From the Nick Gilbert interview that came with Absolute Classic Masterpieces:
We liked the sound at the time, but to get a better sound I started playing bass. We had another drummer but Lawrence was never keen on the way he looked, which was typical Lawrence.
[...]
Tony Race, the temporary drummer, got kicked out. His curly hair was definitely against him. He wanted to talk about football in the Sounds interview, which wasn’t the done thing. That was when Gary joined. Gary fitted the bill better than Tony.
And this from a friend of Tony, commenting at Adrian Denning's Felt reviews:
I came across your site looking for info on Felt, and just wanted to confirm first hand the Felt/Tony Race/curly hair story, as Tony's an old mate and yes, it's all true! The adjuncts to the story are that Tony's also a mad football fan and talked about it all the time, much to Lawrence's disgust, and in addition Lawrence absolutely hates cymbals on drumkits, and forcibly removed them from Tony's kit, which went down as well as you'd imagine.
"Tony's also a mad football fan and talked about it all the time, much to Lawrence's disgust".....I'm not sure about the level of Lawrence's interest in football but I know from more than one source that he has supported Man Utd. Met up with him tonight after the St Etienne gig - he's been DJ'ing with them for the last couple of nights and he loved it!
Some electronic stuff - others I can't remember because I was too busy chatting with my mate and supping the odd beer - but the one that really stuck out for me was the original Roger Whittaker version of "New World In the Morning"
