All The Young Dudes: Mott The Hoople And Ian Hunter

Contents

Title Page

List of Illustrations

Foreword by Brian May

Foreword by Joe Elliott

Acknowledgements

Introduction

1:It’s a mighty long way down rock and roll

2:The Loner

3:Little flame, tormented soul

4:Two miles from heaven

5:When both of my minds have gone

6:Maybe I’m just a loser

7:We ain’t bleeding you, we’re feeding you

8:I’m a dude, Dad

9:Verden grew a line or two

10:’73 was a jamboree

11:I’ve got to move on

12:Ladies and gentlemen, the golden age of Rock ’n’ Roll

13:It’s got to be the greatest show on Broadway

14:Ziggy played guitar

15:I’m just a marionette

16:Trapped halfway up

17:Just a whitey from blighty

18:Don’t let them tell you that you’ never find fame

19:Can you hear us?

20:Give me one more chance to run

21:Noises

22:God bless you, Guy

23:Take another roller coaster ride

24:Never too small to hit the big time

25:Michael Picasso, goodnight

26:Something to believe in

appendices

1: Chronology

2: Discography

3:Sessionography

4:Live Dates

Other titles available from Cherry Red Books

Copyright

ix

Foreword

Brian May

Hey!

Mott The Hoople were the first Rock ’n’ Roll band we ever knew. I don’t mean ever heard, or heard of – because we’d heard loads, by the time we precocious young boys of ‘Queen’ started out into the world. I mean this was the first Real Band we ever were close enough to touch, smell and share our lives with. I vivid­ly remember the first day we turned up to the rehearsal theatre for the tour we were about to embark on, as support group to Mott (the only time Queen ever supported anyone). We were pretty full of ourselves, and probably already felt we knew it all – we knew the theory, we had made our first album and we were fast discovering our own style in music, ethos, clothes and staging. But as we sur­veyed the excitingly huge amount of gear on the Mott stage, up strolled the Band. They looked ‘The Business’ – they were obviously It, seemingly without trying. They appeared as an agglomeration of bright colours, bizarre shapes, scarves, leather, sunglasses, velvet, huge boots, strange felt hats, blending seam­lessly into the masses of hair, beer bottles, fags, battered guitar cases covered with stickers and swagger. They looked lived-in; they exuded Attitude and easy humour and the utter confidence born of ‘Knowing you are Good’. They were.

They were friendly to us and courteously treated their warm-up group as equals from the start, but in the following months, as we toured Britain and the USA with them, I was always conscious that we were in the presence of some­thing great, something highly evolved, close to the centre of the Spirit of Rock and Roll, something to breathe in and learn from.

Travelling a lot together, we soon learned the Mott language as we shared countless buses (‘It was open, Stan I’m starving!!!’), planes (Esheven Lags this tour, Rog …), hotel bars (‘Raging Pits’), shopping expeditions (to the Shawn Pops!) and philosophical discussions. I vividly remember Ian’s advice to me, late one night, realising I was missing my home comforts, (‘If you need your things around you, Brian, you’re in the wrong business’ – he was right….). I remember Ariel Bender and Morgan Fisher crashing through my hotel door as one body, with a bevy of beauties in tow, with the cry ‘looking for a bit of head, Bri?!’ (I was too shy). I remember the whole world of rock and roll girls Mott attracted and felt so at home with – they became a big part of our world too. I remember standing around back-of-stage in an arena in Memphis, seeing the place erupt to the first chords of ‘All the Way from Memphis’, truly a great moment of re-con­nection to the original capital city of White Rock. I remember the night-long party afterwards in a Holiday Inn on the banks of the steamy Mississippi, a scene comparable with the Pirates of the Caribbean ride in Disneyland, with a seam­ingly endless traffic of revellers in and out of everybody’s rooms … and a lady who said, ‘I’m going to make you a Rock Star.’ And so much more.

Oh, and there was the Music! We worked our butts off on the tour, with great success; luckily for us most of the Mott fans took to our style. But there was never any doubt who was the Headline Act. Mott would swing relentlessly and xunstoppably into their show every night, like a marauding band of outlaws and every night there was something close to a riot – the kids couldn’t get close enough to the stage – they simply couldn’t get enough. Every night the legendary Silver-Cross-Painted-on-Chest Overend Watts would be winched on stage in his impossibly high boots, to thunder deafeningly, and menace the audience from on high. Ian Hunter (the unwritten Boss) would plant himself centre stage behind his shades and dare anyone to remain seated, pianos would be pushed off stage, amps would be thrashed, dedicated roadies would scuttle tensely across the stage, always aware of the possibility that the strong and silent Buffin would suddenly lose his rag and trash the drum kit over their heads. Ariel Bender played – screamed – on guitar, with his whole body and spirit, rushing around the entire stage, on his feet, on his back, guitar behind head, or held aloft or however the mood took him – an inspiration.

And it rocked. It was raw, fun, angry, glorious, jagged. It was everything ex­cept normal or predictable.

All things must pass. Mott The Hoople passed away much too soon. But it all lives on in our heads. And in the surviving recordings there are hints, echoes of those days of Danger and Wonder.

God bless ’em!

xi

Foreword

Joe Elliott

The memory, as time goes by, plays tricks on us, which is why it’s difficult for me to pinpoint the exact moment when I realised Mott The Hoople was the great­est rock ‘n’ roll band ever.

It was either hearing ‘The Original Mixed Up Kid’ on a friend’s compilation album (El Pea) or sneaking a listen to ‘Record of the Week’ (‘Downtown’) on Radio Luxembourg when I was supposed to be asleep! I think I was ten years old then, but it was some time after the event that I really got hooked. Yes, I’d heard the singles, yes, I’d seen the band on Top of the Pops, but it wasn’t until 1975 (after they’d split!), whilst queueing for lunch at Shannington College, Sheffield, that the familiar rings of an ‘unknown’ song caught my ear. A kid a year above me was stood five feet behind me singing ‘Drivin’ Sister’. ‘I know that song!’ – ‘Well, you should,’ he said, ‘it’s Mott The Hoople. Best band ever!’

You see, for years I’d had a battered vinyl copy of Mott with no labels and scratched to hell to the point where ‘Drivin’ Sister’ and ‘Violence’ were the only two playable tracks. I had no idea who the band was! It has to be one of the strangest re-introductions to a group ever.

