Dragonmilk

ENTER THE DRAGON

I had not been doing very much; in fact I had gone back on the ‘milk’ to earn some money and also worked part-time at the local swimming baths, in King Edwards Park in Harlesden, as a lifeguard.

Before getting the job of lifeguard I had to take a few tests, mainly could I swim under water and retrieve a rubber brick from the deep end of the pool in one breath and also basic life saving techniques.
I had actually won a gold medal whilst at school for life saving back in 1963, my one and only gold medal. I did ‘save’ two people in my time as lifeguard, a boy that got into trouble in the diving pool and another young boy whose mother had let him get into the pool on his own only to go straight under the water and start to panic. I pulled him out and took him back to his mother who wasn’t that bothered about it only to say to her little boy ‘don’t do that again’.

This took up most of my time and for a few months this seemed to be the way things would go until one day I got a ‘phone call from Keith Mears.
I had known Keith for a long time although we never had actually worked together our paths crossed occasionally. Keith wanted to know if I would be interested in joining him in a comedy band with a guy called Paul Jay. I said I would think about but only do it on a part time basis. I phoned Keith back and said I would give it a go.
Paul Jay, as it turned out, was quite a genius in writing comedy and came up with some really funny songs but he couldn’t write music. We needed some body else in the band so we advertised for a guitarist (with a van if possible). We got one reply from a Welshman called Clive Richards had just been made redundant from Eglebert Humperdinck’s backing band.

Clive was living in North London, which was handy for me, and he had a van, an old blue Ford Transit. Clive and I ‘hit it off’ straight away and we used to practice Everley Brothers songs. Our voices, although not that marvellous, used to blend well. Keith Mears was living in Essex and Paul Jay was living on the Isle of Dogs, East London. We used to all meet up at Paul’s house and start to put together some songs. Paul’s songs were quite funny but Clive and I thought we could do better than this, so after only a handful of gigs we decided to leave, Keith also left. What happened to Paul Jay I don’t know but we never heard from him again?



Clive and I started going to ‘night-school’ to learn to read and write music. We were half way through the first term when we got a call from Pete Moss, another friend, asking us if we would like to join a working duo called ‘Dragonmilk’.

Clive and I went along one night to the Redcliffe Arms, a pub in Chelsea, which just happened to be opposite the ‘café des Artistes’ club that when I played in the ‘Flies’ we had gigged at so many times.
When we got to the pub the duo was in full swing and after they had finished we were introduced to John Carrington and his brother Alan. John played keyboards and Alan was the drummer and they had a very good sound. They wanted to enlarge the band with a bass player and a guitarist. We arranged to meet again the next day at a pub that they used to rehearse in and after setting up our ‘gear’ we played through a few numbers and everyone agreed that the enlarged sound was just what they wanted, so we became full-time members of ‘Dragonmilk’ this was to be a beginning of a long and fruitful working relationship with what was to be the best ‘live’ band that I had played in.
Dragonmilk continued playing as a duo whilst Clive and I learnt their repertoire and after a month of hard work we were ready for our first night as a four piece.
The date was Saturday 17th February 1973 and the place was Southfield’s College in Wimbledon. After an edgy start we soon got in to the swing of things and by the end of the night we thought we had done a good job, the audience thought so as well.
The next night we played at ‘Crystal Palace’ football club and that night really went well, after that the gigs came in thick and fast.

Before joining Dragonmilk, Clive occasionally went ‘home’ to Swansea on a weekend and one weekend I went with him. His Bother owned a nightclub and this particular weekend was the club’s first birthday and a big celebration was planned. It was at this ‘party’ that I met my future wife, although it would be some years before I made ‘an honest woman’ of her. She spent the evening trying to chat me up and we seemed to hit it off. Her name was Joan and she was Clive’s cousin, we soon became very good friends and talked a lot on the phone and met up when ever we could. She would come up to London about once a month and come to all the bands gigs. Dragonmilk used to play down in Swansea as well.

