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Conversation: David Bailey and life with Squeeze
613 Plays1 year ago
Among those who are true and dedicated fans of Squeeze, David is among the top. Fortunate enough to not only see Squeeze live these past few decades, David has also worked with the band in many capacities, helping to run the first fan club with Jools Holland's mother June right up to the present day with his all-inclusive blog 'Packet of Three,' Join us as we stroll down memory lane, going to record shops, rain-soaked gigs and inside the vaults for a few surprises.
David's blog:
https://packetofthree.com
David's radio show:
https://www.mixcloud.com/TheLyricShow/
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Transcript
Introduction and Guest Welcome
00:00:06
Speaker
Hello, and welcome to Cool for Cats with me, Amy Hughes. We're inviting you in for black coffee and a chat about our favorite band Squeeze. This episode, I'm welcoming David Bailey, well known to the Squeeze community. Hello, David. How are you? Hi, Amy. Well, that's very kind of you. I'm fine. Thank you. How are you?
00:00:27
Speaker
I'm doing good. I'm doing good. I'm extremely happy to have you on the podcast for many reasons. But most notably, there are so many people out there who
00:00:42
Speaker
say that their Squeeze fans have worked with Squeeze who have worn many hats with the band and I think you're probably one of those individuals so I'm super happy that in my Squeeze-dom and I can go back many many years it's nice to to get a lot of people who just say yeah
00:01:05
Speaker
You know, nobody really says no when I talk about Squeeze. They're just like, yes, I'm there. And I've said that many times on the podcast when I ask people. So for everybody out there who is not intimately familiar with David and his associations with Squeeze, David, I'll let you kind of sort of take charge and tell us what your history is with the band.
David's First Encounter with Squeeze
00:01:31
Speaker
Sure. Well, as far as I'm concerned, I'm just another fan.
00:01:35
Speaker
So it's an irrelevance when you got into Squeeze as long as you're into them now. It doesn't matter whether you've even heard all of the albums, you're welcome to come along and enjoy the band as they belong to everyone. So whenever I'm described as a super fan, I think, well, I just like the music like anyone else.
00:02:01
Speaker
like anyone else does. I grew up in a house that had very little music. I'm from the north of England. I grew up poor in a northern mill town. My parents worked in shops and I went to my local school and, you know, the music that they listened to, my dad was into big band jazz, which, you know, the Venn diagram with my mum sort of overlapped with Shirley Bassie and she liked Nana Muscuri and the Carpenters.
00:02:30
Speaker
and her Venn diagram overlapped with my older brother who liked Led Zeppelin. But none of that spoke to me. So it was really when I was 14, February 1978,
00:02:46
Speaker
that I heard techno amoebas on the transistor radio. And it just blew me away. I'd never heard anything as beautiful and as romantic, anything as brilliantly composed, where every bar introduced something new, some new delight, that the words were superb. And I heard it twice on the little transistor radio and thought, this is the best thing I've ever heard in my life.
00:03:15
Speaker
And as I walked home from school, quarter to four in the afternoon, I thought, well, if I go home and I turn the radio on, and if I hear it again, and I still like it, I'm going to walk into town now. I've got my 75p and I'll buy a copy of the single.
00:03:35
Speaker
And I got in, went into the kitchen, turned the little transistor radio on onto radio one on AM, really bad, bad quality broadcast. And there was not a single word of introduction, just the very first opening bar of Take Me Out Me Out started. And I wasn't able to sit down, I just stood there looking at the radio thinking,
00:04:03
Speaker
Music will never be as exciting in my life as this. This is the greatest thing I've ever heard. So I walked into town to the Golden Disk.
00:04:14
Speaker
spent 75p, brought it home and that's really a start of a lifetime of loving music with too many words and you can't really hum the tunes. Which is how I like to describe the music of Squeeze to people who've never heard anything by the band.
00:04:39
Speaker
Let me ask you, being there and experiencing it for the first time, what do you feel, in your opinion now, made that such a revelation to
Storytelling in Music
00:04:52
Speaker
you? What was going on in the top
00:04:58
Speaker
pop era of that, of that time that just didn't really speak to you, sort of like, give me a back history of what was going on. And then this comes out, this song comes out, and you're mesmerized. I mean, you're hooked. So what kind of is going on? Well, I've been too young, really, for fully fledged punk. You know, the Sex Pistols just seem so angry and uncouth. I didn't get them.
00:05:25
Speaker
at that time. I was waiting, I was primed, I was ready for some music that spoke to me. And the things I loved were anything that was storytelling. I loved anecdotes, I loved long convoluted jokes. I went to the library every week with my mum when I was small and loved story books. She taught me to read before I went to school.
00:05:55
Speaker
So I was primed for storytelling, for something which was modern and exciting that wasn't old hat like my parents and my brother loved. And Squeeze just hit all of the boxes for me.
