‘A three-minute history of England written in the tour bus toilet’: how Tenpole Tudor made Swords of a Thousand Men

‘Dressed as knights, we’d walk onstage to the sound of the William Tell overture. I’d quote Henry V and the crowd would shout, “You’re the rightful king of England!”’

I’d worked up the basic idea on Stiff Records’ three-month tour of the northern hemisphere. It’s near-impossible to write songs on the road because you lack the basic solitude, so I’d retire to the tour coach latrine. The melody was really a boogie-blues progression, part-inspired by Norman Greenbaum’s Spirit in the Sky and Canned Heat’s On the Road Again. But lyrics only flowed when we came off the tour. Rehearsing near our favourite drinking haunt, the Castle on Holloway Road, London, provided the opening line: “Deep in the castle and back from the war.”

Swords is like a three-minute history of England. I like to think it could have been written at any time and been a popular folk song. Knights were the first superheroes, and the people buying the record in 1981 were 11-year-old boys. It became a playground craze: I’ve always felt I had the mind of an 11-year-old. When I’d recorded Who Killed Bambi a couple of years earlier, for publicity I’d fed Malcom McLaren the line that I was a direct descendent of Henry VIII. He thought it was hilarious.

With the release of Swords, we played up to the whole knights in armour thing, with doublets, hoses and tabards. Our live performances were very theatrical. Sometimes we’d walk on stage to the William Tell Overture and I’d declaim the St Crispin’s Day speech from Shakespeare’s Henry V. People would shout: “You’re the rightful king of England!” I’d say: “No I’m not!” They’d say: “Yes, you are!” It was in the fun, rocking tradition of Sweet, Slade and Status Quo, with a touch of music hall. Swords was one of the first pop videos on MTV. We hired members of the Sealed Knot historical reenactment society for the shoot.

One day, I was walking down the street and a policeman beckoned me over and said: “Are you the person responsible for Swords of a Thousand Men?” Given my permanently guilty conscience, I was terrified. But he just said: “Well done, congratulations,” and shook my hand. That was lovely.

I’ve been touring recently to promote my autobiography. Its title is a play on Swords – The Pen Is Mightier – and when I perform the number the audience sing the chorus for me. Those 11-year-olds are in their late 50s now. You always love the first record you bought, don’t you?

We’d been rushed into the studio to record tracks for our first album Eddie, Old Bob, Dick and Gary. When the mixes came back, we couldn’t hear a potential single among them. So when Eddie got his skeleton of an idea for Swords, its rhythmic, faintly rockabilly feel caught our attention. We worked it up outside the studio. Eddie loved the idea of chants you could sing on football terraces, hence the “Hoo-rah, hoo-rah, hoo-rah, yeah!” We took pride in our harmonies, something you hear on other singles like Wünderbar and Throwing My Baby Out With the Bathwater.

We recorded Swords at Island Studios with Alan Winstanley, who was also producing Madness. He was a master engineer. But although we’d got all the parts down, we still didn’t have an intro. I was influenced by the Stranglers’ JJ Burnel and wanted to write a bass intro that was instantly recognisable, but using as few notes as possible. The “dinga-dinga” bass start to Swords was it – as soon as the song comes on in a club, everyone knows what it is. But, on its own, it was too sparse. So the galloping horses were sourced from a sound effects LP in the BBC library. That horn you hear is me. I’d played bugle in a Boy Scouts’ band, so I borrowed a mate’s trumpet and blew that. Again, very minimalist, just two notes. Our drummer Gary Long overdubbed timpani, sitting in the corridor to get that big, ringing sound.

To me, Swords is a punk-psychobilly crossover, and it gave us a rockabilly-cum-psychobilly following. Our guitarist Bob Kingston had always looked like a 1950s’ ted with his greasy quiff. We did a gig at the Crystal Palace Bowl and got bombarded with mud and weeds, a trait of psychobilly fans.

Tenpole Tudor broke up too soon. I set up my own Panther Studios in Surrey. As well punk bands, these days I make ambient music. But 10 years ago, I was in a band, the Weird Things, that backed Eddie doing Swords at a show in London. It was brilliant being on stage with him again, doing what we used to do.