Viv found a new interview w/Jeremy Spencer

[vivfox]

Kiln House
Fleetwood Mac
1970, Warner Brothers/Reprise Records

Today everyone thinks of Fleetwood Mac as the multi-million selling California band that featured Stevie Nicks and Lindsey Buckingham in the late 1970s.

Most people are surprised to learn that Fleetwood Mac began as an all male blues band in England in the 1960s, and that the Buckingham/Nicks lineup was just one of many versions that formed under the same name after 1970 when original member/guitarist/singer Peter Green left the band, a casualty of the ’60s.

The band name came from the always tight rhythm section of Mick Fleetwood on drums and John McVie, bass, but it was Green, like so many of the guitar heroes of the day a former John Mayall Bluesbreaker (Green replaced Eric Clapton), who was the star of early Fleetwood Mac. He’s the guy who wrote “Black Magic Woman” for Fleetwood Mac in 1968. Yes, the same song that was a radio hit for for Santana in 1970, in which Carlos Santana pays homage to Green’s moody stringbending.

Fleetwood Mac began 1969 by flying to Chicago and recording at Chess Records with Willie Dixon, Buddy Guy, Otis Spann and Honeyboy Edwards for a record called Fleetwood Mac In Chicago. The same year they released the rocking Then Play On, which included the future FM staple “Oh Well.” It was an obvious statement that Fleetwood Mac was growing beyond the blues.

And then in May 1970, Peter Green left the band. When the Americanized version of Fleetwood Mac was big in 1977, Green was tracked down by a BBC reporter. He was living with his father and digging graves at the local cemetery for pocket change. He told the BBC interviewer he was damaged by LSD, and that’s why he left the band. Asked what he would do if the now wildly popular Fleetwood Mac asked him to rejoin the band, Green held up his hands, displaying long, curled over fingernails, and saying he couldn’t play again because of the nails.

That same year the remaining members of Fleetwood Mac – the eponymous Fleetwood and McVie, and Jeremy Spencer and Danny Kirwin on vocals and guitars – released Kiln House, a 35-minute, 10-song romp that was so very different from the heavier, moodier music of the Peter Green years. Kiln House was the name of a converted oast house the band was living in at the time (an oast house is for drying hops for brewing).

The record is concise and playful. Light but not lite. It makes you happy, and that happiness begins with the charming cover art by Christine McVie, John McVie’s wife and a musician in her own right who had a British hit – “I’d Rather Go Blind” – with the band Chicken Shack. By the time the band was living in Kiln House, Christine was already a musical collaborator, even though her vocals on the record are uncredited. She does get credit, however, as co-writer of the song “Station Man.”

While in Los Angeles during the Kiln House tour in 1971, Jeremy Spencer followed Green’s example by suddenly leaving Fleetwood Mac and joing the religious group The Children of God (now Family International). Kiln House was his last Fleetwood Mac album.

Jeremy went on to another phase of his life. You can find out more at jeremyspencer.com. But he never really left music, as proved by the 2006 release Precious Little, a beautiful display of his slide guitar and his talent for covering obscure gems (“Take and Give,” a Sun records b-side by Slim Rhodes, and “Please Don’t Stop” by all-but-forgotten teen idol Fabian). He recorded it in Norway with a group of simpatico Norwegians. Find it at blindpigrecords.com.

But Kiln House is what we want to know about here. An e-mail Q&A ensued.

JL: I believe Peter Green had left the group just months before Kiln House was made, just after the landmark Then Play On. What was the discussion among remaining members about the direction the group would take?

Jeremy Spencer: I remember sitting with Mick, Danny and Christine in a small side room off the practice studio that occupied what decades ago used to be the oast-drying place for the making of beer (specifically, hops), and mulling over our future. All we knew, Danny and I, was that we had some material to record: me some parodies and he a few what someone quipped as ‘la-la-la’ tunes, due to being stymied for lyrics.

JL: Was there a decision made to take the band in a different direction?

JS: Not really. As I said, Danny and I had some stuff that we wanted to record. It wasn’t a question of whether it was to be blues-based or not. As a musician, when you have material you are itching to record and have the privilege to disregard public acceptance, as Peter did with ‘Albatross’, or ‘Man of the World’ etc. (and we assumed we did), you don’t think in terms of ‘oh is this fitting in with our accepted format?’ At least, I don’t think it should be. That’s what gave The Beatles, for instance, so much variety. The freedom to do anything musically they felt in their bones.

Now, I for one had become uninspired with my contributions at that point. A parody, an old rock and roll song, an Elmore James-based blues and so on. I had been there and done that, and I had nothing original up my sleeve.