00:06:15
Speaker
I don't know, I went to the Museum of the Home over Christmas with my girlfriend and they had something written on the wall there. I took a photo of it and it really sums up how I feel about Squeeze. The quotes from Jude Rogers
00:06:37
Speaker
And she said, familiar songs take us back to our earliest years and do it quickly. In 2009, a Czech-American neuroscientist, Peta Janata, ran a study that proved that reactions to pieces of familiar music happened in the same part of our brains as the processing of our sense of self.
00:07:03
Speaker
And I thought, that's me. It's not just that I like squeeze. Squeeze have become part of the very nature of who I am. They're embedded in my brain. They're part of my personality.
00:07:20
Speaker
I've got two friends that I go cycling with every week and one, my neighbour likes the band, has a copy of Aji Baji, I take him along to the gigs, but my other friend just laughs at the band. He likes music that other people approve of him liking.
00:07:41
Speaker
That's something I've noticed about squeeze fans. They have less susceptibility to social pressure. You know, that need to like bands that other people will approve of is far lower in squeeze fans. You know, the people I meet like the music they like and they're not ashamed of it. You know, there's no such thing as a squeeze fan with a guilty pleasure.
00:08:07
Speaker
You know, we love our pleasures and we're unashamed of them. So yeah, I think Squeeze are part of, you know, have become part of my personality, is something very deep-seated. I would agree with that because it feels like you can leave them for a long, long time and then come back to them and realize, well, this was the reason, I mean, I'm talking you could leave them for 10 years.
00:08:36
Speaker
Remember them in your mind and your memory and why did I hook up with this band? What gave me so much enjoyment? And then come back to them, which I feel like right now for me personally is where I am Where I hooked on to them like you did I kind of left music, you know for a long long time and then went to see them in 2021 and that's when I had like this epiphany I'm like
00:09:00
Speaker
I still like this band. I don't care what they're doing, what kind of music they're making. I might have forgotten in the last couple of years, but something is happening here and I'm not quite sure what it is. And I'm imagining you've met a lot of people who've come in into many different
00:09:18
Speaker
entry points for the band and then they go back or they go forward. Has that been your sort of history about meeting other Squeeze fans?
Squeeze Fans' Diversity and Inclusivity
00:09:29
Speaker
Yeah, there's always a slight embarrassment that I was too young or I only got into them in 1987. And I always think, well, it's an irrelevance. Squeeze belonged to everybody. Nobody's a superfan.
00:09:44
Speaker
You can get in any route you you want and you can like them for any any reason that makes sense to you It's all you know intensely personal. I I think there's no you know mine's just one route into the band all routes to squeeze are acceptable Well, it's nice when you can also have a
00:10:07
Speaker
I'd rather say a long history with them, so you could say, hey, I went to see Squeeze in 1981, which is something you have done. And then relate that to somebody who didn't start to see Squeeze until, say, the early 2000s or maybe even just last year, let's put it that way. Do you tend to see that happening a lot nowadays? Do you see a comparison when you go to gigs with friends and say,
00:10:35
Speaker
I remember when they did XYZ date back in the early days. Yeah. One of the reasons why I started the website packet of three is because I have such a poor memory, but I have a method and it's a database. I can put any venue, any city, any dates, any month, and call up where I was, what gig I went to.
00:11:03
Speaker
So I know I went to see Squeeze in 1979.
00:11:08
Speaker
And that was really my first proper religious experience. They played It's So Dirty, my favorite B-side. And I was just transfixed. I stood there utterly transported. And when Glenn started that guitar solo, it was just one of the greatest feelings of ecstasy I'd ever had.
00:11:35
Speaker
I just loved the band and I managed to join the fan club and get a few pen friends as you did then with stamped dressed envelopes to the fan club and I soon found out that it was Julian's mum
00:11:54
Speaker
who ran the fan club. And I had quite a few girls and young women who used to write to me, and they're incredibly kind. I went to a boys' school, I had just a brother, and so it was my first experience of meeting girls. I had no idea that they'd be so nice, so kind, so welcoming, so caring, so interested.
00:12:24
Speaker
it was a revelation from going to school with a whole load of rough bullying boys. I loved it. They'd go and buy me the latest squeeze batch. They'd go and check out all of the magazines aimed at girls like Jackie and O Boy. And if they couldn't get a copy which had a squeeze poster in from one of their friends after they'd read it, they'd go and buy me a copy. And then they'd rip out
00:12:52
Speaker
the centre spread and send it to me, laughing that I probably didn't want the rest of the magazine. And so I built up some real friendships with really nice, caring people. I'd go looking for rare records for them. We'd share all the news and experiences of going to the band gigs and write each other long letters and
00:13:16
Speaker
I had one friend who just found out every band member's address, their mum and dad's address, would go and visit the properties, would find out their telephone numbers, would ring me up from a payphone and tell me they'd just found out what car Chris was driving and what its registration number was.
00:13:40
Speaker
It's funny to think now that she joined the police service, but it should have been obvious to me at the time.
Managing the Fan Club
00:13:52
Speaker
I was there, June, who was Julian's mum, answered my letters and said, look, I'm getting loads of queries from fans about how to find their records. You know more about this than anyone else.
