the band when we stopped gigging, just before the release of 'Slow Fade'.

For this track Les listened through once and then nailed the song first take. His big hero at the time was Ronnie Lane of the Faces and I think that you can hear it in his playful fretwork. Our Les was no backseat bassist... I believe that he currently resides in Spain and still plays with the Haircuts when they get together for the odd 80s review tour with T'Pau, Howard Jones and other lesser talents...