Be True To Yourself: Joey Molland Talks
“Mike McCartney is a lovely, lovely man,” Joey Molland says. “He’s a real scouser, isn’t he? I’ve met Pete and Roag Best at events, and I’ve had some real laughs with Roag. Real ‘on the ground’ laughs, you know what I mean? People say I look like Paul-that’s what they’ve been saying. I don't see it- I haven't been looking for it- but that's what they’ve been saying all these years."
These people first noted the resemblance in the seventies, when Molland-one of two Liverpool men in an otherwise Welsh band-started performing with the guitar outfit Badfinger. With his natural good looks, and remarkable taste in shirts (there was never a sleeve under pressure), Molland proved the most engaging of the three frontmen who sang for Badfinger. Pete Ham’s work was mystical, Tom Evans’ confessional, but Molland’s proved the most immediate to listen to on first sitting. “Wish You Were Here has become very popular in recent years,” Molland chuckles. “I’m normally allergic to the ‘favourite songs question’, but if I had to pick: LoveTime has a nice melody, I like the In The Meantime/Some Other Time track too. Out of Pete’s stuff, Dennis is just tremendous. You’re So Fine was a song Mike Gibbins wrote, and me and Pete sang it. It’s the only time that it’s me and Pete singing, normally it was Pete and Tommy doing the singing. Tommy and I sang I’ll Be The One, but I always thought that one was a bit corny. I like it, but it’s a bit corny.”
"I played a 1955 Telecaster on Pete's part of the song [Meanwhile, Back At The Ranch],” Molland continues, “before playing a Firebird on my song,Should I Smoke. I still have my Firebird from the Badfinger days. My wife Kathie wouldn't let me sell it, even though there were times we really needed the money. I didn't use it on this record, but I bring it out when I'm playing onstage for the fans."
"We're here today to talk with Molland about his first solo album in almost ten years, released on 16 October by Omnivore Records and boasting a star studded line-up of guest stars". Molland’s calling from Minnesota, but he remains as committed as ever to those Northern vowels. “My mum’s half Irish, I can’t remember where, but she had Irish in her. I haven’t been to Ireland in years, but we played a few times in Dublin and Belfast. Dublin was great: the beer was good, the girls were so pretty. So pretty.”
He finds it easier to discuss Liverpool, the city many proudly proclaim as the ‘Real Irish Capital’, (my apologies to any readers from Glasgow). A hybrid of communities, the city’s colourful, contradictory nature featured in Paul McCartney’s jaunty Penny Lane, Mike McCartney’s biting Edward Heath, and formed the basis of Molland’s triumphant gospel ballad Be True To Yourself. “I guess it is a philosophy. You’ve got to tell the truth, you’ve got to temper it, ‘cause you don’t want to be rude to people, but you’ve got to be truthful. I wrote that song when I visited my brother Frank in Liverpool. I didn’t really know Frank, he’s sixteen or seventeen years older. He was in the navy by the time I got to know him. So, this was the first time we really talked. We talked about all sorts: religion, politics, our own lives. We got on great. I went away with the words, and originally recorded it for the Return to Memphis album. Well, not really: we changed the chorus and melody.”
The “we” in this instance refers to Mark Hudson, Be True To Yourself producer and co-writer. “Mark sings like a bird,” Molland replies. “But it’s not his record, it’s my record [laughs]. Whenever I play a Beatlefest, he comes up to sing the high harmony on No Matter What with me. I didn’t really sing on the original. I played guitar, I added some ‘oohs’ and ‘ahs’, but most of it is Pete and Tommy. But I’m there at the end of the record.”
He’s all over Be True To Yourself, the most exciting record Molland has released in some time. The album, described by its singer as “beat music”, revels in chest thumping choruses, infectious hooks and some truly colossal displays of guitar effects. Positivity drenches the album, decorating a world that questions the legitimacy of the future (This Time, I Don’t Wanna Be Done With You) against the more precise solitude offered in the here and now (Heaven, Shine). Bearing in mind the degree of sonic ambition evinced on the title track, the album comfortably shirks any ghosts The Beatles and Badfinger left behind for a sound that is entirely Molland’s own.