Since then of course, things got a lot better. I spent years freaking out as all the original albums were finally released on CD. I abused my ‘celebrity status’ to the maximum listening to unreleased Mott The Hoople material courtesy of Peter Overend Watts. I followed the band’s splintered careers with a passion. I really dug the ‘Nigel Benjamin’ Mott (sorry Ian!). I saw British Lions, Hunter Ronson and Ian Hunter live so many times I’ve lost count. I joined Ian on stage on numerous occasions and shared the honour of Def Leppard performing ‘All the Young Dudes’ with Hunter. I guess you could call me the ultimate male groupie!

But it’s music that counts and Mott the Hoople made music! Some songs just breeze past you, others make the hairs on the back of your neck stand up. I can’t think of many Mott songs that don’t do the latter. From the crashing guitars of ‘Rock And Roll Queen’ to the haunting ‘Through The Looking Glass’, from the autobiographical ‘Ballad of Mott The Hoople’ to the sad lament of ‘Saturday Gigs’, which still brings a tear to my eye.

My biggest regret is that I never saw Mott The Hoople live. I witnessed every other incarnation but not the original. Still, regrets are few when it comes to Mott because the pleasure that they have given me and countless thousands of others, outweighs all. Anyone who knows me knows I was weaned on Bowie and Bolan but the best was always, and will always be, Mott The Hoople.

Having had the opportunity to read sections of this official biography prior to publication, I was amazed but also thrilled to discover things I didn’t know about Mott and Hunter on almost every page, so I know you are in for a damn good xiiread. This book is the perfect companion for some of the best music ever to come out of rock ’n’ roll.

Nice one, Mott The Hoople! Shame you weren’t around for a little longer.

ix

Acknowledgements

The author and publishers would like to give sincere thanks to the following, who gave assistance and contributed personally to this project:

Verden Allen, Miller Anderson, Richie Anderson, Hugh Attwooll, Ariel Bender, Jet Black, Tony Brainsby, Patrick Brooke, Buffin, Mel Bush, Fred Cheeseman, Tim Clarke, Jeff Dexter, Richard Digby-Smith, Joe Elliott, John Fiddler, Morgan Fisher, Pete Frame, Dale Griffin, Luther Grosvenor, Ian Hunter, Trudi Hunter, Steve Hyams, Paul Jeffery, Ray Laidlaw, Alec Leslie, Ray Major, Willard Manus, Benny Marshall, Brian May, Les Norman, Mick Ralphs, Mick Rock, Mick Ronson, Maggi Ronson, Peter Sanders, Johnny Smack, Diane Stevens, Dave Tedstone, Billy Thunder, Stan Tippins, Lord Peter Overend Watts, Blue Weaver, Muff Winwood, Roy Wood, Trevor Wyatt.

They also thank and acknowledge the following:

BBC Radio One, Andy Basire, Kevin Cann, Deb and Little H for undying patience, Martin Colley, Andrew Darlington, Steve Davis & Chrysalis Records, Ray Fox Cumming, Kris Gray, Sven Gusevik, Mark Hagen, Bob Harris, Martin Hayman, Bill Henderson, Island Records, George Jamieson & Gary Jones, Jo Murphy and Brian O’Reilly, Norsk Plateproduksjon, Paul O’Mahony, John McDermott, Mojo, Alan Price & Demon Records, Justin Purington, Q, Record Collector, Martin Roach, Carlton Sandercock, Charles Shaar Murray, Sony Music, Windsong Records, Ray Zell, Zig Zag.

The publishers acknowledge the following for permission to reproduce lyrics in the text:

Blue Mountain Music, Island Music Ltd, EMI Songs Ltd, April Music Inc., Spiv Music, PRI Music Inc. / Jesse John Music Inc., News Music BMI, Mick Ronson Music Inc., Kehr Bros. BMI, Necessary/Maxwood/Maxwood, Jesse John Music and Island Music Inc. / Warner Tamerelane Publishing Corp. BMI.

Every effort has been made to contact copyright holders: if any have been in­advertently omitted, the publishers will be pleased to make the proper acknowl­edgement at the earliest opportunity.

***

In 1991, I was urged to compile a ‘new’ article on Mott The Hoople. Eventually, I surrendered and interviewed the elusive Verden Allen and that November 1992 evening in Hereford became the launchpad for this project, a personal ‘journey’ that I had wanted to attempt for years. The road has been interesting, to say the least, confirming that the outside world is permitted to see one aspect of the music business – the positive side. Fans and record-buying public alike are sheltered from the darker, negative elements and so, whilst I have tried to docu­ment ‘stories told and untold’, I have also respected the ‘code of the road’. Some of the Ballad of Mott The Hoople and Ian Hunter therefore remains unsung, and it will remain that way. I have far too much respect and affection for the players xand participants to do otherwise. In any case, there are differing recollections and some interesting contradictions in this complex tale, so it will be fun to read between the lines.

This project is meant to appeal to ‘students’ of Mott The Hoople and Ian Hunter and to the casual music fan; hopefully that dual mission has been achieved. The biography is a companion to Sony Music’s new Mott the Hoople CD set: All the Young Dudes – The Anthology.

It has been a privilege to have such a close and unprecedented first-hand view of the musicians, their music and history. I extend extra special thanks to Ian Hunter, Dale Griffin (for flying the Mott flag – always), the incredible Pete Watts, Verden Allen, Mick Ralphs, Stan Tippins, Luther Grosvenor, Morgan Fisher, Ray Major, John Fiddler, Steve Hyams, Richard Digby-Smith, Miller Anderson, Freddie ‘Fingers’ Lee, Richie Anderson and Benny Marshall – who aided and abetted me, beyond the call of duty, to make this biography possible. Hunter, Watts, Griffin and Allen deserve special mention for their unyielding support. My gratitude to Brian May and Joe Elliott, for writing such stunning forewords, is also immeasurable.

I would also like to thank Carlton Sandercock (who paved the way to Cherry Red Books), Iain McNay and Ian Carlile of Cherry Red for their faith, Nicholas Jones of Strathmore, who took care with type and photographs, and Hugh Attwooll of Sony Music, who helped me down the home straight on this project.

I could not have completed this biography without the unbelievable patience of my family. I am indebted to them, and now promise to make up for lost time.

By no means least, thank you to one of the nicest individuals I ever met, Mick Ronson.

campbell devine

London, August 1998

xv

Introduction

Mott the Hoople was one of the world’s most exciting and innovative rock groups, from their formation in June 1969 to their demise in December 1974, when Hunter Ronson departed to form their own band and Watts, Griffin and Fisher re-grouped as Mott.

