ARTICLE ABOUT Keith Moon (The Who) FROM SOUNDS, December 29, 1973

Enjoy this great chat with Keith Moon from the last number of Sounds in 1973. Difficult to believe all those myths about him when you read this one. He probably did have a “bad” way to behave on occasion , but as is common in so many of us, we have a little bit of light and shade in our personalities. Hell of a drummer, he sure was.

Life in the old Tom yet

Steve Peacock talking to Keith Moon

We`d been told that Keith Moon was ill, thus he wasn`t appearing in “Tommy”, but as often happens that wasn`t quite the case. In fact, he said, he`d never agreed to do “Tommy” at the Rainbow this year in the first place, but they`d said he would, and excused his withdrawal on the grounds that he was ill. Such is showbiz.
In fact, Mr. Moon was looking in peak condition, dressed as he was in impeccable early sixties gear – from the black, exquisitely tailored three-button jacket, the broad pink-stripped shirt with white button-down collar and black knitted tie, the slightly flared black cord trousers, to the original “She Loves You” stomping Beatle boots with cuban heels and pointed toes – all genuine and from the wardrobe of Mr. R. Starr.

FILM

He`d been for a screen test for a part Ringo was to play in the film “Stardust” – he already has a part in it, but they asked him, so why not? And, in fact, he was planning to visit the Rainbow for “Tommy” – but in a purely backstage role. He had promised, he said, to keep Viv Stanshall sober. No comment.
And he had been ill – though that was during the Who`s American tour. Or rather: “I`d been made ill. Someone put elephant tranquiliser in my drink. We found out later from the San Francisco hospital that four people who`d drunk from the same brandy bottle as me had been laid out, but fortunately I have a strong constitution and I didn`t notice it until it started to hit me towards the end of the show – then I was a total blank for ten hours. It seems the West Coast is very good at that kind of thing, they seem to think it`s funny, but if I ever found out who did it I`d rip his arm off and beat him to death with it.” Merry prankster, you have been warned.

BORED

As for “Tommy”, well – he feels he`s done that show as many times as he wants to, and he didn`t particularly want to get up on stage and flash through Uncle Ernie one more time: “It`s like playing the same song over and over again – eventually you get bored with it so you leave it out of the act. I`ve got fed up with playing the same part over and over again, so I`ve left it out of my act – no reason other than that.”
Or sometimes you re-arrange the number, and in a new form. Uncle Ernie Moon will go through the hoop just one more time. Keith has a number of projects on the go at the moment, including the “Stardust” film in March – which is loosely a follow-up to “That`ll Be The Day” with David Essex – Who tours of Europe and America later in 1974, and the film version of “Tommy” with Ken Russell directing, which they`ll be shooting in April. Earlier in the New Year, the Who will be recording some new Townshend songs for the film`s soundtrack. As musicians the “Tommy” film involves the whole group, but as actors it involves Roger and Keith “more than Pete and John. They really don`t have any interest in acting – John, for instance, would much rather be in the studio making music than making films, whereas with me it`s vice versa.”
So there`s life in the old deaf and dumb friend yet: you`d have thought that “Tommy” had had such a run with and without the Who that it would be very difficult to breathe new life into it. “Which is why it had to be Ken Russell – he`s the only person who could do that, the only person I know anyway. He came down to the studio while we were recording `Quadrophenia`, and he impressed each of us… he seemed one of the most perceptive men I`ve met. He really is an amazing man – if you start a sentence he`ll not only finish it for you, but go into the next one while you`re still thinking about it. I`m really looking forward to working with him.
“I spent a couple of hours with him over a bottle of wine at his house, and the way he saw the characters, the way he`d developed the characters, and the ideas he was coming up with… they`ve never ever been done like Ken`s going to do `em. His whole conception of `Tommy` is totally different from the way anyone else has seen it, but it`s still `Tommy`.”

Could he be more specific? “Well no, not really – you`d have to spend a couple of hours with Ken Russell. But then we`ve got to see whether the ideas work, so the only way you can really know is to see the film.”
And so to “Stardust”. It`s a follow up to “That`ll Be The Day”, he says, in so much as that film covered a period up to the Beatles and the British invasion of America, and this one will take in the period from then up to the present day. “That`ll Be The Day” was: “a kind of English version of `American Graffitti` – America couldn`t  really identify with it, but this one goes from the Liverpool thing, the Beatles thing – which is one of the reasons Ringo didn`t want to do it, because he`s been through all that – brings the English and American things together, and then follows them as they began to find their own identities again.”
So while “That`ll Be The Day” was really more concerned with what was happening around the music of Chuck Berry, Buddy Holly, and all those people – life as related to the jukebox and transistor radio speaker – “Stardust” will concern itself more with the life and times of musicians and others in the business of music. “It`s more involved with the pressures the musicians were under – the agency problems, management problems, what it takes to get a group to America, advertising bullshit and the hype that goes on to get a record in the charts – all that kind of `for God`s sake don`t say balls to a reporter, and don`t forget your 17` stuff. I think a lot of people will be more interested in that than in hearing a lot of oldies but goldies.”
Once again, Ray Conally has written the script, and Keith is more than happy: “He`s great, because he says `if you don`t like the way I`ve written this bit then I`ll change it, or you can write it, or we`ll write it together` – the important thing to him is to get it right for the person who`s playing it. He doesn`t feel he`s written a successful part unless the person who`s playing it feels comfortable saying the words.”
It seems that in the way Keith is able to work in films, he`s in an ideal situation. He`s able to be involved with all the aspects of creating a movie, rather than merely being one of the director`s pawns as we`re led to believe is generally the case. Hitchcock`s cattle – actors dictum seems as far away as the man with the cigar doing his `sign here and I`ll make you a star` routine in the pop world.