00:14:10
Speaker
you know, would you be prepared to just answer a few letters for me? You know, because you know what to say. And I said, yes, of course, you know, just send them along. And she said, well, I'll always ask them to send in, you know, the postage, send in a stamped addressed envelope. And then if you could, it saved me a huge amount of time. So right from 1979, you know, the band, Julian's mum was getting me to, you know, write to fans, support the band, help people find their records.
00:14:40
Speaker
Um, so I remember one summer.
00:14:42
Speaker
I was incredibly bored and I thought, well, I'm going to try and find out what records have been released by Squeeze all over the world. I knew that there were different singles in America and I thought that was absolutely fascinating. So I phoned up A&M Records in the Kings Road from the home phone and said, hello, I'm Record Consultant, the official Squeeze fan club.
00:15:10
Speaker
Jules' mum had said I could call myself that. I wondered if you could give me the address of every A&M Records in the world, please. And they laughed and said, well, which countries? And I said, all of them. I've got my piece of paper here. So they gave me the addresses. And I wrote long. I created my own name. I created my own headed note paper.
00:15:37
Speaker
got all the addresses I wrote to each individual there saying I'm interested in finding out what Squeeze records have been released where. If you could send me a full catalogue, preferably send me copies of the singles. I went to the post office, put the right postage on for Japan, Australia, Canada, France, Germany.
00:16:03
Speaker
And I remember I was at work, I had a Saturday job, and my mum phoned me to say, you've got parcel after parcel here. And I was so beside myself with excitement, my boss let me leave work early. And I'd just been sent 26 records from Paris, France, with albums and singles that are only released in Denmark.
00:16:32
Speaker
promotional biographies and I got stuff from all over the world and so that was the beginning of my collection really. So it was hardly any surprise when I set up a business and got a marketing qualification and created logos and business names and wrote persuasive letters.
00:16:55
Speaker
I've had lots of education, lots of O levels and A levels and got a degree in postgraduate qualifications, but nothing was as useful as loving Squeeze and playing about with my hobby to train me as a 15-year-old how to do that.
00:17:19
Speaker
Well, it's interesting because there are many parallels to what a lot of people nowadays went through back with The Beatles and sort of the work that they put in voluntarily for the fan clubs back in the day. And that led to no matter it seemed what kind of education or path they led in life, those sort of beginnings of being responsible
00:17:44
Speaker
and taking the initiative on something that really is just a passion project, but you were entrusted with it led to a lifelong career, you know, kind of pushed you forward because you took such an interest as a teenager.
00:18:01
Speaker
in something that you invested so much of your time with. So I think that that's pretty cool. I mean, when you went to the gigs, what was the atmosphere like there? Were there people that you had continually met? And then you would say, I'm going to be at this squeeze gig. And you just followed the band to certain venues that that time? Yeah. Well, the first one I went to in Manchester,
00:18:26
Speaker
The capacity, Manchester Apollo, was probably about 3,000. I think they'd probably sold about 500 tickets. And the date had already been cancelled once, because they'd delayed the entire tour to try and finish recording Aji Baji, and it had overrun. And they'd broken down on the way to the venue, on the motorway,
00:18:52
Speaker
So they arrived late. It was November in Manchester and absolutely persisting it down. I was like a drowned rat outside. It was freezing cold. We were left for hours. And the atmosphere was terrible in the gig. It sold one in six tickets. The band were moody because they'd broken down and been on the motorway for hours.
00:19:20
Speaker
And yeah, so the atmosphere was terrible. People in Manchester didn't like them because they're a London band and none of my friends liked them because they thought they were cockneys. But they played incredibly well. It was a transcendent moment. But from then on, I started travelling the country.
00:19:40
Speaker
All my squeeze pen friends, normally slightly older girls, were really welcoming. They'd invite me down, I'd get the train as a 15, 16 year old, five hours across the country, sleep on their lounge floor.
00:19:58
Speaker
do the tourist bit around London, go to London gigs. And then I got invited to backstage parties. I was there with the country's first million pound footballer and soccer player to you. And having a great time. The first time I met the band, I was just going to see them.
00:20:26
Speaker
But a pen friend, Justine, begged me, please come along with me. I need to meet the band. Will you stand on a street corner with me? So I thought I'd be gallant and meet up with her at two o'clock in the afternoon, stand on a Manchester street corner. And we spotted them arrive in a minibus. So I waved and said hello, pointed to my squeeze t-shirt, went over there. Glen wound the window down.
00:20:55
Speaker
And I couldn't believe how polite he was and how interested in meeting us. And I said, this is Justine. She's desperate to meet you. Come and say hello. And we chatted for five minutes and they'd gone to the wrong car park and had to drive off. So the incident said, get on the bus, get on the bus. So, you know, the first time I met them, we got on the tour bus, carried on chatting.
Meeting the Band
00:21:22
Speaker
I went backstage, carried on chatting, there's a curly sandwich and a warm can of double diamond.
