A Life in Music: Mike Hatton's bass motives

Bassic Fundamentals: get your Jazz chops right, and the groove will follow.

Mike Hatton, like many musicians, plays in more than one band - he can be found delivering smooth Jazz grooves, or a solid bedrock for powerhouse blues, or even harking back to 60s power rock. 

One of those bands - Steve Ajao's Blues Giants - has been going for well over 30 years, giving enormous pleasure to Midlands audiences and beyond. And all three members are very much eligible to take place in the Lives in Music series of podcasts. Two of them are in this series; I'm still chasing Washboard Pete. 

Mike fits right into this series because he is one hell of a dedicated craftsman, as you will hear on the podcast. Head to the podcast page, or to your favourite podcast supplier, to grab it. Or skip down to the bottom of this page to stream from this blog page. 

Mike Hatton crafts very considered and delicate works for solo bass. And he's being doing this for generations. Along with Mike's own music, a few of the many types of music and musicians that Mike references in this chat are gathered together in this post - see the Music Links section below.

The Album

We talked in early autumn, when Mike was putting the finishing touches to his new album. Bassic Salvation is out this week. It's just him on all the basses, plus drums, it's full of splendid music, and it reeks of craft and serious thought. You can hear excerpts in the podcast. Or, if you're in Birmingham on Friday 1st November... 

Go to the Album Launch Gig

Fletchers Bar is in King's Heath, Birmingham's muso central. The place will be wall to wall with fellow musicians, and that's when Mike is holding the launch gig. That's - that was - Friday 1st November 2019. 

Stop Press: March 2021: Mike has a new lockdown multitrack special up on YouTube, here.

Music Links

Paperback Writer - The Beatles
Silvershine - Andy Hamilton
Start Everywhere - Steve Lawson 

The podcast

Lives in Music

The Lives in Music podcast series celebrates people who have spent a lifetime in music. They may be famous; they may be people who have spent their lives working in the background for the love of it. They all have stories.

Other podcasts in Lives In Music 

All with show notes and music links

1 - Ruby Turner 
2 - Steve Ajao
3 - The Men Who Make Mellotrons
5 - Horace Panter
6 - Jasper Carott  
7 - Sam Slater
8 - John Patrick
9 - Gordon Giltrap
10 - Jim Simpson
  

The theme music for this series is by Mike's other local band, Big Q Fish. 'Boksburg Jive Toon' was written by Brian Neil, and recorded at the Jam House, Birmingham, in 2017.

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A Life In Music: The Men Who Make Mellotrons

In a workshop not too far away from you, magic is being made (and recreated). 

John Bradley and Martin Smith have been involved with Mellotrons all their lives. 

What is a Mellotron? Well, please read on, and listen to the companion podcast. 

John is the pragmatic engineer who can look at a piece of kit and know exactly what to do. Martin was and is a superfan of 60s, 70s and 80s music with a decided taste for Progressive Rock. The Mellotron simply reeled him in. John's dad ran the original Streetly Electronics, based in a small building just to the north of Birmingham. They made Mellotrons. Musicians beat paths to their door. It was John and Martin who revived the current business. And now the musicians are calling on them. 

The Mellotron was key to 60s and 70s pop. Then it sort of fell out of fashion. But the sounds on countless Beatles, Genesis, Moody Blues and Barclay James Harvest tracks, and tons more are still in demand. So much so that John and Martin's order book is full for the next two years. And as for their stellar client list...

Be warned: there's one teeny little swear word; it's so funny, I couldn't bring myself to cut it out. I travelled to the workshop for the Lives in Music interview. Copious amounts of tea were consumed. Followed by copious amounts of editing. 

The podcast has now been published: go here to listen, subscribe and/or download... or go to the player at the bottom of this post. 

Background

If you are still not entirely sure what a Mellotron is, read the exhaustive details on Wikipedia here...

Some samples

Here's a YouTube link for Strawberry Fields Forever...
This is a Link to one of the earliest recorded uses of the Mellotron ...
or how about this Moody Blues cut?

Other Links

Streetly Electronics website
Streetly Electronics on Facebook

Listen to the podcast

Lives in Music 

Lives in Music celebrates people who have spent a lifetime in music. They may be famous; they may be people who have simply spent their lives working at their craft for the love of it. They all have stories. Lives in Music is a Radio To Go production.