"It's great that you seem to have taken an interest in the record," Molland says. "We’ve released Rainy Day Man as the first single. We recorded the album very quickly, in six weeks or something, in a studio that David Bowie once used. We spent some time with guitar overdubs, but most of it was recorded quickly. It's going down well, it's being played on the radio. Julian Lennon came along to do some singing on the tracks, he added some 'oohs' and 'aahs'. That gave me a lot of confidence that people wanted to sing 'on my songs'. He sung great. Julian also took the photograph for the album, and it's a really handsome cover. It will make a real collection on vinyl. And for guitar heads, I've used a John Lennon Epiphone Casino."
Be True To Yourself , a vast kaleidoscopic soundscape written as earnestly as Lennon’s towering Imagine, is likely to garner much of the critical attention, but the project holds another, equally formidable opus in All I Want To Do, a jaunty guitar painting written as concretely as any of the exhilarating rock pieces Radio Caroline exhibited in 1967.
"We soak up a lot of influences, but we'd never consciously copy anyone. Just the way it is, like a big sponge, but it’s the kiss of death to copy. I mean, nobody plays guitar like George Harrison. The Beatles had broken up when he worked with Badfinger, and he asked if he could play with us? He didn't have a band to play with. I basically handed him the guitar, and he and Pete put down the slide parts to Day After Day. Those guys were great to work with: Todd Rundgren, Chris Thomas, George Harrison. I'm saying everything's great, because that was a real highlight of my life."
This optimism feeds into music, just as much as the songwriter feeds into the energy. There’s Loving You, the singer’s great expression of love;Heaven, a power ballad every bit as joyous as Belinda Carlisle’s pop standard; and All I Do Is Cry, a boogie woogie number appreciative of the world he and his listeners live in. Much as he does in our interview, Molland-the only surviving member of the classic Badfinger lineup- shows himself to be every bit as eager to write, record and play as he ever did.
"I’d ask people to give the album a shot,” Molland asks. “I was meant to be on tour this year with Christopher Cross and Mickey Dolenz. Obviously, that didn’t happen. But I’m busy appearing on podcasts-I’m on one tomorrow- and hopefully we’ll do the tour when we can. I love playing in a band. I don’t know if you’re in a band, Eoghan, but it’s always great when a band gets better on the road. The more you play, the tighter you get, and the smarter the arrangements are. George always encouraged Badfinger to harmonise. He got us to practice together, and record together. That was the way it was done in those days. You see pictures of Frank Sinatra, and when he needed backing singers, they were standing in the same place. I mean, we could have recorded the voices separately: there was twenty four track, sixteen track. But George wouldn't let us, he made us sing together live. I think we sounded better because of it .The Beatles, they could harmonise."
Ringo? "Ha ha! I won't tell him you said that!"
Originally published on We Are Cult in 2020.
A Keith West Opera
Singer-songwriter Keith West is here to talk about his freshly published book, a sprawling compendium of anecdotes tipping its hat to the most revered decade in the countercultural world. In one of Thinking About Tomorrow's more ravishing endorsements,Eleanor Rigby writer Paul McCartney pays due attention to one of the sixties more dazzling forays into narrative: "What I take the influence back to, was Excerpt from a Teenage Opera, a record in the late 60s, by Keith West that was episodic," he writes; "That was really the one that was the biggest influence, and then lots of people started doing it."
