My Favourite Beatles Song
My Favourite Beatles Song
Dig A Pony – Gary Kemp
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Gary Kemp discusses Dig A Pony, from Let It Be. He tells us how John's snaking "I-I-I-I", heard on a Saturday-afternoon TV showing of the Let It Be film, gave him the spark he needed for one of Spandau Ballet's biggest hits. We also get into his latest book, 1967: The World of Brian Epstein and The Beatles, made with designer Simon Halfon. It tells the story of Brian's last year, through the 404 names in his address book, which Gary bought at Sotheby's in 2020.
- 1967: The World of Brian Epstein and The Beatles, by Gary Kemp and Simon Halfon – book and live events: https://kempandhalfon.lnk.to/1967book
- Gary Kemp on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/garyjkemp/
- Rockonteurs podcast: https://lnk.to/rockonteurs
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Original music by Joe Kane
Logo design by Mark Cunningham
Welcome to my favourite Beatles Song, the podcast where we celebrate the music of the Beatles with a distinguished guest. I'm Tim Tucker, and with me today is musician, singer, songwriter, podcaster, actor, and author Gary Kemp. Welcome, Gary. Hey Tim. Thank you for having me on. Great to have you on. And um people will know you from Spandal Ballet, from your solo career, from the Rock on Tours podcast.
SPEAKER_00Bit of Nick Mason as well. And Nick Mason, source of the world. Of course, yeah. So I entered that Pink Floyd world, which was uh probably as discerning as the Beatles world. Really? Yeah, as forensic. Yeah. Forensic, yeah. I was embraced in the end, but they do do a bit of that. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_02First memory of the Beatles. Do you can you recall that the first time you encountered them?
SPEAKER_00Well, I think it feels like it was always there, doesn't it? Really? Um I was born in fifth late 59. And so I do think, and I say this in in the introduction of my book, I I I I s I think I have a memory of them being on the Royal Variety performance. Uh some gags that were said before they came on. But uh it seems like I would have been too young because I only would have been three. But maybe I remember the chat about it more. It's it's it's hard to know if that's true. Yeah. They were definitely I was definitely aware uh of something about the culture that was surrounding the competition between the Beatles and the Rolling Stones. Because at some point I remember this, I was standing on the we we we rented one floor of a house, and I was standing on the landing outside our sort of space flat, if you like. Um and I was talking to my dad, and for some reason I thought it would really annoy him if I said I preferred the Rolling Stones to the Beatles. Because somehow I'd embraced this black and white thing that Brian Epstein and Andrew Lou Goldham had created, or Andrew had certainly created, this idea of the opposition to the Beatles. And and and my dad became furious because, as far as he was concerned, the Rolling Stones were an after to all his sort of working class beliefs of a bloke putting on a tie to go and work in a factory, which is what he did every day, and um and and so I sort of like I I kind of enjoyed that moment of uh of uh sort of frisson between my dad and myself, you know, about about a joint the culture wars of of Lou Goldham and Epstein. So there's that I think song-wise, for some reason, oh blah de o blah da kind of pop into my mind, but then I was really not buying any records, I didn't buy a single Beatles record, um, as they when they were released, as and when they were released. I my parents didn't buy records, and they weren't gonna buy Beatles records or Rolling Stones records, they they you know what we had was some Frank Sinatra and we had a Billy Cotton album, Wakey Wakey, uh, which had all stuff like you know, I've got a lovely bunch of coconuts on it. And um so the first Beatles or Beatles member records that I bought, Beatles members, can I say that? Uh uh was uh was power to the people or uh it's either that or it's my sweet lord, which came first. I'm not sure. So so but so I w I was buying their solo stuff, you know, because and I bought Wings, Band on the Run, because that was I was as I started to buy records from about 1971, um, starting off with T-Rex, you know, I I um I was only interested in what was being made in front of me. I wasn't going back into the past, and as far as I was concerned, the Beatles were a group that no longer existed when I started buying records.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, and and you mentioned in the book, we'll we'll talk about your book more later um after our song discussion, but you mentioned that you kind of went back later to explore the Beatles' career and their music in more detail, is that right?