Also published in Lives In Music 

all with show notes and music links

1 - Ruby Turner 
2 -  Steve Ajao
4 - Mike Hatton 
5 - Horace Panter
6 - Jasper Carrott
7 - Sam Slater
8 - John Patrick
9 - Gordon Giltrap
10 - Jim Simpson

The theme music for this series is by local band Big Q Fish. 'Boksburg Jive Toon' was written by Brian Neil, and recorded at the Jam House, Birmingham, in 2017.

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A Life in Music: Steve Ajao. Lenny Henry's a fan

A proper Renaissance Man, is Steve

A stalwart of the Birmingham music scene, Steve has been laying down greasy guitar blues and elegant cerebral Jazz sax in equal quantities, for generations. Oh, and he builds guitars, beautifully... and he's completely self-taught. And he's got the deepest voice in all Birmingham. His Blues trio can be found playing live in all the best joints in the Midlands and beyond. They are astonishingly relaxed and extremely tight - something that comes from decades of playing together. 

On top of this, Steve Ajao's facebook feed carries all sorts of other titbits, such as recipes for homemade Sauerkraut, gardening tips, and more. He's into loads of stuff :-) Gourmet, gardener, guitar restorer, blues shouter, cool saxman. I'm sure there's more.

Music 

The theme music for this series comes from Big Q Fish, a seriously uncompromising Birmingham band that I suggest you check out. The song is 'Boksburg Jive Toon', written by guitarist Brian Neil. There's plenty more to listen to if you follow the link. They're also on YouTube.

On top of this, you'll hear Steve play an improvisation on Steel Guitar in the podcast itself, as part of the interview.

Links

Steve Ajao's Blues Giants website
Steve Ajao's Blues Giants on Facebook
Steve's Club Bebop on Facebook: currently a weekly Wednesday residency at Fletchers Bar in Kings Heath, Birmingham.

And there's a ton of stuff to check out on YouTube, both Jazz and Blues.

Podcast Player

Other podcasts in Lives In Music

all with show notes and music links

1 - Ruby Turner 
3 - The Men who make Mellotrons 
4 - Mike Hatton 
5 - Horace Panter 
6 - Jasper Carrott
7 - Sam Slater
8 - John Patrick
9 - Gordon Giltrap
10 - Jim Simpson

Lives in Music celebrates people who have spent a lifetime in music. They may be famous; they may be people who have spent their lives working in the background for the love of it. They all have stories. Lives in Music is a Radio To Go production.



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A life in Music: Ruby Turner

She's only been knocking the ball out of the park for four decades

This is a companion blog post to accompany the first episode of my new podcast series: Lives in Music. 

The podcast has just been published: go here to listen and/or download or go to the player at the bottom of this post. 

The plan is for the series to appear everywhere podcasts are to found, but it’s early days.That link should get you started. 

Romantic notions? Pah.

I had a theory that there must have been some sort of genius music teacher in Handsworth back in the seventies. Because for three years straight, that mixed and punchy Brum inner city suburb delivered an act each year that went on to shake the foundations worldwide: Steel Pulse, Apache Indian, and Ruby herself. 

And, face it, kids like Robin Campbell of UB40 and Ranking Roger of the Beat were hanging out at the shebeens, soaking it all up. Handsworth did a lot for popular music back in the day.

I put that notion to Ruby during our Lives in Music chat. She, as you'll hear, slapped it right down as my being romantic and fanciful.

There's not a lot of music in this podcast: copyright regulations prevent that. Any music has to be podcast-friendly. So no copyright infringements, and anything used must have the agreement of the performer. So there are no clips of Ruby to listen to, apart from when she bursts into song in mid conversation. That's a shame, because the stuff she does with Jools Holland and with her own band is bloody marvellous. But skip down to the links list, and you can explore to your heart's content.   

Links and credits

Download (and share) the podcast here: Lives in Music: Ruby Turner 

Or stream here:

Ruby Turner's website
Jools Holland's website
Find out about Fado music
Handsworth Evolution: a documentary I made in 2010.
Ruby Turner on YouTube

The Lives in Music Podcast Series

There are ten episodes in this first series of Lives in Music. They will appear weekly from October until early December 2019. I'm now working on Series 2. The central thrust is to honour and highlight those people who have, literally, spent their lives in music, whether it's making music or empowering those who do. 