FLIPPANT

“Well, we`re all involved in trying to get the best film we can – that`s the most important thing. If I`m best at doing one thing, then I`ll do that, and the same with the others. We all get on well together, and we`ve all shared the same experiences, but on different levels. For instance, Ray`s never been on the road so when he says `what`s it like to be stuck in the back of a transit for eight hours?` I can tell him. I can`t write it, but I can explain to him what it feels like to be stuck in the back of a bloody transit for eight hours, and he can put it into words.
“There`s this great rapport, and it`s so much fun working on a film right from when it`s conceived, through the casting stage – thinking `who`ll be best for that bit, who`s really gone through that?` – right to making it. We don`t take it lightly, I don`t want to make it sound flippant, but the idea of one person directing on his own, one person casting, one person doing something else just doesn`t apply any more. That kind of enthusiasm comes out in the film, and it shows – on the screen it shows.”

ACTOR

He seems to have made the switch from drummer with the Who to film actor with remarkable ease. “I don`t think I`ve ever not been an actor – I`ve always been an actor that plays the drums. I haven`t been a film actor, but there are many aspects of acting – it`s just different ways of projecting. You project through the theatre on stage with the Who, and you project in a different way to a camera for a film – it`s the same thing, just a different approach. On a screen that`s maybe 70 foot wide, you may only have to lift your little finger, whereas to get the same effect on stage you`d have to swing your whole arm.”
He`s always been an actor – I wonder. Has he just been playing the part of the crazy drummer from the Who all these years? Are you an actor offstage Keith? “I seldom stop acting, except… well, when I`m asleep.”
Is it a conscious thing? “Not all the time. I`m a natural extrovert, and if I want to get a point across then I`ll use expressions – vocal or physical – that`ll do it. That`s what acting is, I suppose, and it comes very naturally to me.”
So instead of sitting in a hotel room saying “I`m bored”, you`ll throw the bed out of the window? “Something like that.”
There was that disturbance in Montreal for instance. “Ah, yes… well, it just escalates. `Oh dea, vats zis, it`s fallen off ze table… appears to have smashed on zose glasses zere… ooooh, dear, oh dear, now you`ve knocked a chair over and the cushions and the desk`s fallen over… bam, bam, bam, bam… oh dear, now the television seems to have gone out the window…`

“It`s not planned, it just escalates, the adrenalin builds up and then bingo – `what would you like? Cold coffee, a bit of toast and six hours in Montreal nick. I shall have to write to the Queen about that really – Canadian breakfasts are terrible. I`ve had much better in Holloway. She`s neglecting the colonies – `bout time she went over there, showed the old boat race again.”
One of the best descriptions I heard of that kind of human whirlwind was by the novelist Edna O`Brien. On TV, Russell Harty asked her if she ever `freaked out`. Yes, she said, in the sense that she got into something to such an extent that she just didn`t think about ever coming back.
“You do”, affirms Mr. Moon. “You just become one with all of it, and then when you`re brought down and all of a sudden you`re sitting in the back of a Black Maria, that`s when it hits you. (In his best downtrodden Dudley Moore voice): `Dear Mum, once again Life has stood up and punched me right between the eyes.`
“That`s when you`re back to reality. It`s impossible to explain, it`s complete escapism. You`ve got all this energy which has got to go somewhere – and it takes you.”

I have personally transcribed this from the original paper. Any errors in the text from the original magazine may not have been corrected for the sake of accuracy. If you have a music-related web-page where this fits – please make a link to the article. With credits to the original writer of the article from all of us music fans!

This number of Sounds also contains articles/interviews with these people: Leo Sayer, Tim Bogert, Gallagher&Lyle, Keith Emerson, Deep Purple, Magma.

The original music paper this article came from (pictured at the top) is for sale!

1. Send me an e-mail if you are interested. Send it to: geirmykl@gmail.com
2. The offer should be 20 $ (US Dollars) to be considered. (This includes postage).
3. We conduct the transaction through my verified Paypal account for the safety of both parties.

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ARTICLE ABOUT Roger Daltrey (The Who) FROM SOUNDS, September 15, 1973

A very good insight into what was happening around the band before the release of “Quadrophenia”. Deserves to be read.
Ok, I will be off to Copenhagen this weekend, so I will see you around again on Monday with a very good article on a band who, among other things, drew attention to a machine for driving piles into the ground.

