READY
FOR ENGAGEMENTS
- the rehearsal tapes -
Sleeve
notes By Ian Forsyth
It
was towards the back end of 1992 that John Duff Lowe decided to
try and reform his first band THE QUARRY MEN which originally included
a trio of other lads, John Lennon, Paul McCartney and George Harrison.
Although
John had been the only trained musician in the then quintet three
of its members, as we all know, became world famous as The Beatles.
The
purpose of the reunion was to play some live dates, possibly on
the ever popular nostalgia circuits or more interestingly at the
ever growing Beatle Conventions.
Eventually
two other original Quarrymen, Len Garry and Rod Davis, agreed with
John Duff Lowe to reform the band and along with a fine trio of
musicians from The Four Pennies studio time was booked for rehearsals.
They
concentrated on the songs Duff and Len remembered the Quarrymen
performing during their tenure through 1958/59. At this stage Len
and Rod had departed and John, Paul, and George were honing their
own unique sound towards rock and roll, hence the addition of Duff
as the piano player (a la Jerry Lee Lewis!)
The
1992 Quarry Men performances were surprisingly good. Len and Rod's
vocals were strong and hardly betrayed the intervening thirty odd
years. John's backing vocals and keyboard playing was similarly
superb. John had in fact been playing fairly regularly with The
Pennies ensuring a return to form for the piano man. The other Pennies,
session lead guitarist John Ozoroff, original bassist Mike Wilshaw
and studio session drummer Charles Hart tightened the whole thing
up and supplied direction.
Incredibly
the project slammed into the buffers shortly after these sessions
and the projected gigs and possible CD never happened. It was a
great missed opportunity as this CD clearly shows.
Twelve
years later guitar maestro John Ozoroff found the original rehearsal
tape in a drawer full of old cassettes. The tape had deteriorated
but sound engineer Graham Hawes was given the task of cleaning it
up and 'Producer Extraordinaire' Richard 'Moo" Marsh mastered
the overall sound, tweaking the frequencies to make it literally
jump out of the speakers!
It
was the first time that original members of the Quarry Men were
recorded together and it led to the same team, minus Len Garry,
professionally recording the later much more studio oriented 1994
CD 'Open For Engagements'.
All
the tracks on the brand new 'Ready For Engagements' CD are performed
live with bundles of energy and spontaneity. Even Ozoroff's vocal
prompts can be heard between some of the songs! Len Garry's voice
was always admired by a young John Lennon and it does have a similarity
to his old friend, especially on the Quarrymen original "In
Spite Of All The Danger". Mike Wilshaw sounds like Paul McCartney
on bass guitar with some of his riffs being very reminiscent of
Paul's early playing style.
Some tracks do sound stronger than others do but that adds to the
flavour of the whole album. The idea was to rehearse as many numbers
as they could then pick out a final set list of maybe ten of the
more successful for coming live performances.
Hidden
away are two gems - original songs from Ozoroff collaborations with
John Lowe and Mike Wilshaw respectively and a pointer to the new
songs by Ozoroff and Lowe to appear on "Open" two years
later. They are strong songs showing a maturity and caring so typical
of embattled sixties survivors.
The
band that assembled to cut these rehearsal tracks in Liverpool a
decade ago obviously loved their work and the last word must be
given to the man who, thank God, saved them for posterity.
"Listening
to it now, the sheer power and energy is very apparent and there's
no doubt whatsoever that we were extremely enthusiastic about the
music. What a pity this show never actually got on the road in a
big way. I'm sure it would have gone down great with audiences as
you can't keep still when you hear Rock 'n' Roll music!" -
John Ozoroff.
© Ian Forsyth, Author, 2004.
|
News
and information from some of John's friends from the 60's will be
shown here. Keep watching this space! Want to contribute an article
to be posted on this site?....
This
is a John Ozoroff recommended link to John F Crowley’s website on
guitars of The Beatles including the one mentioned in Paul Easton’s
article about Paul McCartney’s Epiphone. It’s a great site showing
pictures of John, Paul and George playing the guitars they owned with
commentary by John F Crowley. Check it out. - Ed
