I call these watercolor works "subliminal etching"....I never know what will emerge from each session. Colors twist and bleed, and they seem to tap into my subconsious. If you create from the heart, you always learn about yourself. I believe my heroes: Egon Schiele, Francesco Clemente, Henry Darger, Larry Rivers, Jean Michael Basquiat, Dali, Picasso, Balthas....all exhibited their soul through their work.
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A DEFINING MOMENT - FEBRUARY 8, 1964
The date was February 7, 1964, when PAN-AM flight PA-101 landed at JFK International Airport.Brian Epstein and The Beatles were met by 5,000 screaming fans, and whisked off to the Plaza Hotel in Manhattan.
The next day, after rehearsals for the Ed Sullivan show, which would air live the next night, Epstein took the lads to the Savoy Hilton to meet Francis Hall, the owner and president of Rickenbacker Guitars. He had rented a suite of rooms and had set up a display of guitars to show and demonstrate to the group. George Harrison had been sick in bed all day and had not left the Plaza. The demonstration took place with Francis Hall and New York based Belgian harmonica player and guitarist Toots Thielemans to show the instruments. Thielemans, who is still alive, remembers that Lennon recognized him as the guitarist for the George Shearing Quintet. Lennon also recounted that he had bought his original guitar after seeing Thielemans with his Rickenbacker on the cover of a live George Shearing album cut in 1955. According to Thielemans, Lennon went on to say in a thick Liverpool accent, "If it's good enough for George Shearing, it's bloody good enough for me." Lennon was also impressed by one of the prototypes of a new Rickenbacker product, the model 360/12, which he insisted be shown to George. The entourage walked across the street to the Plaza and found Harrison still in bed listening to the radio. The 12-string was unpacked and given to George who began to play. A minute or two later, a radio station called to check on George's condition, and in an on air interview George stated that he was feeling better, and was in fact fingering the neck of a Rickenbacker guitar. The radio station countered with, "if we buy you the guitar, will you play it over the air?" He did, they did, and man, wouldn't you like a copy of that broadcast?
The Beatles arrived at Heathrow Airport, London on the 22nd of February and three days later are cutting songs for their first movie, A HARD DAYS NIGHT. Among these first songs cut was "You Can't Do That" which prominently featured the new Rickenbacker. Filming and recording continued for the next several months and on the evening of April 14 John and Paul put the finishing touches on the title track and the subsequent, magnificent ddddddrrrrrrrrrraaaaaaaannnnnnnnggggggggggg opening, one big chord, a Gm7add11, I'm assured by experts, issued in a new era the world is still reverberating from.
Across the world in sunny Los Angeles, California, Jim McGuinn and Gene Clark, alumni of the Chad Mitchell Trio and The New Christy Minstrels, respectively, caught an afternoon matinee of Hard Days Night and were stunned and impressed. That same afternoon McGuinn ordered a Rickenbacker 12 string from a local music store. The Byrds were born soon after and on January 20, 1965, almost exactly at the halfway point of the 60's, during a then standard three hour session at Columbia Record's Hollywood studio, recorded "Mr. Tambourine Man" and blew wide open the doors of poetic possibility in modern rock and roll. The riff itself, a brisk leapfrog arpeggio with a bright Bach-ish flair was delivered with the clarion churchbell ring, glistening with harmonic overtones;a reveille for a brand new day in rock.
The Beatles and The Byrds became mutual admiration societies. They stole from each other freely and with flattering and enchanting openness. George wrote to Derek Taylor in '66, "Tell Jim and David that 'If I Needed Someone' is the riff from 'Bells of Rhymney' and the drumming from 'She Don't Care About Time' or my impression of it.
HITS THAT MIGHT HAVE BEEN
A year or so ago I attended a show featuring The Grass Roots, The Turtles, and Herman's Hermits.......one of those oldies package shows geared towards nostalgic baby boomers. The highlight of the evening was Peter Noone, who, backed by a giant union jack and a crack band of Hermits, delivered a fabulous string of hit records, that included all sixteen of their U.S. top 10 chart entries amassed during a two year period in the mid sixties. Noone related a story of how their producer, Mickie Most approached them with a tune he was keen on and wanted them to record. Because of the fact that they weren't a writing band, material was culled from other writers for their consideration. Graham Gouldman, P.F. Sloan, Ray Davies, Carole King, and Sam Cooke were among the writers who provided hit songs for the group. The song Most was pressing them to record was a Gouldman composition called "For Your Love." The band hated the song and refused to record it, so Most gave it to another band he was producing. The band was the Yardbirds and the song was one of the standout sixties classics.
