A notebook belonging to Lester Butler gives a rare little glimpse into The Red Devils’ lyrics, setlists and creative process.
Among the doodles, dates, phone numbers, notes and cigarette burns are lyrics for “Shake ‘Em on Down” and a nascent “Your Turn to Cry.”
The writings are in the hands of Paul Brown of the UK. Brown says he was in the crowd at the Devils’ May 4, 1993, gig at London’s Borderline. Afterward, he picked up the setlist left behind on the stage. The setlist turned out to be more than that.
“When I picked up the ‘setlist’ … it wasn’t until I returned home that I realised there were entries in over 20 pages, very much in the style of the notebook in the CD insert,” Brown wrote to us. “There are setlists, lyrics and doodles.”
Jonny Ray Bartel essentially confirmed the authenticity of the one-of-a-kind notebook in a Facebook post: “Nice collection Paul. Looks like you have an entire notebook of Lester’s. Awesome …”.
Let’s look into the pages Paul emailed to us:
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