The band originated in Herefordshire where guitarist Peter Watts and drum­mer Terry Griffin met at school and played in various groups throughout the six­ties, before linking up with guitarist Mick Ralphs and organist Terry Allen to form Silence. They auditioned for legendary producer Guy Stevens and, via a music paper advertisement, secured the services of pianist and lead vocalist Ian Hunter Patterson.

Taking their name from a Willard Manus novel, Mott The Hoople signed to Guy Stevens and Island Records, recording four crazed but crucial albums be­tween 1969 and 1971. Their material varied considerably in style, between the writing of Hunter and Ralphs and the harder edge of LPs such as Mad Shadows and Brain Capers, to the softer, ‘country’ tone of Wildlife. These early records re­ceived wide critical acclaim and, although they failed to sell in quantity, Mott The Hoople became one of Britain’s most successful live acts. As Mott’s career progressed, the red-maned and shaded Hunter was recognised as one of rock music’s most distinctive vocalists and impressive songwriters, and visually, to many, the embodiment of rock and roll. Combining the swagger of The Rolling Stones with the poetic fervour of Bob Dylan, delivered with Hunter’s anglicised vocals, Mott The Hoople mixed tenderness and toughness with irony and compassion.

An inexplicable lack of record sales eventually meant that the group strug­gled to maintain a viable cashflow and they split during a European tour in March 1972. However, David Bowie, who was a secret fan of the band and admirer of Hunter’s on-stage persona, wrote a classic single for them, ‘All the Young Dudes’, and produced an album. Armed with their first ever hit and a stronger belief in their abilities, Mott The Hoople were rejuvenated and went on to produce a total of seven hit singles and four chart albums for CBS/Columbia Records. Mott, issued in 1973, is still regarded as one of the classic rock albums of the seventies. Encouraged by Bowie, Ian Hunter as­sumed leadership of Mott The Hoople, which eventually was to cost them the services of Verden Allen and Mick Ralphs. For the second half of their first headlining tour of the USA in September 1973, Hunter recruited Ariel Bender, formerly Luther Grosvenor of Spooky Tooth, to replace Ralphs on lead guitar and subsequently engaged Morgan Fisher, ex-Love Affair, on key­boards.

This line-up achieved increased commercial success and, in 1974, Mott the Hoople became the first-ever rock act to appear on Broadway playing a week of sell out concerts in New York’s theatreland. However, the Ariel Bender as­sociation did not work out and the band was considering splitting again, until Mick Ronson joined in late 1974. On paper, the combined potential of Mott The Hoople and Ronson was awesome but, during their first European xviconcert dates, a split started to develop in the ranks and, within a month, Mott The Hoople had ceased to exist when Ian and Mick, decided to leave the group.

Post-Hoople, Watts, Griffin and Fisher formed Mott, recorded two CBS albums and then re-grouped as British Lions in 1977 for a further two LPs before largely disappearing from the music scene. Ian Hunter has released ten commer­cially intriguing and stylistically varied solo albums since 1975 and is still record­ing and touring. Many of his projects featured Ronson, with whom Hunter worked regularly until Mick’s tragic death from cancer in 1993.

Mott The Hoople remain astonishingly influential almost thirty years after their birth. For over two decades, they have been cited as a major inspiration by a host of contemporary music’s biggest and most successful names – Queen, Kiss, The Clash, Motley Crue, Def Leppard, REM, Primal Scream to name but a few. Many recent Britpop bands, Oasis and Blur included, also bear more than a pass­ing resemblance to Mott The Hoople. Several of Hunter’s compositions have been covered by artists as diverse as Barry Manilow, Willie Nelson, Status Quo, Brian May, The Pointer Sisters and Great White and charted as significant hits. The quality of Ian’s writing throughout his career has been honest and uncom­promising and today he remains one of very few creditable rock artists, both in terms of studio and live performance.

Precursors of punk, Mott The Hoople’s impact on late seventies music was enormous and probably greater than any other band preceding that era. ‘The Moon Upstairs’, from their 1971 Brain Capers album, set the musical tone for the ‘New Wave’ six years later and ‘Crash Street Kidds’, from 1974’s The Hoople LP, predicted the onslaught, all with a style and attack that rendered the new move­ment tame, clumsy and lacking in real lyrical substance or musical credit. Ian Hunter’s percipience and lyrical foresight was unmatched by any other early sev­enties rock composer.

Whilst many will claim that Mott The Hoople were not the world’s greatest band in technical terms, they were, without question, one of the most innovative and valuable. They strived to capture their true spirit on tape, but, in hindsight, were ahead of their time, and perhaps so different musically that they were vir­tually unrecordable using seventies technology and the dead studio sounds of that period. ‘We never learned much about Mott The Hoople,’ says Ian Hunter. ‘Part of the charm of Mott The Hoople was that nobody within it knew anything about it. The sound came because we really didn’t know that much.’

The beginnings of Mott The Hoople go back to the early sixties, when a guitarist and drummer first met in Ross-on-Wye, near Hereford, and subse­quently formed a series of bands including Silence, The Buddies, The Doc Thomas Group and The Shakedown Sound. This early period, and some of the Mott The Hoople story is sketchy. Drummer and founder member, Dale Griffin, regards the history of the band as impenetrably complex and subject to personal memory and bias. Numerous events and external influences worked on the group – wives, girlfriends, families, friends, managers and record company people.

This biography, with personal input from all the players, traces the story of Mott The Hoople and Ian Hunter from their early days, through their rise to xviiinternational stardom and beyond. Peppered with previously untold tales from all the group members, it’s a story of determination versus adversity, triumph and tribulation, rapture and rupture, strut and stumble. It’s a unique and exciting musical journey. It’s a mighty long way down rock and roll!

1

1

It’s a mighty long way down rock and roll

‘All the Way from Memphis’ – Ian Hunter

The early sixties were an interesting and crucial watershed for society and pop­ular music in Britain. Car ownership, a relative luxury in the 1950s, weekly earn­ings and the number of students in higher education were all increasing rapidly. The Conservative Prime Minister, Harold Macmillan, resigned in 1963, the year of the Great Train Robbery, after the notorious Profumo sex scandal and, by 1964, Harold Wilson led the Labour Party to victory, promising increased social change.

Music was changing, too. The wilder fifties rock and roll vocalists like Jerry Lee Lewis and Little Richard were on the wane, and while the British album charts were led by an assortment of film soundtracks, Cliff Richard and the Everly Brothers began to hog the singles charts, along with a much-tamed Elvis Presley. 1963 saw Beatlemania spread like wildfire and ‘The Fab Four’ flattened all before them in their helter-skelter ride to glory. The Rolling Stones, The Kinks and The Who aided and abetted this new musical direction and, of course, other important and influential groups were to follow including David Bowie, Roxy Music and Mott The Hoople.