SPEAKER_00Yes, um I suppose you know I was I was a kid of glam, you know, I was into Bowie and and I don't think there was a Beatles song on the Pinups album, you know, so because the Pinups album sent me back looking into the 60s for a bit. Mostly that was mod culture. So Bowie actually gets mentioned in my book um because in it's November 1964, uh Bowie, sorry, Brian puts together a Jerry and the Pacemakers package tour with Gene Pitney, and um and there's a guy on it called Bobby Shafto, but he ends up getting dropped, and he's replaced on the bill uh by a very sort of tight-fisted group call called uh Manish Boys. Um, and I remember they used to do that famous Bobby Bland, I Pity the Fool, and uh and of course the lead singer in that was a young David Davy Jones who became David Bowie. So so there's this sort of tantalising brush uh in a backstage corridor between uh Brian Epstein and uh the future David Bowie. Um which um I I I just want to add one more memory to the mix of when I was on my way with my parents to see um uh uh Dr. Doolittle in the West End, believe it or not, with with uh with uh Rex Harrison. And um uh and for some we we walked past this house and I could hear music coming out of it. And I looked through the window and there were all these sort of hersuit hippies really dressed up in sort of you know as like sort of Lord Kitchener's valet or or um Granny Takes a Trip vibe. Um and my memory always tells me they were listening to the Beatles, and I can only assume it was Sgt. Pepper's because obviously as we all know that sort of changed the musical landscape quite quite a l a lot, you know, and influenced so many people. Um I I didn't buy any records in the 70s, uh Beatles records in the 70s. I hadn't I had none in my collection. It was as I say, I went in from Bowie into Punk. Punk certainly didn't allow me to go back and buy Beatles. It was not until the 80s that I I f I found them. And and I and I found them really but in about 1982 with a rerun or uh a screening of the Let It Be film that was on on BBC uh one Saturday afternoon. And I happened to watch it and and that got me so intrigued by the band that um that I I I obviously started to listen to them and buy their records and and and and research their story as it were. Do the deep dive, yeah. And I became later on I think I became really obsessed with this story, the idea of you know this very potted short, punchy story of a band and the arc that it took and how grateful I needed to be because of it.
SPEAKER_02That's great. And did do you have a favourite period of the Beatles from the early mop tops to the middle folk psychedelia or the what I call the hairy scary Beatles at the end?
SPEAKER_00I suppose if I'm gonna dig out a record I feel it's really hard. See, I love Hard Days Night, and I think that's such a great film, self-deprecating, beautifully shot, you know, has a sort of neo-realism to it, has like new new way French movies do. Um I love the music in that. It's really hard to say I have a favourite, you know. I so I love that Beatlemania idea and John's voice, you know, and twist and shout, and um, you know, the fact that they were writing songs for the Rolling Stones, I want to be your man. I just that's uh sounds so great, but then the maturity of of of Revolver um is really impressive. Um I I I do I obviously love uh this psychedelic moment with Sergeant Peppers, but but I suppose if I was gonna reach for one album it it would be Abbey Road. Um even though it's a goodbye album, you know, I I just I think the quality of the music on Abbey Road is great, especially side two as we all know, and uh so I suppose it it is it is in the end, I would I would go towards post-rubber soul, really. Um and revolver onwards is is my favourite period of the Beatles.
SPEAKER_02So the hairy scary, the hairy scary and um finally, have you ever met any of the Beatles or their entourage?
SPEAKER_00Yeah, I met them all except John. Obviously, John was killed right as my band was about to take off. So, well, I played with all the others, um, even though just briefly. So I got on stage obviously at the end of Live Aid and would have sung the Band-aid song with Paul. And Paul is someone I'd met quite a few times. In fact, I remember meeting him that afternoon when he arrived and he'd been watching Live Aid and he and he gave me the double thumbs up and said, Oh, you were great this afternoon, I loved it. And um and then I've met him, I became really friendly with his daughters, and uh and I've met him over the years quite a few times. I remember being on a date once with someone and uh a first date, and uh we went to a club bar in um in in Soho, and and then she went, Oh my god, look, Mac has just walked in, and he goes to the other side of the bar and he's with a few people, and then he spots me, and she goes, Oh my god, he's coming over! And he came over and we had quite a chat. But so Paul, I know well, probably you know, obviously better than the other two, and then George and Ringo. I I played with um at a 1987 Prince's Trust um concert at Wembley Arena uh with Clapton and Elton John, Mark King on bass, and um and we I I had a spot with Tony doing through the barricades as well as um Clapton on guitar and Collins on drums, and and then we all got on stage at the end with with George and Ringo and and did uh with a little help from my friends, and that's quite a lineup us on video as well. So that was good. I remember when George turned up uh for the sound check that afternoon and he laid down the rugs and he and he got incense and he put incense on every corner of the stage, had that burning, so he was it was he was living up to his vibe.
