THE MIKE COLE STORY #2

MY YEAR WITH MUNGO JERRY: SUPERSTAR FOR 6 MONTHS

The Stag Audition: In late 1969, I had returned from 8 months spent in Spain and made the decision to try to earn a living as a musician, before I became too old to do so. In those days, the Melody Maker had a section devoted to musicians wanted/available.

I replied to a MM advert seeking a ‘double bass player’ and spoke to a guy by the name of Ray Dorset.

It was arranged that I would meet the band for an audition. I met the guys in Staines. It was quite a walk to the pub. All the while Paul King (banjo player/vocals) was complaining, as if he expected to be driven there by limousine. Anyway, as I recall, we did in fact manage to play two or three numbers before the pub manager told us that the room was now required for a stag party.

Much of the material was basically 12-bar blues, so it wasn’t difficult to follow. Anyway, the stag party began and it was agreed that we could stay if we would play a few numbers for them, which we did.

After a while the stripper came and performed. Midway through her ‘act’ she gyrated on my lap, in preference to all the others. I won’t deny that I enjoyed it, but maybe Paul resented it and it may have been the beginning of his dislike of me.

A few years later, one of the band members (I believe it was the piano player) commented “… that only one person turned up.” It sounds as if I became the bass player out of desperation. It’s a bit unkind to say that. It was probably due to the fact that the ad specified ‘double bass’.

I was using electric bass on gigs but preferred the acoustic instrument. It’s summed up by a statement (and LP of that title) by a West Coast bass player called Curtis Counce who in the 1950s said “You get more bounce with Curtis Counce.”

In any case, my addition to the band contributed to its massive success shortly thereafter. I replaced Joe Rush whom I met a few times. He was a likeable fellow and certainly there was no animosity between us.

I have always said that Ray was 60% of the band, and I had no problem with that. In my opinion Paul was on a massive ego trip. He thought that he was the most talented musician, had the best fashion sense, was the best looking and had to be the most successful at pulling women. He was never content just to be a member of a successful group, and resented that his own compositions were not given equal prominence on the LP as Ray’s.

Paul was quite talented but there was always something self-destructive about him. I don’t know whether that is still the case now but it was certainly true then.

Part of Ray’s account of the ‘Stag Night Audition’: “Although Mike came from a totally different background to me, I liked him from the start. He was a chartered accountant and he played golf, but he had a good knowledge of jazz, and we liked some of the same kind of music. I enjoyed talking to him about anything and everything.”

I found Ray to be an interesting guy to talk to and we shared, to some extent, the same tastes in music. In particular, Fats Waller, who in addition to being a wonderful and influential piano player was a great vocalist, entertainer and songwriter.

I am proud of the fact that my Uncle Nat, an accomplished trumpet and violin player, did a gig with him for two nights in Birmingham in 1938. He told me that Fats would produce a half bottle of whiskey from his inside jacket pocket and declare “Don’t be vague, ask for Haig.”

Gigging & Recording With Ray: I knew that Ray was something special almost from the outset. The first gig I did with the band was at Borough College. He was a dynamic performer and, like Fats, knew how to work an audience.

We (he) went down a storm and, subsequently, everywhere else that we played. Over the next several months we did loads of gigs at all sorts of venues; people would book us on the strength of our reputation as a really good live band. When MJ and the song went ‘monster’ we were hailed as “an overnight success”.

Ray says “Mike was living in a flat in Maida Vale which is a rather posh part of London.” Yes, I was living in Maida Vale when I first met Ray but our flat was anything but posh.

I must admit that at the time I was not a great fan of jug band music, although the groups in the early 20th century were influential in the development of jazz.

One of the first EPs that I bought was of Chris Barber’s band. Lonnie Donegan was the banjo player and when he went solo I became a fan and acquired several of his singles. What I liked most about Lonnie was that his music swung like crazy (listen to Cumberland Gap and Gamblin’ Man).

