Sept. 13, 2020

Mark Feltham interview

Mark Feltham interview
Apple Podcasts podcast player badge
Spotify podcast player badge
Castro podcast player badge
RSS Feed podcast player badge
Apple Podcasts podcast player icon Spotify podcast player icon Castro podcast player icon RSS Feed podcast player icon
Season 1 Diatonic Harmonica Blues Harmonica Country Harmonica Session Musician

Mark Feltham grew up with a love of country music and just knew he had to play harp when he heard Stone Fox Chase on the UK music programme, Old Grey Whistle test.

As he entered the London music scene he found he had to adapt his style to create a fusion of melodic and blues playing, which has served him very well throughout his career. 

Best known from his work with Punk Blues band, Nine Below Zero, Mark also played with Rory Gallagher for a long spell. Alongside this he has had a great career as a session musician, recording for television adverts, films and playing with such giants as Oasis, The Christians, Talk Talk and Godley and Creme, of 10cc fame.

Select the Chapter Markers tab above to select different sections of the podcast (website version only).

Links:
https://www.ninebelowzero.com/mark-feltham

YouTube:

Dennis Greaves duo trailer:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BZYApDHJZtU&feature=youtu.be

Rory Gallagher:
www.youtube.com/watch?v=ePJmB4yqV60&feature=youtu.be

Masterplan with Oasis:
www.youtube.com/watch?v=CZxexZ8v-QI

Playing on the Young Ones TV show:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gYx9wgK2q20


Podcast website:
https://www.harmonicahappyhour.com

Donations:
If you want to make a voluntary donation to help support the running costs of the podcast then please use this link (or visit the podcast website link above):
https://paypal.me/harmonicahappyhour?locale.x=en_GB

Spotify Playlist:
Also check out the Spotify Playlist, which contains most of the songs discussed in the podcast:
https://open.spotify.com/playlist/5QC6RF2VTfs4iPuasJBqwT?si=M-j3IkiISeefhR7ybm9qIQ

Podcast sponsors:
This podcast is sponsored by SEYDEL harmonicas - visit the oldest harmonica factory in the world at www.seydel1847.com  or on Facebook or Instagram at SEYDEL HARMONICAS
and Blows Me Away Productions: http://www.blowsmeaway.com/

Support the show

01:11 - Mark’s South London roots

02:06 - Grandfather brought harmonicas back from abroad for Mark

02:55 - Didn’t take to the guitar but adores bass guitar

03:23 - Loves some singing

04:01 - Stone Fox Chase inspired Mark to seriously take up harmonica

05:55 - How Mark learned the harmonica

07:22 - Knew Tommy Reilly, who gave Mark tips

08:05 - Started getting into blues players

09:14 - Blues players had a feeling about them which is hard to emulate

10:24 - Mark merged Country and Blues styles

10:48 - Mark played in a Country band for two years

11:57 - The beginnings of Nine Below Zero

15:14 - Mark came up with name Nine Below Zero

16:18 - Pack Fair and Square was Nine Below Zero’s first hit

18:59 - Live At The Marquee album

21:26 - Nine Below Zero started doing their own material

22:25 - Mark’s first job as a session musician

23:15 - Nine Below Zero disbanded for first time

24:15 - Mark got a solo deal and then did more session work

24:41 - Joined Rory Gallagher’s band

27:06 - Fronted the Yardbirds for a while and got electrocuted

28:09 - Box of Frogs album and then session work for TV and films

29:39 - One of Mark’s best sessions was on chromatic, although he doesn’t really play chromatic

30:57 - Played at Rory Gallagher’s funeral

32:30 - Nine Below reformed in 1991

34:11 - Chilled album is one of Mark’s favourites with Nine Below Zero

35:50 - Played with Oasis

40:24 - Third stint with Nine Below Zero

41:38 - Acoustic duo album with Dennis Greaves

42:45 - Mark has played with Kim Wilson

43:04 - Nine Below Zero played Glastonbury

44:19 - Playing with The Christians

45:10 - Played with Deacon Blue

48:08 - Album with Talk Talk

49:08 - Mark practises everyday and impact of pandemic

49:43 - 10 minute question

50:12 - Mark has taught harmonica to Jude Law

51:01 - Mark’s favourite harmonicas and worked with Anthony Dannecker

52:12 - Favourite key of diatonic

52:53 - Different tunings

53:32 - Overblows

53:36 - Embouchre

54:32 - Amps and mics

56:15 - Effects pedals

56:34 - Future plans

WEBVTT

00:00:00.194 --> 00:00:02.338
Mark Feltham joins me for episode 22.

00:00:03.238 --> 00:00:10.973
Mark grew up with a love of country music and just knew he had to play hard when he heard Stormfox Chase on the UK music programme Old Grey Whistle Test.

00:00:11.653 --> 00:00:20.230
As he entered the London music scene, he found he had to adapt his style to create a fusion of melodic and blues playing which has served him very well throughout his career.

00:00:20.545 --> 00:00:26.934
Best known from his work with punk blues band Nine Below Zero, Mark also played with Rory Gallagher for a long spell.

00:00:27.394 --> 00:00:39.149
Alongside this, he had a great career as a session musician, recording for television adverts, films and playing with such giants as Oasis, The Christians, Talk Talk and Godly and Cream from 10cc fame.

00:00:40.430 --> 00:00:47.118
A word to my sponsor again, thanks to the Lone Wolf Blues Company, makers of effects pedals, microphones and more designed for harmonica.

00:00:47.560 --> 00:00:49.402
Remember when you want control over your tone?

00:00:49.826 --> 00:00:50.713
You want lone wolf.

00:01:04.897 --> 00:01:07.061
Hello, Mark Felton, and welcome to the podcast.

00:01:07.561 --> 00:01:08.602
Thanks very much, Neil.

00:01:08.882 --> 00:01:10.926
So, yeah, we'll start a little bit with your early life.

00:01:10.986 --> 00:01:13.969
So, you're a South London boy, yeah, born in Southwark.

00:01:14.150 --> 00:01:14.370
I was

00:01:14.430 --> 00:01:17.814
born overlooking Big Ben, actually, in central London.

00:01:18.516 --> 00:01:23.843
But I can remember my mum showing me where the room was overlooking the Big Ben.

00:01:23.903 --> 00:01:25.084
So, right on the river.

00:01:25.165 --> 00:01:26.927
Can't be any more central than that.

00:01:27.287 --> 00:01:28.730
Does that make you an official Cockney?

00:01:29.129 --> 00:01:30.412
I think it probably does.

00:01:30.933 --> 00:01:32.054
My mother certainly was.

00:01:32.093 --> 00:01:34.878
She was born in Bow Church, right next to the Bovells.

00:01:34.914 --> 00:01:38.516
My mother certainly was, and my father was a Londoner as well.

00:01:38.557 --> 00:01:40.638
So I come from a very, very London family.

00:01:40.778 --> 00:01:42.239
Central London family, yes.

00:01:42.501 --> 00:01:48.665
So did those early years in country music, did you dig into that London music scene at all when you were younger?

00:01:49.245 --> 00:01:58.635
Historically, what happened was that my grandfather worked as a professional engineer out in Saudi and places like that, down in Iraq.

00:01:59.075 --> 00:02:00.775
In those days, nobody flew down there.

00:02:00.835 --> 00:02:04.400
Everybody went on merchant ships because it was ongoing back a long time.

00:02:04.439 --> 00:02:04.879
That was my...

00:02:04.879 --> 00:02:14.836
my mother's father because it was a long old journey a lot of sailors used to play chromatics and tremolo harmonicas He used to bring them back for me off the ships.

00:02:14.996 --> 00:02:20.219
And that's how I kind of got interested in these big old chromatics and tremolo tune things.

00:02:20.540 --> 00:02:21.961
Some Chinese, some Hona.

00:02:22.301 --> 00:02:25.724
And he used to bring them back for me on these trips down to the Middle East.

00:02:26.085 --> 00:02:27.826
And that's how I kind of got into it.

00:02:28.206 --> 00:02:31.250
So was your first harmonica then a tremolo or a chromatic?

00:02:31.710 --> 00:02:33.372
Oh, it would have been a tremolo.

00:02:33.391 --> 00:02:36.854
I used to puff and blow on it.

00:02:37.034 --> 00:02:38.575
I mean, I was a baby then.

00:02:39.197 --> 00:02:41.558
I was six or seven years of age when I started.

00:02:41.598 --> 00:03:15.275
And I carried it because I always had harmonicas laying around the house because he was whenever he'd come back he'd bring me fresh ones home so I'd pick them up and not really knowing what I was doing to be honest but I was never a kid to pick a guitar up you know I just couldn't get that head and fingers thing going kind of discovered that I was better with my lung function than with my hands and fingers I could never quite get that right and I'm a frustrated bass player actually I adore the bass part but I couldn't couldn't make their hands do what they had wanted to do.

00:03:15.995 --> 00:03:16.216
Yeah.

00:03:16.355 --> 00:03:17.817
So you touch on other instruments there.

00:03:17.836 --> 00:03:22.222
So has harmonica then always been your only thing, apart from some singing maybe?

00:03:23.043 --> 00:03:24.183
I actually love singing.

00:03:24.463 --> 00:03:25.966
I love the singing voice.

00:03:26.105 --> 00:03:31.050
I think it's nice to see a harmonica player sing as well, which a lot of them don't do.

00:03:31.551 --> 00:03:33.753
I like singing and I've always sung.

00:03:34.014 --> 00:03:39.741
BVs, I sing backing vocals with a lot of artists that I've worked with.

00:03:40.161 --> 00:03:45.326
I'm not a lead singer as such, But I enjoy the harmony and backing vocals.

00:03:45.387 --> 00:03:46.147
I do like that.

00:03:46.508 --> 00:03:49.711
And I would have loved to have also doubled and played bass.

00:03:49.931 --> 00:03:51.612
I do love the bass guitar as well.

00:03:52.014 --> 00:03:57.860
But as I said to you, that coordination, getting the hands and the fingers, I just could never quite get it right.

00:03:58.120 --> 00:04:01.103
My head knew what to do, but my fingers couldn't make it work.