The Thinking Man`s Who

Roger Daltrey talks to Rob Mackie about the new Who album, `Tommy` on film and much more

Behind the penetratingly blue eyes of Roger Daltrey is no kind of sad man. Roger has every reason to feel sour. In the first place, it`s criminal to have to leave a beautiful country home for the sweat of central London on the sort of day when the London papers are fond of exclaiming `Phew, what a scorcher!`
It`s one of those days that turns the other cheek around lunchtime, and slyly changes from being hot and sunny to being sweaty and brooding. On top of that, Roger has no sooner got to Track`s Windmill Street offices and parked than some dolt backs into his car leaving a few scratch marks on the shiny blue chrome.
However, a couple of cups of tea, and Roger`s soon revived and happy enough, turning a creaky wooden chair into a rocking chair somewhat perilously, in Track`s little downstairs studio, he chats about this and that in the multifarious activities of the Who, and sounds always like someone who knows what he wants, makes up his mind about it and sticks with it, making the best of the situation.
It`s true of the interview itself, and it`s true of the way Roger comes over physically and in what he says. He`s not one, for instance, to have a big pop star wardrobe full of flashy clothes. He seems to choose what suits him and leave the rest in the shops. Here he is in his `Best` T-shirt, which I seem to remember him wearing when he played “Tommy” at the Rainbow.
Since then, Roger`s become a star in his own right as well, and it`s typical that he did it with a good, clean straightforward set of… well, pop songs I suppose. Songs, anyway that everyone could understand, identify with and enjoy, not the `pandering to the masses` approach that pop has come to mean. Roger describes them as “Just good songs to hum in the loo.”

In “Quadrophenia”, Roger`s saddled again with his old `bad` role in the group, but I reckon an important part of his role in the group has been as a sort of anchor to keep the ship tied to a firm base through some of the more outrageous and at times unworkable schemes to have emanated from various and fertile Who brains.
Roger has enough common sense and confidence to know when to dig his heels in. I must be about the 101st person to tell him that surely “One Man Band” would be the best follow-up single to “Giving It All Away”, but Roger knows better, and I expect he`ll be proved right.
“Everybody`s said that,” said Roger, with a slight hint of exasperation, tipping his chair back a little more precariously than usual, but of course, maintaining his balance. “I`ve never thought that though. It`s just too obvious. The only reason I`m putting a single out now is because the record company wants one out. I`m not prepared to go on and record something just for a single, so they said they were taking one off “Daltrey”, and at least they`ve given me the opportunity to decide which one we`re going to use.
“I don`t think `One Man Band` will stand up to a lot of play, it`s so instant. You shouldn`t necessarily like a single first time. `Giving It All Away` took such a long time to grow on some people, that once it did, it was a good sign because a single has to stand up to so much airplay. That`s always assuming that `Thinking` is going to get a lot of airplay,” he adds with a laugh.
In case you don`t remember the title from the album, it`s the one which begins “I was just thinking about a girl,” and one of the songs that best shows how well Roger can build a song`s drama with his vocals, and without the aid of three madmen pounding away behind him as usual.

The difference meant being forced into a healthy change of outlook and attitude. “That whole album was feeling a way through and searching for something outside of the Who. I`m a rock and roll singer with what I think is the best rock and roll band in the world, and if I sing rock`n`roll, it belongs to that. With the band, I was getting into the state of thinking I knew exactly what to do with each song, when I did this, I put the Who out of my mind, and thought about different ways and techniques of singing, and after doing the Who`s album, which we`ve just finished, I know that it definitely has helped.
“The album that we`ve just done, the guy is a very mixed up, screwed-up kid, and I think I`ve managed to get that effect, just little differences, but I think it`s worked.”
So from one new solo role, playing himself, Roger`s been thrown straight into another alter ego, which will perhaps escalate and mushroom as much as “Tommy” has. Already, what was originally planned as half a double album has become an entire project with enough available Townshend songs to fill at least two double albums.
Roger`s role? “I`m the aggressive, nasty, mean, drink all the booze sort of job, John`s sensitive, Keith is the absolute madman, and Pete is the religious type – God if you like. My role? Yes I think it`s about right!” he chortles. “No it`s more as I was really, the album`s about the past – he`s on a boat and looking back at all the things he`s been through. Which is more or less what we`re doing now, trying to find a new direction.”
But Roger remains steadfastly behind the idea of quality rather than quantity. “We`re not the sort of band that can say `We`ve got to make an album, lads. Let`s go in the studio next week and bash out a couple of tunes.
“It`s not worth recording like that for a band like the Who. It would kill us. With us, it`s not just an album, but a whole thing to follow. It`s problems for us, but we thrive on them.”

Will the quadrophenic Jimmy mushroom in the same way as “Tommy” has through the various media? Roger thinks that musically it`s better, but he`s a little worried, from the point of view that the subject matter may be a bit less universal.
“The Americans` idea of a mod is somebody wearing a bull`s eye T-shirt, which is not really what it`s all about, you know. It`s hard to think how other people are going to react to it, all it is at the moment is a lot of songs and some ideas. I haven`t even heard it as a total thing myself.
“Besides which, once we get it on the road, it develops. The kids made “Tommy” what it was, we didn`t. We made the record, and helped it on its way.”
Which brought us on to the “Tommy” film, about which Roger is thoroughly enthusiastic, even though it`s going to mean going over some old ground again. “I think it`s perfect for a film, and Ken Russell`s the perfect director. I promise you that will be the last thing we do to do with “Tommy”, though.
“I think `Tommy` can say a hell of a lot more than `Jesus Christ Superstar` has ever said, and Russell`s got a lot of good ideas.
The roles? “I`d like someone like Mick Jagger to play the pinball wizard. The mother`s really difficult… they`re all going to have to be really good professional people. I`d think of someone like Bette Midler. Moon`s playing Uncle Ernie of course, or if you like Moon`s playing Moon.
“It`s gonna be acting and singing, I think there`s about one spoken word, and all the instrumentals will just be visuals, which is all you need, and that`s why Russell will be so bloody perfect for it. His visuals will be some of the best I`ve ever seen.”
Needless to say, Roger will be Tommy, although there will also be a second Tommy for the childhood parts. The score is set to be started on January 1, and before then the Famous Who Tour, the first here for two years, may actually have taken place. The plans, which are still not finalised, are for the band to play about seven Northern gigs, hopefully including two each in Manchester and Newcastle, and then go to the States for 10 days, and come back and play four or five days in London.