JL: Had there been any talk of ending it then or changing the name of the band?

JS: I don’t recall any such talk!

JL: Kiln House is a definite break from the blues-based Fleetwood Mac of the late 1960s. The sensibilities displayed – for example, the playfulness of the album opener "This Is the Rock" – suggest that a veil had been lifted on talents that had not really been tapped by the band before. Was that the case?

JS: I think so. Very much in Danny’s case. Mine, I am not so sure. Recording old-style blues, ‘50s music and parodies at that time was not necessarily regarded as untapped talent unless you were Frank Zappa. I am pleasantly surprised, however, that many people, young and old nowadays are appreciating my ‘untapped talents’! I have recently been recording with a 33-year-old Detroit guitarist, Brett Lucas, and he pushes me to record my obscure material and new instrumentals along with the ’50s stuff!

JL: Were fans and/or record execs surprised by the "new" Fleetwood Mac? Do you recall any reaction to the record upon its release?

JS: Phew! In England, quite a hostile reaction! England was, and still is, understandably Peter Green territory. It was no surprise to me at least, and by the time we took that ‘Kiln House show’ on the road, then incorporating Christine on keyboards and vocals, we soon learned that it wasn’t going to fly in our home country!

Surprisingly, though, when we played in the States for that mid-summer 1970 tour, we met an overwhelming response. Clifford Davis (the band’s manager) said at the time, that our Kiln House album was the biggest seller there that Fleetwood Mac had ever had. That, of course, pleased the WB record execs! Most audiences were unfamiliar with our recent past and were lapping up what we giving them there and then. That was encouraging up to a point for me, but I still felt dry and uninspired musically.

An odd similarity just came to mind. When the ‘star’ of the Moody Blues, Denny Laine, the amazing vocalist that he was, left them, did they suffer? For a while, yes, but eventually, no. The Moodies went on to be bigger than Denny ever was or has been since. Same thing happened with Fleetwood Mac. Despite the departure of Peter, Danny or me, they went on to be one of the biggest bands in rock history. Why I am getting into this right now, I don’t know, but maybe it’s of reflective interest to some!

JL: Your songs in particular, show a fondness for the Sun sound and rockabilly. Were those significant influences for you?

JS: Absolutely. Once I was in a position to purchase anything and everything I could in that genre, I buried myself in it, and the more obscure the better! That’s why for decades I had longed to record ‘Take and Give’ by Slim Rhodes – a Sun records b side, and I finally got to do so on Precious Little. I have always had a special fascination and love for the unknown recordings or songs that are dear to a performing artist’s heart, especially (which is usually the case) when they are overlooked by the general public. Buddy Holly’s music is a case in point.

JL: I've always taken "Your Blood on the Floor" on side one as a parody of an American country song, taking the stereotypical cheated-on male of country song to the extreme ("I shot my darling three times or more. The reason I'm going, there's blood on the floor."), complete with honky tonk piano and weeping guitar. How did people respond to that song?

JS: I don’t know for certain. Some people loved it and others … well, they seemed puzzled, I think. I loved and still love that old Country music from the ‘50s and early ‘60s, and in that hippie era, the only way you could perform ‘50s bop and doo-wop or country was to parody it, sad to say. Actually, people objected more to me recording Donnie Brooks’ ‘Mission Bell’!

The thing is, Jim, I did what I always did and do – musically – what I wanted. It wasn’t and isn’t a matter of ‘pleasing the fans’ and prostituting myself, nor is it a matter of being so-called selfish and not pleasing the ‘fans that put you where you are’, (which is arguable these days!) It just turns out that one day you and your music is ‘in’, and the next day it is ‘out’. You just have to know how to deal with it when it’s ‘out’.

When I first played Elmore James at 17 yrs old, it was curious to many who hollered for the Rolling Stones or Beach Boys or said I should save myself the trouble and use a whammy bar like Hank B. Marvin. Then blues became the in thing once Mayall and Clapton hit the scene.

Peter Green had the same ‘vision’– ‘if you don’t like it, there’s the door.’

JL: The next tune, "Hi Ho Silver" by Fats Waller and Ed Kirkeby, sounds like you got to do some Jerry Lee Lewis on the piano. Who came up with the idea to cover Mr. Waller?

JS: Johnny Burnette and the Rock ‘n Roll Trio in 1956! I based it on his recording of the song, originally called ‘Honey Hush.’ The guitar riff on his version was a slightly modified take on ‘The Train Kept a-Rollin’’ which was on the same Decca vinyl I heard it on. In hindsight, I would have preferred to have toughened up that riff as being the main drive behind it and kept it insistent and steady.