"John Lennon liked Tomorrow's version of Strawberry Fields Forever," Keith West says. "It wasn't bad for a three piece. I mean, there is an overdub, but it's basically guitar, bass and drums: which, when you consider how much was on the original was pretty good....John Lennon would come and see us play at The Speakeasy. He'd ask for that one, and Paul McCartney liked Teenage Opera, which is why we have that quote in the book
In one of Thinking About Tomorrow's more ravishing endorsements, the erstwhile Wings frontman pays due attention to one of the sixties more dazzling forays into narrative: "What I take the influence back to, was Excerpt from a Teenage Opera, a record in the late 60s, by Keith West that was episodic," McCartney writes; "That was really the one that was the biggest influence, and then lots of people started doing it." Conjuring a spectacle through concrete, cinematic language, Excerpt from A Teenage Opera opened listeners up to a village thrust into a world where their Grocer has died on their doorsteps. His purpose, disregarded in life, has added pathos when mothers find themselves unable to explain to their toddlers what has become of their favourite visitor. Astonishingly intellectual for its time, the pop vignette opened up a world where psychedelia and parsnips shared a similar vocabulary. As with the best of art, the song came from a place of truth, and many of the experiences heard on West's magnetic performance came from the life goals he and his friends set for themselves. Just as his younger self committed that truth to music, now the veteran singer unveils his life truth to print.
“I thought about writing the book myself,” West says. “But putting together that kind of detail isn’t really my forté. In the end, Ian Clay did it. It was all pre-Covid, so I could meet him for a few hours at a time for an interview. It’s not easy remembering everything, and fans want that kind of information. Putting it this way, we were working every day, smoking hashish.. Ha ha! So, it’s not easy to remember everything. Steve Howe’s memory is quite sharp, funnily enough. He remembers many of the things that happened clearly.”
Transporting readers from the paradigms of a pandemic headfirst into the crisp, kaleidoscopic colours of sixties psychedelia, Clay constructs a world where information, invention and inspiration fuelled the whims of a generation crafting an image based on on comfort, colour and creativity. Amidst those searching for recognition came a series of bands eager to express an England distant from whims, woes and world wars. The guitars were louder, the shirts were flowier, and anyone abstaining from sex was making a greater statement than those who partook. Clay expertly notes that "women play a major role in the story; they fill multiple roles: as influencers, as inspiration, and – not quite as elegantly – as short-term distractions." Thankfully, the text espouses the virtues of the many women who sang -as well as lay- in the sixties, and any romantic intentions are written with a delicacy you wouldn't find in, say, an episode of On The Buses.
"Dana and I didn't make music together, because she was my girlfriend," West laughs. "She really did that on her own. She was about sixteen, seventeen, and I was only a little bit older. And before she was a musician, she was the British Junior Water Ski-ing Champion! I knew all the bands: Syd Barrett, Traffic. We did some shows with Jimi at the Saville Theatre. Tomorrow actually played in Ireland. It happened after I'd had the hit [Teenage Opera], and the guy who put us up insisted that we play it. We said,'It's not part of the set', but he said that he wouldn't pay us. So, the three other guys in Tomorrow had to come up with some arrangement for the stage [laughs]. I liked going out in Ireland, having a few drinks. I like Guinness, I still like to drink Guinness, and it always tastes better over there."
Released on July 28th 1967, Excerpt from 'A Teenage Opera (Grocer Jack) awoke listeners to the possibilities of rock narration. The Beatles probing Sgt.Pepper had flirted with the idea, but Mark Wirtz had grander ideas, and spun a tale of an England changing to the beats set by a younger generation. It was audacious, but Wirtz’s idea to give listeners an insight into the world he was crafting was a canny one.
“Mark and I liked the Pet Sounds album," West admits."We liked production sides of things; people like Phil Spector. I don't want to spoil things for people, but we just did things day by day, really. Mark gave me a tape, and asked me if I'd like to sing on it. He also told me that he had a few more, ha ha! It's not a typical pop song; it's not everyday you hear a song about a guy dying from a heart attack! EMI got the bill, even though Mark wanted it to be a bit quiet about what he was trying to write. So, we released that single and I worked with him on two or three others, but then I felt it had run its course. I heard Dear Old Weatherman, and I hated it! So, I walked away from the project. That said, I later found out from Tim Rice and Andrew Lloyd Webber that they realised that they could write something based on the strength of the single. And that was for Jesus Christ Superstar."