00:21:30
Speaker
which I think was lager. I won't tell you what it tasted like. They just adopted me and looked after me as a young fan, fed me, watered me, chatted to me, incredibly kind, looked at the collection and records that I'd brought along.
00:21:54
Speaker
Yeah, you know, they've always been really nice. You know, they're decent, decent people. Always treated me with respect. And yeah, from then, I remember I went to London and met up with Julian's mum, June, and she took me out to the pub, Royal Standard in Blackheath, and bought me my very first pint of beer. Illegally, I was only 16 and not having a meal.
00:22:23
Speaker
but she didn't seem to mind. Went to her house and her twins, Julian's younger brothers were rehearsing in the front room. So yeah, it was lovely. I felt, I had a calling, I had friends, I had a whole social network. Being a fan of Squeeze was not something I did, it was something I was.
00:22:51
Speaker
Would you say that there were a very few of you that would really kind of have started and have just gone through any iteration of Squeeze? Because I'm imagining it would take a lot to sort of hang with them as long as you can, thinking, this is a band that's going to make it. They're going to be huge.
00:23:17
Speaker
But what was it within you that felt, this is a band that I could really stay with no matter through thick and thin? Well, I think after buying Take Me I'm Yours, I didn't even know Bang Bang had come out.
00:23:32
Speaker
So it was Goodbye Girl that I bought next. And I thought, this is absolute genius. Whoever's writing this music, telling these stories is breathtaking. So I instantly went out and bought the first album before any other. And the first album became my favorite albums. I feel really lucky, really privileged for Squeeze to be my favorite band on the basis of the first album.
00:24:03
Speaker
you know, before Cool for Cats came out, before Up the Junction came out. So when Up the Junction, Cool for Cats, you know, when I got that album, you know, it just became part of who I was. And, you know, as far as Up to the Junction is concerned, it is Van Gogh's Sunflowers.
00:24:25
Speaker
It is the pantheon in ancient Rome. It is the hanging gardens of Babylon. It is one of the greatest works of art, which will still be talked about and revered in a thousand years. And for two young blokes in their early twenties from South London to have created something utterly timeless like that.
00:24:54
Speaker
says an awful lot about them and the time that they managed to harness, I think. Does that make sense? Yeah, because would you also say, too, that it just happened not only for Chris and Glenn, but it also happened at the right time as far as what was going on within Britain, maybe?
00:25:19
Speaker
Yeah, I think if you listen to what Squeeze sounded like live in 1975 and 1976, because really, you know, reasonable audio recordings of, you know, the live gigs in pubs and clubs, you know, there's a live recording of Gilson's very first gig with the band.
00:25:41
Speaker
And they're a heavy R&B band. You know, they sound like, you know, Doctor Feel Good, Nine Below Zero. They're a leather jacket, rhythm and blues numbers, three minutes, you know, a mixture of, you know, glancing, Elvis Presley, you know, covers with, you know, doing an Elvis impression.
00:26:08
Speaker
which is hilarious, or a mixture of their own songs or songs that Chris had written on his own and a few Beatles numbers.
00:26:20
Speaker
But it's heavy, loud, rhythm and blues music. And what was around in mid-70s, before Punk and New Wave, was Rick Wakeman and his dozen keyboards and everything had to be done by professional musicians and massively overproduced.
00:26:45
Speaker
They were just masters of the three-minute pop song and did it with a huge amount of energy So, you know, they were never a punk band, but they had that in common right because I felt like reading of that history at that time that there just wasn't a lot of You know, it was hard to scrape together a band more or less, you know, you just had what you had and if you had a if you were lucky enough to have a job and
00:27:12
Speaker
that's what you bought with your money was your gear, if I may say so. And then getting the gigs in the smaller venues, would you say that that was lending itself to sort of like a hometown kind of crowd? Had you sort of experienced that when you went around and saw those early gigs? Yeah, well, I didn't say the really early gigs. 1979 was my first one.
00:27:39
Speaker
But in the early days, most of the members of Squeeze had jobs. The band was what they did in the evenings. They spent four years together before they managed to get a record out, slogging around with all their equipment in borrowed cars or a manager's van. I found that there were lots of, there were loads of fans like me
00:28:09
Speaker
I'm not in any way special. Every one of the band members had at least five girls outside the flat at all times, desperate to chat and get their records signed and have photos taken. Besides being able to see them live and experience them live, what was that first experience like seeing them on
00:28:36
Speaker
the television, which I imagine, did that happen when Cool for Cats came out? It did. I saw them first when Technium Yours was on. They were on Top of the Pops twice in 1978, and then once again, but only as the play-out music.
00:28:53
Speaker
with the audience dancing at the end. I just lived every moment of it as if it was the very first experience, as if I'd been newly born, as if these were the first sensations in a strange world. I just couldn't get close enough to the TV and watching every expression, every note that was played
00:29:23
Speaker
Yeah, yeah, I enjoyed it. I've never been someone who's selfish or thinking that it's my band. So I want...
