'i remember asking him, did you break finger? i wouldn't, i just would not acknowledge uh, what i was, what i was saying, and that lasts for for maybe forever, for a long time that you your mind tell you not that this is not, you know, you're in denial basically, and um, so i, i, i crawled as far as the ditch, and i pulled myself up'. "all i wanted to do was to to get some relief because i couldn't breathe properly and i pulled myself up to a little branch sort of was hanging towards the field and i leaned over that to see if i could get if i could catch my breath but ... and then i'd stand up and i'd fall down again and remember that it was almost like light show there was a the the the ditch was on fire and every time you the fire would crackle or whatever you" it would light up something and

and uh while i was crawling around there was uh there was body parts on the one of these unfortunate men his arm was was in the field and it was um like it's it's surreal it's it's like a bad night america and you're telling you you're just ignoring that and uh eventually then um heard walkie talkies this was after about an hour, i spent about an hour crawling around the field and telling the lads that you know - i said tony's fine, and i said to fran, you know, brian is is - seems to be up for the count, but does be back to with help, and um, heard these walkie talkies and was convinced that the man had come back to to finish off this thing, heard

somebody jump down into the field and i said to myself, i'm going to stand up, i'm not going to die line down, so i stood up and faced what i could hear coming towards me and light on my face and i remember man saying we're the police on and uh i went to walk towards him and the the ground was sort of was on the even and i actually tripped and he caught me, there was another... those two police men, they caught me, they eventually got me inter the hospital and um, i remember being, they were running down this corridor with me and all the lights flying past me and they put me up on on on on an operating table and and they were questioning me, there was men there questioning me, and i don't know whether there were doctors or police or whatever it was, but there were uh one of them said uh, you know, um, what happened to you? and i said uh, i fell through a ditch,

that's the only explanation i gave him, i fell through a ditch, and he said, well, you've got some scratches and marks, he said, what are they? i said, well, the ditch, and uh, there was a this nurse came over and she had a scissors, and she, i had a blue jumper on me and a sort of black jeans and uh, and she said, um, i'm going to cut this now, i said, no, not, she said, i've got to cut this off, she had to say, i said, i just bought it last week, so i put my hands back and they gave in and they they actually took it off me without cutting it, so i was happy enough with that, and the these people were pointing and the had a small uh wound on the right and a a small wound on the left, and these were the entry and exit ones, i just kept saying you, i felt through a ditch, and the i remember the... one man said, um, uh, what were you

doing up here? they obviously heard my accent, which isn't isn't northern accent, said - said, what are you doing up here? and i said, i was playing, yeah, i had no idea that they didn't know who we were, you know, because we go into a shop, everybody knows who we are, you know, um, and uh, i said, i was playing, and he said, he said, playing at what? so eventually uh, i said playing music, and um, i think they started to realize this is band mixing all these machines started to come down, i think was x-rays or something like that, and all the banging and the noise from these, and next thing i woke up - hours, hours later, eight or nine hours later and...

um, it's just my wife was just standing there, she had been dead, billy and marie brought her up, and when they arrived at daisy hill hospital, um, um, there was a... lot of security, there's a lot of commotion outside daisy hill and uh and billy went straight over to the the security man with he had a like a clipboard and billy said we're here to see stephen travers and uh and anne was there she i mean you think about she was like she was only 21 you know 20 22 21 22 and uh and uh he said uh travis travers he looked on the clip book oh yeah he's dead and billy said, no, check it again, he said, we're told he's that he's he's uh that he's he's okay, and he said, all my mistake, he's in theater, and um, so eight or nine hours, but i have to say uh, disney hill hospital within 24 hours,

48 hours of the whole thing happening, gave me back my my faith in mankind, the just amazing people, you know, amazing people, steve, it's an extraordinary story. uh and no matter no matter how many times i hear it, it's just um it it stays with me, i mean it's took you many years, it's taken you many years sorry to come to terms with what it happened, but also you've been engaged in a journey of reconciliation from that, which is you know speaking to you before, has been very very important for you, you want to talk about that, as you say coming to terms with it is is is is is important, i don't know if you ever come to terms with you. actually accept that something happened, um, you never quite understand it, and uh, and for me it's not an extraordinary story at all, it's it's my life, i don't know any other life, and this is the case with many victims, uh, but for all those years up until 2016, until we,

number of us got together, and eugene reeve, whose three brothers were murdered on the 4th of january, 1976, he's and joe kampel whose father was murdered in kushindall, actually by the same, the same man was involved, the jackel the jackel robin jack jackson um uh killer for hire and working working both with the special branch and with mi5, um, we got together - there was an event in in the uk was run by michael oher whose little sister magella o'her was murdered. uh in in 76 and i think it was august 76 and it it was a bring people together from both communities who had been uh had been impacted by the troubles uh one of the other speakers on that particular event his his his his his his wife had been