00:04:01.443 --> 00:04:05.068
So, as you say, you started playing the harmonica around the age of six.

00:04:05.187 --> 00:04:08.891
But I don't think you seriously got into it until you sort of got into it as a teenager.

00:04:08.912 --> 00:04:11.895
And I think you heard the old grey whistle test inspired you.

00:04:11.914 --> 00:04:18.718
Is that what really got you into play.

00:04:23.810 --> 00:04:45.369
Well, I think someone had bought me a diatonic, and, you know, from going from the big harmonicas and tremolos and chromatics that was given to me by Grandad, all of a sudden someone presented me with, it may have even been a golden melody or predating a golden melody, so I didn't quite like it after playing all the full sound of a big tremolo thing, you know.

00:04:45.668 --> 00:04:47.930
And then I thought, I've got to try and learn this.

00:04:48.230 --> 00:04:55.036
And then I started to get into watching lots of bands on TV, going out to see bands as a young lad.

00:04:55.418 --> 00:05:01.524
And then the Old Grey Whistle Test theme tune kind of got me interested in that.

00:05:01.663 --> 00:05:02.665
That's really nice.

00:05:02.725 --> 00:05:04.226
I wonder how they do that.

00:05:04.608 --> 00:05:07.310
That doesn't sound like a chromatic or a tremolo, you know.

00:05:07.831 --> 00:05:14.538
And of course, it was only later that I realized it was Charlie McCoy, of course, playing on that.

00:05:14.658 --> 00:05:16.259
And I had to get the theme tune.

00:05:16.360 --> 00:05:18.502
And in those days, we had no computers.

00:05:18.783 --> 00:05:28.512
So I looked at an advert in Melody Maker, which is a thing that we have here in the UK and they had lots of shops selling albums and import albums.

00:05:28.673 --> 00:05:33.999
I think I wrote to the BBC in those days, a letter, open letter, you know, what was this music?

00:05:34.059 --> 00:05:34.860
Where did it come from?

00:05:34.879 --> 00:05:41.387
I got an answer to say it was from this album, I think A Trip in the Country by McCoy and all the Nashville Session players.

00:05:41.807 --> 00:05:46.973
I ordered it, I think an outlet in Aberdeen that used to import a lot of American country stuff.

00:05:47.153 --> 00:05:52.338
So I ordered it and then it came and I listened to it and I thought, Christ, this is what I want to do.

00:05:52.358 --> 00:05:53.579
You know, this is me.

00:05:53.680 --> 00:06:28.076
I can really dig this I mean you've got to remember it was in the days we never had none of this online tutor stuff that they've got now you know I think that in the old days I can remember spinning the old put my hand on the record deck and slowing it down to try and find out what other players would do how do they make that and of course when you put your finger on it to slow the turntable down it knocked the key down knocked it all out of tune so it was frustrating but the award that you got after and when you cracked it and found out what they were doing was fantastic.

00:06:28.177 --> 00:06:29.598
You know, it took me a long time.

00:06:29.999 --> 00:06:41.711
Yeah, I think it's a topic we touched on a few times on here is that that time, and I was spot on that era just about, you know, you kind of taught yourself, didn't you, by going through the pain, was kind of getting going.

00:06:41.730 --> 00:06:45.836
Everyone sort of expects answers for everything now, doesn't it, and sort of be told what to do.

00:06:46.536 --> 00:06:50.279
So I think there is something to be said, isn't there, about learning in that way, which may be...

00:06:50.521 --> 00:06:52.182
And it was discovering as well.

00:06:52.223 --> 00:06:53.584
Everything is in your...

00:06:53.584 --> 00:07:25.838
you know you don't know who to turn to I'm not really saying I'm not saying that that's fantastic for some but I can remember the thrill of hearing something on late night radio you know just going to bed putting the headphones on the big old wolf down headphones on and listening to country music on the records and put my records on and thinking oh man you know that's a beautiful instrument when played that like that all those lovely bands as Charlie Charlie McCoy was doing then and Don Brooks from Waylon's band and then I used to go to the London functions with Tommy Riley.

00:07:26.139 --> 00:07:27.940
I used to sit next to Tommy Riley.

00:07:28.341 --> 00:07:28.661
Really?

00:07:28.942 --> 00:07:31.483
Yeah, he was a very nice guy, actually.

00:07:31.665 --> 00:07:44.098
He used to give me tips on breathing and things of that sort, but he was a straight chromatic player, and none of those chromatic guys got into diatonic at all, whether they looked down their nose at the diatonic players.

00:07:44.517 --> 00:07:46.661
In fact, there were very few that do the two well.

00:07:46.761 --> 00:07:56.192
Stevie Wonder was a beautiful player that could play at the top register as well in diatonic, but in those days, it was very much Mel Bay's tutor book type thing.

00:07:56.492 --> 00:08:02.500
I'm going back to the late 60s now, late 60s, when I first kind of wanted to get serious.

00:08:02.581 --> 00:08:04.783
I was about 15, I suppose, 16.

00:08:05.124 --> 00:08:10.312
You know, as you said, you were influenced by country players initially, and you mentioned there Charlie McCoy and Don Brooks.

00:08:11.012 --> 00:08:14.757
So how long did it take you to maybe start getting into blues?

00:08:15.098 --> 00:08:15.619
Was that something

00:08:15.639 --> 00:08:15.879
you thought?

00:08:15.899 --> 00:08:23.069
Well, it was around about, I guess, the first blues player I ever heard was probably Snooki Pryor.

00:08:23.490 --> 00:08:26.505
and Sonny Boy Williamson I, John Lee.

00:08:40.929 --> 00:08:42.832
And then Sonny Boy Williams in the second.

00:08:43.072 --> 00:08:52.826
The kind of blues thing was much more accepted in London and the UK at the time because you had the Stones, Clapton and all that that was doing white boy blues.

00:08:53.027 --> 00:08:58.534
And they were doffing their caps to the great bluesers that were coming over on the blues packages.

00:08:59.155 --> 00:09:02.000
Whereas country music here was kind of scoffed upon.

00:09:02.399 --> 00:09:13.888
But for my instrument, my learning, for me to get on, I wanted to play country music because it opened up exciting possibilities on the diatonic for me the way that blues didn't.

00:09:14.269 --> 00:09:28.860
Some of these blues guys, when they played and when you listen to it now, no matter how much you master it or how much you try and sound as good as you can like them, you just can't feel it like they felt it.

00:09:29.322 --> 00:09:31.783
You just can't feel it the way that they feel it.

00:09:31.803 --> 00:09:37.629
It's just an expression of that pain and that anguish and that feeling that we're I don't know.

00:09:37.908 --> 00:09:39.471
It's just impossible to say.

00:09:39.711 --> 00:09:42.553
Whereas the white country players that were playing.

00:09:42.835 --> 00:09:47.019
Well, country music, I've always said, Neil, that country music is white man's blues.

00:09:47.278 --> 00:09:52.044
And I feel that I was much more attracted to melody, you know, and playing the melody lines.

00:09:52.465 --> 00:09:59.913
I mean, the first time I was given a little Ultra album, and I thought, Christ alive, his timing is unbelievable.

00:10:00.013 --> 00:10:01.914
Now, where is his head?

00:10:02.375 --> 00:10:04.057
Let's get inside that brain.

00:10:04.398 --> 00:10:06.480
No, I can't make that look like that.

00:10:06.480 --> 00:10:38.134
you know that's unique to him it's his thing and there are very few white guys that can do that you know that was predominantly a black man singing and very proud they should be of it too because a lot of white guys just shouldn't even go there you know they're just unique to them and that's why I followed the country path rather than the blues path it wasn't a kind of accepted country music in 70s London the beginning of punk for a start and then I up joining a punk blues band.

00:10:38.474 --> 00:10:44.662
So I had to lean on the blues thing and kind of mix it with what I knew from the country thing as well, a melody.

00:10:44.822 --> 00:10:52.671
So I had to kind of combine the two because I did actually find, I found a country band called Pony Express.

00:10:52.991 --> 00:10:58.418
All these guys that were in the band were very, very successful traveling salesmen.

00:10:58.638 --> 00:11:00.320
They all were great looking men.

00:11:00.360 --> 00:11:32.610
They all looked like country stars they all had suit and ties on by day doing their up and down the country selling toys one of the guys selling toys and then by evening they'd put the Stetsons on and the big old gear all the gear and start performing country stuff and it was lovely for me I did about two years of that and the band was called Pony Express so good for me you know all get all the chick muchops together but that would have been proud upon by the guys I'm with now well the guy that I come And they still were.

00:11:32.751 --> 00:11:34.283
People would have laughed at him.

00:11:34.647 --> 00:11:35.796
So was that your first band?

00:11:36.258 --> 00:11:43.965
No, because that was running parallel to the Stans Blues Band that I started working with in 1976.

00:11:44.065 --> 00:11:45.005
So,

00:11:45.025 --> 00:11:56.775
yes, as you say, I mean, your melodic approach to playing country obviously influences your style a lot and allows you to get some great chops, which are a little bit different, and also allows you to do a lot of the session work, which we'll get on to later.

00:11:57.275 --> 00:12:03.061
But before then, you joined Stans Blues Band, which was the name before it turned into Nine Below Zero.

00:12:03.081 --> 00:12:09.868
So, Dennis Greaves, of course, the lead singer and guitar player, for that he lived on the same street as you and that's how you met and it got started yeah

00:12:10.187 --> 00:12:20.479
yeah that's correct I had a job as a lineman with post office telephones I was working full time as a full location engineer with the post office as a lineman I think they called him lineman America

00:12:20.840 --> 00:12:21.880
it wasn't the Wichita

00:12:21.941 --> 00:12:38.558
lineman Wichita lineman that sort of thing I was always up telegraph poles full location and I enjoyed it but I got this strange call from a bloke one day that said listen I heard you play a bit of harmonica you went down to a friend of mine I'm actually in the process of putting a band together and I didn't really want to push that angle.

00:12:38.599 --> 00:12:44.043
I was quite happy playing indoors, you know, with my songs and with my bunch of harmonicas.