This made me think of another story related by Eric Burden in his autobiography involving his friend, the British singer Chris Farlowe. Burden remembers getting a call from Farlowe who informed him that Paul McCartney had come around in the middle of the night and left a demo disc with his mother that he hoped Farlowe might record. Burden offered his congradulationsand eagerly inquired when Farlowe planned to cut this "gift from the gods." According to Burden, Farlowe growled, "Ah,....I don't like it. It's not for me.........it's too soft. I need a good rocker, you know, a shuffle or something." "Yeah, but Chris," Burden responded. "Anything to give you a start, man, I mean even if it's a ballad, you should go ahead and record it." 'No, I don't like it,' Farlowe insisted. 'Too soft.' Burden, who was slightly incredulous by this time, inquired, "so what are you gonna' do with the song?" Farlowe countered, "well, I sent it back, didn't I?" Burden, out of curiousity asked, "what was the title of the song?" Farlowe replied, "Yesterday."
Speaking of the Beatles, George Martin, in late 1962, urged the lads to record "How Do You Do It?" a sprightly pop number written by Mitch Murray. The group did record the number, but as evidenced by their performance of the tune included on the Beatles Anthology, didn't really put their heart into it. They came up with "Please Please Me" instead, and George Martin gave it to another Brian Epstein act, Gerry and the Pacemakers who took it to number 1. I've also wondered about several Lennon McCartney songs that they gave away, and wondered why they did so. "World Without Love"/"I'll Keep You Satisfied" and possibly "Bad To Me" and "From A Window" would have made great Beatle tunes.
A STRANGE DREAM OF JOE MEEK PRODUCING THE BEATLES
It was the beginning of 1962 when Brian Epstein brought the Beatles to London. Even though they were idolized in Liverpool, he was having difficulty getting them a recording contract. Decca Record's Dick Rowe and Mike Smith became legendary as the first men to turn him down. To compound Rowe's legacy of incompetance, he further stated, "guitar groups are on the way out, Mr. Epstein." The chain of monumental stupidity continued as Pye, Phillips, Columbia, and HMV all passed on the Beatles. It was during this period that Epstein wined and dined an independent producer who operated out of 304 Holloway Road in London. The producer in question was the legendary Joe Meek, the mad genius who recorded in a 13' x 17' bedroom studio with mattresses nailed to the walls and a spring echo unit-a garden gate spring, stretched out on a piece of wood and nailed to the floor and certain naked wires being held into sockets by matchsticks or chewing gum. With none of today's multi-tracking conveniences he was well served by a make-shift mixer in the style of a telephonist's switchboard with jack plugs and sockets serving microphones and little booster amplifiers. It has been said that Joe achieved sounds in an hour that people today, using computerized mixing and 24-track recorders spend weeks getting, which gives an indication of the acute, intimate awareness he had regarding the capabilities of his equipment. It was in this less than "state of the art" environment that Joe recorded Billy Fury's backing group, The Tornados, and came up with a track called "Telstar" that improbably topped the U.S. charts and became the only British group of the time to do so.
Surrounded by intrigue and controversy, Joe Meek was Britain's first truly independent pop producer and established the criteria for the throngs who envelop the music scene today. He was a strange man, who against all odds produced hit after hit in his flat in London's busy Holloway Road. This was the pre-Beatles era when the British music industry was being run by the likes of EMI and Decca, and Britain was awash in a sea of tepid cover versions of American teen idols and the scenario of one man battling the giants was improbable to say the least. From his Aladdin's cave of dusty wires and ropey old spinning tape machines he developed a unique sound which made his records instantly recognizable. It gave them an exciting, spiritual feel which is still to this day so attractive that his discs are collectors items and sell for high prices.