00:29:32
Speaker
the whole world to appreciate Squeeze and for it to become a bit of their personality as well, the more the more the merrier. So, you know, I've been to Squeeze gigs where they don't know I'm there. I've got a ticket is very back of the auditorium. I sit there and chat to the fans beforehand, you know, leave at the end. It's all fine by
00:30:01
Speaker
fine by me. I just want to be a fan and experience it. So let me ask you because Julian figures so heavily early on with you, especially on a personal level and his mother. What was your feeling, do you remember back then, as you may or may not have started to witness that Julian wanted to leave Squeeze?
00:30:26
Speaker
Yeah, the first big breakup really that I was aware of. Yeah, it was heartbreaking. Heartbreaking, the thought that someone who was so integral to the band, to their look, to their onstage persona
00:30:43
Speaker
Because he had always been often quite quiet and just playing boogie woogie along to their songs. But later on, by 1980, he was an essential part of who the band were, how you felt about the band.
00:31:04
Speaker
A lot of the early reviews of Squeeze, they criticized the band for having no stage presence. A band just arrived and played fast three-minute numbers one after another and then disappeared with minimal chat. And the music papers hated them. The enemy was the enemy, as far as I was concerned. And so were sounds. And the melody maker didn't really get it either.
00:31:33
Speaker
Squeeze weren't a political band, weren't punk, and therefore were to be hated. And the music papers just wrote about how much they hated the sort of people who went to see a band like that, rather than actually talking about the music.
00:31:55
Speaker
Julian became an essential part. Something snapped on an American tour and he just started doing 10-minute long monologues.
00:32:07
Speaker
over misadventure, introducing the band, talking nonsense, making it all up, insulting the audience, being just hilarious, all that extemporising was genius. So yeah, it was a major loss to the onstage persona.
00:32:27
Speaker
They're always going to be different after Julian left. Little did we know they'd go and make an even better album next.
00:32:38
Speaker
Exactly. The weird part is, and I don't know your perspective on it, so what happened was with the U.S., I feel like R.G. Barge was a little bit under the radar to be like, you'd have to be a dedicated squeeze knower of things to have gone to have seen them at that time.
00:32:58
Speaker
And we had various incarnations across the United States of what was then called music videos. So the launch of MTV, which happened in the summer of 1981, and then it kind of started from New York City, which was where it was based outward to the rest of the states, the first
00:33:19
Speaker
viewing that we had of Squeeze as a band was with Paul Carrick. So it was almost like we're starting from scratch. We didn't know who Jules was. And we saw this kind of soulful kind of band that kind of just kind of stroll out and took it easy. And you had a semi-familiar voice singing the song.
00:33:42
Speaker
So that was sort of the United States mass market introduction to the to the ban. So did you were you aware of that kind of perception? I mean, other than the fact of now we know in hindsight what was going on and who was helping them and who Paul was, what was your initial thoughts? Do you remember back when that all happened?
00:34:05
Speaker
I do, yeah. It's interesting because a lot of people grew up with music, TV, and I really missed out on all of that. I had no TV at all from 1982 till 1990, so I'm not someone who has any memories.
00:34:26
Speaker
of Squeeze on TV. I don't associate any of the music with videos. I never watched MTV. And so that's a whole other world of Squeeze fandom. So for instance, I've got all the greatest hits of Squeeze on DVD multiple times every time they've come out on, including VHS.
00:34:51
Speaker
PAL, NTSC, DVD, but I've probably watched their videos twice and that's it. If you ask me what a video to one of their songs is like, I probably wouldn't know. I'd have to go and watch it. So for me, it was an entirely musical journey, but I was well aware because I had American pen friends as well.
00:35:17
Speaker
who sent, you know, started trading cassettes with me and would photocopy, you know, undercover photocopying missions at work, would photocopy things like trouser press and Rolling Stone. So I'd get all of the interviews and, you know, a real understanding of how they reviewed a stateside.
00:35:43
Speaker
So yeah, I did understand that they were a completely different band to other people, which was great. It just meant I always had a different perspective to talk about with people who are friends.
00:35:57
Speaker
It's understandable too because it feels very Americanized when you talk about music television and the pervasiveness of this network just kind of plowed over everybody. It was just like blanketed after about a year. And it was the persistence of being able to get a lot of those bands from England who had already had music videos available. And I think that's what really
00:36:25
Speaker
You know, if I'm trying to put it in a nutshell for early MTV was that that's how they were able to make that big break is, you know, to be honest, they weren't still MTV still was not, you know, fully national. They needed videos to play.
00:36:42
Speaker
And they played them over and over and over and over and over again. So Tempted just kind of was able to be one of those lucky few that were able to be on nearly 24-7 at that time. So in a weird way,
00:36:59
Speaker
for someone of my generation. I graduated high school in 1982. I was 18 in 1982. So that's kind of where my standing with Squeeze was. I was like, this is a band that keeps getting played all the time.