In the early days, before MJ became ‘famous’ we used to do a regular weekly gig at the Northcote Arms in Southall. The first time I went there I couldn’t find the pub, so I asked a couple of policemen in Southall High Street for directions. “You don’t want to go there” they said, but anyway they told me how to get there. When I arrived the car park was full of motor bikes and rockers and ‘teddy boys’ with their girlfriends. I was quite intimidated.

The line-up was Ray, Colin, myself (on bass guitar) and a drummer (I think he was called Alan – a pleasant young guy). We played classic rock tunes – Chuck Berry, Elvis, Jerry Lee Lewis, Gene Vincent, etc, numbers.

I was expecting a hostile reception but in fact the audience loved it and were very friendly with us. Between sets, they used to come and talk to us, and I remember that some of them would proudly tell us of their minor exploits with the police. Despite their appearance, most of them were pussycats. Apart from the regular gig we would play at their private do’s and wedding parties.

During this time I was doing a lot of gigs with Diz Disley at various folk clubs in or around London. He was a likeable guy, full of fun and a pleasure to work with. He encouraged me a great deal.

I also remember an encounter with Graham Bond in Wardour Street. I was a frequent visitor to the Flamingo club which had been a jazz venue, often to see the great tenor player Dick Morrissey.

At that time, before Xmas 1969, the club held all-night sessions. Our band had just completed the set from about 10.00 to 12.00pm and I was parked outside the club putting my gear into the car (at that time it was possible to park in Soho).

It was cold and snowing quite heavily. A car parked behind me and the passenger got out and proceeded to talk at me at a high rate of knots. I could barely understand what he was saying, thinking he must have been ‘high’ but I gathered that he was there to do the next set from about 1.30am to 3.30am. This carried on for about 5 minutes. This was my second encounter with Graham Bond. Eventually, I made my apologies and drove off.

Anyway, we went on to record 14 numbers at Pye studios, near Marble Arch in December 1969 and January 1970.

The newspaper and other media accounts of how the name Mungo Jerry came about is totally inaccurate. I recall very clearly what happened because I was partly responsible for inventing it.

We were originally called ‘The Good Earth’ or ‘Good Earth’ but an American band already had that name. Barry Murray did indeed propose the name ‘Incredible Shark’ but we were never going to accept that. Meanwhile the record company was screaming for a name because they needed to print the record label, sleeves, posters, etc.

What happened was that on the evening before we were due in the studios I went to Paul’s place (I believe it was in Sunbury) to rehearse with him (just the two of us) a couple of numbers that we were to record the following day.

It was Paul’s idea to write down whatever names came into our head in two separate columns. We then married up names from each column and came up with ‘Mungo Jerry’ amongst others. The next day in the studio Mungo Jerry was accepted by all – reluctantly as I recall.

None of us was aware of the T.S Eliot connection at the time, although he had been part of my ‘A’ level curriculum at school. A few weeks later an ex-classmate of mine, who later became a barrister, asked me if the name originated from T.S Eliot’s ‘Old Possum’s Book Of Practical Cats’. I told him that it had not – it was pure coincidence. The fact that ‘Jerry’ is spelt differently (T. S Eliot names one of his cats Mungojerrie) is evidence of this. I hope this clears up the myth of how the name came about.

The record was released in May 1970; it was a maxi-single (an EP sized record played at 33 1/3 rpm) on Pye’s Dawn label. Side one had two tracks – In The Summertime and Mighty Man; on side two was Dust Pneumonia Blues. Everyone at the record company thought that Mighty Man was the most likely to be chart material, which shows that nobody can reliably forecast a ‘hit’.

An important point I would like to make concerns the rhythm of ITS. When I first started playing it my initial impulse was to go along with the dotted rhythm – dom-di-dom. After a few plays, I realised that it was more effective to play a straight bass on the 1st and 3rd beats of the bar, giving a solid foundation against which the distinctive dotted rhythm could be played.