After two years of busy seclusion, the Who are girding their loins to hit us on all fronts again. In what spare time he has had, Roger`s been slaving over his extensive home and garden, and is now in a condition of near athlete fitness that he feels is necessary for the sort of extended controlled energies that go into a series of Who concerts.
The thought of actually being on the road again brings out a mixture of strong emotions. “We`re frightened to death, but we know we`ll take it in our stride.
Roger doesn`t expect they`ll make much money from the English tour, but does expect a lot of fun.
We went upstairs for a quick preview of Quadrophenia`s own Pinball Wizard, a number called “5.15”, which will be backed with the stage number “Water”, for a pre-album taster.
I`m not really supposed to review it, but suffice it to say that when the Who said they were getting a little too ordered and smooth on “Who`s Next”, I didn`t really believe it until you compare this one, which builds from a subtle start to all the dirt and grit of yer archetypal `oo. It had Roger and I helplessly bopping in the offices, and should be coming your way in little more than a month.
We pored over some possible album sleeves as well, and it seems as sure as makes no difference that the front will be a stark, striking photo of a back-view mod on a flash mid-sixties scooter with fur on the back and all mod cons. A lot of its atmosphere comes from the ethereal misty smoke behind him, putting the whole thing somewhere between dreams and reality.
It sets the tone brilliantly – a look back at the frustrated angry pill-popper of “My Generation” with hindsight but without condescension. That`s the Who `73 really. Still fighting not to be establishment, still as different as air, earth, fire and water, still as similar as the four liths of an orange. And still the best living definition of that time-honoured term “rock`n`roll.”

I have personally transcribed this from the original paper. Any errors in the text from the original magazine may not have been corrected for the sake of accuracy. If you have a music-related web-page where this fits – please make a link to the article. With credits to the original writer of the article from all of us music fans!

This number of Sounds also contains articles/interviews with these people: Dale Griffin, Roxy Music, Jess Roden, Billy Preston, Nick Mason, Home, Hemlock, Lou Reizner, Commander Cody, Elton John, Rolling Stones, Tony McPhee, America, Martin Carthy.

The original music paper this article came from (pictured at the top) is for sale!

1. Send me an e-mail if you are interested. Send it to: geirmykl@gmail.com
2. The offer should be 20 $ (US Dollars) to be considered. (This includes postage).
3. We conduct the transaction through my verified Paypal account for the safety of both parties.

ARTICLE ABOUT Keith Moon (The Who) FROM SOUNDS, May 5, 1973

This number of Sounds was very reduced and presented as the “Emergency edition”. This was because of what Sounds called the “May Day industrial disruption”. But still, this interview with one of the legends gone too early, Keith Moon, was still available for us to read. And it is a good one.

Bored Side Of the Moon

Penny Valentine meets an old friend

Keith Moon, it was rumoured, was bored. Normally I wouldn`t have believed it. I mean Moon over-zealous, Moon looning, Moon causing riots across the globe? Yes – such rumours I would have believed. But Moon bored, actually BORED? No indeedy.
Still, such tales emanated from a good source. Pete Townshend in fact. There I was standing in Wardour Street at around 6 p.m. the other day (waiting to get home I assure you) when Townshend loomed in the distance, on his way to the station, and we cheerily shared a cab.
On the way we talked of many things – shoes, ships, sealing wax… and Keith Moon`s boredom. Pete, it transpired, had tried to cheer him up with tales of `only two weeks to go and we start on the next album.` But Moon had stuck firm and said, somewhat gloomily, that two weeks was a damn long time to wait for activity – or words to that effect.
Pete had taken the whole thing with humour – a man obviously well accustomed to such tales of woe within the Who, a group let`s face it who do not like inactivity at the best of times.
So when, some days later, it was set that I should parlay to Mr. Moon over a few brandies in a local pub I put it to him straight. What, I enquired, was it all about? And indeed was it a fact?
Needless to say when we got to the nitty gritty things weren`t quite as dastardly and dramatic as I had at first supposed.

