Τον γνώρισα σήμερα - κάνει διακοπές στην Ελλάδα. Μου τον σύστησε ο jimmis_kos. Το σαββατοκύριακο έχουμε κανονίσει ραντεβού για ...περεταίρω γνωριμία και "τζαμάρισμα".
Η αυτοβιογραφία του (
‘Les Who?’) θα κυκλοφορήσει φέτος.
Αξίζει να επισκεφθείτε το
site του, να διαβάσετε τη βιογραφία κάποιου που επιμένει και να ακούσετε δείγματα της δουλειάς του.
Κουράγιο Les...
Πολύ ενδιαφέρον Παναγιώτη. Θα μας πεις λεπτομέρειες από τη συνάντηση; Φαντάζομαι πως θα είναι ξεχωριστή εμπειρία.
Το βράδυ θα ακούσω και τα MP3 που έχει στη σελίδα του, γιατί εδώ στο γραφείο τα έχουν "κόψει"...
With Britain still gripped in the depths of the Second World War, Les Payne appeared for the very first time, in Newport on the Isle of Wight. Born at his auntie Stella’s house at 36 Linden Road on the 22nd of August 1943, Les lived with his mum (Joan) and his sister (Val). Dad (alias Dan) was a sergeant radio operator in the Royal Corps of Signals helping to fight the war in Burma. Les never saw his father until he was 2 years and 3 months old.
Growing up in the forties and fifties was a very different experience to life in the sixties and onward. The term ‘teenager’ had not been used, jeans and t-shirts were unavailable and the only takeaways were fish and chips or faggots and peas! There was no television or washing machines, fridges were just for the rich, microwaves hadn’t been invented and many things were still on ration.
School for Les, and for many others like him, was an absolute nightmare. Open brutality from teachers, verbal and physical, was common, and unless one was academically brilliant, particularly on the island, with just one small technical college, there was not even a thought of further education. A pupil would be booted out at fifteen; indeed Les was only 14 in July 1958 when he joyfully rode out of school for the very last time on his old black girls bike.
In spite of the aforementioned, Les had a fantastic happy family life and enjoyed growing up on the Isle of Wight. He started work in August 1958 at Leigh Thomas in a provender mill, working as a truck driver’s mate. Les knew from a very young age that he wanted to entertain, having already run a Punch and Judy show and loved performing magic to anyone who wanted to see it, and sometimes even those who didn’t!
When Rock and Roll started in America in the mid-fifties, Les was totally smitten knowing then, with no doubt in his mind, where he was going. He was always singing; his friends can still remember him walking backwards to school whilst playing an old Spanish acoustic guitar. Les went on to do many different jobs, including a pool attendant at Seaclose swimming pool on the island and an officer’s steward in the Merchant Navy. After moving to the mainland, he joined a pro-band in 1963 called The Cavaliers but after many gigs and a big management problem with finance, the band dissolved and Les went back to a proper job driving a tipper truck.
He got married in 1965 to Brigitte (a nickname gained from resembling Brigitte Bardot). In May 1966 his first son, Crispin, was born. He continued taking demos of songs he had written to publishers/record companies and signed his first major publishing deal in 1968. In 1970 he signed his first major record deal at C.B.S. with a band called Chameleon. In 1971 his wife ran off with a music promoter and after more than thirteen years since leaving school and more than forty proper jobs under his belt, he finally decided enough was enough; it was time to become a pro-musician and was now really determined to go for it! There was no turning back.
On the 22nd January 1971 Chameleon had their first single released. It was called ‘Who am I?’ It received one play on radio 1 and got a good review from Anne Nightingale and then sank without a trace. C.B.S. seemed to lose interest and so Chameleon decided to move on. They had no problems in getting a release. Chameleon were now offered a deal from Bob Grace, who ran a company for Chrysalis called Butterfly Records. Bob introduced the boys to David Bowie and David came up with a song for them. It was called ‘Star’, later to be recorded by Bowie on Ziggy Stardust (see book by David Buckley, Strange Fascination). The song was recorded and produced by John Schroeder but was never released. Sadly on September 11th Chameleon played their very last gig.
Les determined not to give up started playing solo again, supporting bands such as Genesis, Mott the Hoople, Gary Moores’ Skid Row and many other big names of the day. Friend and producer John Schroeder came to one of the gigs. On the strength of audience reaction to Les, he decided to record a single; a song called ‘Jiggy Jiggy’. This was to be the first of many songs recorded by Les to have live strings. Unfortunately, John couldn’t get anyone to release it and so yet again hopes were dashed. More endless gigs, auditions and meetings finally came to a high point in 1972 when Les was signed to Chappells as a staff writer.
After recording lots of self penned songs at Chappells’ studio and at home, Les was signed to R.C.A. The first solo single was released on February 14th. It was called ‘I can’t help to feel the love’. On March 16th Les married his second wife, Roz, and by this time the single was Johnnie Walkers’ record of the week and a picture of Les and Roz made the front page of the London Evening News! The song received extensive air play on all stations, sold over 3000 in one week and then there was a miners’ strike and an oil crisis which caused a vinyl shortage and the whole country went on a 3 day week. There were no more copies made of the record for nearly 2 months and by this time the interest had waned.
Les had a second single released called ‘Don’t say goodbye’. R.C.A. had kept Les waiting for a year and it received very little attention. After much thought, Les said goodbye. With very little happening, owing to several staff changes at Chappells, Les decided to finish with them as well. In March 1976 John Schroeder managed to secure 3 days in Island’s Basing Street studios to record more songs with Les. The recording went well and again an enormous budget with the cream of session musicians. Island loved the songs but didn’t like the recordings; they said the magic of the demos had been lost exit Island Records.