The meetings with Brian Epstein never came to fruition presumably because Meek wanted too big of a percentage, but the possibility of a Beatles/Meek union is fascinating to ponder. At this point in his career Joe would have made few concessions to the Merseybeat sound. Epstein was pretty anxious so Joe would have been calling the shots and he would have most definately made his presence felt on their records. Had he allowed them to record their own songs, "Love Me Do" and the other hits would have had a fair amount of compression and echo added plus the slightly muffled quality that results from overdubbing. Overall, their natural rawness would have been replaced by a more produced sound.If everyone concerned had managed to stay the course the Beatles/Meek sound would have been imitated throughout the land, while the sounds of the Mersey beat would have probably been shorter lived. Considering George Martin's huge influence on the Beatle's records it is highly likely that Joe's contribution would have been just as great or greater. However, given the contrasting personalities of Joe and John Lennon it is doubtful their association would have taken in more than the first two or three records.
COTCHFORD FARM/BRIAN JONES TRIBUTE
Copyright 2006 Craig Davis
I remember it like yesterday
London town was all a buzz
Thru’ a haze of Owsley’s finest wares
It was the summertime of love……..
Up and down King’s Road
In a Rolls we drove
In our velvets and our bell-bottomed cords
And we smoked hashish
With a sweet little peach
That had brought down the House of Lords……
But let me start at the beginning
For a year I’d been singin’ R&B
Hopin’ soon to perform;
And we aped all the acts on American wax
In the backroom of the Bricklayer’s Arms………
He was blonde and lean
In the early days
We first saw him at the Ealing club;
He did “Dust My Blues” by Elmore James
And I swear our eyes just bugged………..
All the schoolgirls cried
When that bottleneck slide
Touched a part of their souls real deep;
It was dangerous vibes
With his steel blue eyes
That laid ‘em all out in a heap……
Well, we all had a laugh
Later on when the staff
Shuffled ‘round with the mop pail crew;
And we added Chuck Berry to his vocabulary
And redefined rhythm and blues……….
He took our name from a Muddy Waters tune
That he liked called “Rollin’ Stone”
Then we hired Charlie Watts
And the beat got hot
And the jazz cats got dethroned……
We jumped from the pub
To the Marquee Club
Man, we tore that scene apart;
And the Fab Four even showed one evenin’
To hear old Brian blow harp…………
Now before too long
We had cut some songs
And we hooked up with Andrew Loog;
And he made us write
‘till we got real tight
and he plotted our every move;
Soon the hits just rolled
With American gold
Ed Sullivan had turned the tide;
So we flew over there
And shook our hair
And sang “Time Is On My Side”…………
As the stars lined up
We filled our cup
With that swingin’ 60’s brew
Then this Owsley dude
Had some sugar cubes
That rearranged all we knew;
It’d been true all along
Keith and I wrote the songs
And Brian began to have some doubts;
So he took a handful of pills
And chased every thrill
Man, that cat was so spaced out………
And on top of all that
At the drop of a hat
Anita left him for Keith
And the wound never healed
Though he deserved it for real
It was him at the end of the leash……….
As the sessions wore on
He was always so stoned
He couldn’t even find the right key
And we laughed behind his back
At the hysterical fact
His guitar wasn’t even plugged in, you see…….
Well, it’s true that all
That goes up must fall
‘though we weren’t so hip to that back then;
It was all about love
Or at least we pretended it was
When it came time to sack our old friend;
We drove through the rain
Like a train in vain
Sunday, June the 8th, ‘69
To his country home
Where the honeycomb
Grew thick in the woods and the vines……
It had once belonged to A.A. Milne
Who had written Winnie the Pooh
And the country charm of Cotchford Farm
Was where we’d rendezvous?
He led us in
Like we were still his friends,
It was awkward, but it had to be done;
And he rubbed his neck
While we wrote out a check
‘though he smiled
I could tell he was stunned………..
As we left the place
I saw the face
Of the contractor Brian had hired;
And his drunken men
And their women friends
Lounging ‘round like country squires;
And I later heard
They had robbed him blind
They resented his pop star act;
Yet at night they dined
And drank his wine
And whispered behind his back……..
It was late in June
Just around midnoon
A support beam crashed to the floor;
And Brian got shook
That was all it took
He became unglued and swore;
He fired the builder
Who just shrugged
A smirk upon his face
And three days on, no one had gone
They still acted like they owned the place…….
There’ve been many tales
To lift the veil
Of that Wednesday in early July;
Who was there that day
What they had to say
What was real and what was implied;
But, there’s one truth looms
Above all else
And it’s face takes the shape of a ghoul;
At about midnight
With his friends in sight
Brian died face down in the pool.
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