BARNSBURY BOY - bill pitt-jones: on MUSIC
On Fame and Fortune, the Joe Meek Way
I lived in Beaconsfield Buildings off the Cally with my hundreds of siblings. My elder brother Roy taught Lenny (Peters and Lee) basic piano and sang in all the local pubs. Elder brothers clubbed together to buy a £6 pound guitar. Couldn’t play it. Skiffle Groups were in as were Bill Haley & Duane Eddy.
Never had a lesson in my life (and it shows). Hung about guitar shops in Tin Pan Alley. Watched and listened; the staff put up with me as long as I didn’t touch the guitars with my dirty little mitts.
Got together as often as possible with like-minded pals to jam together. Steve Howe, Paul Kenealy, Johnny MacDonald when I got to Barnsbury. The Moon Rakers were already established when they asked me to join. Playing USAF air bases clubs and other dives through an agency.
My first paying gig was with Paul, Steve and Johnny at a Saturday night youth club dance in the infants school across that little road from the back gate at the Eden Grove Barnsbury school. We also played the Pentonville Prison Wardens Social Club. Inside the walls. They used to buy us drinks instead of paying us (even though we were under age) We played a Barnsbury Christmas Show.
One Saturday morning in the early winter of 1964 three seventeen year olds (two of them Gobbs) one sixteen year old and one twenty-one year old stood outside the doorway of 304 Holloway Road.
'C'mon then' said twenty-one year old Roger Hall, the driving force of the band (Groups in 1964) and in near-total darkness we groped our way up the massive interior straight line of stairs leading to the Victorian apartments built over the parade of shops.
On the landing at the top we turned to the right. In the dark, Roger rapped on the solid front door and after a long pause did it again. The door creaked open just enough to show a slight chink of light and another Gobb, Patrick Pink, stuck his nose through the opening.
‘Hi' we said in unison, 'We understand these are the studios of Joe Meek. We’re the Moon Rakers and would like to audition'.
The nose looked over its shoulder and another voice informed us, 'We don’t do auditions. Go away!'
At which point Roger, made of sterner stuff, said 'Well at least listen to our demo record; made at Curly Claytons.'
The response was for the door to open completely, blinding us with electric light, and Joe Meek himself confronting us in a half-rage saying, 'I don’t listen to demo disks made by amateurs like that fucker!' Or words to that effect. And maybe as an afterthought, when he saw that he was dealing with young lads and not the heavy mob, added, 'Come back 9 o'clock Monday morning and play the song to me'.
9 o'clock sharp on the Monday, the elated Moon Rakers carried their gear up those endless stairs to R.G.M. Recording Studios. Yours truly carrying a massive Bass Amp Cabinet on my shoulder. Into the studio walked the man himself. Happy. Affable. Jolly. Groomed, but well out of fashion in his Blue Serge Italian style suit. (bum-freezer jacket, 14-inch bottoms, Winkle Pickers and Elvis Presley quiff with D.A.)
‘What's that then,’ he said, pointing to my amp.
'A 180 guineas Vox T60,' I answered proudly. (on H.P. of course).
‘Well, we won’t use that rubbish,’ he said, handing me a jackplug with a lead that disappeared into the next room. 'Use this.'
Anyway we set up and did a bit of boogie to warm up and sound balance, and then wondered, 'what happens next?' We were in a sound-proofed room with egg boxes on the wall, blocked-up windows behind very heavy curtains and one of those woman’s changing screens you saw in films, surrounding the drum kit. An old Hammond organ stood against one wall, there were microphones all over the place, and that was it. Where was the glass partition and blokes wearing white coats and earphones?
In comes Joe again and grabs me by the elbow leading me to the doorway. (ROGER! HELP! WHERE ARE YOU?). Stands me in the doorway where I can see into another room crammed with machines resembling the flight deck of the TARDIS; open boxes full of used spools of Reel to Reel Audio Tape and enough cables to to empty the national grid, trailing across the floor.
'You stand here and relay my instructions’, he said.
First Take. We begin to play 'Little Baby'. Halfway through Joe signals me to stop the music. I'm apprehensive.
‘O.K. I’ve got the sound balance. Start again.'
We do. We finish. Joes head comes around the door with a massive beaming smile. 'Right that'll do for a demo. I've got a meeting with PYE records now so I'm taking this with me. If they like it, when I come back we'll make the record.... While I'm away learn to play the bloody thing P-R-O-P-E-R-L-Y!’
We set to it over and over again. No tea breaks, no lunch break, no nothing. Though Patrick Pink did eventually bring us in a cup of tea. The bastard didn't come back till about 8 o'clock that evening.
We cut the record in two takes, then spent hours double tracking and helping Joe with his very many recording tricks and techniques. Just could not believe the amazing sound of the playbacks. What ever else he was, the man was an absolute genius at sound recording.
Did not get home until two in the morning. The only way I could placate my dad was to explain that I was going to be a rich and famous pop star, and that he would have to sign the contract because I was under age.
The Moon Rakers became the Blue Rondos. Check them out on the links below.
