Dear reader, I must have been writing this column too long because I
keep seeing AAA musicians everywhere, even in the most unlikeliest of places! Why
just this morning there I was, minding my own business and watching series six
of ‘Bewitched’ (the classic show made at the same time and featuring many of
the same cast as The Monkees) when who should pop up playing ‘teen idols’ than
Monkees writers Boyce and Hart! (They were pretty good too – perhaps they
should have been half of The Monkees?!) And then straight after who should pop
up on an episode of Columbo than Johnny Cash playing – of all things – a
country-rock guitarist?! Madness! What’s even more alarming is that it’s all
true – both the two I’ve mentioned and the following100% genuine cameos by AAA
bands in places you’d never expect!
1) Musical cameos in
films (The Hollies in ‘It’s All Over Town’ 1964 and The Small Faces in
‘Dateline Diamonds’ 1966): It’s obvious isn’t it? A film about motorbike gangs starring
under-rated comedian Willie Rushton with no real plot that seems to have
invented the ‘road’ movie four years before ‘Easy Rider’. Just what this film
needs is a soundtrack by an impossibly young looking Hollies, who just happen
to be singing at a club when the bikers roar past. And that’s that, there’s no
real mention as to what The Hollies are doing and they’re never mentioned again
until the end credits of the film. Still, get a load of how young Graham Nash
is – and what teeth! The Small Faces film is similar, although at least this
plot about smuggling diamonds inside an amplifier makes more thematic sense.
Alas The Small faces are going through their ‘directionless’ phase in-between
scoring big with ‘All Or Nothing’ and reviving their career with ‘Itchycoo
Park’ so the late-Decca era music they play isn’t among their best. Still, this
is the youngest footage we have of the band in full flight during the Jimmy
Winstun years and as such is fascinating! Both films available on DVD, but
they’re pricey and hideously short, so beware.
2) Musical cameos in
established science-fiction television series (The Beatles in ‘Dr Who’ 1965):The story is ‘The
Chase’, the episode number one and the Tardis crew is possibly the best ever – with
the original and best Doctor William Hartnell still joined by the
schoolteachers you wish you’d had Ian and Barbara and with the under-rated
resourceful Vicki replacing the squawking terrified screamer that was Susan, The
event is a new television that the Doctor’s just ‘borrowed’ from the Zarbi –
with a bit of tweaking it shows whatever the people want to see: Shakespeare,
Queen Elizabeth and The Beatles (the television thingy seems to have tuned into
the band’s 1965 appearance on TOTP miming to ‘Ticket To Ride’). This is a huge
thing for TV in 1965 – far from being just ‘a craze’ The Beatles are placed on
the same level as monarchs and Shakespeare (well, they’re more important then
either if you ask me, but by 1965 standards this is amazingly progressive
stuff) and Vicki, a character from the 22nd century, has not only
heard of their ‘classical music’ (as she calls it), but they’re the people she
most wants to see in the whole wide galaxy. It’s as if the production team
wanted British viewers of 1965 to believe they were around in the greatest era
of all – which, perhaps, they were. The Beatles approved, by the way, as they
were big fans of the show, although that didn’t stop a row over rights delaying
‘The Chase’ on video till comparatively late (it’s now available on a sparkly
new DVD along with my 2nd favourite ever Who story ‘The Space
Museum’, so if you want to k now more buy it now!) Legend has it that the Dr Who production team
and Brian Epstein had agreed to shoot a special clip of The Beatles dressed up
to look old, reforming for a concert special in Liverpool in the year 2000 but
the band were simply too swamped with offers to accept it. One other question,
unresolved by time and space, is how Ian not only knows about a band whose only
had one top ten single by the time they left in the Tardis in November 1963
(‘Please Please Me’ in September) but how he knows the words to a song from 1965
(or is he just singing the chorus he’s just heard?...) We could also mention
Justin Hayward popping up unexpectedly in Jeff Wayne’s musical version of ‘War
Of The Worlds’...
