Tintern Abbey: a value-for-money coupling

David MacTavish, Don Smith, John Dalton, Stuart Mackay

Few bands can claim immortality on the strength of just one 45, but the short-lived Tintern Abbey certainly qualify. The masterful Beeside / Vacuum Cleaner appeared in November 1967, but sold poorly. Its reputation has never stopped growing, however, and in recent years copies have changed hands on eBay for over £1000. The flippantly-named A-side is a woozy Mellotron-dipped ballad, while the real B-side is a stupendous psychedelic rock song, with one of the greatest distorted guitar solos of all time, courtesy of Don Smith. Though more press appeared about the band than most one-single-shots of the era, not much is known about them. Here's what I've found.

Tintern Abbey coalesced at the Overseas Visitors Club in Earl's Court, where singer / songwriter Dave MacTavish met guitarist Don Smith in late 1966. Smith brought in drummer John Dalton after meeting him at the Cromwellian Club in South Kensington, and the line-up was completed when MacTavish met bassist Stuart Mackay in a dole queue. They rehearsed at MacTavish's flat in World's End, and made demos of various songs in the spring of 1967, which can be heard here. These reached the ears of manager Nigel Samuel, who signed them up and despatched them to Cornwall to get their sound and act together, after which they signed to Decca and swiftly recorded a 45 with producer Jonathan Webber, probably in October. Here's the press release the label sent out to promote the 45:

And here are a couple of previously unseen promo shots (taken at the same session as the one at the top of this post):

And here's Don Smith onstage:

Here's an advance acetate of Beeside, named 'Busy Bee', on Larry Page's 'Page Full Of Hits' imprint, which would have been used for publishing purposes only:

And here's the actual disc, which appeared on November 24th 1967:

The band was fortunate to have a wealthy patron in the form of Nigel Samuel, a young publishing heir who was happy to splash his cash around the underground (he also supported International Times and The Deviants). As such, numerous adverts promoting the disc appeared in the music press - far more than most such 45s received. Here they are:

The ads did little good, though the band did creep into Record Mirror's 'Names & Faces' column at the time of Beeside's release:

Press reaction was favourable, though for some reason Melody Maker didn't run a review:

NME

Record Mirror

Disc & Music Echo

Samuel also appears to have paid Michael English (of the über-psychedelic design team Hapshash & The Coloured Coat) to design this extremely rare and valuable promo poster:

The band played a few shows to promote the 45, including one at the hip Happening 44 in Gerrard Street a month before its release:

The disc was officially launched at London's Arts Laboratory (at 182 Drury Lane) on November 27th. Melody Maker had only this to say, on December 9th:

 A further show followed at the equally hip Speakeasy on December 29th:

Oddly, despite these live ads, Don Smith has no recollection of the original quartet ever having played a concert in Britain. He does, however, recall them travelling to Amsterdam, where they played at The Birds Club - a trip this rare poster commemorates:

By the end of 1967 the band was being represented by the Ellis-Wright Agency (later to evolve into Chrysalis):

In November 1967 the band recorded further demos, but whatever momentum they had gathered was lost in January, when Smith was asked to leave (essentially because he was into uppers, and the others were more into pot). Dalton departed soon afterwards, and the duo were replaced by Colin Forster and John 'Willie' Wilson. Here's a rare signed picture of the new line-up:

And here they are in action:

You might have noticed that MacTavish has a honey buzzard (named Thor) perched on his shoulder. I asked his friend Tim Du Feu (bassist with fellow London hipsters The Open Mind) if he could shed any light on this, and he told me: "It was Dave's pet. The band lived in a mews cottage in Chelsea that was paid for by Nigel Samuel. It had a minstrel's gallery, and that bloody bird used to swoop down to catch ping-pong balls thrown by Dave. It was terrifying round there." 

Apparently Samuel used the band's house as a party venue, and expected the band to provide spontaneous live entertainment at all times of day and night (the lucky neighbours). Not many gigs seem to have been played beyond its walls, but Samuel continued to place ads (whose purpose is unclear) in International Times as 1968 wore on. Here's another:

and another:

and another:

In March, Forster was replaced by Paul Brett. Here's the final line up (clockwise from top left: MacTavish, Dalton, Brett and Mackay):

At much the same time their management was taken over by Spencer Davis, who was evidently looking to expand his interests (he also handled July). Here's the announcement:

On March 16th, Melody Maker announced the band's second single and subsequent tour:

The single did not appear, perhaps because (as a surviving demo attests) it was a boring pop ballad, with none of the genius of their debut.

Other ads appeared in the first half of 1968 - here are a couple:

The new configuration taped some demos at Tony Pike's studio in Putney, four of which were released on this EP in 2006 (click on the back cover image for more info):

Do What You Must and How Do I Feel Today? are said to have been pencilled in for release as a 45 (IT announced that it was 'in production' in mid-March), but it never materialised. The songs are pretty good, but - in my opinion - not as inspired as the earlier 45. In its 'Pop Supplement' of March 8th-21st 1968 IT described Tintern Abbey as 'an emergent progressive pop group coming onto the club scene', but in the following issue John Peel criticised their inclusion:

Though they'd received relatively prominent promotion and had a well-received single behind them, work seems to have been intermittent, and an LP that was reportedly planned for August was never recorded. That autumn Melody Maker announced that:

By the late summer, however, things had more or less ground to a halt, and by the end of the year Tintern Abbey had petered out.

