Fact #137801
When:
Short story:
British pop paper The Melody Maker runs a feature about The Preachers, a band from Bromley in Kent, England, UK, whose fifteen year old guitarist is named Peter Frampton.Full article:
Peter Frampton : I was working on Saturdays at the local music store, which was actually a department in the big Robertson’s Electric Store. You could buy a washing machine, a record player. But, there was a music division and they went overboard and we had Gretschs, Strats, Teles.
We had the whole deal. This was 1964. We had 335s, 175s (Gibson Les Paul ES-335 and ES-175). If I think of all the guitars I used to have to clean and re-string every Saturday, my God they would be worth a fortune now!
I worked on Saturdays and basically all the top local musicians would come in and I would jam with them, in the shop, to sell them something. You know? This guy called Tony Chapman came in, and he was the drummer, at that particular time, of the band I was to join later, The Herd; different personnel, still the same band. Well, his story is this, he was the original drummer of The Rolling Stones. It was Tony, Brian, Mick and Keith. They had no bass player.
So, Tony went to school with Bill (Bill Wyman, Rolling Stones) ; Beckenham and Penge Grammar School. And he said, "Well, I know this bass player, and he's got a van, too." So, I think that was a big part of why he got the job. No, I'm joking. You know how big a van was in those days. Who wanted to put their stuff in your dad's car and possibly damage it, you know? This is the very beginning of The Rolling Stones.
Enter Tony into Robertsons in Beckenham on Saturday for a pair of sticks and he sees me jamming with some other musicians, you know. He'd left the other band, the Herd, for sort of the same reasons. And he says, "I'm forming this band called the Preachers and Bill Wyman is gonna produce us. Do you wanna join the band? It's a semi-pro band." I said, "Well, I'm still at school, you know?" and he said, "Well, we've all got jobs so, you know, it's not gonna be a burden. What do you think?" Then he said, "Come around to my house and I'll give you some albums to listen to and this is the sort of stuff I wanna do in the band."
Well, I go over to his house and he gives me, like, 30 albums. He gives me everything from Otis Redding's Otis Blue to Roland Kirk, Mose Allison, Kenny Burrell, Wes Montgomery, Miles Davis, you know, it was very eclectic. Some pop, some blues. Oh, yeah, a lot of blues. And it's like Friday night and he said, "Can you learn these tracks off these albums by Tuesday?" So I said, "No problem!" with the sweat pouring down my brow, you know?
So, I turn up to rehearsal and he's got some of the top musicians, he picked great musicians from all these local bands that had folded for whatever reason, and I was playing with The Cream of the crop from South London, England, UK. That's where I got the love of jazz, as well as blues. But, everyone was doing Bluesbreakers, with the same haircut, the long sideburns, basketball boots, and trying to find something that looked like a '59 Les Paul. I just thought it's so cool. I love Eric. I went to see him as often as I could. That was when we had, every place you drove in London, on every wall, the graffiti 'Clapton is God.'
(Source : interview by Steven Rosen, Modern Guitars, November 1, 2008)
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We had the whole deal. This was 1964. We had 335s, 175s (Gibson Les Paul ES-335 and ES-175). If I think of all the guitars I used to have to clean and re-string every Saturday, my God they would be worth a fortune now!
I worked on Saturdays and basically all the top local musicians would come in and I would jam with them, in the shop, to sell them something. You know? This guy called Tony Chapman came in, and he was the drummer, at that particular time, of the band I was to join later, The Herd; different personnel, still the same band. Well, his story is this, he was the original drummer of The Rolling Stones. It was Tony, Brian, Mick and Keith. They had no bass player.
So, Tony went to school with Bill (Bill Wyman, Rolling Stones) ; Beckenham and Penge Grammar School. And he said, "Well, I know this bass player, and he's got a van, too." So, I think that was a big part of why he got the job. No, I'm joking. You know how big a van was in those days. Who wanted to put their stuff in your dad's car and possibly damage it, you know? This is the very beginning of The Rolling Stones.
Enter Tony into Robertsons in Beckenham on Saturday for a pair of sticks and he sees me jamming with some other musicians, you know. He'd left the other band, the Herd, for sort of the same reasons. And he says, "I'm forming this band called the Preachers and Bill Wyman is gonna produce us. Do you wanna join the band? It's a semi-pro band." I said, "Well, I'm still at school, you know?" and he said, "Well, we've all got jobs so, you know, it's not gonna be a burden. What do you think?" Then he said, "Come around to my house and I'll give you some albums to listen to and this is the sort of stuff I wanna do in the band."
Well, I go over to his house and he gives me, like, 30 albums. He gives me everything from Otis Redding's Otis Blue to Roland Kirk, Mose Allison, Kenny Burrell, Wes Montgomery, Miles Davis, you know, it was very eclectic. Some pop, some blues. Oh, yeah, a lot of blues. And it's like Friday night and he said, "Can you learn these tracks off these albums by Tuesday?" So I said, "No problem!" with the sweat pouring down my brow, you know?
So, I turn up to rehearsal and he's got some of the top musicians, he picked great musicians from all these local bands that had folded for whatever reason, and I was playing with The Cream of the crop from South London, England, UK. That's where I got the love of jazz, as well as blues. But, everyone was doing Bluesbreakers, with the same haircut, the long sideburns, basketball boots, and trying to find something that looked like a '59 Les Paul. I just thought it's so cool. I love Eric. I went to see him as often as I could. That was when we had, every place you drove in London, on every wall, the graffiti 'Clapton is God.'
(Source : interview by Steven Rosen, Modern Guitars, November 1, 2008)