Lives in Music Podcasts now published:  

with show notes and music links  

2 - Steve Ajao 
3 - The Men who make Mellotrons
4 - Mike Hatton  
5 - Horace Panter
6 - Jasper Carrott     
7 - Sam Slater 
8 - John Patrick
9 - Gordon Giltrap
10 - Jim Simpson

The theme music for this series is by local band Big Q Fish. 'Boksburg Jive Toon' was written by Brian Neil, and recorded at the Jam House, Birmingham, in 2017.

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Lives in Music: a new Radio To Go Podcast series

When you've played for ever, you've got stories to tell

I'm launching Lives in Music, a podcast series. The first episode dropped this Sunday, October 6th. 

You can get all the published podcast episodes on Spotify, iTunes and all good podcast directories. Series 1 episodes are currently arriving weekly.

I've been working on this for some time; I've thought about this for even longer. The series will feature musicians and music workers from our patch who have put in some serious time. These are people who have literally spent their lives making, or supporting the making of, music. Some are very well known; others less so. But they're all pretty damn fabulous and/or interesting. After hundreds of gigs - maybe even a thousand or more - which have brought me great pleasure, I want to try to give back just a bit. Hence this series of interviews. It's a tip of the hat. And the stories I'm hearing are amazing.

So many people, so little time. 

I have a list as long as your arm of people to talk to. I've recorded quite a few, aiming to complete an episode a week. That doesn't mean I'll be able to drop a podcast every week. There's editing, polishing, illustrating, and all the podcast gubbins to do. That takes time. So Lives in Music Series 1, kicking off this Sunday, will be a ten-parter, with an episode dropping each week. Lives in Music Series 2 will kick off after Christmas, all being well.

Nailing some people down can be a challenge, too: after all, some of our outstanding musos are out playing five or six nights a week with different outfits, making money – at last - through their versatility. You can't begrudge them that when some were barely scraping a living forty years ago. 

Free your mind and your music chops will follow

I've long felt that musos can go in one of two ways in terms of creativity and craft as they get older. They can stick with what they know, playing the steady, the safe and the familiar; there's a market for that, and good luck to them. 

Or - and this is where it gets interesting and wondrous - they expand and blossom as they grow older, embracing more styles and experience, for the love and the exhilaration of it all.  Often you find those guys tearing it up with huge smiles on their faces, in tiny places. Those guys interest me, and they're the ones I want to feature.  

Not forgetting the enablers

But there's also a host of people who work in and around the industry, who love the business of making music: promoters, instrument makers, managers. They also help to make all this possible. I'm talking with several for the series; several more have agreed to chat. 

The joy of small venues where the magic happens

These days, I spend more gig time in small venues, close up to the artist, than ever I did in enormodomes back in the day. The attraction? Well, apart from cheaper drinks and free parking, it's the music and the musicians, naturally. Especially the sheer craft of people who have been playing forty years or more. 

I get more out of it, whether it's places like the Hare and Hounds in  Birmingham, or the Kitchen Garden Cafe across the road for Jazz and Folk, or any of the venues where the peerless Lisa Travis has been in charge, including her newest perch, the Prince Of Wales. There's plenty more - space prevents me listing everywhere. But I should mention, and give a tip of the hat to, the wonderful Paul Murphy. Paul ran his second Songwriter's Cafe for several years from his treehouse venue; I did online continuity for him. He was one of the people who showed me just how powerful great music, crafted from deep experience, could be in a tiny intimate venue. He was in no small way responsible for my thinking in this area, especially since he passed on.  

So... who's on the menu?

Ah, that would be telling. Series 1 will be an interesting mix. I'll have a fresh blog post, with all the relevant details, to go with each podcast episode. You'll be able to keep across who's in the series by following the Lives in Music podcast once the first episode drops. On top of that there'll be the usual Facebook and Tweetage. 

But there is one stalwart, who I recorded with, who won't be going up as a podcast. Sadly, the audio quality just wasn't good enough. But not all is lost; I will transcribe, and it will be worth it. Steve Gibbons and I talked for two hours straight about growing up in Brum, where his first gigs were, who looked after him, and how he got started. He was meticulous. So that episode will see the light of day as a Radio To Go blog post... and I will be spending a lot of time researching pictures of the locations. It's making for brilliant Birmingham rock history. 

The Lives In Music podcast is on Spotify, iTunes and all good podcast directories. Series 1 episodes currently arriving weekly!

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