Label: None
Year of Release: not issued
Acetates are an expensive folly in the average record collector's life. If you see one in a second hand record shop or on Discogs or eBay, the price is usually ratcheted sky-high, the seller knowing that the scarcity and uniqueness of the offering is going to make it very enticing. Yet when you do purchase one, what you usually get is a songwriter warbling over some basic piano melody they've written, or a half baked beat idea from some smalltown group whose ideas and style hadn't moved on from 1962.
And then, of course, there's stuff like this which surely had a backstory, but I'm damned if I know what it is. Carl Gresham was a highly influential man about town in Bradford, being a record store manager and club DJ at the turn of the sixties, and occasional actor - he was Tom Courtenay's stand-in for "Billy Liar" - and a "personal appearances" agent to the stars, offering them work opening supermarkets and department stores (which begs some serious questions about that 'supermarket opening' scene in the film "Billy Liar", which does not feature in the novel at all. Was this a sneaky, knowing nod to Gresham's sideline business?)
Gresham - or "The Gresh" as he was known to friends and associates - gradually grew into something of an establishment figure in Bradford, appearing in pantomimes and having his own weekend breakfast radio show on Pennine Radio, so it wouldn't have been unexpected to see him pushing out a novelty single at some point.
The trouble is, though, this sounds like a very early sixties demo with very simple Freddie & The Dreamers styled melodies, which dates it ahead of Gresham's rise to minor fame. On the A-side you've got a frivolous, cheery melody buried in a terrible mix which he chirps along to serviceably. It's a pleasant enough early beat offering but nothing to crack open the cheque book for.
Over on the flip, however, is a very strange "comedy" version of the song, which was apparently arranged and conceptualised by the director and producer David Mallet, who worked with Les Dawson and Kenny Everett later in his career, as well as becoming one of the most successful music video directors of all time. In this The Gresh whacks out, screaming and shouting, making panicky asides about "falling down the hole in the middle of the record" and generally acting the giddy goat. It's not clear what this piece of work is connected to or why an acetate of it was pressed. It's possible it was to accompany a comedy show or idea which never got commissioned, but equally likely it was just Gresham dicking around in his remaining studio time.
Sadly, Gresham passed away in January 2023 so we may never know. An auction of his belongings took place not long after his death, and the fact that this acetate fell into my lap not long after that event suggests the lucky winner of some of the lots may have been splitting some of the artefacts for sale on eBay.
None of which leaves us any wiser, of course, but Bradfordians in particular might enjoy hearing this recording of Gresham in his DJ-ing heyday sounding as whacky as a dog's joyous tail in close proximity to two dustbins.
If the previews below aren't working properly, please go right to the source.
No comments:
Post a Comment