This site will look at the only virgin teritory until now left untouched on planet meek
We will look at at his freakbeat and psyche sides ignored by his Biographer and burried by his CD compilers
At his end was he a washed up musical has been -or was he ahead of the musical pack?
at last you can make up your own mind
Any comments -good or bad -either email me or post a notice on the Meek NB
Published in the Joe meek Appreciation Society Newsletter Jan/Feb 2002
. Back in the nov/dec issue (reproduced below) I called for a CD release to show that Meek was more than just a early 60's has been, by collecting together all his freakbeat and psyche tracks of merit. I have now decided to provide the answer to my question. I hope this is more that just one of those many vanity lists -its intended to show that meek was not a spent force at the end and that he was just expanding the territory he'd created with Telstar. If old Joe had avoided that final confrontation with his landlady would we now regard these sides as his "Hear a new world" sessions for his 1970's period? All will become apparent as the collection proceeds (you know the tracks so I've used a shorthand to describe them):
The Tornadoes (Telstar) classic is here as the opener because it made the 2nd generation of the UK beat boomers think off the wall - Meek is entirely responsible for that!. Until the last track there's no real order -this collection plays well on random play:
Syndicats: (On the Horizon/Crawdaddy Simone/Howlin for my Baby) -some people thought my article had been answered by the recent Joe Meeks Groups collection - But I think this selection shows that strict RNB have been excluded unless they're going somewhere off the wall-like these 3.
Blue Rondoes (Lt Baby/Baby I go 4U/Don't want your lovin no more/what can I do) All 4 sides that meek produced -all exceptional as many have said b4.
David John and the Mood (Strutt/Jerone/Gold/So fine) Again all Meeks output but what exceptional RNB and what a unique driving sound.
Tony Dangerfield (She's 2 way out) I've got reservations about this 1 -its mentioned in various freakbeat collections but retains a lot of RNR sound?
Lord Sutch (Train kept a rollin) a bit RNR but I had to get a Blackmore solo in somewhere and most of his Lordships other contributions come under the category of novelty.
The Buzz (Holding me Down/Buzz) - Hard driving RNB with attitude-was any1 else in the UK getting as dirty a sound as this at the time?.
Pamala Blue (Hey There Stranger) Maybe from his pop period but it had a distant-wispy quality to it - more than boy meets girl and what are those dead flies on the wall?
Charles Kingsley (Summer without sun/still in love with u) The intelligent sounds for the summer of love.
Tornadoes (Ship I hear) I wanted an instro that wasn't a typical big beat instro -this was the only 1 that I could find to fit the bill.
Denise Scott (Your Love Keeps me going) It might be Meek but it sounds to be going in the same direction as folk rock 70's stalwarts Fairport Convention?
Glenda Collins (Its Hard to Believe) Meeks eve of distruction? His concerns for earth but showing his mind could go much further.
Paul Richie and the crying Shames (Come on Back) Guitar screeches weird organ and so much more -perfect.
Impac (too far out) - Hard driving pop and nothing else.
Jason Eddie -(singing the blues) Old RNR number but light years from the original -guitar and rhythm showing very little interaction with the singer - could any1 doubt Meeks tormented state of mind after hearing this? When Capt. Beefheart went in this direction with Trout mask replica it was labeled a work of genius.
Tornadoes (No more you and me) They open and surprisingly close the collection -simply because this track by an entirely different set of musicians, and is pointing toward 70's prog. Rock.
The surprise is that Meek often accused of being a pop svengarli - churning out clone pop hits for 60's bands, but in reality by 66 he's bringing out each artists unique potential.
This collection the crown jewels of his later output, despite the lack of hits, shows off his ability as a producer as well as a sound engineer, suggesting he still could have found a prominent role in the early 70's music scene? Some of his sidemen went onto international stardom -Meek was adapting and had the potential to stay the course -these sides prove it. Why was it a crime for most freak/psyche to be flops -their ideas and styles would form the backbone of successful albums in the next decade.
Perhaps we should address the question of why many Meek fans including his Biographer have rejected these sides. I believe its because meek latched onto the sounds of dissonance. To understand that you have to look to a parallel universe of New York '66 where a group of punks with 1 Welshman were equally on the same trail. I'm talking here about The Velvet Underground whose initial releases (VU + Nico and White Light /white Heat ) were equally rejected and ignored, but are now recognised as dissonant feedback drenched classics. In fact one can hardly imagine the outcome if Brian Epstein had carried thru his plans to bring the VU to London and then placed them with his old mate down the Holloway Road?