“Mmm well,” and he stuffed a cigarette into a long holder with great dash – if not applomb – “I suppose I must have been when I spoke to Pete. But I do manage to stave off a lot of the boredom I could suffer when we`re not working. Like doing the film, other incidentals.
“I think it`s important to have a `hobby` outside the band. If all your energies were directed into the Who it would be very easy for the whole thing to just take you over. It`s important that there are other things going on that we can all get into so that the Who doesn`t become a chore.
“It`s also important that those things stay simply hobbies and that the Who is the utmost thing in all our minds – which, I may say, it is.”
For those of you who are the smallest bit fashion concious I feel I should, at this stage, point out that this very day Mr. Moon is looking quite resplendant. He is wearing a three piece suit (yes a suit) topped off with a very large spotted bow tie – and that cigarette holder.
He also now sports a gap in his front teeth. Very endearing when he grins, which he does a lot, and an addition which heightens his strange resemblance to the late Robert Newton (famous, you may recall, for his rousing TV performances in “Treasure Island” and a gentleman whose impersonation Moon has off to a fine art. Much “argh Jim M`lad”).
Keith is also sporting an air of some sobriety – a fact that also comes as a surprise today. The main reason being, I am informed, that he has promised to be very upright indeed when he appears later this very afternoon on Radio 4 giving a talk on “The Care of Guns”. Somehow this all adds to the amusement of the day.

Interviewing Keith Moon can be dangerous. He is extremely likeable. He is also very very funny. But unless people know him well they tend to shy away from his image of achetypal maniac, in fear that they may never be seen again once having trotted off to have words with him.
In fear, indeed, of meeting a ghastly end in some far flung public call box at his wily hands. It is this image that Moon has carried with him since the very earliest days of the Who – somehow setting the whole atmosphere of the group at large.
They have gained from it – just as they have sometimes suffered from it. Moon is not a man to be ignored. And yet he can be serious, down to earth and beguiling. He tries hard today to smother the obvious temptations to have me curling on the floor in hysterics, unable to set pen to paper. Indeed for the first quarter of an hour of our conversation he is damn near solemn.
We talk about this image of his and whether he ever feels the other side of his character is being swamped by it. His answer is brief and to the point: “I find it very difficult to be serious – put in a ready laugh there would you? (Okay Keith – ha ha ha) I always see things in a very funny way. I can see any situation at any time and see the funny side to it.
“Anyway there`s bugger all I can do about my image. I`d have to change my whole lifestyle if I wanted to do anything about it.”
We also talk about his extra-curricular Who activities – like “That`ll Be The Day”, and the yet to be seen film with Harry Nilsson. The part from “That`ll Be The Day” was especially written in by Ray Connolly – after they`d met on the set. Originally it didn`t have a line of dialogue. Then Connolly met Moon and… well words had to be found from somewhere.

Since that film Keith has also started work on a film script – something he wants to get into much more at a later date: “I met a lot of people during filming that started me thinking about working on various other things. The thing is that within the Who I`m not as into the music side as they are, I`ve always been more involved in the visual side of the group.
“There were several suggestions that with Roger doing an album and John doing his I should do a comedy album. But I was a bit dubious about the idea. So much of what I do is purely visual.
“I just can`t imagine doing `Eight million ways of falling over` for instance, on record. I feel that might get rather lost`.”
Next week the Who go into the studios and start work on the grand double album enterprise from Pete Townshend`s brain. Maybe it`s the proximity of getting back to work that`s cheered Moon up – 18 months is a long time without something other than an arm to get your teeth into.
So bored, a little, Moon might have been. But idle? Never. Aside from the filming there are all kinds of jollies to impart – very tempting sagas they are too. And by another couple of brandies Moon is telling them with some relish.
There is the saga of the Monty Python football match, for instance. Moon`s team, it transpires, were not doing very well. Python`s mob were tromping them soundly: “I`d say the result was two goals, a try and two submissions.
“During the first half we brought all these little kids into our goal mouth. They stood looking winsomely across the pitch and everytime Python roared across we yelled `Mind the kids`. Very good, and it worked.”

During the second half Moon moved a bar, well equipped, into the goal mouth instead. This time cries of “Save the ale!” caused Python to disband in some confusion. No more goals were scored.
There is also the saga of Moon `touring` in the Australian production of “Tommy”. Aside from Graham Bell, moon was the only other original member of the Rainbow cast that accepted the invite to do a two week run in Australia. His Aussie version of Uncle Ernie apparently was something to be seen.
“Because we hadn`t worked for so long I needed the money – and also there`s a great duty free shop in Singapore, so I thought it would be a good idea. I wasn`t really looking forward to it because the last time I`d been in Australia was in `68 and it wasn`t a very happy tour.
“I`d never met such a lot of pig headed bastards and we had all these hassles with the press and the authorities. They weren`t into a lot of long haired idiots coming over and spearing the bearded clam – it upset them.
“But this time everyone was great, I did 4 TV chat shows and the whole place felt different. We were only supposed to do the show for a week but we sold out so many times it went into two. In the end I could see myself spending the rest of my life shuttling between Melbourne and Sydney.

“I think my Uncle Ernie over there was even grubbier than it was here. I really played him as a dirt-ridden old pervert – type casting you may think. In the breaks between shows I used to go into the park in my filthy old mac and straggly beard and jump out from behind the bushes. It terrified all the audience that had just come out.
“You know the only instructions I got on how to play the part for Australian audiences was from the director who came up one day and said, `Moon if you go on sober again I`ll sack you`.
“Apparently he didn`t feel I was really getting all the relish I could into the role because I was behaving myself. After that I got better.”
So Moon emerged from the `new` Australia a wiser and richer man? Well, no, not exactly. Unfortunately his returning plane to London stopped over in Singapore for a good 24 hour period. And that`s where that really good `duty free shop` lurked. And that`s where Moon lurked. And that`s why he didn`t return to London laden with wealth.
Still he had a good time. And he certainly wasn`t bored.