3) Personal appearances
in comedy shows (John Lennon in ‘Not Only But Also...’ 1966, George Harrison in
Rutland Weekend Television 1979 and Paul Simon on ‘Saturday Night Live’ on
various 1970s broadcasts: Surprisingly, it’s not the natural comedians who dominate this
list but musicians who can take a joke and act as straight men. I still haven’t
seen Paul Simon’s Saturday Night skits yet but I’ve heard their good – after
all, who else has a good enough sense of humour and yet the composure not to
get the giggles as Paul Simon? One only has to look at the spin-off music video
for ‘You Can Call Me Al’ starring Chevy Chase to see what they would be like –
let’s hope they’re all out one day in the UK (at the time of writing each
character has a ‘best-of’ DVD out but as far as I know none of them feature
Paul). The John and George appearances are interesting ones too – Lennon plays
a lavatory attendant resplendent in such finery most fab four fans of the day
didn’t believe it was him, refusing to admit Peter Cook and Dudley Moore in for
their sloppy dress (this clip isn’t officially available but its endlessly
repeated in ‘comedy moments’ and Cook/Moore compilations so keep an eye out for
it); George is hanging out with his buddy Neil Innes, later the creator of The
Rutles on whose TV series George will also star, but it’s this first appearance
with George dressed as a pirate on ‘Britain’s smallest television network’
(rutland being Britain’s smallest county) that’s the most fascinating. The
show’s presenters are really pleased to have a Beatle on the show – but George
isn’t interested in singing his old songs and insists on being a pirate! By the
ends of the show his band strike up the opening chords to ‘My Sweet Lord’ and
you think he’s acquiesced, but no – it’s just the start of a song that goes
‘I’ve got a jolly roger, its big and red and vast and I’ll run it up your
mast!” Cue pandemonium. And credits. Alas this isn’t available either except on
YouTube which is a great shame because the rest of this short-lived series was
pretty good too.
4) Personal appearances
in stuffy television discussion shows (The Grateful Dead on ‘Playboy After
Dark’ 1969): What exactly was Playboy celebrity Hugh Heffner trying to pull
off with this chat show? A very 1950s show, full of posh people in tuxedos and
pearls name-dropping, the show was a bad anachronism by the late 60s. And yet,
to be fair to him, Heffner isn’t anything like as patronising as the other
1960s chat shows I’ve seen (barring the great Dick Cavett) and actually gives
the Dead (his only AAA guests) the time to speak. Jerry Garcia was, along with
David Crosby, the best spokesperson the hippie movement could have and he copes
with the questions about Haight Ashbury and rebellion with aplomb as ever They
also get the chance to play a really beautiful version of ‘Mountains Of the
Moon’ (which may well be the definite cut of that track), although alas a
sprightly ‘St Stephen’ is cut off by the end credits. By the end you sense that
most of the people involved with the show want to leave their day jobs and run
off with the Dead circus, but then that might also have something to do with
the legend that the band spiked the drinks being served on the film set with
acid, something that might also account for why the play-bunnies attempting to
dance at the end look unusually un-rhythmic! Alas not available on DVD, but one
of my favourite Youtube clips.
5) Personal appearances
on children’s television programmes (Paul Simon on ‘Sesame Street’ 1973 and
1986, Justin Hayward does the music for ‘The Shoe People’ 1986):Well, if the
likes of Carol King and John Sebastian end up doing the best work of their
twilight years for the first Care Bears movie, I don’t see why two members of
the AAA clan can’t get in on the act. We’ve already mentioned the first Paul Simon
appearance on Sesame Street (where he tries to play ‘Me and Julio’ only to be
upstaged by a six-year old girl improvising her own set of words!; available on
the ‘Old School Volume 2 1974-79). But there’s also a second, dating back to
the ‘Graceland’ years, where Paul and Ladysmith Black Mamboza not only teach us
our ABC’s, they teach us a bit of African too (no wonder I always got my
languages so confused!) Alas this oft-seen clip (in my childhood anyway) is
still unavailable (in fact we’ve waited two years now for a volume 3 – get a
move on, Children’s Television Workshop, I’ve only learnt my numbers up to 8!)
Moody Blue Justin Hayward, meanwhile, composed the theme music for the five
minute long episodes of ‘The Shoe People’. In fact, according to the DVD
commentary, he helped the show get on the air after meeting creator James
Driscoll at a housewarming party, pledging his services for free and helping impress
TV executives that the show could work.