I had always been interested in recording and for a long time had an old ‘Peter Scott’ reel to reel tape recorder which I spent a lot of time trying out different recording techniques. This machine was very limited and in time I would buy myself a ‘Revox’ A77, a professional tape machine complete with a remote control! I started making recordings in my ‘front room’, putting down one track and then ‘overdubbing’ with another track on top. Using this technique you could put down about six tracks before you started to lose quality.
Whilst in the band Dragonmilk I started making ‘live’ recordings, using about four microphones and a direct feed from the PA system. I would set up the Revox on one side of the stage and operate it remotely. Having to play bass and sing the recorded results were a bit hit and miss but some good ‘gigs’ are preserved for prosperity. It was difficult getting the balance right and with only limited post-recording edits possible the results were not as good as I’d have liked.




I was relaxing one day on a rare day off when the phone rang; it was Chris Hedger, a friend of mine who played in a band called ‘Legend’.
‘Hi mate’ he said ‘are you doing anything tonight?’ ‘Not really’ I said ‘we’ve got a night off why?’
‘Do you fancy playing bass for us tonight only our bass player is ill’. ‘Okay’ I said, ‘right we’ll pick you up at 5pm’.
I phoned our guitarist, Clive, and asked him if he wanted to come along for laugh. Clive came to my house and we were picked up as arranged, so off we went to an unknown gig.
The gig turned out to be a pub in Harrow. It was only a pub gig but it was still going to be challenge. On the way to the gig we all went over some of the songs we were going to do.
After setting up the equipment on a small stage we all adjourned to the bar for a couple of pints before ‘show-time’.
It was getting nearer to going on but there was one person missing, the drummer. It was now time to go on and still no drummer. I had a thought and said ‘how about if I play drums and Clive plays bass?’ ‘Can you?’
‘I’ll give it a go’ I said. I’ve always had a secret ambition to be a drummer and tonight was, for one night only, a dream come true.

The make shift band took to the stage and we ran over a few numbers. The time had now come to perform for real. The night went as well as can be expected considering the right hand didn’t really know what the left hand was doing and that was just me on drums.
After the gig I was knackered, never again would I criticise a drummer for ‘slowing down’


The next night it was business as usual with ‘Dragonmilk’ and wasn’t I relieved, back in the safe hands of playing bass along side a real drummer!
I never did play drums again, except for ‘knocking around’ in recording studios .

Dragonmilk started to write and record more original songs, most of our recordings were done in West Hampstead at Ivan Berg’s studio. This was a small 4 track-recording studio made out of a converted garage. Although small we managed to get down some fairly good stuff. The band had been working on a themed album of ‘mythological beasts’ songs such as The Dragon, The Gorgon, Salamander, Chiron, Phoenix and the Sphinx were among the short-listed titles for the album.

We weren’t under contract to any record company but quite by chance Ivan Berg was contracted to produce a number of children’s cassettes tapes for sale via ‘The Times’ newspaper and it didn’t him long to ask us if we wanted to have our album released in this way. We jumped at the chance and for the next few weeks, whenever we had time, we went down to the studio to work on the album.

It was eventually released in 1973 under the title of ‘LION AND THE UNICORN’ only on cassette but some years later I managed to get it released on CD by ‘Kissingspell’ records under the same title.

Nigel soon decided to leave the band just as we had signed to play a month long residency in Lubeck in Germany. By this time I had bought a VW van from Adrian Gunn, a friend of the bands, and had it kitted out with 3 aircraft seats as well as the 2 at the front so 5 people could travel in relative comfort.
I also fitted the van with a full-length roof rack so all our equipment fitted in one vehicle.

I made a phone call to Keith Mears, a friend I had known for a long time.
Keith was a drummer whom I had worked with in the Paul Jay Band together with Clive Richards, and before that Keith used to play in a harmony band called ‘Playground’.

‘Playground’ were involved in a Road traffic accident in Scotland where Keith was badly injured and sadly their bass-player was killed. I had driven up to Gretna Green to pick up their equipment from the local police station and bought it back to Essex for them after which Keith and I became good friends.
I asked Keith if he was doing anything and how did he fancy a month in Germany? He jumped at the chance and it wasn’t long before we were off on the road to Germany.

After a few preperations for the long trip to Germany , fitting a large roof rack to the van etc. it wasn't long before we were on the ferry to Belgium.

To be continued!! shortly I hope