I have personally transcribed this from the original paper. Any errors in the text from the original magazine may not have been corrected for the sake of accuracy. If you have a music-related web-page where this fits – please make a link to the article. With credits to the original writer of the article from all of us music fans!

This number of Sounds also contains articles/interviews with these people: Glencoe, Chris Wood (Traffic), Davey Johnstone, Tom McGuinness, Groundhogs, Beach Boys.

The original music paper this article came from (pictured at the top) is for sale!

1. Send me an e-mail if you are interested. Send it to: geirmykl@gmail.com
2. The offer should be 20 $ (US Dollars) to be considered. (This includes postage).
3. We conduct the transaction through my verified Paypal account for the safety of both parties.

ARTICLE ABOUT Pete Townshend (The Who) FROM SOUNDS, February 10, 1973

A really nice one about The Who where Townshend discusses several subjects, among them the solo albums, his work with Clapton, rock operas and their future as a band. A “must read” if you like the Who just a little bit.

Who comes first

Pete Townshend talks to Steve Peacock

If you think you`ve noticed something strange about the Who recently, don`t worry – It`s just the sound of four people following their own noses for a while.
As Pete Townshend puts it: “Just at the moment we`re undergoing a bit of a renaissance, in many senses of the word – going back to square one.” Since they last worked together, in October, they`ve all been following various projects – Moon`s exploits you`ll have heard about, John Entwistle has been getting Rigor Mortis. Roger Daltrey is doing a solo album, Pete had his own solo record out, has been working as producer and concert band organiser with Eric Clapton, and most recently has been working on an album with Willie Barratt and John Otway who`re part of the Community Music set-up. And of course, they all got involved with the Lou Reizner “Tommy”.

UNHAPPY

But give it another four or five months, and you should see The Who back on the road in England with a new albums – the next “rock opera” for want of a better working tag – and a stage set based on it. They`re building their own studio in Battersea, and Pete reckons they`ll be in there in mid-March for two months working on the album. Then a British tour, then America.
He feels the past few months have been very good for the Who, in that they tend to get cloistered in their own little world – “very incestously away from things, like four elderly sisters” – and now they`ve been getting out and about a bit. He says it was remarkably good for him to be involved with the Clapton concert, quite apart from the obvious joy of seeing the thing work and seeing Eric get on a stage again, because “I really needed to play with someone, have some larks. It`s the first time I`ve ever really done anything outside the Who since Thunderclap Newman.”
He is now unhappy, however, about his involvement with the “Tommy” thing, because where Roger was able to add something to his original contribution, he didn`t feel he added anything. Particularly on stage: “In the Who when you`re on stage you don`t remain yourself – you forget all about yourself and you jump about and work and rock and roll in the traditional sense. But when I was suddenly stuck on a stage, not able to do anything but sing a few lines off a bit of paper, I kept thinking `what am I doing here?` – just because I wrote the thing. It`s like writing a TV play and having the bloody author sitting on a chair in the corner of each scene, just because he wrote it.” He refused an offer to appear in the American version.

The Eric Clapton thing started when he was down at Eric`s house “trying to help him to get his cursed album done – it`s three-quarters finished, and what there is is incredible.” That`s not the live album that`s out soon, but some studio tracks laid down by the last Derek and the Dominoes (with Jim Keltner on drums) at Olympic. The album is two or three tracks short as it stands: “In my new role as producer extraordinaire I was hoping that the live thing would be good enough to spur us on to do some studio recording so we could finish the album and get it out. I think the set up we had on stage was one of the finest bands I`ve ever heard, and I`d really like to hear that in a studio.”
Whether or not it would be possible to get that exact band together again to record he`s not sure, but he seemed pretty confident that they could get something near it to finish the album.
But for now, it`s back to the Who, and there`ve been some changes. He reckons that all he wants to do on this album is write it and play on it, leaving the production ideas to the Who as a whole; they`ll be using the new studio, not Olympic, and they won`t be working with Glyn Johns this time. They all felt something had to be done to re-vitalise the band and “what we`ve done really is looked at the Who and said `OK, in order to shake it up let`s turn the whole thing upside down and start again.` I don`t think it`s going to be easy.”

TRAGEDY

What he`s done in writing “Quadraphenia” (a gag on schizophrenia that`s become a working title) is construct a central figure, a kind of archetypal mod, using each member of the Who as a facet of his character – “so it`s not autobiographical of me, but it is of the Who in a way…
“I suppose what I`m really trying to do is a kind of “Clockwork Orange” musically, if you see what I mean, but where “Clockwork Orange” was a comedy, this is more a tragedy. There are so many tragic things involved with the Mods – the fact that they grow up and become respectable, that`s a miserable situation. The fact they turn into middle aged pop stars, that`s miserable. The fact that they`re badly educated kids, deprived, and the only things they have are kicking people and dancing, that`s miserable. But at the same time it`s got this incredible triumph in that this kid`s an individual in the midst of a world where the individual doesn`t exist.”