00:12:44.205 --> 00:12:44.705
I was happy.

00:12:44.784 --> 00:12:49.990
I didn't really want to make a career of it because I had a steady career going at the time.

00:12:50.510 --> 00:12:52.673
I was a very young man, just started work.

00:12:53.173 --> 00:13:00.601
And then this guy called me and he happened to live on the same estate that I did, a very working class council estate.

00:13:00.982 --> 00:13:03.225
In fact, he only lived about 12 doors away.

00:13:03.245 --> 00:13:04.645
It was most bizarre.

00:13:05.067 --> 00:14:10.155
And he said, I'm putting about and he was full of go and Dennis was full of verb and get up and go where I was completely opposite I was completely laid back and he would do all the pushing and reluctantly drag me with him so he said I'm putting a band together a blues band I'd like to come down and have a sit in and have a little play you know so I went down to this pub one night he was playing that ferocious kind of really hard edge blues punk you know he'd come from that mob blues punk thing and it didn't appeal to him to me at all and I said it's not my thing and all the noise of the amplifiers and you know he was in a thrash 100 watt marshals and I didn't like the sound of you know I was more into the American thing and after a time of sitting with me and going through my record collection and listening to his record collection I said to him look you know why don't you listen to this have a listen to this see where this come from see where this stuff that you're playing now it come from somewhere else before that this is where it came from so we would get together and I would kind of try and calm him down and let him listen to some other stuff.

00:14:10.235 --> 00:14:18.144
And then we finally come to a kind of agreeance that he would do half of the stuff that I liked and I would do half the stuff that he was.

00:14:18.325 --> 00:14:28.296
He formed this band called Stan's Blues Band, which was named after Stan Webb, that was an English blues guitarist that the blues aficionados out there would know Stan Webb.

00:14:28.836 --> 00:14:31.278
And he had a band called Chicken Shack, and Dennis adored him.

00:14:31.698 --> 00:14:33.201
And that's what the name of the band was.

00:14:33.280 --> 00:14:35.984
But as it was called in the day by journalists...

00:14:35.984 --> 00:14:40.969
It was called a loathsome navvy of a name, Stan's Blues Band.

00:14:41.289 --> 00:14:49.778
We got spotted in a pub one night by a guy that had come along, a manager that was working as a talent scout for A&M Records.

00:14:50.099 --> 00:14:54.043
And at the time, A&M Records had Joan Armatrade in the police, the carpenters.

00:14:54.563 --> 00:14:56.946
So we were in good company.

00:14:57.086 --> 00:15:04.293
And he said, I'd like to take you up to meet the MD, Derek Green at A&M Records, who'd just signed the carpenters.

00:15:04.634 --> 00:15:05.936
How long have you been playing as a bum, though?

00:15:05.936 --> 00:15:06.677
this

00:15:06.697 --> 00:15:06.777
time?

00:15:06.856 --> 00:15:12.806
Well, we were a steel stands blues band at the time, and a guy called Mickey Modern walked in the apartment.

00:15:12.826 --> 00:15:14.028
He said, that name's could go.

00:15:14.548 --> 00:15:15.168
I had a name.

00:15:15.269 --> 00:15:16.831
I thought it was my name.

00:15:17.072 --> 00:15:19.254
I said, well, what about Nine Below Zero?

00:15:19.355 --> 00:15:21.077
I said, Nine Below Zero, what's all that about?

00:15:21.177 --> 00:15:23.520
I said, well, it's an old Rice Miller song.

00:15:23.620 --> 00:15:25.023
I remember it from Rice Miller.

00:15:25.043 --> 00:15:26.666
You know, I did Sunny Boy, too.

00:15:28.450 --> 00:15:38.269
It done got nine below zero, and she done put me down for another man.

00:15:48.865 --> 00:15:49.466
How about that?

00:15:49.506 --> 00:15:50.486
And they all liked that.

00:15:50.567 --> 00:15:52.749
So we changed the name overnight.

00:15:52.990 --> 00:15:59.836
We were quickly signed by the record company to do an EP as a kind of, let's see how we go with this EP.

00:15:59.875 --> 00:16:01.537
Let's go and do a demo for us.

00:16:01.576 --> 00:16:02.998
So they paid for it all.

00:16:03.018 --> 00:16:08.722
We went down to Vineyard Studios that was subsequently owned by Stock Aitken and Walterman.

00:16:09.023 --> 00:16:10.183
But in those days, it wasn't.

00:16:10.245 --> 00:16:11.144
So we went down there.

00:16:11.485 --> 00:16:17.370
We did a four-track EP, Pack Fair and Square, and Last Night and This and The Other was on it.

00:16:17.811 --> 00:16:24.128
And the Pack Fair and Square Fair and square was a kind of rough and ready version of what Jay Gulls and Magic Dick had done already.

00:16:37.505 --> 00:16:46.013
record of the week on Radio 1, and Dave Lee Travis, who was a DJ, maybe, you know, it was guaranteed five plays a week.

00:16:47.455 --> 00:16:48.535
We still had day jobs.

00:16:48.875 --> 00:16:56.903
And because of that, all of a sudden, the promoters, International Talent Booking, ITB at the time, said, you know, how about doing a tour?

00:16:56.923 --> 00:16:58.865
And I'm thinking, how am I going to do a tour?

00:16:58.884 --> 00:17:00.326
I've got a day job going here.

00:17:00.706 --> 00:17:04.269
And Dennis, the singer of Nine Blows Zero, was carpet fitting.

00:17:04.809 --> 00:17:37.521
And Peter, the bass player, had a very good job of in WH Smiths we all had kind of decent careers but Dennis just wanted to get rid of the career and just go into music full time you know and all of a sudden the ITB the talent people the booking agency was saying well I've got a show in Huddersfield tonight that was on a Wednesday night then you're in Bolton the next night or whatever and I'm thinking hold on a minute how am I going to get up in the morning for work if we're playing in Huddersfield or Bolton the night before And we did.

00:17:37.603 --> 00:17:39.263
We did that for a time.

00:17:39.284 --> 00:17:41.326
And we bought an old yellow bus.

00:17:41.405 --> 00:17:43.287
We converted it with milk crates.

00:17:43.548 --> 00:17:48.352
We had them for seats in the back of an old rickety old big transit thing that we bought.

00:17:48.811 --> 00:17:54.116
And sit on that old hard, hard seat all the way up to Bradford and places like that.

00:17:54.376 --> 00:18:00.481
And then straight after the gig, come straight back to London, get in bed for three hours, get back home here at four in the morning.

00:18:00.722 --> 00:18:02.003
And you could do it in them times.

00:18:02.023 --> 00:18:03.704
You can't do it now with the M6.

00:18:03.765 --> 00:18:47.833
But in those days, you could get up there and in four hours to be young again oh man it was a nightmare because I'd get like three hours sleep and then I realised I was losing a bit of time at work and then one day the governor come up to me he said I've heard you're doing a bit of playing up and down the country and still doing this you're losing a bit of time he said I'm just telling you you've got to give you a warning so I'd already had a warning for a job that I loved anyway and then the record company said I want you to do a proper album which meant taking more time out going in and recording live at the which we did and then we subsequently did another album and it all got too much for me and I had to go up to the guy that was running my manager there and say you know I've got to leave

00:18:48.233 --> 00:18:50.661
no regrets now though you think you made the right choice back

00:18:50.862 --> 00:18:52.326
then Yeah, no regrets.

00:18:52.567 --> 00:18:57.431
I've had a wonderful life and I've seen the world with somebody else praying for it.

00:18:57.531 --> 00:18:59.153
And that's what music can do for you.

00:18:59.393 --> 00:19:07.980
So you mentioned that your first album, as you say, Live at Marquee, which is a really big album in the harmonica world, you know, and obviously your first album, lots of great songs on there.

00:19:08.421 --> 00:19:11.624
Riding on the L&N is a song which I think you're famously associated with.

00:19:11.703 --> 00:19:14.625
It's a song I learned when I was younger and really love that intro you do.

00:19:14.747 --> 00:19:17.709
And Winged Job, another great instrumental, not an ETA.

00:19:17.989 --> 00:19:23.013
It really shows that harmonica being a really strong part of the driven sound of the 9 below 0, isn't it?

00:19:23.273 --> 00:19:26.277
Well, it had all been done before me by great players.

00:19:44.973 --> 00:19:48.758
I don't think it was ever done with such verve and aggression.

00:19:49.346 --> 00:19:53.612
because you've got to remember that Dennis wouldn't allow the beat to slack.

00:19:53.672 --> 00:19:56.816
He wouldn't allow anything to chill every now and then.

00:19:56.875 --> 00:20:01.261
It was a race to get to the end of the song, and that's what he was like, and the kids loved him for it.

00:20:01.481 --> 00:20:05.267
And I, unfortunately, had to keep up with him, and it wasn't my style at all.

00:20:05.287 --> 00:20:15.961
I mean, when I listen to Homework, the way that Magic Dick plays it, it's beautiful, that lovely slow vibe, and the same with Peter Green, you know.

00:20:16.513 --> 00:20:20.237
And Dennis had to punk it up and make everything a million miles an hour.

00:20:20.257 --> 00:20:24.740
And when I listen back now to Live at the Marquee, I go, oh, man, what am I doing?

00:20:24.800 --> 00:20:31.307
Why am I going, man, I really, really, it annoys me, it irritates me, my playing on that, you know.

00:20:31.666 --> 00:20:39.354
And yet at the time, it was looked upon as being quite a strong, harmonic and listening album, you know.

00:20:40.194 --> 00:20:43.096
But now I listen to it and I wouldn't play it like that now, you know.

00:20:43.317 --> 00:20:48.064
But I think that's what experience and years under the give you meals.

00:20:48.285 --> 00:20:52.477
But I think, you know, that was probably quite a big part of Namblo's zero success, wasn't it?

00:20:52.497 --> 00:20:57.130
That you were, even if that's on a punk edge, you might not have got the commercial success you did.

00:20:57.506 --> 00:20:58.708
That's absolutely right.

00:20:58.867 --> 00:21:14.051
And as I say, at that time we were coming off the back of Punk and Dennis was very much a mod and mods tended to club together a lot because that was a little set in itself, you know, up around Carnaby Street and all that.

