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SAM CULPECK 24 JUL 1978 - 2 JUN 2015 I was broken from the winter I was washed up on the shore 'Till you came to me and calmed me Pulled the splinter from my paw Once my dreams were torn and broken Once my hope was almost spent Now the dream has re-awoken Let this be my last lament Oli Spleen, Last Lament (Song for Sam).
preferring to push the same commercial pop to gay men that is sold to teenage girls. As more of an outsider to the gay scene however, Sam loved to go out and felt more at ease on the scene than I, as she was less likely to be subjected to the sort of unwanted attention she would often get elsewhere.
) It is with great sorrow and a heavy heart that I write this. My dear friend, companion, soulmate and collaborator, Sam Culpeck, passed away in the late hours of Tuesday, June 2.
PETER LINDARS 2 JULY 1970 - 20 APR 2015
) Peter Steven Lindars passed away on April 20, 2015 and was laid to rest on Tuesday, May 12 following a service to celebrate his life at St Andrew’s Church, Waterloo Street, Hove. He was born to Maeve Lindars and the late Michael Cheevers on July 2, 1970, at North Middlesex Hospital in Edmonton. He attended Chesterfield Junior and then Enfield grammar schools, before leaving school to work for Bairstow Eves Estate Agency in London. Having worked in the estate agency business for a number of years, first in London then more recently in Brighton, Peter changed direction with his career in 2004 and became co-owner of the Iron Duke Hotel on Waterloo Street in Hove entering into business first with Bob Evans, then with Gerald Featherstone, before successfully running the pub and hotel on his own for the last few years. He entered into a civil partnership with Greg Clark in 2011, and they had lived together in Hove since 2004. Peter was a keen runner and ran more than 10 half and full marathons in the last 18 months of his life, both as a personal goal and to raise money for the various charities he supported. He was a great supporter and friend of the Actually Gay Men's Chorus who rehearsed and gave performances in St Andrew’s Church in Waterloo Street and used the Iron Duke for social purposes after choir rehearsals. He leaves an older brother, Mike Cheevers, and a younger half-sister, Emma Lindars. If you would like to make a donation to charity in memory of Peter Lindars, please go online to Virgin Giving and search for Peter Lindars to donate to Mind and Epilepsy Research, charities that Peter had himself been involved in raising money for.
) On Saturday, July 4 at 7pm you are invited to join friends and colleagues of Peter at the Dukebox Theatre in the Iron Duke at 3 Waterloo Street, Hove for an evening of music and comedy. The Peter Lindars Memorial Cabaret Fundraiser will be raising money for Epilepsy Research UK and Mind UK and will include performances from the Actually Gay Men's Chorus and a DJ set from Peter von Sleaze. Entry is by donation. Greg Clark
A little over three years ago, Cod Riverson, the bassist in my band Pink Narcissus, was approached by Channel 4 and asked if he would date a Brighton girl with dwarfism for the TV show The Undateables. When the show aired I was instantly struck by his date Sam's bubbly personality, adventurous nature and sense of humour. I felt sure we'd become friends, should we ever meet. I was also pleased that Cod had come across as the gentleman he is and was portrayed as the more successful of Sam's two dates, leaving her with hope for the future. I became a pen pal with Sam whilst she was on a skiing holiday and in the weeks after the TV show aired. When she came to a Pink Narcissus gig on my birthday we hit it off and became solid, inseparable friends. Sam was completing a Phd in psychology and her lust for life and sense of adventure was contagious, as I had first witnessed watching her skydive on TV.
I was on the cusp of releasing my debut solo album Fag Machine and Sam and I set about venturing on to the scene to recruit extras for a music video for the album's title track. The idea of the video was to send up gay culture and its stereotypes in a loving way. She located a venue for the shoot, Brighton's Queens Arms, where she had previously made friends and connections doing a charity fundraiser.
When I expressed to her my concern that we may have too many women in the video as many of the men she and I had headhunted for the shoot wanted to be in drag, Sam suggested that she could fill a male role and was For two and a half years Sam was a keen to play the moustached leather constant in my life and we went biker stereotype of Tom of Finland's everywhere together. Her love and generosity knew no bounds. She loved drawings and the Village People. Christmas, so she ensured that our The video was an immediate hit with Christmases were magical, giving me viewers and secured us a gig in a second Swiss Christmas with her Amsterdam - the first of many where family where a tree would be Sam would back me onstage. Whilst illuminated with real candles. there we got to witness a genderqueer/drag dance troupe Like Sam, I had suffered from depression and though by the time we perform their brilliant routine to the met I was at peace with my sexuality I Fag Machine track. On top of all this, the manager at the Queens Arms never felt at home in the gay scene asked us if we would be interested in where I had experienced loneliness hosting a night for them every week and rejection. I also felt that, while all to showcase whatever we liked. At subcultures were embraced in last we were finally given an Brighton, its gay scene seemed opportunity to bring to the gay scene predominantly mainstream and didn't truly embrace real gay culture,