killed in the shankel road bombing and um there was there was four of us uh talking about our experiences because it's important to to talk about these things so... people understand the futility and the failure of violence and uh we decided that the event that was almcbr was the the man's name whose wife sharen was was murdered in on the shenkel road bombing but um when when we began to realize you know there's more there's more about other people as well as me you know it's it's so i had been focusing for all of these years on myself and my own story and then i started to hear all the people's stories, i thought, you know, well, it's important that that that society understands what happened, because you have to understand the past, it's like, people often say, well, let's move on, but if you go down to to do your driving test a, and you turn up without

rearview mirror, you'll fail the test, you have to know where what's behind you before you can, you can navigate safely into the future, so it's important uh, that we no, so it started to to understand all the people's stories. first of all, i wasn't alone uh in this, i wasn't, this was, this was a journey that we all had to had to make and to come to terms with and to understand, you can't, you can't excuse the things that happened, but began to look at the word, the big word for me now is context, you know, why people do certain things, i believe that the people who who were there on the night and even those with the you know screaming and shouting the obsenities. but they actually you know the products of of of uh the times the were in the also products of of of of the society that they grew up with and if you're bounced on your knee by your grandfather and tid you to hate the person who lives across the road because they say different prayers to the

same god you're going to believe that you know and and this fear and all of these things it's not excusing these things but um so the the journey the reconciliation journey started off with using the word reconciliation and then we we noticed that words like reconciliation meant different things to different people, to people down in the south who... 'unfortunately know little or nothing about what happened in the north, they think reconciliation is, let's build you know a big expensive peace bridge in the north and we get both factions uh tell them behave themselves meet in the middle and hug each other, that's not, that's not going to happen, that's not, it's not feasible, it wouldn't happen anywhere, so i began to understand the whole thing, so and more and more it just there was two things that just came to the for me, was first of all education, education is to understand what happened, why it happened, it's not, it's not enough to understand what happened, just

always ask the question, why did it happen? and um, terrible things, once once once the killing starts and once once somebody on either side or and it wasn't just two sides because it was orchestrated by as as tommy sans, the great singer songwriter said to me one time, tommy has a beautiful song, i would call there were roses, it's about two two young friends, catholic and protestant, and we're up in his house in ros trever one time, and there was lots of guitars and everything around, this is not too long ago and i said to tommy sing, sing there were roses and he sang it and it brought it back you know the the because we were mixed band and and i remember saying to tommy, god tomble things done by by both sides during the conflict and he's a wise, wise old man, he said, um, i say old, he won't like that, but uh, he said, um,

oh, he said terrible things indeed, he said, but there was a terrible thing there in the first place to make it happen, and in my new book, i actually finish with that sentence, because there was an unjust, it was an unjust society, it was, it was was injustice there, and uh, but as i say, when you know... when when when either side starts to kill the innocent and murder the innocent whether it's you know whether it's the miami or claudy or or whether it's you know and skillen or the or or or the revies or the odouds or anything you can go on forever with these things but we have to say we have to call it out and say you murdering people is wrong and it it but we can't say well you i'm going to blame you for this now i'm going to you know i'm never going to have anything to do with you. unless this dialogue here, we have to, we have to, dialogue is really, really important, we

wouldn't have had the good friday agreement without dialogue, and our organization top through, you can see it on tarp.ie, but it was very, very successful in so far is bringing people, letting them tell their stories, but there's a danger in that as well, that it becomes very sophisticated sort of very sophisticated. what about exercise? and you're inclined to want to balance the books, well if somebody here from one com in one community, because neither community has a monopoly on suffering or loss, but you somebody, you say, well, we've heard the story of this person, we better get somebody from the other side and hear that story, so as we, and that doesn't work, and it's something that you know, in the years since we formed her, but trying to balance. the books is is not healthy, somebody who is impacted by one side or the other is entitled

to stand up and tell their story on their own, and they should be able to tell their story on their own, just as i'm doing here now, and they shouldn't have to have somebody from the other side to tell their story to balance it out, um, and the people on the other side should also be able to tell their story without having to having to, because what happens is you get this, you get this phenomenon where... 'when you hear these stories uh and you're trying to balance the books, people who are are you know especially in this out or in the uk or wherever say ah one was as bad as another you know they're all the same they're all attitude they should have got a bit of sense and it wasn't like that it's it's context and every single uh killing every single thing has has its own context it didn't rely on something else and you can't say i was justified to kill somebody because somebody kill my neighbor, it isn't like that, so we have to hear individual stories. the other thing then is

that that, as i say cliches become this sort of firewall for us, we say, you know, we talk about what happened on bloody sunday, but we don't mention the names of the people, you talk about dublin bombings or the dublin, we don't mention the people, we they become a cliche, we talk about omar, ennis gillen, there are some people, you you'll never forget. wilson's voice, but then again at the same, the vast majority of the people who are who died during the troubles, they become, they become cliches rather than actual individuals, because... is inconvenience for people to have to say these were real human beings, but we do have to know the stories, because the alternative it is - if you know violence, as i say, it doesn't work, you can see it's not working anywhere in the world, and there's always it'll go on for hundred years and another hundred years and it will still never stop, so hopefully the message