PROJECTS

He`s written most of it now, but he reckons that about a quarter will be thrown out when they record, to be replaced by what emerges from the rest of the band. It sounds as if it`ll be not only a major Who album but perhaps the first really major album by the Who. Did he feel that the last few months had given everyone a lot more energy to put back into the band now?
“I don`t think that necessarily follows,” he said. The point was that so far all the solo projects by people in the band have been what`s left over at the edge of the Who – side issues if you like. He has a feeling, though he hasn`t heard any of it yet, that Roger`s album might be the first one to be really successful in its own right, and that that might cause a problem – perhaps even a kind of Rod Stewart/Faces situation. “I think it would be wrong to assume that that kind of situation couldn`t happen with the Who – maybe not in England, but in America…”
“We`ve never been in the position of having a leader as such, we`ve had a spokesman and composer in myself, I suppose, but we`ve never had someone that emoted everything for the group in the way Jagger does for the Stones. I often wonder whether it would be bearable to be in a situation where the Who were just sort of grooving along all the time.

CHANGE

“I think it`s this kind of mood, this sort of doubt about whether we can pull off another major album that leads people around us to wonder whether there`s anything going on as regards splitting and things like that. But it`s got nothing to do with splitting – it`s always taken for granted within the group that we`re going to carry on, whatever. But things can change on the outside, and you can`t stop them.”

I have personally transcribed this from the original paper. Any errors in the text from the original magazine may not have been corrected for the sake of accuracy. If you have a music-related web-page where this fits – please make a link to the article. With credits to the original writer of the article from all of us music fans!

This number of Sounds also contains articles/interviews with these people: Dave Lambert, Beck, Bogert & Appice, Isaac Hayes, Peter Frampton, Rory Gallagher, Dusty Springfield, Syd Barrett, Stevie Wonder, Badger, Judy Sill, Jennie Hahn, Help Yourself, Ian A. Anderson.

The original music paper this article came from (pictured at the top) is for sale!

1. Send me an e-mail if you are interested. Send it to: geirmykl@gmail.com
2. The offer should be 20 $ (US Dollars) to be considered. (This includes postage).
3. We conduct the transaction through my verified Paypal account for the safety of both parties.

ARTICLE ABOUT John Entwhistle (The Who) FROM SOUNDS, October 28, 1972

I am on a visit to London today, staying in this wonderful city until Sunday, and what better way to celebrate than sharing this article about one of the members of The Who, a band formed in London in 1964. When I`m here I try to make room for some sightseeing at famous places relating to modern rock music history. I have been to Freddie Mercury`s house, went to all the music shops in Denmark Street and bought some rock and roll street wear at Camden Market. I am thinking of going away to see the offices of Classic Rock Magazine where so many of my favourite music journalists have worked. If you have any other suggestions for my visit, please send some words my way! Thank you!

Entwhistle: more rigour than mortis

Interview by Martin Hayman

The other side of the glass window the forgotten man of the Who is pumping out bass notes and a lunatic figure at the piano bashes out “March of the Mods” with a fiendish cackle. This is Tony Ashton, drinker, fun-timer and piano player extraordinaire.
Entwhistle cuts a commanding if slightly impassive figure, burly rather than stout and dressed in his customary slightly sinister black. He cracks into a grin at the antics of his piano player and after a couple of false starts for fits of laughter, the band, boxed off from each other by studio screens, blaps into some hairy rock and roll.
The take done, they stroll back into the control box for refreshments with an air of well-earned satisfaction. Entwhistle exchanges some light-hearted banter with the Who`s “press agent” along the lines of “More rigour than mortis there I`d say, har har”, and plays through a delightful little death song about Rollerskate Kate who met her end in the fast lane of the motorway and has now gone to join the Great Skating Rink In The Sky. Shoop-doo-be-doop.
Yes, it`s the man who brought us well-loved little masterpieces of monstrosity like “Boris The Spider” and “Cousin Kevin”, and he`s doing it again. This new album, which will be the sequel to “Whistle Rhymes” (coming your way on November 3) rejoices in the blood-curdling title “Rigor Mortis” – thus the pun.

It`s a rock and roll album with an updated feel and John`s own extra little something, his brand of black humour, which is quite endearing when you get into it. Assisting at the funeral are the aforementioned Tony Ashton, hammering the ivories, Alan Ross on guitar and Graham. Graham who? “Er… can`t remember his second name. I only met him about three days ago. `Ere, what`s Graham`s second name?” he shouts up at the control room. A voice detaches itself from burble of chatter on the intercom and bellows “Deakin. D-E-A-K-I-N.” He plays drums. “Ah, Right,” says the deadpan Entwhistle.
Alan Ross figured on the last album “Whistle Rhymes” and brought in the drummer from his own group Ro Ro, so there`s already a familiar set-up here. So far they have laid down four of five tracks and they are working fast. It all seemed to be clicking by the spontaneity of the jam they were doing when we arrived – not for the record.
These are early days yet, though, as there`s a lot of overdubbing to do, mostly horns. John himself is quite a dab hand with the horns, and plays a collection which excludes only the slide trombone.