To students of Mott, 1963 was an important year for another reason, as it brought together, for the first time, two youngsters who formed a school band. This meshing of musical wills was common during a period that marked the early development of numerous late sixties and early seventies rock groups, but, without this particular catalyst, at Ross Grammar School, the long and winding road to Hoopledom would never have begun. However there was to be an im­portant distinguishing factor in this particular case. The group that would be formed six years later, as the zenith of various Herefordshire bands, would never seek to be an obvious or direct derivative of its more illustrious predecessors. It would be unique.

In 1969, groups became progressive, often devoid of personality and were rev­erentially scrutinised by press and fans alike. Mott The Hoople were unlike other ‘rival’ bands and perceived this state of affairs to be ludicrous. Believing there must be a more unconventional approach to making music, Mott would thrive on struggle and adversity, generate unprecedented energy and occasional anar­chy, and unwittingly leave behind musical and lyrical influences which would continue to inspire new artists nearly thirty years later.

Sleepy, some would say comatose, Ross-on-Wye, in the county of Here­fordshire, all but ignored the Rock ’n’ Roll revolution of the mid-1950s, since Skiffle and Trad[itional] Jazz were more to the liking of most ‘hip’ Rossians. One hundred and twenty miles from London, Herefordshire was one of England’s smaller and more rural counties, sandwiched between Gloucester, Worcester and Shropshire to the East and the neighbouring Welsh border counties of Monmouth, Brecknock and Radnor to the West.

2Born in Ross, on 24 October 1948, Terence Dale Griffin became Mott The Hoople’s drummer. He was the first-born child of the late Joyce Addis and Fred Griffin, a local farmer, and he has four siblings, Bill, Christine, Bob and Anna. Educated at Walford County Primary and Ross Grammar Schools, Dale subse­quently worked briefly as a Kleenezee brush salesman and then as a public rela­tions officer for an electrical firm, while his drumming and part-time musical career developed. Inspired initially by his parents’ records (Frankie Laine, Doris Day and Johnny Ray), and subsequently fuelled by influences such as The Beatles and The Who, his intermediate interests had been the big bands including The Ted Heath Band, Count Basie and Duke Ellington, then singers like Little Richard, Eddie Cochran and Buddy Holly. Dale’s boyhood hero was John Leyton, a British TV actor who scored a number-one hit with the Joe-Meek-produced single ‘Johnny Remember Me’, and starred in the films Krakatoa, East of Java! and The Great Escape. ‘Leyton had long hair, wore great togs and drove an Austin Healey sports car, complete with gorgeous female passenger. I was keen to emulate him!’ says Griffin.

‘I had a happy childhood. Great Britain was still in the grip of post-war austerity when I was born, but I got my National Health orange juice and, when I started school, the regulation one-third pint of milk per day in the classroom. Despite coming from a farming family with a large dairy herd, I loathed milk, especially when unchilled, always seeking to gift it to a willing classmate, which regularly resulted in my being punished for snubbing the State’s great gift to me. My parents were young and the house was full of music, mostly middle-of-the-road stuff, until my father ‘got’ rock ’n’ roll in the mid-fifties, when blue-labelled HMV (His Master’s Voice) 78 rpm discs by the oddly-named Elvis Presley began to appear in the living room.’

Fred Griffin was a keen musician who could play piano, guitar and mouth organ but young Terry was only ever interested in drumming. Beginning with knitting needles as sticks, and any hard surface and metal fruit servers as his ‘kit’, he swiftly graduated to his first instrument, an Eric Delaney snare and 8-inch cymbal, which was closely followed by a red sparkle Gigster snare, tom-tom and bass drum. Questioned about his musical education, Dale once commented, ‘You must be joking. As Carl Palmer once said, As a drummer he’s got natural talent as a road-sweeper!’

Terry met Peter Overend Watts, Mott’s bass player, in 1961, when Watts first attended Ross Grammar School, having moved to Ross-on-Wye from Worthing, near Brighton, at the age of thirteen. Pete was a Midlander, born in Yardley, Birmingham, on 13 May 1947. His father, Ronald Overend Watts, originally from the Lake District, married Joan Aylwin Lineker, a distant rela­tive of England footballer Gary Lineker’s family. Ronald was a college lecturer in metallurgy and applied mathematics and became a headmaster in Ross. Pete has one younger sister, Jane.

‘In the early fifties, I remember my Dad saying that computers were the thing of the future and they would take over the world,’ says Pete. ‘I didn’t know what he was on about. I kept imagining these little blokes with funny eyes. He also delved into our family history, hence the Lineker connection, and 3found that the Christian name Overend was probably the family surname at one time.’

Pete’s middle name was traditionally given to the eldest son of the Watts family and apparently originated several hundred years before in Westmorland. Overend was to develop considerable dexterity at corrupting names and generat­ing amusing spoonerisms and was responsible for the derivation of Dale’s nick­name, Buffin – ‘Sniffin’ Griff Griffin’ (a name adopted for drumming purposes) became ‘that little bugger Sniffin’ and later ‘that little Snigger Buffin!’ He did the same with Terry Allen, Mott’s keyboard player, and devised group names such as The Natalie Tokered Band, Shane Cleaven and the Clean Shaven and working titles (‘Why King Turtles’) for group songs.

Pete attended Church Road and Eastbourne House schools in Birmingham, followed by Worthing High, after he moved with his family to Sussex on the south coast of England. The Watts finally ended up at Bridstow in Ross-on-Wye and, like Dale, Pete studied at Ross Grammar School. Overend claims his early musical interests were singing along, at three years of age, with 78 rpm records on his Mother’s wind-up gramophone – Italian opera, Mario Lanza and show soundtracks like Oklahoma! were big favourites – but young Watts also started playing his father’s cello guitar when he was four, which his dad traded for a clar­inet and hid under his bed.

‘I wasn’t allowed to touch Dad’s guitar, but when he was at work, I used to go and open the case and pluck the strings. At that time I knew how to tune the gui­tar, because I remembered what it sounded like. Lucky for me that it was in tune in the first place, or else I’d have learned wrongly!

‘I listened to the radio a lot as a tiny kid, all the standard pop tunes of the day or easy listening, semi-classical music which they used to play. I still look out for fifties light music records now and try and collect them. I always liked music and my favourite song was The Runaway Train. I used to mispro­nounce the title and even sang glory to the Newport King in Hark! The Herald Angels Sing at Christmas. I once asked my parents if we could go to Newport to see the King.