00:21:14.132 --> 00:21:15.934
And he was in with all those guys.

00:21:15.974 --> 00:21:18.157
So it was almost like Rent-A-Crowd.

00:21:18.219 --> 00:21:23.666
You know, whenever we went down the country, there was all young mods coming up to us and we had a good time.

00:21:23.686 --> 00:21:25.148
We had a good time for a long time.

00:21:25.794 --> 00:21:30.458
And then you started writing a few of your own songs as well, didn't you, on your second and third album.

00:21:30.478 --> 00:21:32.568
I think Egg on My Face is an example of

00:21:32.588 --> 00:21:33.634
the one you wrote yourself in.

00:21:33.654 --> 00:21:34.238
Yeah, and then it...

00:21:34.529 --> 00:23:11.730
Dennis then started writing with Mickey the drummer at the time and it got a little bit more serious because you know we couldn't carry on doing covers all the time so we had to try and find some new material I didn't really have a hand in the writing process there but it made me think in another way because all of a sudden I had to come up with my own stuff rather than listen to other players and try and emulate some of the greats of the past which I enjoyed doing you know doffing my cap to them but I also now I had to start thinking for myself it was a different ball game and that's really when the learning process come in and when it started to get a bit hard stand up now and come and let's hear something from you Felton you don't need to play everybody's stuff now the more I did of that the more I enjoyed it and that's when I kind of did the very first session I did was on the very day just before when I was just about to get signed I think it was a band called The Gels as I remember and that was the very first session I did I think they went on to become to be Bananarama I think it was one of their demos years and years ago in the late 70s mid late 70s you know that was the first session and I can remember always I like that I like to play on other people's stuff because I was never 100% into what I was doing with the Nine Below Boys because if I'd have had my way I'd have said Dennis no let's go away from this let's get some country so you know I was I Older, much older in my thinking than they were, you know, almost to the point of being old-fashioned, you know, and a little bit stayed.

00:23:12.171 --> 00:23:14.781
That's where my thinking come from and my learning come from.

00:23:15.394 --> 00:23:17.075
You had a few stints to name below, didn't you?

00:23:17.095 --> 00:23:23.901
So I think you left around 1982 and then went off to do, first of all, the Yardbirds and then you went to Rory Gallagher.

00:23:23.961 --> 00:23:25.222
Is that the decision?

00:23:25.663 --> 00:23:28.184
We'd been around each other for a long, long time.

00:23:28.224 --> 00:23:33.269
At one stage, Neil, I think we were doing something like 290 shows a year.

00:23:33.829 --> 00:23:38.233
Couldn't do that now, but you did in those days down the country, flying around.

00:23:39.115 --> 00:23:42.657
Most of it was in the back of a bus unless we were flying out to Europe.

00:23:43.238 --> 00:24:23.192
Thankfully, we ended up getting a bit of a fan base in Europe and some bands don't but we slogged out there as well France especially that loved their rock and roll France got different taste to anybody else that we used to have really old rock and roll fans big American cars turning up you know and we did Sweden Norway we did all Scandinavia in the early days so when we finished we were all very very tired young men but very tired we'd done the circuit and we'd all got fed up with each other and then I initially was signed as a solo project for A&M Records again as a singer, harmonica player.

00:24:23.532 --> 00:24:26.798
I did a couple of demos for A&M and then A&M folded.

00:24:27.137 --> 00:24:28.539
So that went nowhere.

00:24:28.980 --> 00:24:34.028
And then I thought, you know what, I'd love to continue with my session work.

00:24:34.147 --> 00:24:35.790
I wonder if anyone would be up.

00:24:35.810 --> 00:24:40.857
So I had some cards made up because I always really fancied being a session player.

00:24:41.377 --> 00:24:46.321
And then I went over to a pub in the east end of London called The Bridge House.

00:24:46.643 --> 00:24:48.503
This was in 1982.

00:24:48.743 --> 00:24:52.827
And I met Gerry McAvoy and Brendan O'Neill from Rory Allo's band.

00:24:53.327 --> 00:24:57.372
Gerry said, it'd be great to drag you in to work with Rory, you know.

00:24:57.771 --> 00:25:01.015
And I thought, it was just too heavy for me, you know.

00:25:01.154 --> 00:25:03.978
Yeah, it's got, again, quite a heavy blues vibe.

00:25:04.057 --> 00:25:05.838
Again, you've got it in one.

00:25:05.878 --> 00:25:07.361
You've absolutely got it there.

00:25:07.760 --> 00:25:08.801
Heavy blues again.

00:25:09.201 --> 00:25:13.989
Anyway, so I went down and As it happened, I found him absolutely charming.

00:25:14.328 --> 00:25:17.955
There's no secret what I thought of Rory.

00:25:18.056 --> 00:25:19.538
He was also a wonderful player.

00:25:19.597 --> 00:25:21.260
So I thought, you know what?

00:25:21.521 --> 00:25:23.945
This would be nice for me just for a little while.

00:25:24.606 --> 00:25:30.537
And he asked me, could I come out and sing Pisa and do the Italian Blues Festival in Pisa?

00:25:30.857 --> 00:25:33.382
By this time, it was 1983-84.

00:25:34.042 --> 00:25:35.226
I joined Rory.

00:26:00.354 --> 00:26:01.780
and rock stuff.

00:26:02.505 --> 00:26:08.655
I wasn't involved in none of that, so I'd wait in the wings, and they'd call me on for six or seven songs as a guest.

00:26:09.281 --> 00:26:50.906
and that continued through the years with Rory and the good thing was with Rory while this Rory thing was going on and we were going out doing you know Scandinavia then we did a world tour you know it wasn't physically difficult because I didn't have to play like the other three did the whole set you know Brendan was coming off with he did long sets Rory long long sets and it was a breeze for me because I had a wonderful governor in Rory himself and he and I had a great understanding between us and I'd come on for the bluesy things and the folky things and then go on with Rory and just do the duo, myself and Rory, on a couple of slow country blues, you know, which was lovely.

00:26:50.946 --> 00:26:58.941
So I was kind of tagged along around the world a couple of times, just doing seven or eight songs in the set, you know.

00:26:59.521 --> 00:27:04.309
But it allowed me also, when I got back to London, to do work with other artists.

00:27:04.801 --> 00:27:06.525
which I really enjoyed, you know.

00:27:06.545 --> 00:27:13.213
And then I got a call from the Yardbirds to front the Yardbirds to sing and play harmonic, which I did.

00:27:13.494 --> 00:27:19.644
I did that for a couple of shows, including a tour in Spain where I got electrocuted out there.

00:27:20.164 --> 00:27:21.926
I had a terrible electric shock on stage.

00:27:21.946 --> 00:27:22.788
Yeah, that frightened me.

00:27:23.549 --> 00:27:24.832
Was that on stage?

00:27:25.332 --> 00:27:25.752
Yeah.

00:27:25.992 --> 00:27:27.295
Yeah, that just stopped the show.

00:27:27.335 --> 00:27:28.356
I was really bad.

00:27:28.376 --> 00:27:29.818
I really got whack.

00:27:30.220 --> 00:27:31.582
Yeah, right across my chest.

00:27:32.034 --> 00:27:33.214
I can't remember much else.

00:27:33.275 --> 00:27:46.086
I woke up in the dressing room and the electricians didn't check all the way and the mic was live because I had the bullet mic in the left hand and I touched the vocal mic with the right hand and it shot straight across my chest.

00:27:46.586 --> 00:27:49.229
That's a new dimension onto being annoyed with a sound man, doesn't

00:27:49.249 --> 00:27:49.348
it?

00:27:49.828 --> 00:27:51.971
Oh, well, the whole thing was shabby.

00:27:52.010 --> 00:27:53.873
You know, the promotion was shabby as well.

00:27:53.913 --> 00:28:01.960
For a band as big as the Arbor, the promoter at the time wasn't the right promoter, you know, and I kind of, when we went in there, I didn't like the look of the venue.

00:28:01.980 --> 00:28:39.807
I a funny feeling about that venue but that's a long time ago another story that's what happened with Oso I did that and then I come back in and then they asked me to do the Box of Frogs album which was a spin off from the Yardbirds and I kept myself busy with various sessions and then I got what they call a fixer for anyone that may be uninitiated might not know it's the kind of guy that literally fixes the sessions for you and I got in with a big agency in London and They said to me, would you go down and play on maybe a lolly or an ice cream advert?

00:28:39.846 --> 00:28:48.463
So I'd go on the train up to London, do a few ice cream adverts in the morning, then do a few American truck adverts in the afternoon, playing.

00:28:48.483 --> 00:28:51.568
I had that voting as well, you know, I...

00:28:51.970 --> 00:28:57.494
I think I had a fairly good ear, although I wasn't classically trained and I couldn't read music.

00:28:57.855 --> 00:28:59.537
I think I was blessed with a decent ear.

00:29:00.057 --> 00:29:04.421
So I could anticipate what they wanted to hear, where they wanted to hear it.

00:29:04.881 --> 00:29:12.387
And those days you'd have all the clients coming in to the listening room down in Soho, where I used to do all the session work.

00:29:12.768 --> 00:29:17.471
All the clients used to come in and they'd all be sitting on the other side of the glass and then you'd be performing.

00:29:17.811 --> 00:29:18.772
Come out, what do you think?

00:29:18.833 --> 00:29:19.394
Have a listen.

00:29:19.693 --> 00:29:20.474
Oh yeah, that's great.

00:29:20.494 --> 00:29:21.415
Can you do a bit more?

00:29:21.675 --> 00:29:22.939
So in Yeah.

00:29:36.321 --> 00:29:38.165
any famous adverts from back then?

00:29:38.445 --> 00:29:43.295
Well, funnily enough, one of the best ones I did was on Chromatic, would you believe?

00:29:43.936 --> 00:29:47.663
Which was the cowboy, the John Voight Midnight Cowboy.

00:29:47.683 --> 00:29:49.346
I did that on Chromatic.

00:29:49.386 --> 00:29:50.388
Unbelievable.

