Oh Thicky, you magnificently silly bastard!
By Sean Atkins
Andy lawn sprinkler japes. Portugal 1999
PING!
It’s Sal. This isn’t going to be good.
Please don’t let this be the brick in the face we’ve all been quietly dreading. Surely it’s not THAT hour. Two words into the preview line of her message and I know it is…
That text. Ever since it landed my mind has been racing with memories of my relationship with this glorious man I’ve called one of my closest mates for over 30 years.
A straight up goofball. The smartest idiot you’ll ever meet. Fiendishly clever, but in an utterly silly way. A guy who didn’t for a second realise how good he was or how good he had it - ultimately to his detriment.
And that’s kind of where my head has remained. Snatches of hilarity briefly coming into view that I can’t make sense of. Memory patterns I can’t seem to fully form. And, like Andy himself (and so many people in his life), words are supposed to be my tool!! They’re letting me down today. There’s a narrative here, but it’s all so ludicrous, heartbreaking, hilarious, energetic, depressing, inventive, generous, down-to-earth, full of warmth and yet ultimately bleak that I just haven’t got the skill to put it all together. He would have.
So I’m just going to ramble – string together some of the stuff we experienced together in an attempt to paint a crude picture of that Bristolian fun machine we called Thicky. And of course, I’ll have to figure out a way for it to end with Max The Dog having a shit.
Deep breath…
When I landed at Future Thicky was already part of the folklore. He was Jim Carey to Stevie J’s Jack Dee - a ball of energy with a determination to have fun at all costs (not Stevie J).
The first time Andy got me in trouble I hadn’t even met him yet. I was a green Staff Writer on TOTAL!, Andy was due to triumphantly return to the mag, after a stint on Mega I think, as the new Editor in a week or so and I was given my first solo assignment to travel to London (in Jimmer’s flash car) and interview LucasArts for the exclusive Return Of The Jedi cover feature. Only when I got to their Soho board room, three frowning suits awaited me clutching the latest issue of TOTAL! open at the next month page. The famous speeder bike scene was lovingly recreated to fill the entire page, except where Luke’s head should have been, the gurning face of Andy had crudely replaced it. Above was the headline ‘Next Month Return Of The Thicky!’ The men were LucasArts lawyers. I didn’t play the game. I didn’t see the game. We didn’t cover the game. Instead we narrowly avoided a lawsuit from one of the biggest entertainment companies in the world which would have crippled the mag - and Andy hadn’t even started yet.
The second he rejoined TOTAL! the silliness ratcheted up - the mag became funnier, the team caricatures became just ludicrous, Hazel the cleaner suddenly had a regular column and I had a new best mate. Before Andy we just seemed to be vibrating at a lower frequency.
After that it becomes a bit of a blur: we invented a new sport in France (Château Ball anyone?)… we jointly pitched N64 Magazine to the Future Board and collapsed in laughter upon hearing the news that it got the green light but neither of us was being offered any job on it let alone editing it (we headed immediately to Hatchets to play pool)… he didn’t blink when our car blew up on Christmas Day outside of Bath, immediately scooping us up from Frome, taking us home, feeding us, watering us and making up party games all while Piano Man and Jagged Little Pill played on repeat… we went on many holidays together… he took us out on his boat in Devon (the most serious I’d ever seen him!)… that Summer party where Spindly Wig Hat’s unique dance stylings made him howl with laughter so much it forced him to leave the venue – watching Andy clutching his sides in laughter-induced agony on the ground outside became far funnier than the mesmerising Spindly hip pivot that started it all… I haven’t even scratched the surface (or mentioned his beloved creation Max The Dog), but it all boils down to this: I’ve never laughed as hard as I have with Thicky.
Miss you Andy.
X