‘What really blew me away was when I saw Tommy Steele on television doing Singing the Blues, round about 1956. I flipped when I saw him, but my parents didn’t like that type of music and said it was a bad influence, so, of course, I did everything I could to go and hear him at other people’s houses. Then he did Little White Bull and I instantly went off him, but Mum and Dad suddenly thought he was nice. I also saw an Elvis film poster at the cinema with Dad once and, although he wouldn’t take me to see it and yanked me out of the foyer, I was intrigued. Then, there was Little Richard, Chuck Berry and Jerry Lee who were incredible, not just the music, but their attitude as well. By the time I was ten or eleven, I was really hooked. I used to grip the arms of my chair with excitement and anticipation when Drumbeat was coming on the telly. I was even smitten by the trombone and sax players with Bob Miller and the Millermen. Dad was a radio ham and he went out and spent 43 guineas on a new innovation, a Capitol stereo system, which was lucky for me, because he could play classical records and I could play The Everly Brothers. My father was something of a musician and 4he’d written a song called I’ve Got a Cow That’s Got Three Legs, which was brilliant. It could still be a hit today!’

When Pete moved to Ross with his family in 1960, he heard The Shadows’ record, ‘Apache’, and the effect upon him, of that guitar sound, meant there was no turning back. ‘Hank Marvin started me playing, just as people like Brian May will admit. From there on in, I guess we all had the same influences. Lonnie Donegan was highly influential to all of us and was probably the most under­rated person in the history of British pop music. I still think The Beatles are the greatest band of all time and can never ever be surpassed by anybody. It’s a joke to compare Oasis with them and Oasis would be the first people to admit that. The recent Anthology CDs were an incredible insight into how The Beatles’ material was recorded and were exciting releases for musicians like me. The Who were also influential and were the greatest live band I’ve ever seen. They were aggressive and exciting. Townshend is still a hero to me.’ Watts’ other musical influences include Neil Young and David Bowie (Man Who Sold the World / Hunky Dory era), and he remains fanatical over Nils Lofgren and Grin, Warren Zevon, and sixties groups such as The West Coast Pop Art Experimental Band, The Monks, Buffalo Springfield and Love.

‘When I’d heard the Shadows and then saw a 1960 Hofner V3 electric guitar in a shop window, that’s what finally did it for me,’ enthuses Watts. ‘It was the poor man’s Fender Stratocaster, sunburst finish, with three chrome pick ups and a tremolo arm. There was also a Junior Futurama 2 and a Rosetti Bass in Hickey’s shop in Gloucester that day and my father had to drag me away from the win­dow. I kept saying to Dad I wanted an electric guitar and he said if I learned to play his, he’d buy me one. That was April 1961, and by Christmas I’d learned and he bought me a Hofner Colorama, two-pick-up, six-string, for 32 guineas – four weeks wages!’

Pete’s non-musical jobs were later to include Christmas relief postman and a year spent as a trainee architect with R. J. Wilson & Partners in Hereford, but by the age of fifteen he was already playing ‘wild guitar’ with Rory Haisley and a 55 year-old drummer, Ronald Rudge, who appeared resplendent in RAF handle­bar moustache, fancy waistcoat and bow tie. Ron Rudge and his Ploughman Band played local village halls and Young Farmers’ Club Dances, but when Rudge couldn’t appear at some gigs, the remaining line up performed, minus drums, as The Hawaian Airs. Watts’ next band was an unnamed group, some­times embarrassingly billed as The Crystals, who were formed to play at Ross Grammar School’s Hobbies Exhibition and Women’s Institute concerts in 1962.

In the same year, Pete joined the former Camp Road Cats – Paul Jeffery (rhythm), Lionel Jeffery (high bass guitar) and Robert Fisher (snare drum and cymbal) – in a new instrumental group. Now named The Sandstorms, after the B-side of a Johnny and The Hurricanes single, the Boy Watts played his Hofner and was always deafening and continually required to ‘turn it down’. At one concert, a particularly exasperated member of the public gave him 1s 6d to ‘go and have an orange juice and give my bloody ears a rest!’

One lunchtime at Ross Grammar School, Dale Griffin heard the Jeffery brothers and Pete playing blues and instrumentals on three guitars in a Form 5Room and, as they had no drummer, he set to work on his Dad to upgrade his Gigster kit which was not considered ‘rock ’n’ roll’. Blessed with a new four-piece blue sparkle Premier set, acquired from a Cheltenham music store, Dale made sure his latest acquistion became known to Pete.

‘I’d always seen Buffin around the school and he seemed like an odd sort of kid,’ says Watts. ‘Then one day I saw a big group of twenty or thirty kids laughing in the playground and I went over and Buffin was doing a silly walk and crashing into posts. Then he’d fall into a great big puddle on the floor and roll around and everyone would be laughing. And I thought, What’s wrong with him, what’s the matter with that kid? He had a happy-go-lucky attitude and I took to him, I liked him. I used to call him my friend because I didn’t even know his name. He was known as my friend for about six months. We’d walk around Ross, lounge around the cafes and tea shops and he’d ponce money from me.

‘There were three of us on guitars doing old numbers at school one day and Buffin came up to me with a ticket in his hand with Premier written on it. I thought, What’s this, a new pair of shoes? I didn’t know what Premier was. He said it was a drumkit so I said we needed a drummer. We had a bit of a drummer by this time in Patrick ‘Softee’ Brooke, but he’d only just got his kit and we arranged to have a secret practice with Buffin. The next Sunday after­noon Dale and his Dad turned up at my house in a Jag. His father looked like a film star, like John Leyton, and Buff had this incredible looking blue sparkle drumkit with him. It was a professional kit and he was only thirteen. I suddenly felt inadequate with my Watkins Westminster amp and Colorama. Buffin was amazing and Softee was out. It was so good that Pat O’Donnell, one of the vo­calists, said we had to play that night. He phoned around all the pubs in Ross and asked if we could perform that Sunday evening, which we did, at the Hope and Anchor.’

Thus began a summer residency for the hurriedly named Anchors, which was a big mistake according to Dale, (‘Just add a W at the front and what do you get?’). With a repertoire that embraced Beatles, Kingston Trio, Shadows, Ventures and old rock ’n’ roll songs, Watts and Griffin, with Bob Davies (rhythm guitar and vocals), Patrick O’Donnell (vocals and percussion) and John Sutton (double bass) played at The Cabin Bar adjoining the pub through June and July. In 1963, The Hope and Anchor on the edge of the River Wye in Ross was a regular date for the group, and although they were under age, they were paid £2 a week plus two pints of beer each night by Harry Thomas, the landlord.

