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Well, this month they've really had me little (big) feet running. And I mean running. First to your good young U.S. A mate of mine, namely men's designer Steve Lyons, and I decided to open a men's clothes store called Zoo. Well, up I went and over (the Atlantic) to help open the store and do a spot of modeling of some of the clothes we'll sell. It turned out to be a very hectic time, but since I really like the clothes we'll have, it's worth all the dodging and carryings on. We're really very happy with the way things are turning out there, and I hope you'll drop by sometime if you get a chance! A little while ago they had me running round London pursued by a camera. Well, not exacty running. Walking. Or standing still. Making like a tourist poster. Against shots of Picadily Circus, Houses of Parliament ... that lot. With me gawping at the scene (and a mob gawping at me gawping at the scene). All in the cause of a new disc called The London Look. They were making a little promotional film which was shown all over Europe where I've been touring (well, it makes a change from the States!). The film showed me looking at London and showed the viewers what London looked like and the disc was called The London Look and had me singing about the look of London and ... well, you get the general idea. (Brilliant, some of these boys in the record promotion departments.) But the point I'm getting at (cries of "At Last!") is that I really felt like a tourist! I mean, I was seeing bits of London I hadn't seen for years - if at all! And of course it's true that the average tourist sees oof a city in one week's visit than the average inhabitant does in a lifetime. In my case, it's extra true. Because I'm travelling 'round the globe so much. And this applies especially to the music sene. I said (didn't I?) that the British scene never seems to stand still. Well, coming home this time, I've been knocked sideways. I've been astonished, agog, agape, amazed, staggered, stunned ... to put it mildly, surprised. And what, I can hear you asking (three thousand miles away? You must be joking!) - what had caused my eyebrows to raise in semi-circles like tie-lines in music? The incredible VARIETY we've got! Just look at the bills posted up all over town. Or if you can't afford the fare to come over personally and have a look, permit me to tell you. There's a Bill (Haley) and his Comets pulsing out rock-and-roll in one place (and I still think he's one of the best at this kind of music). There's another Bill (Basie - better known as Count) putting over his great powerhouse big-band bluesy stuff in another place. (And you |
can play me Basie any time.) There's the Grand Old Man of Jazz himself (Satchmo, no less) topping (yes, topping) our charts with What A Wonderful World. There's a Spanish number getting massive radio play - the Eurovision Song contest winner (against 16 other nations) entitled La, La, La. There's the Greek Zorba's Dance getting a big new revival. There's the Israeli duo, Esther and Abi Ofarim, who've just had terrific success with Cinderella Rockefella. Plus, of course, a whole heap of established and new talent coming up in a seemingly endless flow of new sounds, new experiments. The British Tin Pan Alley (a street actually called Denmark Street, to make the whole thing even more international!) seems at the moment like a great seething melting pot of ingredients from every part of the world. And it's great. It means that everybody, but everybody, is at last opening out to what's going on around him. Instead of, as a few years back, putting down everything that wasn't the current in thing. It means too, that anybody, but anybody with real talent has today a greater chance of expressing that talent than ever I can remember. The fact that Basie and Haley, in their different kinds of music, can BOTH draw massive houses - the fact that both have been around for ages and can still attract - the fact that Louis Armstrong can come romping along (at 67!) and triumph at the top of the charts - THIS is great, because the cry of novelty-for-novelty's-sake has at last been abolished and people are now listening with their own ears and not going by what other people tell them they ought to hear. The fact, too, that complete unknowns (like Esther and Abi; like Massiel, the girl who sings the Eurovision song) can come along and get accepted immediately SOLELY because of their talent - THIS is great because it means that people's tastes are widening all the time. And its especially great because the established stars are now all feeling that the sky's the limit. That they are free to experiment the way they want to, with new sounds and new styles, and don't have to play safe and give the public "what it wants." Who knows in advance what it wants any more? The unexpected is the thing. And that's what makes the scene today such a vibrant, vital one. That's what makes it great to be a part of it. The Grand Old Man is right. So far as pop music is concerned, it IS a wonderful world! I expect I'll still keep running around the world for a while, but I hope to come back to America soon. And stop running and shop in my own shop! 'Till then! |