JL: Two of the 10 songs are credited to several band members, including the incredible "Station Man." How did "Station Man" come together between you, Danny Kirwan and John McVie?

JS: The McVie here is Christine. Danny wrote the tune and I believe it was in that very side room at Kiln House that the three of us came up with those lyrics.

JL: I've read that the second side opener, the Buddy Holly tribute "Buddy's Song" which is credited to Holly's mother, Ella Holley, was really written by you. Is that correct? If so, why credit Buddy's mother?

JS: I did not write it. Buddy’s mother wrote it by stringing together titles of her son’s songs. I first heard the tune by Bobby Vee in 1964, and I think he even recorded it at Norman Petty’s Clovis studio in New Mexico.

JL: Christine McVie is credited with the charming cover art, but I've come across several references that claim she also contributed unaccredited background vocals. I've listened and just can't find her. Did she sing on the record?

JS: Yes she did. She sang back-up vocals. Her voice was in a lower register, so you may have mistaken her for one of us males!

JL: Kiln House was your last stand with Fleetwood Mac before your life went in another direction. I've always thought of Kiln House as a joyous record. Do you have fond memories of it and the times?

JS: A joyous record? Hmmm. Well, that was a summation of many fans and critics in their opinion of the album (in the USA!). We weren’t consciously going in that direction, but I do believe outside ‘forces’, if you like, were steering us away from the brooding, negative darkness of previous endeavors. The hippie generation in 1970 USA was facing a terrible impasse. ‘Where do we go from here? Our utopia is a hookah pipe dream, and where are we?’

‘A generation lost in space’ as Don McLean said in response, ‘With no time left to start again.’

I personally had felt that the joy had gone out of our music. For me it wasn’t fun anymore, and viewing the progression of videos of us from that time shows us looking less and less happy. Playing music seemed to be becoming a chore and a labored expression of misery and musical artistic perfection. Hence, Pete and I bowed out, albeit for different reasons.

JL: Have you ever thought about what might have happened musically had you stayed with the band?

JS: At the time, I was perceiving a little of what could have been the direction should I have stayed with them. I was looking forward to doing more harmony vocal stuff. Maybe we would have gelled more, incorporated Christine’s creativity and all that, but I think in the end we would have all sat staring at each other with big fat question marks over our heads. For me, personal issues were overriding musical considerations.

JL: Anything people should know about Jeremy Spencer in the year 2010?

JS: I am recording 2 CD’s worth of material with a wonderful accomplished team of Detroit musicians, Brett Lucas (guitar), Todd Glass (drums), and James Simonson (bass), and I get to play piano and keyboards; something I have not done in a studio for almost 40 years! I hope to play this year with them in Europe, Canada (a very appreciative audience, by the way) and there in the States.

If you and any of your readers pray, please keep those hopes in them!

http://www.scenenewspaper.com/arts-e...ner-notes.html

[sharksfan2000]

Nice find, and a very good interview. Thanks to Viv and thanks to Jeremy too!

[TrueFaith77]

What a great interview. Jeremy's reflective moods make for fascinating reads.

I'm really psyched for the new cd/s as well. Thanks for posting!

[aleuzzi]

Originally Posted by vivfox

Kiln House
Fleetwood Mac
1970, Warner Brothers/Reprise Records



JL: Two of the 10 songs are credited to several band members, including the incredible "Station Man." How did "Station Man" come together between you, Danny Kirwan and John McVie?

JS: The McVie here is Christine. Danny wrote the tune and I believe it was in that very side room at Kiln House that the three of us came up with those lyrics.



http://www.scenenewspaper.com/arts-e...ner-notes.html

This indeed is what I always suspected. Christine had more to do with Station Man than was credited.

[Almost Simon]

Originally Posted by aleuzzi

This indeed is what I always suspected. Christine had more to do with Station Man than was credited.

But its John on the credits. Why not credit Christine??

[aleuzzi]

Originally Posted by Almost Simon

But its John on the credits. Why not credit Christine??

Let's ask Jeremy. Jeremy, you out there?

[sharksfan2000]

Originally Posted by Almost Simon

But its John on the credits. Why not credit Christine??

There was a discussion on one of the other threads recently about there having been contract issues regarding Christine McVie in 1970, and that this may have delayed her officially joining the band, so it may not have been possible to credit her on the album.

[GJK]

Originally Posted by aleuzzi

Let's ask Jeremy. Jeremy, you out there?

Yes, celebrating his birthday...

GJK

[slipkid]

Will we ever know the "true" story?

[vivfox]

I wonder if Jeremy ever saw this thread?