John Sutton soon departed to play bass with the National Youth Orchestra of Great Britain, whilst Bob Davies and Pat O’Donnell went to the south of France – troubadours to the stars, they performed for Brigitte Bardot and Sylvie Varten amongst others. Later, Bob went to teaching college in Birmingham, then formed successful bands called The Vacant Lot and Cinnamon Quill, who cut several cult singles in the late sixties. Davies and Sutton later became headmasters and O’Donnell a senior Art lecturer in Hereford. Bob eventually taught Ben Tippins, future Silence singer and Mott tour manager Stan Tippins’ son.

6The second incarnation of The Anchors had Paul ‘Twiddlefries’ Jeffery (rhythm guitar and vocals), Fred Fishpool, aka Robert Fisher (rock ’n’ blues bawl­ing) and Patrick Brooke (lead vocals) with Peter ‘Dog’ Watts on lead guitar, and ‘That Little Snigger’ Buffin on drums, but no bass player. There were various local guest singers including John ‘Screw’ Farr, Tommy ‘Knucky’ Hall, John ‘Bomber’ Dean and Mike ‘Jeambers’ Chambers (brother of Pretenders drummer, Martin Chambers). Brooke also became the clean-cut ‘teen idol’ vocalist in con­trast to Fisher, the ‘down and dirty’ rock ’n’ roller.

The Anchors Mark II played from July to September, and they were learning – their new modus operandi was to ‘lure women’! Due to the exigencies of schol­astic duties however, they were forced to end their tenure at the Hope and Anchor. Next in a line of Ross Grammar School groups was Wild Dog’s Hell Hounds, led by Pete ‘Wild Dog’ Watts and raucous singer Moanin’ Cass Brown (Robert Fisher). The Hell Hounds lasted from September 1963 to February 1964 and had the same line up as The Anchors Mark II. Pete confesses that the band did not have a particularly auspicious career.

‘We were really wild, although all we ever used to play was school dances. I had a gold lame waistcoat made out of curtain material and used to wear Marks & Spencer’s see-through shirts, with string vests borrowed from my father un­derneath and Beatle wigs. We used to leap about the stage playing rhythm and blues. Everybody would request Twenty-Four Hours from Tulsa and we would give them Lucille. The school hall we used to play had a little trap door in the stage and I used to hide a rubber bone down there before the start. The group would come on and start playing Lucille but I’d be off the stage and I’d come on on my own like the big star with the gold waistcoat and wig. I’d go down on all fours, open up the trap and take out the bone and start biting it, then I’d drink water from a bowl that said Dog on the side. I also had the hat of many horns – a big bowler hat pushed over a smaller bowler hat, with two horns wedged out of the side. Then I used to pick up the guitar and all the band would stop, I’d play a great big beeennnd on the guitar and then we’d go berserk and that was the first number in the act!

‘Fishpool would do wild songs like Some Other Guy and blues numbers, and Patrick was the pop idol of the group singing the commercial hits of the day, that girls liked, such as Travelling Light and Do You Want to Know a Secret. Fishpool’s sex appeal was non-existent at that stage. He’d had some of his front teeth punched out in various fights and he’d get pissed, remove his false teeth and put them on the end of his nose. We’ve always done strange things. Wild Dogs wasn’t really a group though, more a name that was hanging around for about a year I suppose, and we probably only did three or four school dances. The head­master didn’t like us very much!’

Two days in January 1964 changed the lives of the Hell Hounds forever. First the group spied a Vox AC30 six input guitar amplifier in a local electrical store, and, although priced at £115 10s, they acquired it on hire purchase, signed for by Fred Griffin. This bona fide professional gear soon fuelled the ambitions of the group to get gigs outside of the Ross area. Then, three weeks later, Mersey band The Undertakers played at the New Inn in Ross and Fred Fishpool, seeing 7their bassist and singer Jackie Lomax, knew instantly that his future lay in being a bass player with a sleazy, slurring vocal style. Two days later he was bassman with the newly named The Soulents, having taken up Pat Brooke’s Harmony Bass at a group practice. He never put it down again.

‘We were named The Soulents because we played with soul, and because, unlike The Anchors, this wasn’t a name that could be turned into something rude – unless prefaced with an Ar, which we failed to notice,’ says Dale.

In 1964, The Soulents ‘became semi-pro’ and secured frequent good gigs in Wales and the Hereford area at venues such as Aubrey Street’s 1600 Club and the Hillside Ballroom in Redhill, playing for between eight and thirteen pounds a night. Whilst The Anchors’ sets had been high in instrumental content, The Soulents adopted a tougher stance. The band grew in confidence as the equip­ment, musicianship and gigs improved and they became more focused. They also became determined, such as the evening they walked out of a gig at the Top Spot Ballroom in Ross following a row with the owner over sound levels and played free instead at the Ross Rhythm Club, previously the local jazz club.

The Soulents ran into difficulty in October 1964 when Paul ‘Bunglefries’ Jeffery left to enter University in Coventry, but they now had Paul Davies, for­mer manager/agent of rival band The Beatniks, taking care of business, and high profile support slots materialised with The Zombies and The Yardbirds.

‘The Soulents was going really well,’ recalls Watts. ‘Bunglefries Jeffery, as a rhythm guitarist, was a very stabilising influence on the group. He wasn’t that important musically, although he was a good singer and played good rhythm, but when he left, although the four-piece became tighter musically, it never seemed the same without Bunglefries to me. I always liked him there.’

By this time, The Who had arrived on the British music scene and showed everybody that drums, bass and one guitar could work, so The Soulents battled on. They utilised Arbour Hill Farm in Ross-on-Wye, the Griffin’s house, as their rehearsal base, a location they would use up to and including their late sixties bands such as The Shakedown Sound and Silence. Fred Griffin gave the boys great encouragement and acquired a £30 van for the group.

‘We were presented with a van by Buff’s father and, since I was the only mem­ber with a driving licence, it fell to me to be chauffeur,’ recalls Paul Jeffery. ‘We were certainly privileged at that time to have our own transport – with the band’s name emblazoned on the side panels and a large S on each hubcap – and we drove around like lords, oblivious, in our youthful mix of naivety and arrogance, to the fact that many of our contemporaries nursed within them a gnawing desire to drag us from its sanctuary and beat us to pulp.’

