Jones - Let the good times roll: my life in Small Faces, Faces, and The Who

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To Jayne, for your love and support.

Nah. Never heard of him.

That would have been the response to anyone in the 1950s walking down Havering Street in Londons East End, where I grew up, asking where Kenny Jones lived. Back then I was known to my mates and everyone on the street as Kenny Ward.

I was the only child of Violet Elizabeth Jones and Samuel Thomas Jones, born on 16 September 1948. We lived at number 34 with my mums parents, Jane and William Ward. That terraced house in Stepney had been the Ward family home for, well it seemed like forever, and although Kenneth Thomas Jones was my real name, no one ever thought of me as that. My grand-parents were part of the furniture of Stepney, and very nearly ended up as part of the street itself.

My grandfather used to tell the story of a bomb dropping at the bottom of Havering Street during the Blitz, down by Commercial Road, while he and my nan were in bed. I dont know why there wasnt an air-raid siren, but obviously they woke up with the explosion. It was a very near miss. Not only did all the windows of their house shatter, but the blast was sufficiently strong also to blow in the bedroom window frame, which ended up hanging around their necks as they were sitting up, probably thinking this was it for them.

I saw something similar happen many years later to a very angry man in a hotel lobby in Honolulu, although with a picture rather than window frame. I thought it was a laugh; Im sure my grandparents didnt find their experience at all amusing.

Our house in Havering Street was the centre of the whole family, the Joneses and the Wards. A happy home, full of love and affection. My dads parents also lived close by, across the road, near Arbour Square nick, where I made my first public appearance. Ill get on to that in a moment.

Mum always told me that it was Nan and Granddad who brought me up because she was too ill. She was always telling me she was ill, and while its true she didnt always keep the best of health, she lived to the age of 89. I think Im right in saying that she was among the first women in England to undergo a pioneering colostomy procedure, a big deal back then. I was 16 at the time, and remember visiting her in hospital, telling her all about my hit record that had just come out. She was in the London Jewish Hospital, on Stepney Green, not that we are Jewish, but that, of course, didnt matter at all; people of all religions were cared for there. Mum was very well looked after.

The hospital had originally been built to help meet the needs of the large Jewish community who were very much part of the fabric of the East End, many working in the garment industry, known as the rag trade, and contributing to the vivid character of the streets on which I played and sometimes ran riot.

One Jewish lady in particularly stands out in my memory or more precisely what she sold stands out. She ran a delicatessen on Cable Street, around the corner from us, where you could buy bread and dripping for a farthing. To serve you, she would tuck the loaf under her arm, dip her knife into the jar of dripping, slather it over the end of the bread, then slice off a massive doorstep. Brilliant.

Right opposite that deli was another source of wonderful treats the local fish and chip shop. Not that we could afford the fish, but that didnt matter. For a penny you could walk out of that place with a bag of crackling the scraps of batter that had fallen off the fish or saveloys of whatever was being cooked in the fryer. Better than boring old cod any day.

Before illness restricted Mums working life, she was an engraver and cutter for T. & W. Ide, a glass factory just off Cable Street, very near my school. The section where she worked was fronted by a large, frosted window, embedded with wire mesh for security. This being the East End though, nothing was entirely safe. Some urchin had shot at it with an air rifle, leaving a convenient peep hole about the size of a sixpence, or a tanner as we knew it, for me to eyeball Mum and attract her attention with a shout of, Can I have half a crown?

If she had anything in her purse she would quickly duck round to the side door and slip the coin to me. She was good like that. Then Id trot off to school, deciding what to spend it on. I dont think it would have been cigarettes then, this was in Primary days, but I cant be sure.

Dad was a lorry driver. Hed learned to drive trucks in the army during the war, and after being demobbed he joined the firm J. Packers and Sons, based in Canning Town. In those days it was a motor and trailer, not an artic as is common now. Dad drove and his mate looked after the trailer. The lorry cab housed a big engine covering, which I loved to sit on because it was warm and exciting. They used to take me on trips, long distance sometimes, and even then, long before Id ever thought of becoming a drummer, I had the best seat in the house, sitting between the two of them pretending to drive.

I got on well with Dad, I loved him to bits. He was quiet, loving and unassuming, but there was also a roguish element to him. I used to wonder what the hell was going on when, every now and again, he would come home, almost certainly after enjoying a few pints at the local, walk into the kitchen and throw a wad of cash into the air. It was such a sight. Notes back then were the size of a newspaper, and they used to float slowly and gently to the ground. Im sure he was up to no good. Thats probably how he managed to afford the various cars he bought over the years, including a fantastic Austin convertible which he loved. I loved it too, even though I once suffered a burn on my leg in that car. Mum and Dad were both smokers and one of them flicked a butt out when the top was down and it flew back in, landing on me, squeezed in the back. There were only ever a handful of cars parked on Havering Street while I was growing up, and one of them would be Dads. Ask no questions, that was the neighborhood motto. Everyone understood that.

Flamboyant gestures were unusual for my father, who was by nature a shy man. Unless hed been to the pub. Then a more theatrical side of his personality would nudge itself to the surface. I recall arriving home from school to find Dad a little worse for wear after an afternoon with his mates, during which hed concocted a plan to play a trick on Mum. He was clearly very pleased with himself, sitting there with a smile as wide as the Thames.

On you go, son, he said, gesturing towards the kitchen. Take a look in the sink.

I couldnt believe what I was seeing. Staring back at me was a pigs head. Wearing a flat cap or a cheese-cutter as they were called in the East End.

This is going to be great.

Just after five oclock, Mum arrived home from her work at the glass factory. Cup of tea, Sam?

Love one.

Off she went to the kitchen, while Dad and I sat in the front room, desperately trying to suppress giggles as we waited for the big moment. Nothing. We could hear her putting groceries into the cupboard, taking out the biscuit tin, setting cups and saucers on the table, tidying up. Then at last, she went to fill the kettle. Crash! It clattered to the floor as Mum started screaming like mad. She thought it was a human; we thought it was hilarious.