00:29:50.849 --> 00:29:53.054
I've probably never picked it up since.

00:29:53.281 --> 00:29:54.663
That was for the AA.

00:29:54.944 --> 00:29:57.209
I've tried to find that and I can't even find that.

00:29:57.269 --> 00:29:58.151
I'd love to get that.

00:29:58.570 --> 00:29:59.834
But I did a load.

00:30:00.273 --> 00:30:07.948
I must have done certainly more than anyone else in this country, harmonica adverts, because there wasn't many of us around for a start.

00:30:08.308 --> 00:30:09.790
This was through the 80s you were

00:30:10.211 --> 00:30:10.633
doing these?

00:30:10.653 --> 00:30:11.314
Absolutely, yeah.

00:30:11.374 --> 00:30:13.438
Mid-80s and through the 90s, yeah.

00:30:13.698 --> 00:30:14.920
And while you were still touring

00:30:14.960 --> 00:30:15.921
with Rory on and off

00:30:15.941 --> 00:30:16.942
through this time as well.

00:30:17.344 --> 00:30:19.026
Absolutely, yeah, yeah.

00:30:19.046 --> 00:30:25.796
And then I got asked to do records as well, signed bands records, and I did a lot of records in the 80s and 90s as well.

00:30:26.396 --> 00:30:27.859
You did two albums with Rory?

00:30:28.180 --> 00:30:28.420
Yes.

00:30:28.701 --> 00:30:30.202
Yeah, Defender and Fresh Evidence.

00:30:34.670 --> 00:30:34.750
Yeah.

00:30:56.993 --> 00:30:59.017
I believe you even played at Rory's funeral.

00:30:59.037 --> 00:31:00.619
He sadly died quite young, didn't he?

00:31:01.662 --> 00:31:02.021
He did.

00:31:02.242 --> 00:31:02.603
He did.

00:31:02.644 --> 00:31:03.785
He died at the age of 47.

00:31:04.866 --> 00:31:06.769
Well, I've become very close to him.

00:31:07.330 --> 00:31:15.404
I mean, you couldn't really get to know him too much because he was a very private man, private person, and we all respected that.

00:31:16.097 --> 00:31:22.969
But his love of country music and his love of ragtime and old blues was similar to where my head was.

00:31:23.028 --> 00:31:24.730
That's why I liked working with him.

00:31:24.932 --> 00:31:27.596
I just knew where he was.

00:31:27.695 --> 00:31:28.817
I just had this thing.

00:31:28.998 --> 00:31:31.000
You very rarely get it with players.

00:31:31.342 --> 00:31:34.046
I had it with Dennis when we play acoustic now.

00:31:34.178 --> 00:31:38.365
I've now got him to do an acoustic show with me, Dennis, at last, after all these years.

00:31:39.207 --> 00:31:40.528
But I had that with Rory then.

00:31:40.568 --> 00:31:50.786
Sadly, Rory became very ill, slipped into a coma, and the family asked me to go to the hospital and play for him while he was in a coma to see if I could bring him round.

00:31:50.826 --> 00:31:52.990
He had a liver transplant.

00:31:53.346 --> 00:31:57.694
It was a sad time, you know, it was a sad time going up there and trying to...

00:31:58.016 --> 00:32:03.827
He was a huge Bob Dylan fan and he loved George Jones, people like that, no-show Jones.

00:32:04.108 --> 00:32:09.058
He loved all the bad boys, you know, he loved all the bad boys.

00:32:09.580 --> 00:32:11.644
Johnny Paycheck and all these type of guys.

00:32:12.354 --> 00:32:14.036
And I loved working with him.

00:32:14.136 --> 00:32:15.278
I liked where his head was.

00:32:15.858 --> 00:32:21.027
And it was a terrible loss when he went because, you know, I lost the career myself as well.

00:32:21.446 --> 00:32:25.753
I'm not being selfish here, but I did actually lose everything when after that.

00:32:26.054 --> 00:32:29.159
So to start again, I'd lost the Nine Below, lost the Rory thing.

00:32:29.660 --> 00:32:29.980
Did this

00:32:30.039 --> 00:32:35.067
lead you, because you reformed with Nine Below in 1991 as part of that process.

00:32:35.407 --> 00:32:36.589
That's completely right.

00:32:36.630 --> 00:32:39.453
Well, Rory had started getting ill now.

00:32:39.746 --> 00:32:44.890
Our old manager had a kind of idea to put the old band Nine Below back again.

00:32:44.930 --> 00:32:48.834
And Dennis and I were still actively working as musicians.

00:32:48.913 --> 00:32:52.217
He had a band called The Truth, and I was still working with Rory.

00:32:52.257 --> 00:32:55.319
And he said, well, where are we going to find a bass player and a drummer?

00:32:55.339 --> 00:32:57.480
So I said, well, I've already made one here with Rory.

00:32:57.801 --> 00:33:05.689
Why don't I ask Brendan and Jerry McAvoy to come and be the rhythm section for a little Nine Below Zero showcase?

00:33:06.169 --> 00:33:07.349
So he said, that's a good idea.

00:33:07.430 --> 00:33:08.590
Yeah, the three of you, you know.

00:33:08.951 --> 00:33:34.275
So we were out in The first album you did back then, the first album with that was On The Road Again album.

00:34:10.690 --> 00:34:12.353
And then we did Chilled,

00:34:13.014 --> 00:34:14.215
which I was very proud of.

00:34:14.396 --> 00:34:20.065
It's got Spanish Harlem on, which is a great tune with you, isn't it?

00:34:28.440 --> 00:34:34.389
Yeah, I enjoyed Chilled.

00:34:35.297 --> 00:35:27.030
more my baby because I said to Dennis we should really do something a little bit toned down and at that time it was when people when the unplugged thing was very popular you know everybody was unplugged it seemed so I said why don't we try and do something a little bit softer so we did Chilled and I think that I think it's a nice record generally Chilled it's quite nice pleasant record but Chilled come and then we started touring as Nine Below again with Gerry and Brendan and myself and Dennis and was you're old today sir did they all come back out the modern yeah they did they were a little bit older but they generally they did yeah and then we went we were on the road doing a lot of shows and we were in Sweden I'll never forget it and I got very ill in Sweden I was just very tired I needed a break you know I got flown home, by the record.

00:35:27.269 --> 00:35:27.791
That was it.

00:35:27.972 --> 00:35:34.563
I fell out with the guys over it, and I think subsequent interviews with them, they said that we didn't realize.

00:35:34.742 --> 00:35:38.108
We could see he wasn't quite there, but I don't mind admitting it.

00:35:38.168 --> 00:35:39.871
I was just out with the fairies.

00:35:40.353 --> 00:35:45.201
I was just exhausted, mentally exhausted, physically exhausted.

00:35:45.793 --> 00:35:49.402
So that ended your second stint with Nine Below.

00:35:49.523 --> 00:35:49.744
It did.

00:35:50.485 --> 00:35:56.842
So a big thing which a lot of people will know you for is playing with Oasis, which I think you did first in 1995.

00:35:56.882 --> 00:35:58.648
How did that come about and how was that?

00:35:58.949 --> 00:36:00.371
Well, that was the fixer again.

00:36:00.411 --> 00:36:02.177
That was the fixer calling me.

00:36:02.690 --> 00:36:07.184
Our old guitar tech joined Oasis, Spooner, and he was with Oasis.

00:36:07.244 --> 00:36:14.309
He'd mentioned me to Noel, and Noel said, okay, then we get Mark in, touch with the people that know how to get hold of Mark.

00:36:14.730 --> 00:36:15.612
So I come down.

00:36:16.130 --> 00:36:19.454
In the albums I did, they were never there.

00:36:19.775 --> 00:36:20.815
I never even met them.

00:36:21.416 --> 00:36:30.750
And then the most famous, if you will, thing that I did with them was from the Royal Festival Hall that we did, which is on MTV.

00:36:31.230 --> 00:36:37.838
That was a fluke as well, because Nolan had a fight with Liam just before filming.

00:36:38.219 --> 00:36:40.342
So I hadn't rehearsed nothing.

00:36:41.264 --> 00:36:42.224
Absolutely nothing.

00:36:42.324 --> 00:36:42.525
So...

00:36:42.978 --> 00:36:44.431
We had a big brass section.

00:36:44.451 --> 00:36:47.155
Now, all the brass guys was with each other.

00:36:47.521 --> 00:36:50.206
and they were all mating because they were the jazz boys.

00:36:50.586 --> 00:36:58.820
I was the country blues boy that didn't know that set because they were session players in their own right doing film, TV, orchestral, jazz stuff.

00:36:59.320 --> 00:37:03.889
I didn't go in those circles because when I did a session, I was always the last one to go on.

00:37:04.228 --> 00:37:06.932
So everyone had always gone home when I got there.

00:37:07.253 --> 00:37:12.422
So I didn't actually ever really do a lot of playing with other people when I did my studio work.

00:37:12.762 --> 00:37:13.945
All the players had been and gone.

00:37:14.264 --> 00:37:14.425
So...

00:37:14.882 --> 00:37:17.224
I didn't know a lot of players around.

00:37:17.786 --> 00:37:21.871
So with this Oasis thing, it was fixed up by the fixer.

00:37:21.911 --> 00:37:24.817
The jazz boys were all there, all chatting to each other.

00:37:25.317 --> 00:37:32.728
The band were all there, all looked after and very much in cotton wool by the management and myself.

00:37:33.188 --> 00:37:35.873
There was nothing to do with either of them.

00:37:36.434 --> 00:37:39.097
And then we got down to the festival hall.

00:37:39.489 --> 00:37:42.876
Very big filming thing for MTV.

00:37:43.398 --> 00:37:47.706
And there's a fight between the two lads, Lim and Noel Gallagher.

00:37:48.106 --> 00:37:49.268
So these fights were genuine.

00:37:49.309 --> 00:37:50.510
These weren't just put

00:37:50.751 --> 00:37:51.353
on for the...

00:37:51.552 --> 00:37:52.494
Oh, no.

00:37:52.815 --> 00:37:53.257
No, no.

00:37:53.297 --> 00:37:56.181
They had their fisticuffs, the two of them.

