With the Beatles
Page 21
Elton used to beg me to come to some of his gigs – he was only singing in pubs in those days – just to fill out the audience a little. He was that keen to get started, he even thought one or two more people would help swell the crowds. ‘Bring the missus and bring some friends,’ he’d say. Elton deserves all the success he’s had since then, because he really worked hard. He wasn’t proud. If I had any guests in the office, he was always happy enough to go and make the coffee without being asked.
My big idea was to advertise Elton on London buses. He had this wonderful album called Skyline Pigeon and I took advertising space on the back of 100 London buses. I thought it looked pretty dramatic but it was some time later before Elton John became a household name.
It was virtually hopeless trying to get publicity for unknown artists and I didn’t seem to have any discernible gift for PR work. Dick only gave me the job out of kindness. But it wasn’t working out and Dick and I had a friendly meeting and decided it was time for me to move on. I then worked for Saga Records with a guy called Marcel Rodd who I found too difficult to work for.
I saw a job advertised working for Morgan Grampian magazines as a project manager and I did that for a long time until Lesley and I spotted a chance to get out of London altogether running a craft centre and tea rooms in Derbyshire.
We saw an advert in the Times for a middle-aged couple to run this nice little profit-sharing business. We got the job and worked our fingers to the bone but it wasn’t financially worthwhile.
We scraped enough money together to buy a house thanks to a loan from my father-in-law and I began a round of depressing labouring jobs. I’ve shovelled lead, made machine knives, washed pots in pubs. I’m not proud or very well qualified.
The Beatles were my life as a young man. I loved them all and I’m still trying not to be bitter about how I was treated in the end. I risked my marriage and I ruined my health. I was so determined to get the job done I wouldn’t take a holiday, and I will always believe it is because of that that I contracted glandular fever, which laid me really low for a long time. But I still wouldn’t have missed it for anything.
The Beatles took the piss out of the world for eight-and-a-half years. And when it stopped, I think a lot of fun went out of many people’s lives. There is no question that as pop musicians, the Beatles were the best there has ever been, but as people it was difficult for them to live up to that accolade.
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First published in 2003
This edition published 2012
ISBN: 978 1 84358 349 3
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