comes across that the only reason i'm telling these telling this story are are talking about the actual horror. of it, it's so that people will say, i don't want that for my kids. steve, it's always great to have you in belfast, and i want you to do one last thing before we finish, you said you had new book, do you want to plug the new book? i thought, thank god for that, i thought you're going to ask me to sing a song, i never, um, or play the guitar, um, yeah, we have have new book, the uh, the book we we brought out. in 2007 was called obviously the miami show band massaker survivor search for the truth um and that led to the netflix documentary uh so it was brought the story to a global audience like your film you mean there's nothing better to you than to get people into a theater showed on television this new book is

actually called the base player and the nature of base player somebody sort of stands back at least in my in my case, the vast majority of vs like to stand back and uh lay down a groove and and work with the drammer and not be the one that has to get out there and and and and front the band and smile and jump around the place and all that, we were the ones that stayed back, so in that context, i i hope that you know i'm able to maybe talk about the things that i've seen, talk about the things that were in front of me, anybody could write a book about the... show and massager this time, but uh, how, how it, how, how it changes your life, how it uh, makes you different from the person that i began at 24, complacent, arrogant, somebody, you know, who who couldn't care less about what was happening in the north, uh, um, to somebody who cares passionately, now about

about um, about what happens to our people - on this island and and on these islands, but it was a... learning corve and it's taken me next year will be the will be the 50th anniversary and it's taken me this long to realize that every single incident my uh my experience everybody's experience whether it's you know all of these well-known atrocities or whether it's the ones that people never get an opportunity to speak about you're all connected we're all connected and together i think there's no bet antidote to uh to violence, no better deterrent to uh um any of these evils that brought brought all of all of those debts about than the voice of the victim, i think the voice of the victim is very very important and there are some i'll i'll never forget listening one morning i was listening to uh i think it was the nolen show we don't

get that down s but i live in cork now but i could hear somebody rang me said it turn on the internet and you can hear the is 'there's a discussion on about the the troubles and there was this lady and she came on and she apparently she had been on the day before and she had been talking about her husband who was killed 40 or 50 years prior to that and i hadn't heard that particular conversation but she unusually she was back on the following day and she came back to say thanks very much to the presenter uh for having her on'. and she said, the reason i want to thank you for having me on yesterday, she said, because before i was on your program yesterday, i was nobody, and my husband was nobody, but since i spoke on the program, she said, "i am somebody, and my husband is somebody," and i felt guilty because i mean, ours is very high profile case, and the rock and roll element

in our thing, you know, actually gets the attention of people, generations in the future all, because is always this..." rock and roll rebel type of connection that you you know young people have, so we have that advantage, but i remember feeling very guilty listening to that lady and thinking to myself, you know, i'm taking it for granted that that our story is well known, so whenever i speak about about these things now, i also like to remind people that, i'm i'm only one of over three and a half thousand people, you know, when it came to to to people who were killed, but there was... 44, 45,00 people injured in that, so if by telling my story uh, if if that makes somebody stop and think, you know, there's a better way to do this, there's a better let's... "let's let's talk about it is not going to be easy, so the difference, the journey that i've had from being this uh, you know, couldn't care less about what was

happening just up the road from us to to where i am now, i'm a slow learner, but at least i think i think uh, it's important, my journey is important, so the base player is that journey, it's the story, that the the new book which will be out at the end of this year, it's a story of the journey." and the ark of the journey and where and and and how i got here, so i hope i hope that hope that'll be my legacy in at this particular book the bas, well we all be looking forward to to reading that dave, thanks once again want to thank you for coming to belfast, always good to have you here, it's always great to be in belfast, thank you, thanks, and that does it for another week, we'd like for you to join the conversation by sharing the link to today's program to help us grow our audience across all our social media platforms and once again like to thank our special guest steve travers, in the meantime the conversation will be back next week with more investigations and analysis. i'm sean

murray, bye for now. ramadan in iran where ancient traditions blend with modern celebrations to create a truly unforgettable spiritual journey where everything comes alive with the spirit of the holy month, a unique experience like other. these and more on this edition of iran today. this week on expose, benjamin netanyahu vows to reject any calls to help the rafah invasion as he and joe biden intensified

their staged public spat over zionist israel's geneside in gaza. now following the statement made by former president donald trump that there would be a blood bath if he is not elected in november, left this politicians and media personalities completely lose it on social media and lastly, a recent politico iso survey reveals that 50% of americans think trump is guilty and ought to be tried before the 2024 presidential election. stay tuned for expose, the truth is just the revelation away.

this is forest. in today's show, we'll be covering the growing popular. polity of kudsday and the frantic efforts of zinist extremists to undermine and sabotage it. well, it tells you that the uh intend to intimidate, bully and harass any organization that gets in their way, and they intend to be able to occupy those organizations, so that's it's been saying, these were organizations which did it off their own, but the designers didn't even have to lift finger in some some cases, because the organizations took each other to court. they contacted every... non-brown named person individual um back in 2017 saying you work for an anti-semite, how do you feel about it, but they didn't contact anyone with a brown sounding name, which shows uh where they're coming from really, but yeah it really does take it out of you, but thanks to friends, thanks to supports, thanks to people like yourselves who've gone through what you guys have gone through, you know and that energy helps.