FLUID

“This one`s more or less a set group,” he says, “there`s piano, guitar, bass and drums and the brass comes in later. This was by way of distinguishing it from the previous effort, which was much more of a fluid band, with odd players popping up on different tracks: John Weider on violin, Peter Frampton on guitar, Jimmy McCulloch on guitar, Neil Shepherd on keyboards.
“I should imagine there`ll be a few guest appearances later on, maybe sort of Moon on congas or something. And I haven`t paid Frampton for the last session either so he`ll probably come, and I`ll pay him for both.”
Did John feel that being with the Who had given him a freedom to get down his own musical ideas which he might otherwise never have had? “Any member of the Who can do a solo album: Roger`s gonna do one, Keith could quite easily do one, producing and playing drums. But as far as I`m concerned, it all depends on where I got to without the Who.
“If I`d been in another group it might have been the same. If I`d never got into a group then most likely I wouldn`t have started composing anyway. Most likely be an amateur French horn player in an operatic society. I did a bit of everything – played Dixieland, modern jazz, brass band, military music – but most of my time I spent in an orchestra. Middlesex School`s Orchestra. I played French horn in it for about two years… I really enjoyed that.”
Not actually one of your Sheperd`s Bush nationalists then? “No, I`m from Chiswick, which is like a gnat`s piss away. The reason the Who say they come from Sheperd`s Bush is because that`s the general circle we were moving around in when we first started playing. Roger lived in Sheperd`s Bush and then moved to Chiswick so really it all came from the Chiswick, Ealing, Wembley area.”

How much of his time did he find was taken up with business relating to the Who? “It varies from year to year. Two years ago we were doing about three gigs a fortnight, playing universities and we would be doing about two four-week American tours a year, plus one English tour and at least a couple of big gigs in Europe, couple of television appearances.
“This year we`ve hardly done anything. We got two-thirds the way through an album concept and scrapped that as an album. The first six months of the year we hardly saw each other. We didn`t work at all. A five-week tour of Europe and two-thirds of an album – that`s all we`ve done this year.
“We had eight months off altogether, and we realised it didn`t really work, that we shouldn`t do it in future, leave it at the most two, three months. I think we`re starting early next year, recording and touring.”
Why had they decided to scrap the five tracks projected for the next album? “Well I dunno whether they`ll turn up as about five `B` sides. I felt that it was too near to `Who`s Next` – a step on, but still too near. Maybe the public wouldn`t have thought so, but we felt we needed another concept album. We`ll be using it as the basis of a new stage act, sometime next year.”
Entwhistle does not regret “the good old days” when the group played small clubs and even humped its own gear. This despite the huge organisational task concerned with setting up a tour. There are twenty-four people on the road for a Who tour, and each venue is visited by the road managers to ascertain whether the hall is suitable.

He doesn`t think of himself as “Mr. Bassman” either, and says that he has his own career as well as that of the Who to think of. Surprisingly, he has built up a following in the States, where his first solo album “Smash Your Head Against The Wall” sold in excess of 100,000 copies. “I wasn`t really concerned with what England thought about it,” he says. “It was an anti-frustration album. It was to stop me getting so frustrated that I left the
Who. I got all the numbers that I`d written in the last four years and put them on the album.
“`Whistle Rhymes` was written in two months as an album, and this one is written as a rock and roll album. The first one just got me out of a rut I was in. I was writing more and more material and there was just no outlet. One Who album a year with two or three songs of mine on it doesn`t get rid of seventy songs, does it, and that`s what I was getting towards.”
What about John`s taste for the bizarre in his choice of themes for songs? “They`re not as obviously bizarre now. I like to think the words are sicker in a more subtle way now,” giving a graveyard chuckle. “I still find it easier to switch words around and write songs about suicide, things like that.
“There`s too many people composing love songs, religious songs and serious things like that. If it`s my bag to write `orrible sick songs which disturb people some way then I`m content that it`s my job.”

REALISTIC

But deadpan expressions aside, Entwhistle is not some kind of a death freak. He thinks of his songs as having a humourous content which can be overlooked only at your own peril. It may be a black humour, but death is as natural to yer human condition as is birth. And to laugh at the grotesqueness of life is as realistic as to cry.
“Well you don`t want to make it too depressing, do you, otherwise you`d get people jumping out of the window half-way through listening to my album.”
And I bet Charles Manson never saw the humorous side of death. So as long as Entwhistle keeps laughing, that following of his will never be really morbid.
Finally, did he feel like the forgotten man of the Who at any point? “Well it`s almost become part of the act now, me standing still, hasn`t it? I mean if you`ve got four blokes standing on the wing of a plane going at five hundred miles an hour, and three of them are whirling their arms around, which one don`t you look at?”

I have personally transcribed this from the original paper. Any errors in the text from the original magazine may not have been corrected for the sake of accuracy. If you have a music-related web-page where this fits – please make a link to the article. With credits to the original writer of the article from all of us music fans!

This number of Sounds also contains articles/interviews with these people: Melanie, Roxy Music, Medicine Head, Jimmy Cliff, Fleetwood Mac, Paul Simon, Yes, Nick Mason, Steve Tilson.

The original music paper this article came from (pictured at the top) is for sale!

1. Send me an e-mail if you are interested. Send it to: geirmykl@gmail.com
2. The offer should be 20 $ (US Dollars) to be considered. (This includes postage).
3. We conduct the transaction through my verified Paypal account for the safety of both parties.