00:37:56.603 --> 00:37:56.903
Yeah.

00:37:57.284 --> 00:37:58.045
Oh, yeah.

00:37:58.434 --> 00:38:07.902
Instead of Liam funding it, he goes and sits up in the gods looking down on the show because he's refused to be on the same stage as Noel.

00:38:08.304 --> 00:38:13.117
So Noel just looked round at the rest of us and said, you know what, I'm going to do this myself acoustic.

00:38:13.250 --> 00:38:17.956
And I thought, not only am I in at the deep end, I don't know what I'm playing on.

00:38:18.257 --> 00:38:19.719
Now we've not got no singer as well.

00:38:19.800 --> 00:38:25.668
Surely MTV are going to pull this now and it's all cancelled because there's a live audience as well.

00:38:26.230 --> 00:38:30.496
And he just said to me, this is a song called Master Plan.

00:38:30.817 --> 00:38:35.945
He said, it's a kind of minor thing, just make up something on the front for me.

00:38:38.168 --> 00:38:39.269
It was that loose.

00:38:39.650 --> 00:38:41.952
And to this day, that was it.

00:38:42.331 --> 00:38:46.255
I did that thing, and I don't think I ever saw Noel again after that show.

00:38:46.775 --> 00:38:48.557
You played a few like Nedworth with him.

00:38:48.737 --> 00:38:51.119
You must have been the biggest audience you've ever played to.

00:38:51.280 --> 00:38:51.780
Oh,

00:38:52.041 --> 00:38:54.623
absolutely.

00:38:55.224 --> 00:38:56.965
It was very much us and them.

00:38:57.445 --> 00:38:58.646
I got the train up there.

00:38:59.007 --> 00:39:02.570
I was met by the runner, taken backstage, did the show.

00:39:02.929 --> 00:39:06.413
After the show, I was put back on the train by the runner, straight home.

00:39:06.793 --> 00:39:09.615
I was probably home here before they finished the show.

00:39:09.615 --> 00:39:12.458
So I didn't feel ever part of that.

00:39:12.739 --> 00:39:14.501
It wasn't like a rock and roll lifestyle.

00:39:14.681 --> 00:39:17.403
It was for them, but it certainly wasn't for us.

00:39:17.884 --> 00:39:20.025
And the Jazz Boys, it was a piece of cake for them.

00:39:20.487 --> 00:39:22.708
Piece of cake and all that.

00:39:23.090 --> 00:39:24.391
Their parts were all scored.

00:39:24.650 --> 00:39:27.853
They had a guy scoring their parts that was part of them.

00:39:28.375 --> 00:39:37.083
But no, I was completely on my own and I was given a complete foot and I spoke to Liam once and in the bank in Manchester.

00:39:37.182 --> 00:39:39.806
He came up and he went, hello, how are you?

00:39:39.826 --> 00:39:41.146
It's your last name.

00:39:43.188 --> 00:39:44.769
That was the only time I ever met him.

00:39:45.230 --> 00:39:46.512
I never spoke to him again.

00:39:46.592 --> 00:39:47.853
I never spoke to him again.

00:39:48.213 --> 00:39:51.295
But still, nevertheless, a great feather in your cap to have played with Oasis.

00:39:51.576 --> 00:39:53.677
Great thing to have on the CV and have some recordings.

00:39:53.717 --> 00:39:54.338
Well, it was.

00:39:54.418 --> 00:39:54.639
I went

00:39:54.719 --> 00:39:55.739
out to Sweden as well.

00:39:55.800 --> 00:39:58.722
And yet again, they were on a different flight to us.

00:39:59.141 --> 00:40:01.164
I think that private aircraft they went in.

00:40:01.704 --> 00:40:03.186
I went out on my own.

00:40:03.266 --> 00:40:05.487
The jazz guys went out on their own on a different flight.

00:40:05.487 --> 00:40:09.713
So it was a really odd thing to do.

00:40:09.793 --> 00:40:14.440
Whereas with Nine Below Zero, we all lived together, slept together, ate together.

00:40:15.061 --> 00:40:18.385
And all of a sudden, I was just a real freelancer, you know?

00:40:19.005 --> 00:40:20.208
Yeah, amazing, yeah.

00:40:20.568 --> 00:40:21.489
So yes, you did that.

00:40:21.608 --> 00:40:23.552
I was your oasis for a little while.

00:40:24.012 --> 00:40:28.277
And then you had your third stint with Nine Below, again, reforming in 2001.

00:40:28.297 --> 00:40:31.382
So how did you get back together for the third time?

00:40:31.623 --> 00:40:34.045
You know, I can't remember offhand.

00:40:34.434 --> 00:40:39.739
Well, I think we've done about, yeah, I think we've now got 21 albums under our belt.

00:40:39.958 --> 00:40:40.179
Yeah.

00:40:40.840 --> 00:40:42.440
And that's been good, obviously.

00:40:42.521 --> 00:40:45.322
I've had to rethink anew every time.

00:40:45.503 --> 00:40:51.628
Different amps and different acoustics and different approaches, different studios, different engineers.

00:40:51.688 --> 00:40:54.010
You know, everyone's got their own take on it.

00:40:54.510 --> 00:40:57.833
And your last couple of albums, you've had like a big band with you, haven't you?

00:40:57.994 --> 00:41:00.036
The latest album, Avalanche 2019.

00:41:00.577 --> 00:41:00.817
Yes.

00:41:00.856 --> 00:41:02.077
It's quite soulful, isn't it?

00:41:02.097 --> 00:41:06.943
You've got horns on there and the album before that Yeah, I'm

00:41:19.586 --> 00:41:29.436
actually pleased with what I've done on the last two albums and some of the best work Personally, I think I've done, I've come off those last two albums.

00:41:30.016 --> 00:41:36.268
I wasn't 100% sure of the direction that Dennis wanted to go in with the last two albums.

00:41:36.690 --> 00:41:42.820
And thankfully, Dennis agreed with me to do an acoustic album called The Duo, which we did.

00:41:43.262 --> 00:41:49.634
I'm glad that I have the acoustic album to go and play live now, you know, well, pre-COVID, obviously.

00:41:49.985 --> 00:41:56.677
I'm glad that I have that to fall back on because it would drive me mad to keep doing the electric show.

00:41:57.217 --> 00:42:05.969
I like him to keep in touch with where our roots were, you know, and by doing the acoustic stuff, it lets me do that and pulls him back

00:42:06.048 --> 00:42:06.670
into line.

00:42:07.050 --> 00:42:08.492
I actually saw you play that show.

00:42:08.532 --> 00:42:12.297
I came to see you at the gig in Surrey, you know, that Dave Raphael organised.

00:42:12.356 --> 00:42:13.858
I saw you there and I met you there.

00:42:13.878 --> 00:42:15.681
I talked to you about that gig afterwards.

00:42:16.081 --> 00:42:18.204
Some harmonica favourites on there.

00:42:18.224 --> 00:42:22.429
You do Stone Fox Chase, of course, and you do Cherry Pink and Apple Blossom White, which is one of my favourites.

00:42:41.153 --> 00:42:42.655
I know from a Kim Wilson song.

00:42:42.695 --> 00:42:43.677
Is that where you got

00:42:43.697 --> 00:42:43.836
it from?

00:42:43.996 --> 00:42:45.018
Yeah, that's correct.

00:42:45.197 --> 00:42:47.820
I actually got to play with Kim as well in Italy.

00:42:48.121 --> 00:42:49.862
We were opening for the T-Birds.

00:42:50.364 --> 00:42:50.963
He was great.

00:42:51.324 --> 00:42:53.646
We were backstage and he said, do you want to get up and play?

00:42:53.967 --> 00:42:55.289
And I said, I'd love to.

00:42:55.789 --> 00:42:57.771
I got up with him, with his band.

00:42:58.211 --> 00:43:03.197
So I've met Kim a couple of times and he's a very nice man too, he is.

00:43:03.217 --> 00:43:03.556
Yeah,

00:43:03.577 --> 00:43:04.038
definitely, yeah.

00:43:04.597 --> 00:43:07.501
And with Nine Below Zero, you played Glastonbury in 2016.

00:43:08.322 --> 00:43:09.563
Yeah, it poured a rain.

00:43:10.485 --> 00:43:16.414
All day long, we got stuck on the furthest tent away from where the Panthers were.

00:43:16.753 --> 00:43:21.722
There was hardly anybody in when we played, so that was a complete damp squib of a day.

00:43:21.842 --> 00:43:23.344
It was a nightmare.

00:43:24.224 --> 00:43:26.387
But, you know, you get these good ones and bad ones.

00:43:26.688 --> 00:43:31.835
Yeah, and on the duo album with Dennis again, Carmelita, you singing that one?

00:43:32.317 --> 00:43:32.516
Yes.

00:43:35.362 --> 00:43:54.887
I hear mariachi static on my radio And the tubes, they glow in the dark But you're there in Ensenada And I'm stuck here in Echo Park

00:43:55.206 --> 00:43:57.530
We opened for Willie DeVille.

00:43:58.146 --> 00:44:03.856
So I stood there and watched his set and I was completely blown away with everything that he did.

00:44:04.476 --> 00:44:06.400
And one of the songs he did was Carmelita.

00:44:06.420 --> 00:44:10.146
So I found the original and it was a Warren's Evens song.

00:44:11.027 --> 00:44:15.175
And I said to Dennis, this would be great for an acoustic set for me and you.

00:44:15.476 --> 00:44:16.157
Let's try this.

00:44:16.177 --> 00:44:17.119
And he loved it too.

00:44:17.639 --> 00:44:18.541
So we recorded it.

00:44:19.362 --> 00:44:25.036
During all this time, you've done lots of session work, and as you say, really love playing with different bands, pop acts, and all sorts of great stuff.

00:44:25.097 --> 00:44:26.983
So just picking out a few of the songs you've done there.

00:44:27.384 --> 00:44:31.273
One song which I think is you is playing with the Christians on Born Again.

00:44:31.333 --> 00:44:31.775
Is that you?

00:44:31.815 --> 00:44:32.637
Yeah.