SPEAKER_02That's yeah, that's how you want him, isn't it? Brilliant.
SPEAKER_00And then and then afterwards, we all went to some bar. I can't remember what it was, but it was Ringo and Eric, maybe it was George, but I can't remember, definitely Ringo, and we were all all drinking in some bar afterwards, and um yeah.
SPEAKER_02The song you've chosen to discuss is Dig a Pony. It was recorded in January 1969, written by John Lennon, credited to Lennon McCartney, and released on the Let It Be album in May 1970. It went to number one in the UK and the US, that album, so it was a huge success, as with all Beatles albums.
SPEAKER_00Well, I guess one of the other facts is it was pretty much played live because the the recording on the album is is is mostly taken from the from the the rooftop of Apple. And uh so it had that, and they hadn't you know a bit of bit of bit of history on that as well. Obviously, um the band hadn't played live since the end of the summer '66, finished up, finishing off in San Francisco in the American tour, then they become what we all know as a sort of studio band, and uh not concerned about whether or not they can reproduce tracks live. George certainly didn't want to go out on tour anymore. Um and I think it was Happiness is a Warm Gun where they attempted to do the do the track without any overdubs, and I think Lennon quite liked that feel. But it was really Paul's idea to try and get back to their rehearsal space of playing together, working out songs together, sort of recording them live when when he when he s when he they went into Twickenham after the White album uh to get back together with a film crew, you know, Michael Lindsay Hogg, and to try and really I think it was a kind of psychological uh attempt to to to bring them back together as as as the band who had certainly done more than their 10,000 hours, and were a great live band. Um, but they hadn't obviously played live for for nearly three years, and of course the film we we've the the let it be film the way that was edited, you know, it didn't look like it went that well. You know, there was friction between George and Paul and and John and Yoko's right by the side of John, and that seems very odd. And um of course when Get Back comes out, we all we all see, also we see like just a bunch of 20-year-olds having fun together, and who've had this incredible experience and created this amazing thing together, and they still are kids, they look like kids all of a sudden, which they didn't look like in the Let It Be film, um for some reason. But you realize the genius of McCartney at this point, um, you know, give him credit for the creativity that he was that he was bringing to the room. But but then when they get up and play on the roof, oh my god, you know, what a band, what a band, and they're playing in January. I mean, how they can even move their fingers, I don't know.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, but it's John says that at the end, doesn't he? Of this song, he says something about, oh my hands are too cold to play on, you know.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, and yeah, yeah, and yeah, and yeah, it's it, you know, they're all playing so well, and that you know, they've got swing, especially in this song, which is a bit of a it has a bit of a sort of three-four swing to it.
SPEAKER_01You can penetrate and it place you go.