Have I missed anything essential out? - I don't claim to know every Meek track and have no knowledge of unpublished tea-chest tapes. I've quite deliberately left out novelty songs like Goddards Starman. You no doubt can legally compile this collection from your existing CD's (its no crime to re-record tracks you've already purchased-for your own use of course) -but this CD should come out commercially because I'm sure numerous freakbeat and psyche and 60's collectors would lap this up? This collection provides the right gallery for these sound works of art. I of course have it easier than any real compiler -I don't have to negotiate cross licensing agreements and deal with prima-donna artists and I don't have to worry about spreading the best over numerous CD's. So to me this really does represent his closing statement and it proves beyond doubt that Joe Meek was the Godfather of freakbeat and psyche
Stephen Islip
12/12/01
Grumbles with recent CD compilations
Published in the Joe meek Appreciation Society Newsletter Nov/Dec 2001
. THE Editor has been seeking reviews for the newsletter of the latest Meek-related CDs to have been released. Instead of doing that, I have decided to write and let you know about why I have become disillusioned with recent Meek re-issues.
My non-submission of reviews of Hidden Gems Vol. 1 (GEMCD 022) (HGV 1) and RGM Rarities Vol. 1 (GEMCD 012) (RRV 1) is because, to my mind, only a few tracks on each would have come up to Meek's quality standards.
HGV 1 has some real gems from the Tornados, particularly "No More You And Me". The problem is the wide range of styles and the large quantity of what can only be called album fillers, and to merely call them "fillers" is being generous. Take Houston Wells, a third rate country singer with whom Meek was unable to do barely a thing, the exception being "North Wind". The two tracks included here don't match up to the tracks on The Complete (ever been had) Houston Wells (NEXCD 242), where only the first five tracks warranted repeated playing - I realised how bad they were when my family, for the first time ever, asked for repeated plays of a Meek record! If that's not bad enough, HGV1 and RRV1 also have recordings by Chad Carson, a second rate Houston Wells!
I'm also left wondering why The Millionaires open HGV1 - is this for the same reason that the Dave Clark Five now appear in every Ready Steady Go video? Then we have Davy Morgan, a tenth rate Davy Graham clone - if record companies had the sense to reject this then why have these compilers no such mercy? And while we're talking about clones we also have to suffer the poor man's Roy Orbison, Benny Parker.
This is not to say there have not been some bulls-eyes, but that is where we have tightly controlled genre releases:
. Intergalactic Instros 1 (GEMCD 002)
. Meek's Girls (RPM 166)
. RGM Rarities Vol. 2 - The Beat Group Era (GEMCD 016)
I know the compilers will say that (HGV1 and RRV1) are a true reflection of Meek's wide output. But I get the impression that it's just a way to sell more product, by packaging the few remaining gems with stuff that collectors wouldn't touch with a barge pole - if they'd have had the opportunity to have heard it first. The trouble with this approach is it undermines Meek's reputation. As an artist (especially one with his own studio) he was entitled to experiment and, as a by-product, produce some crap - but that doesn't mean it has to be released.
RRV1 has some real crackers from Don Charles, but surrounding them by the likes of Andy Cavell and Alan Klein does them no favours.
It's now time to make a confession - it was a general-purpose collection that rekindled my desire for Meek, the CD in question being the Joe Meek Story Vol. 1 (TRCD 9.01081) - but the difference with that release is that it related to a particular record company, Triumph, and a very specific time period. The same does not apply to HGV1 where we go from late '50s trad jazz (Dauphine Street Six) to '67 freakbeat (a Tornados track, although I also hear shades of prog here too). In between we have cod country and third-rate ballads. The only theme seems to be their rejection by record companies.
The same accusations, that of being a general hotch-potch, can also be made about other various artists exclusive record label selections, eg Decca (DPA 3035/6) and Pye (NED CD 171). But in both those instances the compiler's hands were tied by record company quality control exercised back in the '60s.
These same trends can also be seen creeping into single artist collections. While Glenda Collins (RPM 162) is excellent throughout, Dave Adams (GEMCD 013) lets the side down. I have no objections to the first half of the Adams CD, only the "Silas Dooley" smut of the second half. What was Meek's connection with these demo tapes other than a few writing credits? Okay, so someone paid out vast sums for this acetate then had to justify his expenditure - that's no reason why it has to be imposed on the rest of us. Don't get me wrong, I'll sing rugby songs when I'm in the right mood, but I won't be playing those tracks again.