00:44:51.010 --> 00:45:09.068
produced by Laurie Latham who I'd worked with with Paul Young he asked me to go in and do that and I also played on the Harvest for the World yeah I played first position on that that all of a sudden was played every day on radio that got played

00:45:09.670 --> 00:45:13.333
so you have a few more you played on Love and Regret with Deacon Blue I

00:45:14.054 --> 00:45:24.056
played Love and Regret with Deacon Blue um But I think, you know, if you was to ask me what the highlight is in that long career, it has to be that Godly and Cream album.

00:45:24.436 --> 00:45:25.597
That Goodbye Blue Sky.

00:45:26.018 --> 00:45:26.498
Oh, yeah.

00:45:26.637 --> 00:45:29.681
I mean, I just felt rejuvenated when I did that.

00:45:29.981 --> 00:45:31.621
We spent six weeks on that.

00:45:31.922 --> 00:45:38.949
You've got to remember that 10cc had just had enormous success with I'm Not In Love and Life Is A Minestrone, big, big songs.

00:45:39.309 --> 00:45:55.407
And all of a sudden, Godly and Cream have come up with this weird harmonica album that's got layers of harmonicas and gospel singers I just went in, and we did auditions for that, and they chose me, and they chose the guy that was playing with the rap, Nick Gaiman.

00:45:55.748 --> 00:46:06.623
Nick was very good on that very fast, percussive stuff, you know, he perfectly went underneath me all the time, and I played most of the lead stuff on it.

00:46:07.003 --> 00:46:13.474
We made them songs come alive in the studio when we did it, and it was just six weeks of pure, pure heaven.

00:46:13.922 --> 00:46:20.568
And when I listen back to that day, I'll never forget, I thought, that has been the most productive six weeks of my entire life.

00:46:20.889 --> 00:46:23.871
That's what being a professional harmonica player is all about.

00:46:24.271 --> 00:46:26.414
That album is everything to me.

00:46:39.246 --> 00:46:43.070
And do you know what?

00:46:43.329 --> 00:46:48.416
The toilet that we recorded in had a beautiful natural reverb as well.

00:46:48.596 --> 00:46:50.358
Everything was natural, you know?

00:46:50.398 --> 00:46:51.639
It's funny you should say that.

00:46:51.699 --> 00:46:53.643
I was just talking to Mickey Raffaele.

00:46:53.682 --> 00:46:57.086
He said he recorded a lot with Emily Harris in like a really small shower.

00:46:57.266 --> 00:47:02.313
And he said it was kind of really small and he said it was like really compact and the reverb was really nice.

00:47:02.373 --> 00:47:02.612
There

00:47:02.632 --> 00:47:02.893
you go.

00:47:02.934 --> 00:47:05.916
That's exactly the same what happened to me on that album.

00:47:06.530 --> 00:47:10.773
Lowell said to me, Lowell Cream said to me, Mark, I'm going to put you in the toilet.

00:47:10.934 --> 00:47:16.498
And, you know, I've gone from, like, studios that are completely soundproofed to a live toilet.

00:47:16.559 --> 00:47:19.201
And we had some amazing results on that.

00:47:19.221 --> 00:47:24.025
I mean, if you listen to that album, some of the sounds, forget the playing, I'm not bumming myself up here.

00:47:24.344 --> 00:47:28.048
I'm just saying some of the sounds, the harmonic of the way she called it, are beautiful.

00:47:28.688 --> 00:47:35.594
And that was down to Lowell and Kevin being so, you know, kind of the art student type ears on them.

00:47:36.195 --> 00:47:46.052
You know, they The modernity, is that a word, of the harmonica, and also keeping it, you know, nice and soulful with the gospel singers as well.

00:47:46.452 --> 00:47:49.117
To me, it's the highlight of my career.

00:47:49.137 --> 00:47:56.931
And the frustrating thing about it, as soon as the damn thing was released, it was deleted by the record company.

00:47:56.990 --> 00:47:58.494
They've re-released it since then.

00:47:58.626 --> 00:48:03.592
A lot of the 10cc fans kind of went, what is this?

00:48:03.672 --> 00:48:04.532
What have they done?

00:48:04.592 --> 00:48:07.717
But to me, it's a masterpiece.

00:48:08.358 --> 00:48:11.442
And then I did Mark Hollis' stuff and Talk Talk stuff.

00:48:11.862 --> 00:48:14.525
Yeah, that's a great album, that Spirit of Eden.

00:48:14.545 --> 00:48:17.028
I played on The Rainbow on that track called The Rainbow.

00:48:19.652 --> 00:48:27.422
The Rainbow

00:48:36.353 --> 00:48:37.737
Yeah, so atmospheric, isn't it?

00:48:37.757 --> 00:48:40.525
It really suits that kind of really atmospheric harmonica

00:48:40.545 --> 00:48:40.684
playing.

00:48:40.704 --> 00:48:46.780
Yeah, and it was a real difficult session because, you know, he did a record from the throat and...

00:48:47.266 --> 00:48:54.251
Everything was, I wasn't allowed, no reverbs, no toys you couldn't use, everything had to come from the throat.

00:48:54.391 --> 00:48:57.934
And that was really tiring, those sessions.

00:48:58.195 --> 00:49:02.159
I did three Talk Talk albums, which I'm really proud of as well.

00:49:02.458 --> 00:49:02.980
We'll move on

00:49:03.019 --> 00:49:07.563
from your recording career, because there's so much we can stay on forever.

00:49:08.143 --> 00:49:10.746
I heard you saying that you're pretty dedicated to practicing.

00:49:10.786 --> 00:49:12.748
You make sure you kind of get 90 minutes in a day.

00:49:12.768 --> 00:49:13.849
Is that something you still do?

00:49:14.349 --> 00:49:14.889
Absolutely, yeah.

00:49:15.329 --> 00:49:17.231
I found it difficult to get motivated.

00:49:17.231 --> 00:49:22.237
during this COVID thing because I genuinely couldn't see when we were going to start again.

00:49:22.257 --> 00:49:24.760
How long am I going to be sitting in here not playing?

00:49:24.820 --> 00:49:30.668
I can carry on practicing for the rest of my life, but if COVID takes away everything, what's the point?

00:49:30.688 --> 00:49:32.690
A musician feeds off his audience.

00:49:33.371 --> 00:49:38.657
I had a gig two nights ago, so that's kind of lifted my spirits up a bit.

00:49:39.202 --> 00:49:40.206
Yeah.

00:49:40.347 --> 00:49:42.940
So this question, you know, obviously, like you say, you're dedicated to practicing.

00:49:42.960 --> 00:49:48.105
The question asked each time is, if you had 10 minutes to practice, what would you spend 10 minutes working on?

00:49:48.545 --> 00:49:50.489
Simple, simple tunes.

00:49:50.969 --> 00:49:52.010
Melody and breathing.

00:49:52.311 --> 00:49:57.458
I find a lot of kids, when they first start, just get shoulders too far up.

00:49:57.518 --> 00:49:58.619
They just don't relax.

00:49:59.179 --> 00:50:03.206
And it's kind of counterproductive to be in that stiff mode.

00:50:03.987 --> 00:50:05.027
You can't breathe properly.

00:50:05.307 --> 00:50:10.375
And you know when you go into this stress management, the thing that you have to master is breathing.

00:50:10.675 --> 00:50:18.286
And I think when kids are learning, I don't actually teach, but I've actually had one student, and that was Jude Law, the actor.

00:50:18.594 --> 00:50:19.755
I went to Jude's place.

00:50:19.894 --> 00:50:22.036
I showed him what to do, and he was the same.

00:50:22.378 --> 00:50:25.701
He was hunched up, and I just said, you know, chill down.

00:50:25.880 --> 00:50:29.985
Let's just play single notes, maybe a folk song, or let's just play single notes.

00:50:30.204 --> 00:50:31.385
The bends come later.

00:50:31.726 --> 00:50:32.847
Let's just get the tunes.

00:50:33.148 --> 00:50:34.148
Let's get a single hole.

00:50:34.449 --> 00:50:36.090
Let's get your breathing right first.

00:50:37.012 --> 00:50:40.554
Forget about bullet mics and overdriving an amp.

00:50:41.054 --> 00:50:41.876
Forget all that.

00:50:42.356 --> 00:50:43.958
That comes way down the line.

00:50:44.559 --> 00:50:47.742
Let's get your melody, and let's get your chops together first.

00:50:48.193 --> 00:50:50.998
When you're learning melodies, do you learn them by ear or do you learn

00:50:51.018 --> 00:50:52.000
them from written music?

00:50:52.221 --> 00:50:53.503
No, I've learned them by ear.

00:50:53.902 --> 00:50:57.429
I don't read, Neil, but I think I've got a decent ear.

00:50:58.150 --> 00:50:59.612
So, yeah, talking about gear now.

00:50:59.893 --> 00:51:01.976
First of all, which harmonica do you play?

00:51:01.996 --> 00:51:03.458
I think you're a Horner and Doherty.

00:51:03.858 --> 00:51:06.724
I am indeed, and I'll use anything they throw at me.

00:51:07.706 --> 00:51:10.429
They're very, very good, and they're...

00:51:10.561 --> 00:51:20.951
I'm not, to my detriment probably, a technician with regards to tampering with my harmonicas like Joe Felisco does for his players.

00:51:21.090 --> 00:51:21.851
Fantastic.

00:51:22.192 --> 00:51:24.074
I'd love to have someone do that for me.

00:51:24.554 --> 00:51:26.094
I have to blow them out of the box.

00:51:26.536 --> 00:51:30.398
I might take the plates off and lift a few reeds just to loosen them up.

00:51:30.820 --> 00:51:33.661
You had some Anton Danica though,

00:51:33.681 --> 00:51:34.001
didn't you?

00:51:34.021 --> 00:51:34.722
I did indeed.

00:51:35.083 --> 00:51:40.007
When Anthony started, I said to Anthony, these diatronics, they're too heavy for me.

00:51:40.327 --> 00:51:45.420
So we We worked on a couple of things together and he did a couple of major seven tunings for me.

00:51:45.820 --> 00:51:51.072
But going back, I'm back with Honus now and I like to use the crossovers.