SPEAKER_00So, why did I choose this? Well, I chose it because it changed my life in quite a big way. I um I'd had two albums out with Spandau. We'd we'd had um you know the electronic kind of fall on the floor journeys to glory album, you know, very much about the Blitz Club and that scene in London. Second album was a little bit schizophrenic, you know, chart number one, funk, um, still about the Beatroot Club, very much London-based, and um and and a and a B-side that was a little bit proggy and uh and and a strange route for us to take, but maybe I was not sure which direction I was going in as a writer. I remember going up to Scotland because I'd become really good friends. Sorry, this is a long answer, but I'm gonna get to why I chose it. Uh going up to Scotland to hang out with altered images because I had a crush on Claire, and Claire had become a friend. I think we all did. A lot of people had a crush on Claire Claire. There was a a lot of people howling outside her door. Uh, and and I like I love the guys, I love their manager, Jerry McAholm, really nice guy, and they played um Marvin Gaye and Al Green all the time on their stereos, boom boxes in the car. And I was like, Oh Christ, I've just made this album, and it's a little bit proggy here and there, and it's a bit difficult. And I was thinking, you know, I love this music. This is the music I always used to listen to. And I sort of wanted to write a song, a bit like an Al Green song, really, a kind of Marvin Gay Al Green had a bit of soul to it. I thought, well, I could, you know, we can do that. We're all old soul boys. What's this got to the with to do with the Beatles, you may ask, right? I was working on this song about the difficulty of writing a song for someone because you didn't want to be too honest. Why do I find it hard to write the next line when I want the truth to be said? And I had this idea, I know this much is true. That's all I had. But I didn't really have a melody that was strong enough. And uh Saturday afternoon, and I'm watching on my own, uh, for some reason, I don't know why, I'm watching the Let It Be film that's being screened on telly before it was pulled by Paul, who didn't want it screened anymore. And John does dig a pony. I think in the film, the first time they do it is in the studio, they're sort of messing about with it in the studio. And I loved the way he took the word I and he turned it into a melodic snake. So I've got my guitar here. If you I don't know if this comes out on Zoom, tell me if it doesn't come out. So dig a pony. You know it goes like that, right? Well, I can tell you anything you are, whatever. But it's that bit that I love that I picked up my guitar, and I'm in a different key for true, right? And it was that I which I took from John's Digger Pony, which has got nothing, it's not melodically the same. You know, but it's it it was really me listening to him doing the the hi hi that really made me. I just thought I'm gonna do that, I'm gonna find that. And I picked the guitar up and I and I wrote that hook in true. That song, Dig a Pony, is why I'm living in my house today and why I live the way I live today. I was taking the bat on from the Beatles, as so many people have done before. I um keep reading this story, and and I mentioned this in the book, you know, I might be read in bed reading the Beatles story again. I don't know what book it might be, another tale, another version, and uh and my wife can see me welling up and she says, What's what have you just read? And she's and I said, Paul just met John, and she read, Again? You know, I said, Judo, we wouldn't be living in this house if it wasn't for this moment. But there are a lot of those moments. There are, you know, maybe it's Brian's moment, maybe it's Brian in in on that November day when he walks down the steps of the cavern and decides one lunchtime to see the Beatles. Um that this band that he hears are playing down, you know, just a few hundred yards from his sh record shop. So maybe it's that moment, but there whatever it is, you know, maybe it's the moment that John John wrote Dig a Pony, you know, but whatever it is, it's it's it's all thanks to them, you know, because in even though Bowie might be denying their existence, if it wasn't for them, he wouldn't have been Bowie, you know, and he wouldn't have done what he'd done because I think the the the baton of pop music is taken from America to the UK via the Mersey docks. And and it's it's turned into something much more uh exciting, more visceral, more working class, more erstwhile, you know, that the the the American just couldn't produce well certainly not the white kids the black kids were in America but apart from Elvis who had now sold himself completely out to very naff movies um and you know there was you know this was rock and roll was was forming in in in the working class streets of England but starting off in in Merseyside that's incredible um I would never have guessed that lineage that's that's fantastic from that song but it makes total sense now I mean the the song itself is an interesting one anyway isn't it because it it it appears it's two songs welded together because there's the oh that one is you bit and um and then the sort of you know um oh you can meditate at anything you want and all that stuff. Well people say that but I actually don't hear that I think um I think uh lyrically it is I think lyrically I mean he's just just Lenin's playing around again with a load of sort of uh sort of mess meta nonsense