00:37:14
Speaker
To be honest, like you said, talking about the music press, it was totally different here because the music press was very, very receptive, although they did tend to pigeonhole them a little bit. Even after, say, getting into the Madison Square Garden,
00:37:32
Speaker
time later in 82, but reading a lot of that early press in the United States, they were still considered for what America was looking at them from that prism was new wave. How do you feel about that?
00:37:48
Speaker
Yeah, it's always strange when American fans start talking about the knack and squeeze as natural bedfellows. As far as I'm concerned, all of that's marketing. You can call music whatever you want. You can talk about it at length. You can write.
00:38:09
Speaker
books and articles all you want, but basically musics for listening to. And you get an emotional and intellectual response to it if it speaks to you and it becomes part of your very soul. So yeah, it's just a whole load of marketing and not really who they are.
00:38:35
Speaker
Squeeze could have been so many different bands if they'd had a different record company, if they'd had a different manager, if they'd had a different girlfriends at the time, if they hadn't had a chance meeting with someone else. If you look at Glenn's demos or I was lucky enough to go into Universal's archives and listen to a lot of the
00:39:03
Speaker
recordings have never been released. The Cool for Cats album was completed and submitted and rejected outright and they had to go back in the studio and re-record the whole thing and the album didn't include Cool for Cats or Up the Junction.
00:39:25
Speaker
So, you know, if that album had come out, we'd just think of them completely differently. So yeah, it's all just an accident really, how they're perceived and how people talk about them.
00:39:39
Speaker
There could have been so many other different bands, but they happened to get the collections of songs that they released and got well known for being in a time and place called lots of things like New Wave.
00:40:00
Speaker
but I really don't take that seriously. They write beautiful lyrics, incredible melodies, and would have been hugely successful either on their own or together in any time in the last 70 years.
00:40:20
Speaker
I totally agree because it feels like you remembered that, you know, this is a band who writes, you know, if you put it in, you know, a nutshell, quality material.
00:40:30
Speaker
And we're trying to think back to the time period that the marketing aspect of the band took place, which was during that time period. And you're thinking of all these other bands that started up. And we always say they were hair bands like Flock of Seagulls and Duran Duran and Spandau Ballet. And they all had a presence here. But that really wasn't due to a lot of airplay, to be honest. It wasn't due to a lot of
00:41:00
Speaker
material selling of an album or a single at that time. So we had it skewed a little bit differently whereas I feel your country and despite the fact and obviously they came from the UK that there was a more personal investment
00:41:17
Speaker
in this band where it meant something to go out and see them and it meant something to go out and purchase their music at that time and therefore you felt invested. Whereas we were just, hey, there's this new cute lead singer or this cute guy in the band, he's got blonde hair, his name is Glen Tellbrock.
00:41:41
Speaker
And then it kind of just got, you know, glossed over a bit. And then it really hit hard with Sweets from a Stranger, where they do a video, which, you know, they actually, honestly, and Chris told me, hate. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
00:41:57
Speaker
Well, they weren't interested in style, they weren't interested in clothes, they weren't interested in acting, they weren't interested in visuals. They're songwriters who love being in a band, a live band and playing together.
00:42:16
Speaker
So, you know, it's difficult to get them enthralled by doing something, especially when, you know, the black coffee and bed video was actually recorded when they didn't know the cameras were rolling. You know, they had absolutely right. They had a board run through. After which they said, right, thank you. Oh, when are we going to film it? We've done it. We've got all we need.
00:42:42
Speaker
So, yeah, I was lucky that after Jules left, and my natural connection with the band through him and June, his mum, went, that's Christopher's brother.
00:42:57
Speaker
was associated with the band. He was their accountant, so he instantly got me in as a volunteer.
Working with Squeeze Management
00:43:06
Speaker
Before I went to uni after finishing school, I went to work for the band for a week. They put me up in a
00:43:16
Speaker
in a hotel in South Kensington, I commuted every day to Putney, went in their management offices and did all the filing, all the photocopying, you know, owned all the posts, went to the post office, chanted to the manager, you know, David Enthoven, who
00:43:37
Speaker
Then went on to manage Brian Ferry, Roxy Music, and some bloke who was in Take That, who became a megastar. What's his name? Yeah. So I went there. Robbie Williams? That's the one. Yeah, he managed Robbie Williams. So I chatted with him and helped them plan a tour. I did the letter to fans inviting people who were members of the fan club.
00:44:08
Speaker
to come along to Hitchin, the Regal Theatre, to see the band play, and it was a simulcast. So it was on Radio 2 in FM and live on BBC TV on, I think, a bank holiday weekend.
00:44:28
Speaker
So I was involved in planning to get the fans to come along and giving them free tickets. So we got an absolutely mental audience. I'm in the front row in a white shirt, absolutely drenched in sweat, having the most fantastic time for that concert. So yeah, that's how I sort of, you know, started really early, just volunteering to help.
00:44:55
Speaker
And exactly the same happened 18 years ago when I took redundancy from a full-time job.