6) Non-musical cameos in
films (Paul Simon in ‘Annie Hall’ 1977, David Crosby in ‘Hook’ 1991 and ‘Thunderheart’
1993, Neil Young ‘Love At Large’ and ‘68’, Keith Richards in ‘Pirates Of The Carribean
III’ 2006): It’s a good job I’d learnt about Crosby’s cameo in ‘Hook’ along
with friend Phil Collins or I’d have spent the rest of the film going ‘you know
that scurvy-ridden pirate over there, doesn’t he look like?...’ Actually Cros’
links with the film industry go way back – he tried to be an actor before
making it as a musician and his father was a cameraman - not to mention becoming Drew Barrymore’s
surrogate dad when she felt out with her parents. ‘Hook’ makes sense – both he
and Collins were friends with star Robin Williams – but ‘Thunderheart’, a
rather drab film about the FBI, is a stranger choice: I’ve sat through the film
twice and haven’t spotted Crosby yet although he’s even there on the credits
(and in my film book). Both are out on DVD by the way. Neil’s films are far
more obscure and I haven’t seen them, but judging by the stills I’ve seen our
favourite chameleon songwriter looks different in every one – with slicked back
hair for ‘Love At Large’ where he looks like an aging 50s rocker! Paul Simon’s
is good though – he actually has quite a few lines as the obnoxious boyfriend
in Woody Allen’s ‘Annie Hall’(out on DVD) – a role he took so he could work in
a movie studio before working on his own film ‘One Trick Pony’. He’s meant to
be in the film ‘Shampoo’ too though I couldn’t see him, just hear him (with a
few alternate mixes of his solo songs on the soundtrack). Oh and finally, who can forget Rolling Stone
Keith Richards appearing as Jack Sparrow’s granddad in Pirates Of Caribbean?
Well, me actually, I don’t think I’ve stayed awake through any of them yet
they’re so dull but Keith makes for perfect casting and its a shame he’s not in
the fourth one, at a cinema near you right now! Perhaps Monkee Davy Jones would
make a good choice for the next film?! (as in ‘Davy Jones’ locker? Ha ha! Get
it? No, please yourself...) Each of these Johnny Depp films is out on DVD by
the way – and another weird Johnny Depp statistic for you is that he started
his career as a session guitarist, appearing on Oasis’ ‘Be Here Now’...
7) TV adverts (The
Monkees and Ringo Starr 1986): Well, to be honest, there’s barely a product The Monkees didn’t
flog at one time or another, but most were in the context of the band’s series
and their sponsors so they don’t really count as unexpected. But this American
advert from 1986 does: Ringo’s been asked to get ‘back together with the boys’
to celebrate Pizza Hut’s new thin crust pizza – only to find it’s the wrong
‘boys’! Micky, Peter and Davy (Mike, as ever, is missing) don’t seem to mind
though, playing a stylised and even more Beatleised version of their theme tune
to match. Almost as weird as the Ronnie Corbett-Iggy Pop advert pairing a few
years ago and, as an advert, it’s unofficially available I’m afraid, though
it’s one of my favourites on YouTube.
8) Giving a musical
accompaniment to a poetry reading (Paul McCartney and Allen Ginsberg 1994): Allen Ginsberg’s
fans know to expect the unexpected. But even they must have been shocked when
they walked in and recognised the hunched guitarist accompanying Ginsberg’s
poems. Yes, this was one of Paul McCartney’s weirder career moves over the
years – and there’ve been a lot of those as us Firemen and McCartney II lovers
can testify – but in some ways it ,makes sense: the two artists were great
friends during the 60s and always said they’d work together in private – what
really was odd was the timing, with Paul on a break from touring and caring for
wife Linda during her treatment for breast cancer. The show was well received,
by the way, but alas was a one off never to be repeated and never filmed – so
we can’t show you any of it I’m afraid.
