Andy Reid is a cultured midfielder. He’s also, by all accounts, an accomplished musician. But a nasty little theft has prompted him to issue an appeal for help in the return of some important items of personal property …
The theft of two guitars owned by me, though an impossible crime since I have only one, would not be a reason for public distress.
You’ll know what I mean by that if you have any recollection of “floor spots” – the contributions of regulars, singers or musicians, before and between the appearances of professional or semi-professional performers – in the folk clubs of County Durham circa 1970. The knowledge that criminals had deprived me of the means of massacring Anji or San Francisso Bay Blues might even be an excuse for a celebration.
Andy Reid is in a different league. He might have been one of the paid guest performers at the folk clubs had he already been born.
And whatever it was about late-night banjo sessions in a German hotel that made the Irish coach Giovanni Trapattoni unwilling to choose him for the national squad, Reid’s music has its admirers.
So, it seems, do his guitars. Two of them – a 1975 Gibson Les Paul and a 1981 Fender Stratocaster – have been nicked from a Durham recording studio.
Reid is appealing for help in getting them back.
He told the official SAFC site: “Most people are aware of my passion for music and the guitars really mean a lot to me. I’m obviously hugely disappointed that they’ve been taken.
“It’s not about the monetary value of them; they’re just really important to me. The two guitars are very distinctive and fantastic to play, which makes them extremely difficult to replace.”
Let us hope no one makes the unworthy suggestion that suspicion centres on the part of the North East that lies to the immediate north of Durham.
Colin Randall