00:45:06
Speaker
and started being self-employed and I only had about one day's work a week self-employed and I needed to to do something about that so I thought I need to learn some new skills I need to build myself a business website that's what I need a business website I'm going to do it myself so I thought well I can't it's too high risk
00:45:28
Speaker
to build that as my first one. I'll build another website. What can I possibly build a website for? Just as a dummy run. Here's what I found. Sorry. It's just as a dummy run and I thought I'll build a Squeeze website.
Fan Site and CD Reissues
00:45:43
Speaker
I'll get a packet of three dot com and I'll put my collection up there and from that point on, you know, band members, band members, families,
00:45:55
Speaker
fans just came out of the woodwork, started writing to me, posting me CDs, sending me photos, you know, everyone loved, you know, looking back. So from that point on I was, you know, running the website and from that universal records got me involved in
00:46:20
Speaker
the reissues of the CDs. So when the four reissues came out, amazingly, how about this as a dream volunteering job for a fan? Universal Music sent me a database of every tape they hold my squeeze. I was able to call up any of them from storage.
00:46:46
Speaker
They employed two engineers for my personal use. They hired in a tape-to-tape, real-to-real player, and put it in a studio for me. I went to London. We had to bake the tapes in a low oven overnight so that the oxide didn't shed from the old tape media. And then I could hear audio
00:47:15
Speaker
that had never been played in, you know, over 40 years for the very first time in multitrack. And I could say to the engineer, can I just hear the backing vocals to find out what they're actually saying in pulling muscles? Ah, right.
00:47:33
Speaker
It's suntan lotion. It's deck chair attendant. Okay. Yeah. I've always wondered that, you know, what, what a dream job. And then I could write the sleeve notes and then I could work with the designer to come up with creative ideas for the CD booklets. And yeah, it was an absolute dream. So yeah, it's been a lifetime journey really.
00:47:59
Speaker
right from my first invitation from Jules' mum to help out to being in the studio with Universal, just being useful I think is what I've been.
00:48:13
Speaker
That must have been, I want to backtrack a second because that must have just been mind blowing, like how it was with Get Back and The Beatles where you have like the minutia, the granular moments that you've never heard before and being able to hear that, that must have been a mind blow. I was wondering too, like how did the choices, how did the choice get made to do the particular releases that you worked on?
00:48:39
Speaker
Yeah, that was all my suggestion. So they came up with the albums and I suggested not doing them in chronological order, doing a mixture, having one out of the four, which would be a double CD.
00:48:55
Speaker
The same sort of thing happened when Glenn had all his demos from all of the years. He got in contact and said, I want to put my demos out. I was just going to bung them on four CDs. Could you have a listen and tell me what you think? So he sent me six CDs full of all his demos, some of which I'd heard before because band members had played them to me.
00:49:23
Speaker
And so I was able to say, no, they've got to come out in five CDs. This is the order. Don't release those. Fans wouldn't like them. This one isn't on the list, but it's a definite. It's stunning.
00:49:40
Speaker
and here's the titles you know you call this one dreams are made of this call the the other one the past has been bottled you know so just being useful being around um well one of the useful things i think is that
00:49:57
Speaker
I've never ever wanted anything from them. And, you know, because I've helped out with the social media occasionally in the early days, you know, if they want to go on holiday and then, you know, need to maintain it.
00:50:12
Speaker
And just every day, there's a whole bunch of people who want stuff from them. You know, they want stuff signed. They want a charity gig. They want to put their live recording up. They want to charge for their DVD. And it's so draining, so incredibly draining for a band to have to face that the whole time.
00:50:37
Speaker
was I didn't care about any of that stuff. If they want me, they know where I am. I'll always be useful. And I don't need or want anything from them. So I think that helped them be able to just trust me. I know loads of stuff that I'd never, ever tell anyone. I've got lots of music that I can't possibly share with anyone.
00:51:02
Speaker
but I share as much as I possibly can to share the squeeze love.
00:51:08
Speaker
Does that make sense? It's interesting. Yeah, because it's going to be interesting with the back in 2014. And of course, this is something the American audiences didn't weren't privy to was that those gigs that Glenn and Chris did sort of the at odds tour, which was more like a celebration, I guess of their 40 years together. Can you give me a little bit of how that all felt? I mean, did you get a chance to go to those gigs?
00:51:37
Speaker
Yes, I always go to as many gigs as I can in the tour. So the last tour they did, it was quite light. I went to four gigs out of the tour. Generally what I do is
00:51:53
Speaker
go to the one in Manchester so I can stay with my parents and look after them a bit. Go to the one in Oxford because that's where my best mate lives and I can take him along to the gig and we can go out and have a great time. Go to a local one here in Devon and my cycling buddy and neighbour will go to that. And then often try and get to a big London one and meet up with the other fans.
00:52:17
Speaker
Yeah, the at odds tour was great. I think it was different because, you know, it was a duo and it was heavily staged. So, you know, they were in their pyjamas. They started the gig in an actual bed together. They did do solo material as well as squeeze material.