really in the verses and uh but then I find that the way the structure great you know the way it comes it builds up to that chorus and he's really at the top note you know for the All I Want is you come on and you know he's singing this with with Yoko sitting there you know and he's he's he's found this woman who's gonna transform him and um and I think that that connects to me and I think it's it's a it's a experienced songwriter writing that going from that very low first intro vocally to to to like an octave higher for for the chorus and I I think it's um he I know he slagged it off later didn't he he said he thought it was rubbish but I I I beg to differ and all most songs are never quite timeless. Songs are pop songs especially but they are of their time and place aren't they you know it's we'll never know what it's like to hear Strawberry Fields Forever or you know Penny Lane for the first time when I spoke to Pete Townsend about Brian Epstein and he you know for the book briefly and and Pete said he rem he one of his greatest memories was Brian saying to him and Eric Clapton come down to the studio I want to play something they were at a party they were out and he obviously just you know went straight down to Abbey Road or maybe it was even to his house on a tape but he he it was to play them and he played them Strawberry Fields Forever on Pony Lane and Pete said when he heard Strawberry Fields he could not believe the sound he was listening to he'd never heard anything in pop music that was like it or anything in music ever. This was so groundbreaking and I said what did you say what did you say to Brian I said play it again and uh and then I said what about Penny Lane he went Penny Lane not so much but but I think it was just what he they'd say he and Eric were just blown away and then Graham Nash when he gets given a tape before an advanced tape of Sergeant Pepper's album he gets given that advanced tape and then can't stop playing it to everybody who he sees listen to this listen I don't he doesn't want to be in the holys anymore now he wants to go somewhere else he goes to the west coast of america and and and and joins you know that crowd you know and and and and talking of which uh Crosby says that he thinks the first he was one of the first people to ever hear Day in the life outside of the Beatles and George Martin etc and he goes oh man yeah I remember being in a in the studio and uh sitting in a chair and they wheeled out these two giant coffin speakers and they put me in between them and and when the final piano chord melded away so did my brains all over the floor you know and uh it was mind-blowing and and so for our our judgment is really is really difficult um all these years later yeah the context is everything isn't it in one sense the all I want is you is clearly about Yoko and the and the you in the other bit of the lyric is more about us I suppose isn't it the listener you you can imitate anyone you want.
SPEAKER_02Yes um do you know what I mean? So there's a there's an abrupt sort of change he can be free this it's partly his politics right I guess you know exactly and um there's some you know it's lovely wordplay but I've talked about this a few times with guests about how the Beatles get misinterpreted and I don't know if you've ever seen that clip at Tittenhurst Park it was it's in the Imagine movie where there's um there's a homeless Vietnam veteran in his gar in his you know garden his property Kurt Claudio he's known as and he came up and tried to talk to John John invited him to talk to him and and this is one of the songs he quotes remember the one um you can radiate everything you are you can penetrate anywhere you go I was just having fun with words it was a literally a nonsense song I mean Dylan does that anybody does it you know well maybe maybe he is talking about Yoko at that point you know um but but also this is scary stuff isn't it when people start to find conspiracy theories and they're joining strings up and they're convinced that it's it's being they're being sung to any other songs that you would mention I think she's leaving is is is such a wonderful song you know not only the the actual story of how they came to write the song but uh it's just the I like the way it goes to the back and vocals I think it's John isn't it who's who's be singing from the parents' point of view it's it's quite musical theatre actually we gave her most of our lives or you know and it and I think that is just structurally an incredible song.
SPEAKER_00I mean I think Norwegian wood is also beautifully constructed lyric. I love the lyric of that I remember hearing that as a kid and just imagining being in that spot you know by the fire. But um and I think you know everybody you know you can't not applaud yesterday because yesterday uses an old fashioned style of of song structure where it's AABA you know rather than and it begins with the title I absolutely love that as a songwriter and I think everybody aspiring to be a songwriter needs to have a look at the um the structure of that because it's not the normal verse verse cookbridge chorus mid-late it's um it it has this much more old sort of vaudeville kind of uh structure to it and uh and of course I wonder if to this day Paul isn't really secretly thinking did I nick that?
SPEAKER_02Thank you for listening hands again uh two cold so um your book which you've written or put together with Simon Half and you you you've written the text and Simon's put the images is that right?