Lush in texture and ambition, the thundering trumpets recall an aesthete comparable to The Beatles’ own work. Between the instrumental breaks, West lunges in to detail the troubled spiritual journey of a jobbing man bearing witness to his last breath. Apropos to form, Geoff Emerick stepped in to man the sonic structure.
"Geoff was a lovely guy: The Fifth Beatle as far as I was concerned. I grew up on a council estate, and Geoff had a similar background. He was a straight, streetwise kind of guy; and wasn't a musical snob, either. There wasn't a sound he couldn't create, and of course everything was on four reel tape in those days. He'd cut up bits of tape, join them all together.. Geoff was young and we were young, and we couldn't really explain what we wanted in technical terms. But he worked well with us. We all came up with ideas for the track. I suggested the children for the chorus. The reason was...Well, I wasn’t going to sing it. It was too cheesy for a man to sing it."
Cheesy or not, the song made an imprint on McCartney, a man who frequently used his children’s vocal talents on many of Wings’ more whimsical moments. But West- although rightfully proud of the track- isn’t sure whether or not he had any sway over McCartney’s decision to do so.
"I think that might be reading too much into it," West chuckles. "Other songs have done it. The Wall used children on the recording. But it is a music business, and people often forget the business side of it, so our recording might have shown that recording with children could be done. And if people were influenced by it, then that's very flattering."
A critical triumph from the moment it was released, the song transformed West from jobbing frontman to rock and roll pin up.Much as it would be with The Faces and Rod Stewart, Tomorrow found themselves in the embarrassing situation where their vocalist was more successful outside of the band than he was in it.But if any resentment did indeed build up between Steve Howe and West, it doesn't prop up in the interview. "We were great friends," West says. "Steve and I lived together. He was a great guitarist to have in the band. I'd write the songs, and I knew I could trust him to play them. He'd do these amazing guitar runs: rhythm and lead stuff. And he wasn't a musical snob, he'd play anything we'd ask. White Bicycle is basically one chord, and I remember him saying, 'When does it change?' I had to say, 'That's it.' But he played it well."
They weren’t without their fans: Listening to their debut now, the cascading riffs, buoyant drum work and melancholic verses serve as the blueprint for neo-psychedelia acts The Dukes of Stratosphear and The Stone Roses. And if you ask Andy Partridge, he’ll tell you that the band encapsulated the late sixties. “ Andy Partridge sent me a tape once, and there was talks about us writing together at one stage. Everyone seems to agree that XTC should have been much bigger than they were-he's a real quality songwriter. All very 'Don't bore us, Get to the chorus! John Peel liked our stuff. He was a great guy, laid back like Bob Harris. Maybe not as laid back as Bob, but he had scruples. He only played what he wanted to play. And Pete Townshend credits me for putting together the first 'Rock Opera'.'"
The comparison is no mere window dressing:Lifehouse, like A Teenage Opera, proved to be one of the more elusive entries in the rock canon. Though neither project made it to their completed destination, the creativity that abounded within the writing and recording sessions produced some of the most indelible, and certainly some of the inventive, tunes in popular music. Time, as it didn’t then and won’t in a pandemic, hasn’t stopped, and neither will West.
"I've been asked if I'd like to write another book," West admits. "But let's see how this one goes first. I'm writing a lot of music these days: I'm using GarageBand to help. Some of it I'm programming, but other instruments-like the bass- I'm playing live. We're all doing things online. Steve is working that way, and I recently sent him something to add to a song. Streaming is a good way, but otherwise this Covid thing is awful [laughs uproariously]. But I'm keeping busy."
Originally published on We Are Cult in 2021.