One evening during a group practice, the band received a phone call to rush to a gig at Hereford’s hippest venue – the 1600 Club. Throwing all their equip­ment into the vehicle desperate to seize their big break, the Bedford van was driven at great speed by Jeffery, who got lost.

‘In the panic, I swerved round a corner in Hereford’s back streets, on the wrong side of the road, with a barrage of contradictory directional advice (coupled with torrents of foul, personal abuse) being bawled at me by my idiot companions. In a split second I found the club and crashed into it, much to the 8bemusement of the waiting throng of clubsters and howls of pain from the other Soulents, who were being bombarded by flying Vox AC30s.’

The Soulents developed a large local following and Paul recalls their van soon became covered with lipstick and eyebrow pencil from girl fans. ‘The van’s paint­work was eventually covered with countless, shamelessly lascivious messages from young girls, affording us all great comfort, solace and succour through the long journeys of the night. Ah yes! Sweet, well-spent youth.’

In October and November 1964, The Soulents breezed through the prelimi­nary rounds of the Malvern Beat Contest cheered on by coach loads of support­ers. In the final of the contest, held at Malvern Winter Gardens on 3 December 1964, they came up against The Ravons, an all female outfit from Pershore, Worcestershire. Like the entire audience, The Soulents were transfixed with the girls’ compelling version of ‘(Remember) Walking In The Sand’, George ‘Shadow’ Morton’s song and record production for The Shangri-Las. Even the boys could not complain about coming second. Brooke sang on crutches having damaged his knee in a rugby match and Watts had to play on a Harmony Rocket six string borrowed from Buffin’s brother, which he didn’t give back to Bill for a year.

Herefordshire produced a number of other good rock groups at this time and The Soulents enjoyed intense but friendly rivalry with them. The Tyrants, who now featured Pat O’Donnell on vocals and harmonica, played electric versions of Bob Dylan songs before Dylan got himself a band, and The Ups ’n’ Downs (for­merly Johnny Rio And The Ricardos) were a wild R’n’B outfit who could easily have made it to the top.

While Watts and Griffin had been honing their musical abilities, two other key players who would be central to Mott The Hoople, had been doing the same. A good group that The Soulents often saw playing at gigs was The Buddies from Bromyard, with Mick Ralphs on lead guitar and vocalist Stan Tippins, who was regarded as something of a local heart throb. In March 1965, The Buddies turned professional and The Soulents continued to build, supporting several major na­tional bands including The Zombies at venues like The Top Spot in Ross, and The Yardbirds, when Jeff Beck played his debut gig at Hereford’s Hillside Ballroom. Overend remembers these formative years.

‘When I left school, I was originally a trainee architect from August 1964 to October 1965, but I was playing semi-professionally with The Soulents. Each night, after work, I went out to see The Yardbirds or The Who, or simply to play gigs. At work, I constantly fell asleep with my head on the drawing board. Nobody seemed to mind the snoozing, but they kept telling me to get my hair cut.’

In July 1965, it was decided that the surviving quartet should change the group name from The Soulents to The Silence, and they began to take on more of the ‘Pop Art’ feel of the time, securing an increasingly sizeable fan base. They sup­ported The Merseybeats at The 1600 Club. ‘We were Merseybeat fans. We went down a storm and they died. Embarrassing,’ remarks Griffin, ‘and unjust.’

The Silence also supported The Who at the Blue Moon Club in Cheltenham that same month, as Dale remembers. ‘This time we died! We’d all been to see The Who and loved ’em, so we started to perform many of their stage numbers. 9We became so full of ourselves that we accepted a date supporting The Who. Big mistake – the stage was so tiny we had to use all their equipment and play their songs, much to Keith Moon’s annoyance. He came and glared at me for a while. Then, disaster: Wattsy couldn’t get the feedback from Townshend’s amps – both guitar and bass amps blew and the audience was patently unimpressed. We slunk off, but worse was to come. Whilst waiting for the club to clear, Fooshers sat on the neck of one of Townshend’s Rickenbackers and snapped it. We panicked and disappeared into the night, in shame and fear.’

A young Peter Watts was featured in the local press in October when he re­ceived a gift of a fifty-year-old French harmonium! Whilst he was surveying, during his day job, Watts had noticed the harmonium lying idle in a vicarage coach house at Kington and thought it would make a good sound for the group. He asked his boss if he could speak to the vicar about buying it and was given the instrument for nothing. The harmonium wasn’t used on many bookings, ex­cept those nearer home, because of transportation and amplification difficulties.

Suddenly, in November 1965, unsuspected and unwelcome, the bubble burst. Watts left The Silence to turn professional with local rivals The Buddies, excited by the prospect of following in The Beatles’ footsteps to Germany. ‘I liked The Silence but had to leave,’ admits Pete. ‘I could see no future and was saying to them, Look at The Buddies, going off to Europe. Buff was sixteen and still at school so he couldn’t do anything, but the singer, Patrick Brooke, was the main problem, because his mother and father were very strict. He was a trainee accountant, working near me in Hereford and there was no way they were going to let him leave. He was going to be an accountant and that was it. Fred Fishpool was on the dole so he was professional for all intents and purposes.

‘I always respected The Buddies, although they weren’t quite as wild as The Silence, and when they asked me to join, whilst I didn’t want to let the guys down, people were saying I had to think of myself. It stood to reason that they should have taken our bass player Fred Fishpool, but, because he was more scruffy and I had a job as a trainee architect and didn’t look too wild, I fitted in nicely with The Buddies’ clean cut image.

‘I remember the first time I saw Ralpher in The Buddies at the Hostel in Hereford. He looked about fifteen and had a Rickenbacker and long hair at the front with a short back and sides. I got on with Ralpher straight away and struck up a friendship, because we both loved guitars. He came to see our group at Percival Hall and said we sounded like The Big Three which was an amazing compliment. We were always bumping into one another in the music shop in Hereford. Mick had a couple of other guitars as well as his Rickenbacker. He was well-off compared to me because he had a job that paid good money whereas I had one that didn’t pay good money, and he kindly lent me things, including a Danelectro 12-string, which I used on gigs. By the time I joined Ralpher, eight­een months later, he had switched to a standard Fender Telecaster, which were quite hard to get at the time, and played that until he swapped it for a red Gibson SG Standard in 1968.’

When Watts linked up with Ralphs and Tippins, this soon lead to the demise of his former group. The Silence cast around for a string-strangler and played a 10trio of gigs with singer/guitarist Ricky Welch, formerly of legendary Gloucester band The Beatniks. However they only survived for a further month when they decided to disband during December in great dismay, parted company with Welch and invited Paul Jeffery to complete their final gigs.