00:51:51.715 --> 00:51:56.146
I'm not really a gear person, probably because I've done a lot of acoustic stuff.

00:51:56.449 --> 00:51:57.472
That's where my head is.

00:51:57.512 --> 00:51:59.675
My head's not really a gear person.

00:51:59.735 --> 00:52:01.297
I've tried everything.

00:52:01.838 --> 00:52:07.907
You know, if someone puts a nice mic up for me in the studio and I'm on an acoustic session, all that goes out the window.

00:52:08.369 --> 00:52:10.092
Come on, we're listening to you now.

00:52:10.132 --> 00:52:11.373
We're not listening to the gear.

00:52:11.873 --> 00:52:14.077
So do you have a favorite key of diatonic?

00:52:14.530 --> 00:52:15.891
Yes, I do, actually.

00:52:15.972 --> 00:52:18.356
I like playing in the key of F sharp.

00:52:18.715 --> 00:52:25.146
I play in three positions, predominantly second, as a lot of us do, except for the wonderful Mr Levy, of course.

00:52:25.206 --> 00:52:26.547
He plays in a million positions.

00:52:27.048 --> 00:52:29.572
I'm a huge Northern Buffalo fan as well, you know.

00:52:29.612 --> 00:52:40.989
MUSIC

00:52:45.505 --> 00:52:51.737
So you say your favourite key was a B?

00:52:52.137 --> 00:52:52.918
Tonally, yes.

00:52:53.398 --> 00:52:54.481
And that's a different tuning.

00:52:54.501 --> 00:52:55.543
You mentioned country tuning.

00:52:55.583 --> 00:52:57.266
Do you use any other different tunings?

00:52:57.806 --> 00:52:59.869
I do use a couple of minor harmonicas.

00:53:01.393 --> 00:53:06.501
We do a song called The Ballad of Domboval, which is a Middle Eastern flavoured thing that I wrote.

00:53:08.985 --> 00:53:09.085
MUSIC

00:53:15.489 --> 00:53:21.418
Do you use any overblows?

00:53:22.139 --> 00:53:28.447
No, not a single one.

00:53:28.527 --> 00:53:34.755
And what about

00:53:34.976 --> 00:53:36.918
your embouchure?

00:53:36.958 --> 00:53:38.260
Which embouchure do you use?

00:53:38.780 --> 00:53:39.262
Pucker.

00:53:39.681 --> 00:53:44.085
So there's a big debate, isn't there, about getting tongue-blocking for tone.

00:53:44.206 --> 00:53:47.728
Do you think maybe because you're more melodic playing, that's drawing you to that sound?

00:53:48.268 --> 00:53:48.489
Yes,

00:53:48.670 --> 00:53:48.949
I think

00:53:49.010 --> 00:53:49.170
so.

00:53:49.510 --> 00:53:52.452
I think that was the different embouchures later.

00:53:52.853 --> 00:53:57.137
This, again, is a year 2000 onwards kind of thing.

00:53:57.577 --> 00:54:06.905
I'm not saying that players didn't use that before, but what with the internet, everybody knows about these different things now, whereas before, you picked it up and you did what you did.

00:54:07.226 --> 00:54:13.092
I think that the U-bend thing that no I don't think nobody ever taught him that that was right or wrong.

00:54:13.431 --> 00:54:15.054
He just did it that way, you know.

00:54:15.094 --> 00:54:21.001
And so many big Americans have got these big fat tongues, tongue blockers, you know.

00:54:21.362 --> 00:54:22.202
But I pucker.

00:54:22.503 --> 00:54:24.385
That's kind of how I am.

00:54:24.425 --> 00:54:28.369
There's certainly some beautiful things can come out of tongue blocking, mate.

00:54:28.429 --> 00:54:29.570
There's absolutely.

00:54:29.871 --> 00:54:31.954
But myself, I've always pucker.

00:54:32.545 --> 00:54:35.007
So you could talk there about you're not massively into gears.

00:54:35.528 --> 00:54:36.048
I've got

00:54:36.188 --> 00:54:41.172
a Fender champ that's been faithful with me, Neil, for 40 years now.

00:54:41.353 --> 00:54:43.596
Belonged to Brian Connolly of the band The Suite.

00:54:44.016 --> 00:54:46.318
That was Brian's amp, and I took that on.

00:54:46.818 --> 00:54:53.103
And apart from putting a new 12AX7, I have a valve guy now that looks after me from Scarborough.

00:54:53.543 --> 00:54:58.889
But basically, I'm using a basement for life, but I'm consistently searching.

00:54:59.289 --> 00:55:07.237
So if someone says to me, that's God's gift for harmony, I'll always say there's something else out there that's got to be better than that.

00:55:07.456 --> 00:55:13.364
But obviously because you're interested in playing melodic stuff a lot you're playing for a clean sound for a PA a lot of the time.

00:55:13.384 --> 00:55:14.123
50-50.

00:55:14.264 --> 00:55:41.856
If someone says to me play acoustic on this I like working off mic when I'm playing acoustic rather than on mic because I think that's a horrible sound when you get right on top of that 58 or beta I like the big 58s for acoustic harmonica work anyone that may consider investing in a beta 58 or a beta 57 for their acoustic work because it certainly sounds sweet as compared to the regular 58.

00:55:42.157 --> 00:55:43.400
That's what I find anyway.

00:55:44.039 --> 00:55:45.543
And what about recording?

00:55:45.902 --> 00:55:46.043
For

00:55:46.083 --> 00:55:50.750
recording, Neil, I leave it purely up to the engineer that knows the rules.

00:55:50.849 --> 00:55:54.996
Normally a nice warm valve mic for recording acoustic.

00:55:55.318 --> 00:55:58.563
And a mic in an amp up, they know nothing.

00:56:00.166 --> 00:56:01.889
Quite often they say to me, what do you do?

00:56:01.909 --> 00:56:03.731
Do you put a mic in front of that amp?

00:56:03.811 --> 00:56:05.494
Do you mic it from the back?

00:56:05.594 --> 00:56:06.717
I haven't got a clue.

00:56:07.297 --> 00:56:13.949
They're okay when they put the big mic in the middle of the studio and you're playing acoustic, but very few of them have mics in amp up harmonica.

00:56:14.753 --> 00:56:18.440
And what about any effects pedals or any effects you use?

00:56:18.882 --> 00:56:19.282
I do.

00:56:19.483 --> 00:56:24.353
I've just one that I use an older DD2 I think I'm using by price.

00:56:24.492 --> 00:56:26.657
Just a slight one, not a lot though.

00:56:26.677 --> 00:56:27.378
A delay pedal?

00:56:27.599 --> 00:56:29.041
Yeah, digital delay,

00:56:29.061 --> 00:56:29.202
yeah.

00:56:29.503 --> 00:56:30.846
So just a touch of delay.

00:56:30.905 --> 00:56:31.867
Just a touch.

00:56:32.369 --> 00:56:33.731
Okay, and then final question.

00:56:34.353 --> 00:56:36.938
Any particular things coming up or things pretty quiet now?

00:56:37.313 --> 00:56:47.182
Well, I just spoke to Dennis Greasy, lead singer with my band, and he said it looks like everything now is out until March next year.

00:56:47.603 --> 00:56:59.873
But one particular show that we had booked in a big church in Farncombe in Surrey, that was pulled out from March 29 or April 29 this year to be played next year, March 29.

00:57:00.153 --> 00:57:01.655
So tickets are all still valid.

00:57:01.974 --> 00:57:08.061
But that's now been pulled because the governors of the church area where we're going to do the show just can't risk it.

00:57:08.081 --> 00:57:11.304
350, 400 people in one room.

00:57:11.644 --> 00:57:12.485
It's not going to happen.

00:57:12.867 --> 00:57:15.889
I mean, we've got two nights booked at the 100 Club in January.

00:57:15.909 --> 00:57:19.153
350 people capacity over two nights.

00:57:19.253 --> 00:57:21.896
It's not going to happen, is it, in one room?

00:57:22.016 --> 00:57:23.599
It's definitely not going to happen.

00:57:24.019 --> 00:57:29.005
Officially, they're not pulled, but I just can't see it happening at all.

00:57:29.409 --> 00:57:35.014
A lot of the stuff still probably is advertised, but everybody knows it won't happen.

00:57:35.315 --> 00:57:45.224
The only reason that we did this gig on Wednesday was purely because the guy that ran the show said instead of playing it indoor, we're going to put it out in a tent.

00:57:45.543 --> 00:57:52.750
So he put it out in a marquee, put some tables in this big marquee with at least six or seven meters between tables.

00:57:52.849 --> 00:58:48.579
It was a huge big marquee, and we only had 50 people in there because that way he could get his social distancing in so we was able to do it problem is and it's like with this O2 arena you know it was suggested to me that in the O2 in the O2 they'll have one seat taken one seat empty one seat taken one seat empty the problem is with that you only sell after tickets the promoter needs to sell the venue 75% and make money and then on top of that a great point was made by Bjorn Alvarez who's the guitarist with ABBA the original guitarist and he said 98% of the world's people don't have it so when this all opens up again is it going to make them fearful of going into a packed arena I think this is a real real issue whoever will work again I don't know I really don't know.

00:58:48.599 --> 00:58:50.302
Glad I've done my work anyway.

00:58:50.523 --> 00:58:56.070
My best work is behind me, so it's there for people to hopefully enjoy anyway.

00:58:56.231 --> 00:58:58.914
Well, it's been great speaking to you, so thanks very much for joining me today.

00:58:59.074 --> 00:58:59.835
Thank you, Neil.

00:58:59.956 --> 00:59:01.277
That's it for today, folks.

00:59:01.617 --> 00:59:09.349
Final word from my sponsor, the Longwolf Blues Company, providing some great effects pedals and microphones, all purpose-built for the harmonica.

00:59:09.688 --> 00:59:11.211
Be sure to check out their website.

00:59:11.831 --> 00:59:14.936
Mark, for the last page, it's over to you.

00:59:15.697 --> 00:59:15.838
One, two.

00:59:16.769 --> 00:59:18.750
Music.