I met Pete Waterman in 1970, while working at the GEC Stoke Works in Coventry. I was an Electrical Inspector at
19, testing telephone racks in the Telecommunications dept. It was a 7am start in a smelly factory (although as Pete notes in his autobiography - it was least polluted part!). While most of the workers had an unofficila 'smoke' break in the toilets (in between the offical breaks!), I used to have 'Write breaks' being a non-smoker and more interested in writing songs than testing telephone racks!
One day the boss was out and I sat at my rack writing a new lyric - It was called A Lotta Rain is Fallin'. It was kind of Bob Dylan / King Crimson (Epitaph inspired - what I was listening to at the time). About that feeling where you doing a lot of things but getting no results - both on a personal basis and a global basis. I constructed symbolic images that expressed or re-inforced that feeling. I'd got the first verse (a longish one and the Bridge, when one of my work mates asked what I was doing. I told him I was writing a song and he said 'You should have a word with Pete Waterman'. The only thing I knew about Pete was that he was the shop steward on the next section and his voice could often be heard ringing out at meetings. He told me Pete used to sing in an R&B band in the mid 60's - Tommorow's Kind and was Coventry's top DJ, at the Locarno and many other places.
Next thing I knew Pete was standing over me and asked to see what I was writing. I told him I put on the band nights at the Umbrella club and wrote song lyrics (I didn't play guitar Myself until 72). Pete took the lyric away (even though it was unfinished) and said he put some music to it. A week later, again while the boss was elsewhere, he brought in one of those small mono cassette players they had in the 70's and played the song. His voice sound to me like a cross between Paul McCartney and Bob Dylan, playing it in 7ths. It sound great to me. He said he's repeated the line 'There's a lotta rivers flowing but the sea's learned how to fly' because he particualry liked that line and asked me to write another verse, which I did, so it patterned, technically speaking, ABAB Verse Bridge Verse Bridge. I don't think it ever got played anywhere that I know of and he didn't have a record company back then but here is the lyric - NOTE - THE AUDIO VERSION HERE IS WITH MY MUSIC NOT PETE'S AND WAS RECORDED ON CASSETTE 1981 WITH STEVE GILLGALLON ON LEAD GUITAR. I DON'T HAVE A COPY OF PETE'S EARLIER VERSION OR ANY SAY SO TO USE IT IF I DID.
A LOTTA RAIN IS FALLIN’
A lotta rain is fallin’, but the earth has moved aside
There’s a lotta bullets flying but the victim’s found somewhere to hide
There’s a lotta rivers flowin’ but the seas learned how to fly.
There’s a lotta clouds a wondering which rockets knicked the sky
‘cos the roads are moving fast but the cars are standing still
and so much is happening yet nothing’s ever done
Oh we want to see the light but we’re dazzled by the sun.
(Bridge)
And some people’s only sunshine
Are their Cornflakes in the morning time
And the age of instant sunshine
In packets of bright display
I know will be dawning, in some future day.
There’s a lotta tears a fallin’, and more are being cried
There’s a lotta people trampled on as man takes another stride
There’s a lotta smoke a rising but the sky’s learned how to swim
There’s a lotta faces smiling but their hearts are feeling grim
Cos a lotta tension’s forming and the bags about to burst
There’s gotta be an answer cos the world is getting worse.
A lotta help is needed to get that truck back on the road
Cos too many people are pullin’ too heavier a load.
(BACK TO BRIDGE)
Pete was working at the GEC by and by night DJ all over the option in Coventry. He invited meto come down to the
Walsgrave Pub (seen in the pic albeit with a new name) on a Tuesday night to his Progressive music venue, where he DJ'd and put on bands. I used to go every week, get there early, help the bands load in their equipment, do odd jobs and sit on the door in the early part of the evening. Pete introduced me to some of the musicians, like Rod Felton and I'd often book some of the bands for the Umbrella club. Some of the bands I already knew from the Umbrella but I got the contact details for Indian Summer and Dando Shaft from there. Some times we'd to town or the Earlsdon Cottage or his house to get equipment before the gig. On one occasion he sat on the lawn outside the Earlsdon cottage accompanying Rod Felton on flute. At the gig itself Pete sometimes got on stage - a memorable occasion was when Pete got on stage with R&B band Gipsy Lee and belted out Rock me Baby - adding in some Jethro Tull like percussive flute riffs. This may astound some of you who only know of Pete Waterman from Pop Heros or SAW
connections! There is more to the man than meets the media eye! Further on in this blog you'll some of the range of
Pete's acitivites and work on the Coventry Music scene - he was Coventry's top DJ and promoter, later he ran the Soul Hole laready blogged about and won a Radio one competition to go over to the USA to find out first hand how the Philly sound worked. it was obvious back then that Pete was going places, had tremendous drive and was marshalling his record producing skills on Coventry's dance floors. But who would of guessed he would virtually take over the music business and charts with SAW in the 80's?
At the GEC Pete was a Shop Steward for TGWU - during one of his big meetings, explaining the strike action and why our sections would be laid off, I wrote this, ironically, as we stood en masse on the green near the Binley Rd.It was my first introduction at 19 to the labour movement but my mind clearly wasn't on politics at that stage.
