Deaf School’s Clive Langer talks to Jamie Bowman about celebrating a wonderful era at the Everyman

THE Beatles may have had the hits, Frankie Goes To Hollywood the controversy and Flock Of Seagulls the hair, but, for many music fans, Deaf School will always be the coolest Liverpool band.

Formed at Liverpool College of Art in 1974, this band of theatrical Bohemians is often credited with dragging the city’s music scene from its post-Beatles malaise and signposting a brighter future through their early association with Merseyside’s new punkier outlook.

Now a reformed Deaf School are providing a fitting soundtrack to one of the final shows at the Everyman Theatre, before it closes for redevelopment, an occasion that brings back a lot of memories for guitarist Clive Langer.

“We were at the Art College down the road, and I suppose the initial attraction was that the Everyman bistro opened late and it was a building full of life,” laughs Langer.

”You could always go there any evening late at night.

“We got to know the doormen so we could slip in after hours.

“The theatre group at the time was great – people like Julie Walters and Bill Nighy, and I remember going to see their plays.

“It was a bit of a scene, really. We were the musicians and they were the actors and we would end up at the same parties.”

One of Deaf School’s biggest fans was former Beatles publicist Derek Taylor, who would regularly meet the band at the Everyman, and eventually signed them to Warners, for whom they recorded their classic 1976 debut LP, 2nd Honeymoon.

However, with punk beginning to raise its spiky head, Deaf School’s arty, Roxy Music-influenced show tunes were already looking out of fashion.