I have just spent about an hour looking over the soul source website enjoying the various contributions and memories and was just about to retire to bed when i came across this article. I, like most of the Heywood and Rochdale crew going to the casino in the mid to late 70's knew salmon well. Salmon was a Castleton lad as i recall and a great debater for any noble cause. He was a big pal of Ross , Frosty , Billy , Lee Shep , Heapy, O'D , Ant Lee and to be honest countless others from north Manchester (Wigan goers) at the time. An ever present at the Casino (mostly in the record bar i seem to remember) he was a very straight talking chap who knew his way around an underground record scene from the USA 60's , 70's and beyond, like not many others. I last saw Salmon around 2 yrs ago and like everybody else i'm sure , now I very much regret not spending a little more time 'chewing the cud' with the chap (if of course an audience he would grant) as i knew he had been ill but assumed he was recovering as he looked so well !
Top chap that Salmon bloke , i know that he had lots of friends outside of the northern soul scene but i do think that this was his family and i feel very sad tonight , how fitting that it's a Saturday ! Just for the record - The 400 bus from Oldham went through Rochdale , Heywood and eventually arrived in Bolton in time for a beer at the pub at the Bus station ahead of the 11pm (515) bus to Wigan (hope i got the bus numbers right). Salmon enjoyed and entertained all through the journey and even after the baths (and goodness knows what 'stay wake' help the next morning) he always had a smile and interesting chat for all.
R.I.P Salmon - you will be sadly missed.