00:52:43
Speaker
So it was unusual really for them to do that because something that's, I don't know, perhaps people don't know this, but Glenn isn't a nostalgia artist. He's not into appearing on 80s revival tours. As far as he's concerned, he hasn't produced his best music yet and he's a living, breathing musician.
00:53:07
Speaker
who loves modern influences, who's listening to every bit of modern experimental music, and although it might not appear to come out in what he does, writes with Chris. It's all influencing him.
Reflections on Live Shows
00:53:27
Speaker
So yeah, it was nice to get a little bit of nostalgia for the fans to do a joint celebration.
00:53:37
Speaker
rather than just being, you know, we've got to have a new material, new album. We're not relying, you know, not resting on our laurels, not relying on our singles 45s and an under. But, you know, there's still a band that's creative and happening now. And it really showed actually, when I saw them in 2021, that
00:54:04
Speaker
they were able to, and again, they're sort of appealing to my age group because where that population that sort of, in quotations, grew up with them, but I ran into a few people that were in their 20s that were aware of them as far as even newer music, had maybe made the entry point in 91 or something, they'd play.
00:54:30
Speaker
or some fantastic place. And then later on, it's now just, it is a name, but people want to hear them. They really, really want to make that connection. So it was good that, you know, that food for thought came out.
00:54:49
Speaker
and sort of kept them like, wow, this is a band that's making great music. They don't have to be like you said, and what Glenn despises as far as nostalgia kind of throwback types of appearances. So that was really just super nice. I mean, we're all kind of anticipating. What's it going to sound like? What's it going to sound like?
00:55:14
Speaker
But they've got a great band too. They've got a solid, solid band as a unit playing together. I would guess that that's just helped so much. Would you agree? Yeah, I think the band they've got now is the most professional band they've ever had.
00:55:34
Speaker
And that's a great thing because Glenn has real consummate musicians who are taking his compositions incredibly seriously and playing exactly what he wants them to play, which is what he's been striving for all of these years. They've got a set list.
00:55:59
Speaker
And a few of the tracks are done to click tracks because Simon's such an incredible character, such a powerful drummer. He does get excited and sometimes speeds up. So we have to restrain him.
00:56:17
Speaker
from that joyous enthusiasm that... Oh, no, really? You have to do that to... Oh, you have to do that to him? No! Just the tiniest bit to keep perfect pace so that everyone else can keep up.
00:56:35
Speaker
So yeah, it's the most professional outfit they've had. It's different in that there's less capacity for devilment, Glenn, especially towards the end of a tour in times gone by.
00:56:50
Speaker
would really start to stretch things out, would start doing a different song, would throw in an incredible solo. Every other band member would be hanging on his every guitar note to wonder where on earth the song was going next.
00:57:12
Speaker
And so there's sort of slightly less of that creative chaos and extension of songs, that sort of thing. But it does sound better than it's ever sounded before. So, yeah, yeah, I still absolutely adore seeing them.
Enduring Love for Squeeze
00:57:34
Speaker
And, you know, it's a religious experience, you know, that the feeling of
00:57:41
Speaker
absolute ecstasy of being beside myself when, you know, one of my favorite songs comes on. You know, when they play Wicked and Cruel and I'm just there, my heart's about to burst. And yeah, I feel, oh, my eyes are getting all wet. This is just incredible to be here and witness it. So yeah, it's been a lovely thing to spend a lifetime doing.
00:58:11
Speaker
And I'm so grateful that they're still there, still fit, still talking to one another, still commercially able to fill all of the big and medium-sized venues.
00:58:28
Speaker
and still have new people coming to them, discovering, you know, what a wealth of music and songwriting and storytelling there is. So yeah, I've been very, very lucky. You know, I chose well when I turned on that transistor radio and the opening bars of Tech Me I Am Yours came on in February 1978.
00:58:53
Speaker
I absolutely agree with you and I'm so happy that you were able to join me and kind of reminisce and give your unique insight into this band. So thank you for coming in and for going into this chat with me. I appreciate it. My pleasure. One final anecdote is in the late 70s, early 80s, probably early 80s,
00:59:20
Speaker
You know, I've such a keen fan and my social life revolved around the band. I remember my brother saying to me quite seriously when it was just the two of us. He said, you know, Dave, I think you take this squeeze thing a bit too far sometimes. And I know he's only trying to be helpful.
00:59:41
Speaker
But I remember looking at him and feeling absolutely outraged. And I said to him, oh, you do, do you? And I said, well, I think I'll be a grey-haired old man and I'll still think Squeeze are my favourite band and Take Me I'm Yours will still be the greatest thing that's ever been recorded. And, yeah, I still agree.
01:00:05
Speaker
And you're the gray haired, still thinking that take me on yours is the greatest thing ever. And they are the greatest band that have ever existed. Yeah. Agreed. Well, it's been an absolute pleasure to speak to you, Amy. Thanks very much for inviting me on. I've really enjoyed listening to the other episodes and you have the very best of luck. Squeeze belong to everyone and I'm delighted that you're helping spread the word.
01:00:35
Speaker
Thank you so much. It means a lot. I appreciate it. My pleasure.