Les had now been solo again for nearly 6 years and told Jake, a guitarist friend, that he was going to form a new band. The band was going to be called Les Payne’s Mainland Band, though later he changed it to Mainland. Les and Jake went through many line up changes but by early 1978 the final five had been decided. With lots of rehearsals and gigs under their belts, they were offered a deal by a small independent record label called Christy, managed by Peter Salmon and ex Deep Purple manager Rob Cooksey. A third manager/well known producer was Martin Birch. Things for Les and the boys were looking good.
Over the next 2 years, Mainland did 3 singles including a picture disc, a video and an album. The first single alone received a massive amount of air play including Radio 1 and Power play on Radio Luxembourg. Then they had single and album of the week on Capital Radio and hundreds of gigs ending with an enormous autumn and winter tour of 81 shows with Leo Sayer. In spite of the air play success and hundreds of gigs, the distribution of records was poor and the public were unable to get them in the shops. Les, with Mainland/Jake, Ade, Mark and Andy, went from wine bar gigs to 5 nights at Hammersmith Odeon. Sadly, with management problems and lack of funds, they did their last gig in Birmingham Odeon on the penultimate day of 1979.
Early 1980 Les started freelance engineering/producing in a studio in Watlington, Oxfordshire, still gigging as his main income, mainly solo and sometimes duos and trios. While Les freelanced at Watlington he produced or recorded hundreds of different acts, including Fish & Marrillion with their very first demo ‘Miss England, Scotland and Wales’ and produced an album based on the Greencross Code, with Dave Prowse and Tony Blackburn.
1980 saw the birth of Elliot, Les’ second son, and 1982 Ritchie, his third son. Also in 1982 Les signed a deal with Polydor, on the strength of a song called ‘Who would be the winner’ an anti-war song. Produced by Pip Williams, it included a 46 piece orchestra. It was recorded over a 2 week period (it took Les 15 minutes to write the song) and cost a staggering £23,000. It was released the time of the Falklands War and because of its anti-war content, it was banned by everyone (see Newsweek 1982). It received one play on radio 2 by Kenny Everett and then again sunk without a trace. Les continued doing an album called ‘Hero’ to go with it but it was never released.
Studio work, writing and gigs continued and in 1985, Les received a call from Geffen Records in New York. Out of frustration Les had sent some songs to America and someone at Geffen loved them, and his voice. At Geffen’s request Les did a show case with a band and had been offered a publishing deal from Warner Bros.! With things looking good, the show case went well; Warners loved Les’s songs. Roughly 6 weeks went by, lots of calls and hassle and everything fell through! Les never knew why.
In 1986 Les did a song with the Bury Jewish Primary School and publishing deal with Peter Ross. The song was for the Children in Need, called ‘Tell me a Story’. It was recorded in Manchester. In 1987 Les started a rock live night at the Pegasus in Marlow Bottom, Bucks on a Sunday night. It was very popular and lasted for 8 years. Also in 1987 Les met Pennie his present wife. In 1989 he moved in with Pennie, Libbie and Josh. In 1990 Martin Atkins offered Les a change to record a CD Album, it was financed by Tony Theobald of Round One Records and was called ’47 Summers’. It sold quite a number of units but again with no distribution it was a slow mover.
Then in September 1991, Les received a call from the organisers of the Harp Beat Rock Plaque. There were 22 in total, usually given to very famous names in rock, to commemorate a moment in rock history. On the 8th one they decided to give Les one for the endurance he had shown, also for over 5000 gigs and generally to represent all the musicians who had done music for a living but hadn’t become a household name. Les was nominated by rock historian, and author of Rock Family Trees, Pete Frame. Les was told to organise a gig/reception in October 1991. Tony Theobald, along with Les and Martin Atkinson tried in vain to get distribution or financial back up in case they got some publicity. They were told that there might be a local paper and possibly a radio station interested. No one was even slightly interested in helping them out!
Unbelievably Les received worldwide coverage. The day before the presentation there were 6 major TV stations covering the story. For a whole week someone somewhere was following Les, including Channel 9 from Australia. The media generally took the mickey about how many near misses Les had experienced. Ironically they had just created the biggest cock-up to date! World wide coverage and no way of selling his product even though the demand was unbelievable! Les became known as the nearly man! Continuing to gig and heading for the 6000th gig, Les and Pennie got married in October 1994. In 1996 Les landed and acting role in a three minute commercial. The ads were brilliant, very spinal tap. There were five in total. With Les being the nearly man, he once again got enormous publicity including playing Sky News out live with guitar and vocals – it put Les on the box again for a few weeks but still nothing long term came from it.
Les then got a part in a very low budget movie playing the part of a bass player, including some speaking parts. Les said it was the worst film he’d ever seen! It never even made the video shop.
Since 2001 Les has been going to schools all over the country, encouraging young people to play real instruments, as part of a team organised by Peter Ross and representing Yamaha. To date, Les is still gigging, but also has a studio and is very active as a writer/producer. He is currently working with Laura Smith, an amazing singer. He hopes to secure her a record deal in the near future.
For a comprehensive version of Les’ story watch out for his autobiography called ‘Les Who?’ which he hopes to finish this year, 2005.
Ενας πολυ καλος ανθρωπος και ειναι τιμη μου να γνωριζω τον les καθος ειναι ο λογος που ξεκινησα κιθαρα ετιμαζει ενα νεο cd το οποιο του ειχε κοστισει κοντα στισ 25000 λιρες οταν βγηκε επειδει ομος ηταν αντιπολεμικο δεν το παιξαν τα ραδιο την εποχη πολεμου με τα νησια μαλβινες ,τωρα τα τραγουδια τα εχει ξαναηχωγραφισει και απο οτι μου ειπε ειναι πολυ καλα