SPEAKER_00Yeah that's right yeah um 1967 the world of Brian Epstein and the Beatles yeah tell us a bit about how that came about well it's it the entire book is based on on on Brian's address book from 1967 uh which came up for auction in 2020 at Sotheby's and um I ended up buying it now I don't buy any memorabilia rock music um I don't even buy other people's guitars you know I'm not I'm not into that something though I saw this in a sale and something caught my eye and I thought I've got to have it and I think it was partly what I've just said about this being the end of the innocence and and the the centrality of this you know that that it is this is about swinging London this is this book also reaches out into the power of the Beatles in other continents you know whether it's photographers or producers or promoters that are uh in Australia in England and you know sorry America and and the Far East they're all seem to be in there you know here's Colonel Tom Parker here's Orson Wells and Dean Martin you know he is uh he you know there's there's every facet of this man this th 360 degrees of Brian's life is in his address book because not only people that we all know easily like you know Clapton or whatever but uh names that I had no idea and have never been in any Beatles biography you know and I needed to find out who they were and this was maybe some to a large extent friends of Brian's or a slightly darker side of Brian but I I I didn't certainly didn't think of it as a book at that point when I got when I bought it in 2020 and I showed a few friends put it in the safe didn't want it to be out on the shelf it's very it's small it's covered in it's lovely black leather it's got red uh gold embossed uh alphabet down the side as little flags that you can you know just sort of so you can you can go to A or B or se uh H or whatever and most of it no half of it I'd say is typed and that would have been typed by his um uh secretary and then the other half is handwritten ninety percent by Brian sometimes by the people who are writing their own um names and addresses in and sometimes by uh Wendy Kitts and his first secretary uh who'd come back in 67 to to help them with Sergeant Peppers and and then also uh Joanne Newfield who was his current secretary and anyway so about 18 months ago um Simon Halfham came round to my house and and I have known Simon Halfham for for many many years we go back to the sort of early 90s he was a designer for Wham uh designed sleeves for George style council um uh later on um and queen and and oasis and co-produced the supersonic documentary he's an old friend he came around for a cup of tea and I know he's a Beatles nut and I forgot right at the end of he's just about to leave and I went oh something I'm I I want to show you and I dug it out of the safe and I showed it to him and he went oh my god this is a book why don't you know I find out visually who the people are and put it together and do the graphics and you you can find out who they are and and and and write about them and I think at the time I probably thought oh well this sounds fun you know I'll write a big introduction and then maybe it'll be like a set of sort of like encyclopedic Wikipedia who's who but as soon as I started I knew it wasn't it wasn't that book this had to be a book about Brian and I was being given a chance here to tell Brian's story biographically throughout through these contacts so it's a life in contacts and to try and gradually and like almost a series of flashbacks um reveal Brian slowly by through through these people and so it started to become a much bigger book than than either of us ever imagined. Oh it's really I mean you've succeeded brilliantly because it's so compelling it's somehow even though it's in alphabetical order so you don't really control the way you unfold the story in that way but so many elements of his story come out and the Beatles behind it of course I I tried to control some of the the the telling of the story in that obviously I wouldn't tell a story twice unless it was from a different point of view and it was it it didn't look right but there were key stories that I I tried to tell um spread out through the book and gradually tell so one of them would have been the merchandise story of the merch you know that that was as an ongoing problem for Brian and was in 67 become coming to a head with him being called over to New York to to to face a a huge legal bill of being sued legally um and um that was with the celltab guys and so I sort of tell that chronologically I did the other one and that weighed heavily on him didn't it that whole incident well in 67 there's a lot of things weighing heavily on Brian there's there's there's the the screw up with that there's there's the fact that um he's got an EMI contract to renegotiate and he's got his own contract with the Beatles to renegotiate um there's talk of Apple um they're not playing live anymore so Brian isn't involved in what he thinks is the sort of most important thing about being a manager and Paul has definitely taken over artistically in every way and it doesn't look like Brian's gonna have much of a say on any record sleeves going forward and he does and he obviously he's never involved in with the music he are he doesn't really turn up much to the the studio and on top of that he has his own sexuality uh inferiority complex his his I you know that he was feeling rather depressed uh a lot he was suffering from insomnia he was taking pills for that he was taking pills uppers and downers he he you know there there there are a lot of things that were weighing on Brian's mind and uh in the centre of this book i i i