Rob Huntington

I am extremely sad to say that Rob Huntington, with whom I published Galactic Ramble and Endless Trip, lost his life in a senseless car accident this morning, aged only 32. He loved books and the English language, and I hope very much that everyone who has derived pleasure from anything published by Foxcote will pay him the tribute of wearing a seatbelt and driving carefully. Rob was a decent-hearted, good-natured and whimsical fellow of the sort the world needs many more of, and will be sorely missed.

Electric Ladyland: three electric ladies

One of rock's little mysteries is why Track and Jimi Hendrix sanctioned such a tacky concept for the British Electric Ladyland sleeve (not to mention where designer David King and photographer David Montgomery found 19 such unattractive topless models). The scantily-clad theme was continued by top London boutique I Was Lord Kitchener's Valet, which promoted the LP in November 1968 by employing three further ladies to disport themselves in its window, as this cutting - from Top Pops - shows. Despite their noble efforts, in an age when the LP has sold for over £1000 on eBay, the sheer quantity of brand-new copies on display here will no doubt prove more titillating to collectors than the 'bikini-clad beauties'.

Sweet Slag: a few words from Paul Jolly

Following my recent post about jazz-rock oddballs Sweet Slag, I've just had a chat with their multi-instrumentalist Paul Jolly, as below. For many years Paul has run the prolific 33 Jazz label, which can be found at www.33jazz.com.

“I was working with free jazz bands around Luton, and got involved with an opera that Mick Wright (which is Mick Kerensky’s real name) had written. He also asked me to join a jamming trio that he had, so we became a quartet called Sweet Slag. It was a bizarre group of people. We were managed by a guy named Keith Edwards, who knew Eddie Kassner at President, so that’s how we got our deal. They wanted us to tone it all down in the studio, which was like a red rag to a bull. The album was recorded in two days flat. The front cover had rubbish on it because there was a binmen’s strike on at the time. No single by us ever appeared, just the LP. We did some strange gigs, including a tour supporting The Equals (who were also on President). I particularly remember a show compèred by Jimmy Saville at Kitson College in Leeds, where we had to play on a revolving stage. We improvised a lot onstage – Mick and I tended to do crazy instrumental workouts, very stretched out. Sometime around the summer of 1971 our bassist, Jack O’Neill, became a Jehovah’s Witness, so he departed and we reconfigured as a quintet, but that didn’t last long. The sadness about Sweet Slag is that we vanished into obscurity before people caught onto what we were trying to achieve – Roxy Music and others later did similar things. Oh well – happy slagging, as we used to say.”

Jerusalem: ‘aggressive music with a lot of rhythm’

Over the years several people have warned me off the sole album by British hard rockers Jerusalem, saying it was amateurish, derivative and trashy – but as I tend to think those things can be virtues in this genre, I recently picked up a copy. Reader, I like it a lot. Yes, it’s crude, dumb and heavy, and shamelessly cops licks from Hendrix and others - but its relentless riffing, tasteless guitar leads, caveman drums and over-the-top vocals / lyrics combine well with its garagey production sound, making it a definite keeper for me. 

Jerusalem were discovered in their hometown of Salisbury by Deep Purple frontman Ian Gillan, who signed them to his so-macho Pussy Enterprises company. Shortly after the nascent band had supported Led Zeppelin in Salisbury's City Hall (in December 1971), Gillan produced their LP in four days flat in De Lane Lea in Holborn, central London. It was released in a gatefold sleeve (with front cover artwork by lead guitarist Bob Cooke) on March 24th 1972:

This is what Gillan had to say about them on the back cover (note that he acknowledges that they are 'raw', 'crude' and 'in their formative stages'):

Here's a test pressing label:

And here are the finished articles:

In January 1972, after the album had been recorded, the quintet posed for some promo photos in the grounds of Hurdcott House, a pile outside Salisbury (the shot on the back cover was taken in the orangery there). Here are some more pictures taken that day:

The disc appeared in the UK and Germany, but no one took much notice. I have only encountered one review, which appeared in Gramophone in May, commenting that 'Jerusalem are young and very heavy, and their album should suit anyone who wants to give a sympathetic ear to the underprivileged side of the latest musical generation gap, between today's riff-sodden teenagers and their sedate, Dylan-loving elders. I find this band distinctly better than Black Sabbath, but who am I to judge?’ Sales were minuscule, despite the appearance of a couple of press ads in early April:

Nonetheless, Deram persevered long enough for them to issue a 45 a month later, coupling the excellent non-LP Kamakazi Moth with the lead-off number from the album, Frustration. The new song has a slicker, more polished and tight sound than the album, and suggests they could have gone on to great things had they had the chance. Here's the press release for the single:

And here's an ad for the 45:

 Here are demo and stock labels for the A-side, and an acetate of the B-side:

The single also appeared in a picture sleeve in Germany (reproducing the LP artwork), and - somewhat bizarrely - had an Italian release too, in this rare sleeve:

In June Beat Instrumental ran a piece offering the quintet's history:

By the summer of 1972, however, the dream was over. The band mutated into hard-rockers Pussy, but sadly rhythm guitarist Bill Hines died in a car accident soon afterwards. The other members are (I believe) still with us. The Jerusalem album is no masterpiece, but still a lot better than most early 70s hard rock obscurities, and I recommend it to fans of Black Sabbath, The Pink Fairies and so on.