‘The Silence split shortly after Pete left because we could not find a suitable replacement,’ says Dale. ‘Fisher and Brooke joined another local band, The Uncertain Kind, and did a stint in Germany. I’d love to have gone there at that time. Everyone who did go has great stories to tell of their experiences.’

Dale was now lured to a ‘proper job’ in Gloucester and played in bands in the evening, including The Charles Kingsley Creation with whom he performed his first gig at the Pontypridd Mineworkers’ Club in Wales. Griffin also got involved in his first studio work, session drumming at Future Sound, owned by Kingsley and Charles Ward. The studio, equipped with two mono tape decks and a mix­ing desk, was a converted potato loft above a barn at the brothers’ family farm near Monmouth. Dale appeared on two 1966 singles, ‘Is It Really What You Want?’ by The Interns, on Parlophone, and ‘Black Is The Night’, backed with ‘Do Blondes Really Have More Fun?’ by (Bryn) Yemm and the Yemen on Columbia. In fact, it was The Charles Kingsley Creation who provided the in­strumental backing to the Bryn Yemm single and Dale made a live promotional appearance with the group on Television Wales and West’s TWW Reports at their studios in Bristol.

Meanwhile, Watts switched from six-string Rickenbacker to Fender Precision bass, joining Bob Hall, Ralphs and Tippins in Herefordshire’s only professional beat group. The Buddies were older than The Silence and Pete actually thought they were a bit old fashioned, although musically tight. He wasn’t sure if he could play bass, but believed it couldn’t be that difficult! ‘I was happy to switch from six-string to bass. The only thing I’d never have considered being was a drummer, because you get all the hard work and none of the glory. Bass was much easier because you didn’t have to look at what you were doing and could do whatever you wanted on stage, including moving freely, eyeing girls and looking cool.’

Like Dale, Stan and Mick both hailed from rural Herefordshire. Stanley William Tippins was born on 14 May 1945 in Sarnesfield, the son of Ernest Albert Tippins and Florence Rhoda Matthews. His father was a farm worker, wagoner and cowman and Stan lived in Sarnesfield for twenty years, until the family moved into Hereford in October 1965. Stan, his brother Les, who died of a heart attack in 1989, and his sister Ruth were educated at Weobley School near Sarnesfield. He was interested in football and played centre half for the school team but also enjoyed English and History. Leaving school at 15, he joined Henry Wiggins’ factory in Hereford for five years and, although he had no musical ed­ucation, he became a professional musician in 1965. Tippins has been married twice, the first lasting three years and his second marriage to Jenny spanning more than twenty, resulting in four children and two grandchildren.

Stan was influenced musically by artists like P. J. Proby, Cliff Bennett and the Rebel Rousers, Stuart James (Mojos) and, particularly, the image-laden rockers Johnny Kidd and the Pirates who, with their 1959 debut hit, ‘Please Don’t Touch’, made the first authentic rock and roll record originated by a UK artist. Kidd was 11Britain’s first ‘rock’ singer in Stan’s eyes. ‘I saw them eight times altogether and they were fabulous. Johnny Kidd had such a great stage show and was probably the best mover I’ve ever seen, and the best rock and roll singer of all time in my opinion, both British and American. My other interests were Jerry Lee Lewis, Sam Cooke, Little Richard, Gene Vincent, Buddy Holly and Brenda Lee. In those days, there were hardly any albums around – it was all singles. I remember listening to Radio Luxembourg very quietly in my bedroom late at night and that’s really all there was back then. I was keen on music and used to do some singing at school at about ten or eleven years of age. My specialities were The Man From Laramie and Davy Crockett, which the teacher would let me sing for the class.’

Tippins formed his first group, Jet Black and the Stormraisers, in 1963. Stan became a good vocalist and dynamic front man and would come on stage in black leather under the name of Jet Black and subsequently Billy Thunder. The group line up included Ed Barnett on guitar, Mick Jaguar on bass and Dave Scudder on drums.

‘The Stormraisers really came about because my friend, Ed Barnet, who lived two miles away, was a keen footballer like me and used to play in a field near my place. One day it rained very heavily and he asked me to come round to his house and listen to some of his records. I didn’t know he liked music too. Ed fancied himself as a lead guitarist so he started playing and I started singing. It took months and months to learn all these Johnny Kidd and Jerry Lee Lewis songs and then we got our first gig at the Unicorn Village Hall, Weobley on 6 December 1963. It cost three shillings to get in, was absolutely packed and we got six pounds for the night. I would wear black leather trousers and a black and white shirt on stage and we went round putting up posters in shops and started playing all the local halls and youth clubs.’

After a while Jet Black was ‘laid to rest’ and Stan became Billy Thunder, at the suggestion of the group’s new manager. Billy Thunder and the Stormraisers played the Herefordshire circuit for a while, but the band fell apart when Ed found a girlfriend. He was replaced by guitarist Alan Lovell and Taffy Jones took over on drums.

‘I couldn’t believe it because Ed was the keenest of all of us and couldn’t think of anything but music,’ says Stan ‘One night we were doing a gig near Monmouth, and he should have been playing a guitar solo and we looked across to find him holding his girlfriend’s hand. It wasn’t the same without Ed, and eventually The Stormraisers came to an end. I turned down a few offers to go with other local groups until I was approached by The Buddies. Les Norman, their singer/guitarist, was leaving to go to college away from Hereford. The Buddies were a very bluesy five-piece and Les was an excellent vocalist. I joined and changed them a bit because I felt uncomfortable with some of their material and was more of a pop–rock singer.’

Stan was described by his fellow band members as a forceful character with the sheer brute power to make others do what was necessary. Dale recalls an example of this a year or two later when Pete Watts would not play one of the numbers in their live act.

12‘In those early days you didn’t play an hour or a two-hour set, you played for eight or ten hours in total, which meant that you couldn’t possibly have enough different songs to play throughout that time, so you would have to repeat things. On this particular evening Stan was introducing the song My Girl for about the third or fourth time and Pete just refused to play it, which made life difficult, because the song opens with a bass riff and it relied on Watts to start it. Stan glared at Pete and went back to the microphone and said, Right, now we’re going to do a number called ‘My Girl’, and looked very meaningfully at Pete who still wouldn’t play. And this happened another couple of times. Stan and Pete stood their ground, they’re both Taureans and very stubborn. After introducing the song again, Tippins turned to Pete and said, If you don’t start