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Alfie outside Camden Mecca bingo hall |
At 90, Alfie’s talkin’ about his generation
Bingo fan catapulted to fame as singer with Zimmers
MEET sprightly Alfie Carretta, from Archway. Aged 90, he is probably the world’s oldest and most unlikely superstar.
Already, tens of thousands have downloaded his video, My Generation, from the internet, and we are all going to hear a lot more about Alfie when his new record is released next month.
For Alfie is lead singer with the Zimmers, a band made up of pensioners who have been assembled for a BBC documentary about ageing.
About 40 pensioners – including half a dozen from Islington – were chosen to record The Who’s My Generation at the legendary Studio Two at Abbey Road – to prove that older people have still got what it takes.
Leading figures from the music industry, including a top U2 producer, have thrown their weight behind the group, which was the brainchild of documentary maker Tim Samuels, who has made series about disenfranchised groups fighting back.
The Zimmers’ video is already starting to become a cult hit on the internet, including the YouTube website, while the group have their own page on MySpace.
The recording has been produced by Mike Hedges, who has worked with U2, Dido, The Cure and Manic Street Preachers.
It all happened for Alfie and his friends after officials at the BBC read in the Tribune about the fight to keep open the Mecca bingo hall in Essex Road. They were looking for campaigners and Alfie fitted the bill perfectly.
“I don’t know why they chose me to sing,” said the retired export manager, interviewed this week outside the Mecca bingo hall in Camden. “But I am rather enjoying myself. I’ve never sung before and nor did I know The Who’s My Generation. I’m more of a Nat King Cole fan.”
Alfie, who has never married, expects to become the centre of female attention when the record is released. He prides himself on being in tip-top health, with just a bit of arthritis in his legs. He doesn’t even use a stick.
“My Generation’s original singer, Pete Townsend, was talking about the plight of young people back in the 1960s,” Alfie said. “But I’m talking about the plight of old people in 2007.
“As the song says: ‘People try to put us down, just because we get around.’ People are living to a ripe old age these days, but life is tough and pensions are often inadequate.”
Not an angry person by nature, Alfie says the closure of Islington’s Mecca bingo hall last month really infuriated him. “I’d been going there for 25 years,” he said. “It was like a second home and where I met all my good friends. I was absolutely gutted when they closed it.”
Another reason he won’t be letting fame go to his head is that he won’t be earning any money from the song. Any profits will be going to charity Age Concern.
“I don’t know how I got to 90,” Alfie said. “My dad, who was an Italian restaurateur in the City, died when he was 58.
“I gave up smoking 36 years ago and I don’t drink. I eat a lot of pasta and I hear that’s good for you. I walk a lot.”
Documentary maker Tim Samuels said: “This is about old people sticking it back to the society that has cast them aside.
“We wanted to take them on a rock ’n’ roll journey that would challenge all our preconceptions of OAPs and give them a great time.” |
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