is is Melody Maker and this interview he does with Mike Hennessy for Melody Maker which is just a few months before he dies which is so revealing about his the fact that he can't find a relationship. And he's quite envious that the rest of the band have because his relationship was with the Beatles and now they've all got partners and starting to have kids you know and and and so and he he hasn't got a relationship. Now a lot of people say oh that's because homosexuality was it was illegal but what you find in the book is there are a lot of people in the book and a lot of people who work for NEMS who are actually very comfortable with their sexuality and even have long term partners some of which they live with. So I think it was more that Brian couldn't find love. He couldn't find a relationship that was that was what he wanted. And um so so yeah so so 67 is is when this book was when this address book is written um is is is obviously the year he's gonna die as well but there's there's a lot playing on Brian's mind. Yeah I mean I found some of the entries chilling like the uh Simon Napier Bell story of him ringing him the night he died right and leaving a message yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah I mean I don't want to talk too much about the ending because I've because it's quite that I discover something that is in the book that shocked me and it really did because I didn't think it was there and it's during that process of talking to Simon Napier Bell and um and then returning to the book after I think I've finished going through all the 404 names that are in it I find something else that's in the book that uh is very moving actually it was it was really truly moving and uh in the in the world of Beatles archaeology I think it was a breakthrough but um it all will be revealed if you if you if you buy the book by the book. I mean this this process for you it was this something new had you ever done research like this before no I hadn't no no this is this was new obviously well I say it was new I mean I've I've spent the last sort of eight years doing rock enters where I research music for all the you know 300 or whatever guests we've had on you know I I I I enjoy music research I've got a whole wall of of uh of of rock biographies and rock books and it's and and the history of music has always been one that I I I love and um I but I I wasn't daunted once I started I was so enthusiastic because you know as I say I wrote out these key elements of what of stories that needed to be told chronologically one another one being obviously the Diz Gillespie story you know he's this this um John Diz Gillespie who's this lover of of Brian's who sort of keeps coming back and ends up being very significant in the tale that was one that I couldn't you know tell different you know I wanted to tell chronologically the other concern was the death itself you know because obviously that weekend the Bank holiday august weekend when his body is found there's so many contradictory stories about that uh people all tell slightly different versions of it and that weiss who was a who was someone who was Brian's attorney in America and uh they started up um uh a separate company of NEMS in America to sign acts like the circle um he um he tells different stories different at different times about the same incident so when he's talking about Diz Gillespie um he t he tells one story one way and then to someone else and then a story differently to someone else you know and it's it's impossible to know what the real truth is but as for example on that night that Brian's found Alistair Taylor's autobiography he I mean he was obviously what the one that walked into the room first uh with a doctor you know he was for the for as far as NEM's people were concerned and he's a significant character you know Alistair goes all the way back to working in the record shop in Liverpool and being the person that Brian went to see the Beatles with that lunchtime um and he says that he phoned he then knew he had to phone Clive Epstein Brian's brother and dreaded it but did it and he describes in his autobiography the whale coming down the phone of disbelief. If you read Jeffrey Ellis's autobiography Jeffrey also was a gay man coming down from Liverpool to work for Nemes, friend of Brian's he says he called Clive and he remembers the whale coming down the phone so I I think the truth is everybody wants to be the centre of the story and and they've forgotten and in the telling if they were there or not. I found Don Black who was also there he arrived later the and and Don said you know and Don was obviously working at Nem's um and he said um uh that he remembers going the body had left uh with Peter Brown Jeffrey Ellis was there and he remembers Jeffrey making the call and he remembers hearing Clive's wail coming down the phone so um you know I think if you go to biographies of Brian they only tend to tell one version but I think it's important in in my book because I have these names that we can retell that story from different POVs and um and it's explain that there's a confusion obviously which I do. The Diz Gillespie thing I think is is interesting um and this is an example of I'll give you two ex the two examples of of of what sort of how the book intrigued me and the sort of slight detective work that you end up finding yourself doing. Diz Gillespie becomes this is is this lover famously in all the books you know he he he's he Brian falls for him he's an American he he um he's a good looking kid he um he then signs him to NEMS as their first actor um but there isn't absolutely no image of him anywhere on on in the digital world