November 2013
http://www.bluerondos.com/page6.htm
http://www.bluerondos.com/page7.htm
http://www.bluerondos.com/index.htm
I lived in Beaconsfield Buildings off the Cally with my hundreds of siblings. My elder brother Roy taught Lenny (Peters and Lee) basic piano and sang in all the local pubs. Elder brothers clubbed together to buy a £6 pound guitar. Couldn’t play it. Skiffle Groups were in as were Bill Haley & Duane Eddy.
Never had a lesson in my life (and it shows). Hung about guitar shops in Tin Pan Alley. Watched and listened; the staff put up with me as long as I didn’t touch the guitars with my dirty little mitts.
Got together as often as possible with like-minded pals to jam together. Steve Howe, Paul Kenealy, Johnny MacDonald when I got to Barnsbury. The Moon Rakers were already established when they asked me to join. Playing USAF air bases clubs and other dives through an agency.
My first paying gig was with Paul, Steve and Johnny at a Saturday night youth club dance in the infants school across that little road from the back gate at the Eden Grove Barnsbury school. We also played the Pentonville Prison Wardens Social Club. Inside the walls. They used to buy us drinks instead of paying us (even though we were under age) We played a Barnsbury Christmas Show.
One Saturday morning in the early winter of 1964 three seventeen year olds (two of them Gobbs) one sixteen year old and one twenty-one year old stood outside the doorway of 304 Holloway Road.
'C'mon then' said twenty-one year old Roger Hall, the driving force of the band (Groups in 1964) and in near-total darkness we groped our way up the massive interior straight line of stairs leading to the Victorian apartments built over the parade of shops.
On the landing at the top we turned to the right. In the dark, Roger rapped on the solid front door and after a long pause did it again. The door creaked open just enough to show a slight chink of light and another Gobb, Patrick Pink, stuck his nose through the opening.
‘Hi' we said in unison, 'We understand these are the studios of Joe Meek. We’re the Moon Rakers and would like to audition'.
The nose looked over its shoulder and another voice informed us, 'We don’t do auditions. Go away!'
At which point Roger, made of sterner stuff, said 'Well at least listen to our demo record; made at Curly Claytons.'
The response was for the door to open completely, blinding us with electric light, and Joe Meek himself confronting us in a half-rage saying, 'I don’t listen to demo disks made by amateurs like that fucker!' Or words to that effect. And maybe as an afterthought, when he saw that he was dealing with young lads and not the heavy mob, added, 'Come back 9 o'clock Monday morning and play the song to me'.
9 o'clock sharp on the Monday, the elated Moon Rakers carried their gear up those endless stairs to R.G.M. Recording Studios. Yours truly carrying a massive Bass Amp Cabinet on my shoulder. Into the studio walked the man himself. Happy. Affable. Jolly. Groomed, but well out of fashion in his Blue Serge Italian style suit. (bum-freezer jacket, 14-inch bottoms, Winkle Pickers and Elvis Presley quiff with D.A.)
‘What's that then,’ he said, pointing to my amp.
'A 180 guineas Vox T60,' I answered proudly. (on H.P. of course).
‘Well, we won’t use that rubbish,’ he said, handing me a jackplug with a lead that disappeared into the next room. 'Use this.'
Anyway we set up and did a bit of boogie to warm up and sound balance, and then wondered, 'what happens next?' We were in a sound-proofed room with egg boxes on the wall, blocked-up windows behind very heavy curtains and one of those woman’s changing screens you saw in films, surrounding the drum kit. An old Hammond organ stood against one wall, there were microphones all over the place, and that was it. Where was the glass partition and blokes wearing white coats and earphones?
In comes Joe again and grabs me by the elbow leading me to the doorway. (ROGER! HELP! WHERE ARE YOU?). Stands me in the doorway where I can see into another room crammed with machines resembling the flight deck of the TARDIS; open boxes full of used spools of Reel to Reel Audio Tape and enough cables to to empty the national grid, trailing across the floor.
'You stand here and relay my instructions’, he said.
First Take. We begin to play 'Little Baby'. Halfway through Joe signals me to stop the music. I'm apprehensive.
‘O.K. I’ve got the sound balance. Start again.'
We do. We finish. Joes head comes around the door with a massive beaming smile. 'Right that'll do for a demo. I've got a meeting with PYE records now so I'm taking this with me. If they like it, when I come back we'll make the record.... While I'm away learn to play the bloody thing P-R-O-P-E-R-L-Y!’
We set to it over and over again. No tea breaks, no lunch break, no nothing. Though Patrick Pink did eventually bring us in a cup of tea. The bastard didn't come back till about 8 o'clock that evening.
We cut the record in two takes, then spent hours double tracking and helping Joe with his very many recording tricks and techniques. Just could not believe the amazing sound of the playbacks. What ever else he was, the man was an absolute genius at sound recording.
Did not get home until two in the morning. The only way I could placate my dad was to explain that I was going to be a rich and famous pop star, and that he would have to sign the contract because I was under age.
The Moon Rakers became the Blue Rondos. Check them out on the links below.
November 2013
http://www.bluerondos.com/page6.htm
http://www.bluerondos.com/page7.htm
http://www.bluerondos.com/index.htm