LIKE A HAIRPIN BEND
Sometimes the road’s so dark and lonely
Shaded by the overhanging trees
Sometimes the road’s so long and winding
Guided by a violent breeze
And sometimes my road’s lined with forests
And confusion breathes
And sometimes the fords are deeper
Than my motor car.
Bridge
But when I get to thinking
That my seas are raging torrents
The wind seems to change direction
And blow the other way
Like a hairpin bend – Like a hairpin bend
And things start happening
As directions change
Like a hairpin bend- Like a hairpin bend
Sometimes the paths I wander
Bare no fruits of life
Sometimes the patterns I encounter
Are painted by the brush of strife
And sometimes my mind is lined with sadness
And reason squirms beneath
And sometimes the cauldrons seem more real
Than just figments of my mind.
(back to the Bridge)
By Trev Teasdel, May 1970
Another one written in 1970 at the GEC captured the alienation felt working in such an environment when you wanted to be doing something more creative with your life. As Pete says in his autobiography, mostly young women worked in our section and the protagonist in the song is female despite being in the first person!
GOOD DAY TO YOU MRS JONES
Alarm clock rings and with it brings a sleepy head that feels like lead on rising.
Throw back the sheets and draw back the curtains and look at the frosty streets.
Put on your clothes, everyone loaths getting up in the morning.
Your mind seems to settle as you put on the kettle although still sleepy.
Frying the bacon, fried bread and eggs, it seems there's a mountain upon your legs.
Brush down your hair, taking great care to paint on the make up, still trying to wake up
but you know that you can't
Slip on your coat, pick up your bag and off to the daily drag.
Open the door and a cold wind bites, go back on your woollen tights
Rush for the bus in the usual crush, collapsing on the seat.
Run to the gate, in case you know you're not really worried.
Look at the clock, must have got stuck, doesn't the time drag by.
"Roll on today, Roll on tommorow" wishing your life away.
Nothing gets done, you're not having fun, you're needing a holiday.
Working for the rich man as hard as you can
and you don't get nothing for it.
He's getting rich while you're living in a ditch
but he don't do nothing for it.
Hometime comes, your head still drums at train beat tempo.
Lay on the sofa, thinking over but you're much too weary to know.
Maybe there's an artist somewhere in you with plenty of things to do
but he never gets a chance
Good day to you Mrs Jones
Good day to you Mrs Jones.
By Trev Teasdel - April 1970
Billy Campbell also worked in that department of the GEC. Bill was a bass player who had played in the group Eggy in the late 60's with Roger and Nigel Lomus (who had been in the Sorrows) and Bill Bates. They made a single
You're Still Mine/B: Hookey (Spark SRL1024 1969) - althugh I knew nothing of this at the time! I did know that Bill, at the time (1970) was playing in a band called Coconut Mat with Martin Barter on Hammond Organ. Pete Waterman suggested I write a 'heavy Song' for them as they were a 'heavy' band. It was the days of Led Zepplin and Black Sabbath. I wrote a song called The City Fires (purely to try and suit the band - I wouldn't have written this one otherwise.) However they took umbridge to the word Beelzebub in the lyric, saying that you could have a hit with the word Beelzebub in it. I had no idea it wa for a single - I didn't know of Bill's recording background at the time and thought it was for the stage. Satanic images were vogue at the time with Black Sabbath. He used to call me Beelzebub after that but 5 years later Queen took Bohemian Rhapsody to the top of the charts with, yes that word Beelzebub in!! Ok my song can't compare with the brilliant Bohemian Rhapsody but they did have a hit with that word Beelzebub in! i fell about when that hit the charts!
It's not my best or favourite lyric from that time but here is the infamous satanic song about the evil of industrialism -
THE CITY FIRES
Amidst the conflagrations
Living substances survive.
Squandering their energies
In the furnaces they thrive.
Making haste that’ll only guarantee
An early grave.
Bridge..
And the cities burn
And the cities burn
And the cities burn
You’re gonna die
You’re gonna slowly die
You’re gonna slowly die too young
In the city fires
In the city fires
In the city fires.
Preachers scream from the steeple
That we’re heading for hell
But tell me people if this place ain’t worse than hell.
Making waste that'll only guarantee an early grave.
Bridge..
The evil witch has cast her jinx
Beelzebub now rules.
Pandemonium’s the song he sings
As he swallows all you fools.
And he’s gonna drink your blood
As your bodies slowly burn
Bridge..2
As your bodies burn
As your bodies burn
As your bodies burn
You’re gonna die
You’re gonna slowly die
You’re gonna slowly die too young
In the city fires
In the city fires
In the city fires.
Bill was a good lad thugh and Martin Barter became friends. I used to hang out with him at the Plough club on a Sunday night. He was very into Elton John who had just emerged at the time and we talked about a kind of Bernie Taupin Elton John collabortion but it didn't pan out. Martin went on to play with John Alderson in Just Jake and a host of other bands since and I think is still going strong.
Trev's Music My Space - Trev and the Collective Unconscious
COVENTRY DAYS - Trev's Bootleg Album on Vox
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