um no I mean I've never seen a picture of him and can't find one and he then becomes Brian's lover and while when when Brian's living um in his first flat here in London uh he he moves in for a bit um ends up holding a knife to his throat and stealing so many thousand pounds um off him or or or getting Brian to give it to him um he then comes back later on when they're playing Shea Stadium uh for the first time and um well he he he then um then then Brian asks Nat Weiss you know his his his buddy to um to to do to make sure that that Diz doesn't turn up at the gig and so he ends up sort of putting him in a hotel room and and I guess there was a security guard outside but then again gets paid money to go away. He then turns up right at the very end of the tour uh their last tour nine 1966 in in in the end of the summer and um they've just played Dodger Stadium and he turns up and Brian doesn't go up to um Candlestick Park because he he's uh 'cause but 'cause Dizzy's there and um he now thinks Diz loves him. Nat Weiss is there also who knows that's crap and um and Diz steals uh when one night when when when Brian and Nat go out on their own for dinner Diz steals uh Brian's attache case and then vanishes and says I'll you I'll you need to pay me so many thousand dollars to get it back. I assume that Brian's uh original address book was in that attache case and never got and he never got it back and that's why he's starting a brand new address book in 67 he may have got uh had a kind of a desk book but this was definitely a book that you could you'd carry around with you. Now he's not going on tour so he's not so he doesn't quickly need this book but at some point he feels that he's he does need a pocket size address book um and so that's my assumption I try to find Diz and I look everywhere for Diz and he's really the only single thing I can find out there in the book in Brian's book he's uh he he it's written John Roy Gillespie um Ohio and the address in Ohio in Ohio is a gravestone with John Roy Gillespie on it but the dates are wrong the dates are too make him too old so was that Diz Gillespie's dad in the book and that's the only way Brian could get actually in touch with him through through John through Diz's father or was was Diz John Roy Jr. And he came from Ohio this sort of is still hanging that that's still totally it's not conscious. The other bit of detective work you want to do is find out when the book was first started so um the book was initially written typed out by Gian Newfield um and the and so you can go back you can think of those names at the top of the alphabet whatever it might be to be the earliest that that the book was typed out and given to Brian before he hand wrote everything else in and Neil Aspinall is top of A. Mal Evans is top of E. Both of them are living at the same address that I become aware of so there was a book on Mal Evans that came out uh a year or so ago and in it um the writer says um that Mal and Neil moved in together in March 1967. So that looks to me like a significant date for the start of this book. Also Terry Doran is in the book down as working at Apple well Apple is only just about to start right so it was a name that was being toyed around with you know and and then there's also a Dr Flood in the book who is from the Priory and he says at Brian's inquest I only met Brian three months before his death so we have we have some dates that that make that that give us where this book is but in saying that Brian did write in a lot of people like Colonel Tom Parker and very hand that that he hadn't met for a few years.
SPEAKER_02Yeah I mean there's some surprising entries as well I was surprised that Keith Moon is the only Who member in there um and it's interesting that he's another sort of tragic figure isn't he Keith Moon as will become more evident you know I mean I I I I also love this this thing about I started comparing the all the looking you know making notes on all the addresses and and then realized that that um Gary Walker or Gary Leeds the drummer from the Walker brothers had the same address as Graham Nash.
SPEAKER_00So I called Graham Nash I happen to you know through rock on turns have his details and he said oh yeah you know Gary live with me for a bit in 67 so you know it was it was nice to find out this little bits of information. Brilliant I mean there's so I mean I urge listeners to buy this book it's fantastic and um this will be out yeah soon isn't it october the 13th it comes out and we're doing a bit of a tour with with we're we're you can get you can find out all from my link in my Instagram bio we're playing um we're we're we're talking uh in Bath in Brighton in Liverpool in London in Manchester the one in London is with Tom Holland from the rest of his history uh interviewing us at Conway Hall that's brilliant and um anywhere else you want people to go for to find out more about if you go to my link it's a it says it's like Kemp and Half on uh webs page you come to that's the link that would be I'll put that in there then yeah in the show notes brilliant yeah Gary it's been amazing talking to you about the Beatles Dig a Pony and your fantastic book 1967 thanks so much it's been great.
SPEAKER_02Oh thanks for having me on Tim good luck with the show thanks for listening to my favourite Beatles song. If you like the podcast please consider giving it a rating or review on your favourite podcast platform. This helps me to reach new listeners. You can follow the podcast on x.com instagram and Facebook look for the links in the show notes. Thanks to Joe Kane for the fantastic music and Mark Cunningham for the logo design. I'll see you next time