9) Presenting chat shows
(Lulu 1997, Graham Nash 1999): OK, I get turning musicians into music programme presenters –
after all, if Jools Holland’s allowed to get away with what he does, I can
easily put with the occasionally stilted performances by Tom Jones and Cilla
Black. But what seems less obvious is turning musicians – ie people who sing,
rather than talk, for a living – into chat show hosts. After all, it’s a big
skill, needing a presenter who has enough ego to carry a programme but enough
humility to listen to guests – so why give so many shows over to those who
can’t do it? To be fair, neither of our AAA members were that bad – Lulu’s
show, a kind of extended National Lottery coverage come chat show come game
show, bombed because the format was poor and the guests atrocious, not through
her mistakes (though going out live was a bad idea, as Lulu often had to
improvise her way out of trouble). Even worse was last year’s ‘The 1960s
Revealed’ – again Lulu is likeable if a bit shallow across five episodes but the
format and guests were just wrong. If the UK television networks really want a
chat show host of their own they can do worse than look out for Graham Nash’s
short-lived chat series about song-writing, one sadly unavailable over here,
where Graham proved himself to be a good mix of enthusiastic champion of others
and a comfortable, charismatic presenter in his own right. Guests included
David Crosby, Grace Slick and Carole King.
10) Cameos in The
Simpsons (George Harrison and David Crosby 1992, Paul McCartney 1994, Ringo
Starr 1995, Moody Blues 1997, The Who 1998): Everyone else has been in The
Simpsons so I suppose it’s not much of a surprise these days, but more AAA
stars than most have cameod in the series. In fact there’ve been four
individual AAA stars and two bands turned into ‘yellow fellows’ over the years,
although the best loved episode amongst fans has to be Beatles spoof ‘The B
Sharps’, one full of spot-on parodies from rooftop appearances to re-creating
lots of famous photographs (the one from the Let It Be sessions, with four very
despondent Beatles plus Yoko, is spot-on!) Best of all, there are cameos from
two AAA stars: David Crosby offers an award to Homer Simpson’s band setting up
some classic dialogue (‘You’re my favourite star!’ ‘Oh, you like my music?’
‘You’re a musician?!?’) and George Harrison tells the band they’re story has
‘been done’ before. Crosby pops up again in the ‘Marge In Chains’ episode,
though to be honest I’m not sure why – his cameo seems randomly stuffed in
without relation to the plot, which has Marge in trouble for accidentally
stealing from Apu’s Kwik-E-Mart. Macca, meanwhile, appeared with Linda Macca in
‘Lisa The Vegetarian’, one of the better Simpsons episodes which has Lisa
finding how others cope with the ridicule of going veggie. There’s even a
groovy new version of ‘Mary Had A Little Lamb’ which, alas, is cut short. The
whole Moody Blues line-up (circa the mid—90s) appear on ‘Viva Ned Flanders’,
where the Moodies appear on the same Las Vegas bill as Homer’s act – spouting
torrents of nonsense spoofing their ‘Days Of Future Passed’ monologue for good
effect. The second-best effort, though, is to date the last AAA-related
Simpsons episode ‘A Tale Of Two Springfields’, where a strange storyline about
Springfield being split between two postcodes and causing rival towns ends up
with Homer’s side getting The Who to take part (the recording for this episode
was one of the last things bassist John Entwistle did as part of the band
before his death). I’m still trying to track down the Ringo episode by the way
– so expect an update when I find out which episode his is! I’m afraid I’m not
sure which series of The Simpsons each of these episodes is from – I own them
as individual videos/DVDs, including ‘Backstage Pass’ (The Who one), Viva Los
Simpsons (The Moody Blues one), ‘Crime and Punishment’ (The Crosby one) and
‘Raiders Of The Lost Fridge’ (The Macca one).
Well, that’s it for another week readers. Except keep your eyes
peeled – who knows when one of the AAA crew may pop up doing something
unexpected to add to this list! Oh and send us in your thoughts on our forum if
I’ve missed out anything obvious. Till then, goodbye! 8>)
A NOW COMPLETE List Of Top Five/Top Ten/TOP TWENTY Entries 2008-2019
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Having a family does funny things to some musicians, as we’ve already seen in this week’s review (surely the only AAA album actually written around...
Some artists just have no idea what their best work really is. One thing that amazes me as a collector is how consistently excellent many of the...
