When we talk about the Beatles, the focus has always inevitably ended up being on John and Paul - and not so much on Ringo, often relegated to the 'wacky sidekick' role, despite actually being rather a good drummer - or on George, a.k.a. 'the quiet one.'
George was a great guitar player, maybe not flashy like a Clapton or a Beck, but a good, solid and often innovative one nonetheless. So, with it being the weekend of what would have been George's 80th birthday (tomorrow - the 25th), I thought we would balance things out all in one go, with three days of celebration.
First up, we use George as our starting point for one of our 'Six Degrees' journeys - before tomorrow, when we will take a look at his life and music in a little more depth - and then round the weekend off with a George Harrison playlist on Sunday.
George Harrison collaborated with many others over the years. He played guitar for other musicians, including Dave Mason (Traffic), Nicky Hopkins and Ronnie Wood and wrote with the likes of Dylan, Clapton, Jeff Lynne, Tom Petty and Billy Preston. Perhaps less well known is that he co-wrote the song Badge with Clapton, which ended up on Cream's last album - 1969's Goodbye. He also played rhythm guitar on the track, under the pseudonym L'Angelo Misterioso (to avoid contractual issues).
Cream are often considered to be the first rock supergroup. Eric Clapton had come from stints with John Mayall's Bluesbreakers and the Yardbirds, while Ginger Baker and Jack Bruce were fresh from time in the Graham Bond Organisation. Cream covered a range of genres from blues and hard rock to psychedelia and knocked out four albums in just three years - Fresh Cream (1966), Disraeli Gears (1967), Wheels Of Fire (1968) and Goodbye (1969).
Cream: Badge - https://youtu.be/Zkosrxtu9zY
After Cream's demise, Clapton and Baker joined up with Steve Winwood (Spencer Davis Group) to form Blind Faith. This new supergroup managed just the one album, Blind Faith - released in July 1969. They gave a free concert in Hyde Park in June of that year, with an estimated 100,000 in attendance. The band thought it to be a very sub-par performance, although Mick Jagger and Marianne Faithful were amongst the crowd. Clapton wanted the band to play the upcoming Woodstock festival in upstate New York, but he was outvoted. On their headlining tour, support acts included Free, Taste and Delaney & Bonnie.
Free were formed in London in 1968. They were a very young band to begin with; singer Paul Rodgers was 18, as was Simon Kirke on drums; hotshot guitarist Paul Kosoff was 17, while bass player Andy Fraser was just 15 at the time. Their first gig was at the Nag's Head in Battersea. After a few false starts, the hit song All Right Now got them onto the bill at the legendary (infamous) Isle of Wight Festival in 1970. That song was on third album, Fire And Water, and their breakthrough into the mainstream was confirmed. Several band break-ups and reformations occurred in a short space of time, before the final curtain came down on the band in 1973.
Free: All Right Now - https://youtu.be/vqdCZ0yHNa4
Paul Rodgers was born in Middlesbrough and started out as the bass player in The Roadrunners - who also included Micky Moody (later in Whitesnake) and Bruce Thomas (who would end us as an Attraction for Elvis Costello). After Free's demise, Rodgers went on to form Bad Company with former Free bandmate, Simon Kirke, Mick Ralphs (Mott The Hoople) and Boz Burrell (King Crimson). Bad Company was the first act signed to Led Zeppelin's Swan Song label. It was revealed in 2011 that The Doors wanted Rodgers to replace the recently deceased Jim Morrison, to the extent that Robbie Krieger actually flew to England to personally invite him (he declined). In 1991, he formed The Law with Kenney Jones.
Kenney Jones made his name as the drummer with the Small Faces (1965-69), before that morphed into the Faces (1969-75) with Steve Marriott's departure and the arrival of Messrs Stewart and Wood. Having been a close friend of Keith Moon, he ended up becoming his replacement in The Who in 1978, following his Moon's sad (but perhaps inevitable) demise. He was behind their kit for a decade, including their appearance at Live Aid in 1985. He was said to often be at odds with Roger Daltrey, because he was a much 'straighter' drummer than Moon had been. Over the years, Jones has also been a guest drummer for the likes of Rod Stewart, The Rolling Stones, Andy Fairweather-Low, Joan Armatrading, Chuck Berry, Jerry Lee Lewis, David Essex and WIngs! He claims to have been the one who first taught a young Zak Starkey how to play drums, and even gave him one of Keith Moon's old drum kits.
Zak Starkey is of course the son of Richard 'Ringo' Starkey and his main gig over the years has also been with The Who, who he has played with on and off since 1996. A friend of Liverpool rocker Ian McNabb, he was briefly the replacement for Chris Sharrock in the last, ill-fated, version of the Icicle Works (1989) - although he never appeared on the final album (Permanent Damage). He played in Johnny Marr's backing band, The Healers, in 2000, before becoming the third drummer for Oasis (2004-2009), where he was ironically followed by Chris Sharrock. More recently, Starkey has been into reggae and built a studio in Ocho Rios (on the north side of Jamaica) and set up the Trojan Jamaica record label, whose releases include Got To Be Tough, the last release by Toots & The Maytals. When he finally wed Sharna Liguz, his girlfriend of 18 years, in 2022, Eddie Vedder and Johnny Marr were his Best Men and Pato Banton officiated at the ceremony.
Toots & The Maytals: Got To Be Tough - https://youtu.be/7nYjZLmjxlM
Oasis were signed to Creation in May 1993 and their first three albums - Definitely Maybe (1994), (What's The Story) Morning Glory (1995) and Be Here Now (1997) - were all released on that label. The label had been founded in 1983 by Alan McGee, Dick Green and Joe Foster, with the name being taken from 60s band The Creation, a favourite of McGee's. The first release was 73 in 83 by The Legend!, and along the way, aside from Oasis, they also put out records by the Jesus & Mary Chain, Primal Scream and My Bloody Valentine - they also dabbled around the acid house scene. The label finally ceased in Dec 1999, with the last release being XTRMNTR by Primal Scream. But they had had difficulties before that, with half of the company being sold to Sony Music in 1992 - it was said that the two years it took for My Bloody Valentine to record their seminal album Loveless (1991) had nearly bankrupted Creation.
The lead singer and main songwriter in MBV is, of course, KEVIN SHIELDS.