That brings me back to Houston Wells... There wasn't enough decent material to justify one full CD of his recordings so I see no reason to be had for a second time by buying the Diamond version.
My view is that if the compilers are going to get me to open my wallet in future they will need to more tightly control the way CDs are put together. How about:
. A '60s R&B/freakbeat collection - how many tracks by The Syndicate are not so far on a Meek collection. . A trad jazz collection - starting with Bad Penny then following through with a selection of the stuff that Meek engineered.
. Maybe a good MOR instrumental collection if there are enough tracks out there.
. A collection of good ballads (for those more romantic evenings!).
The key question should be: what did Meek add to the session? If that difference is there for all to hear, then a track deserves inclusion. Also if they should stick to a particular genre - get it right and it will attract fans outside the usual Meek ghetto. Is that not incentive enough to those compilers?
At the end of the day I don't collect only Meek - and I, like many collectors, if faced with declining quality will vote with my wallet and start pursuing other musical obsessions.
Joe Meek - godfather of freakbeat and psychedelia
However, I don't want to conclude this article on a negative note. I think we, and many other music fans, still undervalue Meek's influence on the future of the British beat boom.
You won't find much of his influence in the first phase (eg. The Beatles, whose raw Hamburg-honed sounds knocked him off his perch), but in the younger brothers of the beat-boomers who were to go on to make freakbeat and psychedelia. Were those second generation beat boomers not trying to learn their licks at the time when "Telstar" hit the waves and did they not try to reproduce its sounds live through demented guitar solos?
One only has to think of the Pink Floyd's "Interstellar Overdrive" as being "Telstar" headed for deep space. Further afield was Kraftwerk's decision to leave the classical field and enter commercial pop - encouraged by Meek's call from afar. What about Lee "Scratch" Perry with his dub plates - where did he get his liking for weird studio sounds? Were George Martin and other producers pushed by groups, demanding, "If Meek can get that sound why can't you twiddle a few knobs and make something 'out of this world' for us?"
So when Meek created his freakbeat and psychedelic sides it should not be viewed as his catch-up time, but as his repossession of a world he created. What I would like to see is someone issuing a compilation CD of Meek's freakbeat and psychedelic tracks perhaps under the title of "Joe Meek: Godfather of Freakbeat and Psych". For once it might justify another re-issue of "Telstar", just as long as it was followed by all of Meek's freakbeat and psyche crown jewels.
If anybody wishes to discuss these issues with me, I can be contacted via email at steveislip@cwcom.net - so please feel free to talk to me.
Steve Islip
Until the end despite his business and personal troubles Meek was continuing to musically prospect for new sounds . We believe that at the end he was close to finding a rich seem that would have seen him progress into the mid 1970's and maybe beyond?
To state why I think these tracks could have been important to meek I need to go into the realms of fantasy but I hope I’m looking just over the horizon:
1 obviously meek does not blow his brains out and does not commit murder .
2 like all good deals what looks like it was off happens, and Meek goes to EMI as producer.
3 His 1st task is to produce an unknown group Pink Floyd whose eventual album gets rave reviews but doesn’t sell substantial numbers initially
4 rumours start that while producing Floyd long after official hours he and another group in the next studio indulged in chemical induced sessions, where he made radical sound alterations to some of they’re key tracks -these remained “lost” until the Anthology series appeared many years later .
5 One of his ex-sidemen Blackmore whose group Deep Purple is struggling with their second album approaches Meek to produce the record for EMI’s Harvest division . The album goes onto major international success .
6 Meek storms out of EMI breaking his contract claiming he was not recognised and rewarded sufficiently .
7 He suddenly finds he is in demand as an international producer.
I base my assumptions on the other 2 60’s erratic but brilliant sound producers Phil Spector and Lee Scratch Perry. Both of these producers dominated their 60’s productions but adapted and survived the 70’s by becoming producers to international rock stars - Meek had the potential to do the same. Once Meeks path was set by his freakbeat and psyche experiments, any of the above was possible -there again he might have just blown his brains out the following week!
Since my article was published I’ve received the following suggestions for inclusion in the collection:
Heinz (Questions I can’t answer /Heart full of sorrow) - Yes these both have an other worldly quality to them. Heinz voice has the road tested sound to it and the productions on these are exceptional.
Honeycombs (should a man cry /not sleeping too well lately) Both productions are different to their hits and feature out of this world guitar solos .
So these trax definitely have potential on sound - only reason I might exclude them is because the artists have close associations with the earlier successful side of Meeks career? There again I did not exclude the Tornadoes on that basis ?