221) Dr Who and the AAA (Five Musical Links) http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.com/2014/01/dr-who-and-five-musical-links-to-alans.html
222) Five Random Recent Purchases http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.com/2014/01/five-random-recent-purchases-news-views.html
223) AAA Grammy Nominees http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.com/2014/02/aaa-grammy-nominees-top-twelve-news.html
224) Ten AAA songs that are better heard unedited and in full http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.com/2014/02/ten-aaa-songs-that-are-better-unedited.html
225) The shortest gaps between AAA albums http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.com/2014/01/the-shortest-gaps-between-aaa-albums.html
226) The longest gaps between AAA albums http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.com/2014/02/the-longest-gaps-between-aaa-albums.html
227) Top ten AAA drummers http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.com/2014/03/top-ten-aaa-drummers-news-views-and.html
228) Top Ten AAA Singles (In Terms of 'A' and 'B' Sides) http://www.alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2014/03/top-ten-aaa-singles-and-b-sides-news.html
229) The Stories Behind Six AAA Logos http://www.alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2014/03/the-stories-behind-six-aaa-logos.html
230) AAAAAHHHHHH!!!!!!! The Best Ten AAA Screams http://www.alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2014/04/the-best-aaa-screams-top-ten-news-views.html
231) An AAA Pack Of Horses http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2014/04/aaa-songs-about-horses-top-ten-news.html
232) AAA Granamas - Sorry, Anagrams! http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2014/04/aaa-anagrams-news-views-and-music-issue.html
233) AAA Surnames and Their Meanings http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2014/04/aaa-surnames-and-their-meanings-news.html
234) 20 Erroneous AAA Album Titles http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2014/05/twenty-erroneous-aaa-album-titles-news.html
235) The Best AAA Orchestral Arrangements http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2014/05/fifteen-great-aaa-string-parts-news.html
236) Top 30 Hilariously Misheard Album Titles/Lyrics http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2014/05/top-thirty-hilariously-misheard-aaa.html
237) Ten controversial AAA sackings - and whether they were right http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2014/05/ten-controversial-aaa-sackings-news.html
238) A Critique On Critiquing - In Response To Brian Wilson http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2014/06/a-critique-on-critiquing-in-response-to.html
239) The Ten MusicianS Who've Played On The Most AAA Albums http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2014/08/the-ten-musicians-whove-played-on-most.html
240) Thoughts on #CameronMustGo http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2014/11/thoughts-on-cameronmustgo.html
241) Random Recent Purchases (Kinks/Grateful Dead/Nils Lofgren/Rolling Stones/Hollies) http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2014/12/six-random-recent-purchases-kinksg.html
242) AAA Christmas Number Ones http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2014/12/aaa-christmas-number-ones.html
243) AAA Review Of The Year 2014 (Top Releases/Re-issues/Documentaries/DVDs/Books/Songs/ Articles plus worst releases of the year) http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2014/12/aaa-review-of-year-2014.html
244) Me/CFS Awareness Week 2015 http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2015/05/mecfs-awareness-week-at-alans-album.html
245) Why The Tory 2015 Victory Seems A Little...Suspicious http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2015/05/why-tory-victory-seems-deeply.html
246) A Plea For Peace and Tolerance After The Attacks on Paris - and Syria http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2015/11/a-plea-for-peace-and-toleration.html
247) AAA Review Of The Year 2015 http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2015/12/the-aaa-review-of-year-2015.html
248) The Fifty Most Read AAA Articles (as of December 31st 2015) http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2016/01/the-fifty-most-read-aaa-posts-2008-2015.html
249) The Revised AAA Crossword! http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.com/2016_07_10_archive.html
251) Half-A-Dozen Berries Plus One (An AAA Tribute To Chuck Berry) http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2017/03/an-aaa-covers-tribute-to-chuck-berry.html
254) Guest Post: ‘Supertramp – Some Things Never Change’ by Kenny Brown https://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.com/2018/06/guest-review-supertramp-some-things.html
255) AAA Review Of The Year 2018 https://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.com/2018/12/the-aaa-review-of-year-2018.html
256) AAA Review Of The Year 2019 plus Review Of The Decade 2010-2019 https://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.com/2019/12/the-alans-album-archives-review-of-year.html
257) Tiermaker https://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.com/2019/06/alans-album-archives-on-tiermaker.html
258) #Coronastock https://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.com/2020/04/coronastock.html
259) #Coronadocstock https://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.com/2020/05/coronadocstock.html
