Camden smells of smoke. A sea passes by, slip through the rings, dog warriors on a cigarette storm. Because here tattoos are the norm. They canvass crowds. A sky blue boy standing shirtless cries out to a gold-gilded girl who sits shy but proud. A drift of grins from the gutter, convinced he's God's gift. Working a piece of two-day old gum around his broken grimace, he's crammed into an overcoat. Hands sewn into the pockets, he sweats. But says he's preserving the day's warmth for the coming winter months. A boy ducks. As he sees ghosts of girlfriend's past parading midrifts bare towards Regent's Park. Camden's a beast, which would swallow you whole. Ignore the busker playing radio heads creep, his name is Johnny. A priest of rock and roll. Dressed in drainpipes and docks, he's 50 years young and six foot four small of Johnny. There's not much to tell, save, dress sense and name. Johnny met the devil in Camden town. Was never heard of again. Punx, weights, placid. Patient atop Camden lock. Just above the cracked ends, they offer photos to tourists at five quid a pop. I live 26 minutes north of this melting pot or salad bowl. I prefer to think of it as a stir fry, where things go so they won't rot. Here, fashion statements are fossilized. Parkways, the only place punk has not yet died here. Kirk, Cabain, never committed suicide, assisted or otherwise. Hendrix never choked on his own insides, Richard would never disappeared. Taken by the seven's tides here, Joe Stromer is still alive. By the roundhouse, he's immortalized Camden, calls everybody strange. Because people are strange when you're a stranger. Amidst this bull pit of bandits who brandish, outlandish, behavior, Camden's dying. The devil spills tears down the high road. They collect in the gutter and drown the grafters and the grifters. The pissers and the night shifters, the streetwalkers, the sweet talkers, the mystics and the critics. The dealers and the stealers, the teachers and the soapbox preachers, the homeless, the jobless, the pick pockets and the old rockers. The forget me nuts, the forgotten sorts. Remember, when you walk through the streets of Camden, these renegades have families and the tragedy of bills to pay. That's why you find a mehikened malkin tent, holding a sign that says McDonald's 200 yards. That way.