The Hollywood Festival: Anyway, at more or less the same time we were billed to appear at The Hollywood Festival (near Newcastle-under-Lyme, Staffordshire) organised by our management company ‘Red Bus’.

The festival had a tremendous line-up, headlined by Jose Feliciano and including bands such as The Grateful Dead, Ginger Baker’s Air Force, Black Sabbath and many others.

I still have a clear image of Ginger Baker arriving in his Jensen Interceptor and entering the luxury caravan reserved for the exclusive use of the ‘superstars’ as a dressing room. Whilst we minnows had to use whatever we could find.

Mungo Jerry was relatively unknown at the time – we were really just there to fill up the bill. I seem to remember that we went on stage after The Grateful Dead.

I think it’s fair to say that we were a bit apprehensive, following such a band of international repute. After we had played our first number the audience erupted; as one, they stood up and cheered us. We were completely, and not a little surprised, at this reception. For me, it felt a bit like maybe scoring the winning goal at a Wembley cup final. This was on Saturday; such was the reception that we were asked to appear again on Sunday.

This is a quote from someone who was present at the festival: “Mungo Jerry’s song In the Summertime had been released days before the festival & was I think already a crowd favourite from the record being played on site, so when they got on stage & people knew who it was or recognized the style, they were into it. There was such demand they played again on Sunday.

I remember seeing the silhouettes of people on the ridge behind us, the fires burning, and thousands of people keeping the beat of the song(s) by banging pop cans together. The song hit the charts the next week, I guess from people who were at the festival who, when they got home, wanted a souvenir of that magical moment.”

The record was a smash hit all over the world. It was ‘plugged’ (i.e. promoted) by a professional ‘plugger’ by the name of Tony Saxon, on a commission based on sales. Such was the success of the record the ‘management’ paid him on a much-reduced basis (I don’t know the details).

Ray and I had driven up to Stoke in my car, sharing the driving. After that sensational weekend we headed back home on Monday. As you can imagine, we were both tired, having had little sleep in the past few exciting days. I was still living in Maida Vale, so the first destination was Ray’s home in Bedfont.

Ray was driving and we were only a few miles from his house when we approached a little slip road which somehow seemed to be a continuation of the main road. Ray turned into it. We were suddenly confronted by a brick wall several yards in front of us.

We must have been doing about 20 mph. I was half asleep but fortunately my survival instinct kicked in and I yelled at Ray to stop, which he did – just in time. A collision would have written off my car and more importantly caused serious injury to us both, or worse. The MJ story could have been somewhat different.

Following Our Overnight Success: Our appearance on TOTP was recorded at BBC studios at White City. The main thing I remember about it was that we had to hang about for most of the day, waiting for our time to record.

Some weeks later I received, on behalf of the band, an award – I think it was for ‘the best new band of the year’. In front of a large press gathering I received the award from Jimmy Saville. I had never liked him, he was utterly without talent – this was some 40 years before the revelations. His handshake was cold and slimy and while he was speaking, supposedly addressing me, his eyes didn’t look at me but through me.

In the summer of 1970 we played all over Europe. For me, one of the highlights was the Rotterdam Festival. I think the audience actually numbered about 100,000 (not 150,000 as has been reported), but who’s counting. We went on after a set by John Surman’s band. They played an ugly (to my ears) ‘avant-garde’ set and the audience was distinctly underwhelmed, so MJ offered a complete contrast. This probably added to our appeal.

One of my main memories is of thousands of people throwing paper plates in the air after each of our numbers. My double bass was lost in transit by the airline (it turned up later) so the bass player of Gentle Giant had kindly lent me his bass guitar.

The other main memory was the strong aroma of marijuana back-stage and no doubt amongst the audience, but the police tolerated it.

We had arrived at Amsterdam airport. I spent the night with an American lady and in the morning she gave me a lift back to the airport on her motor scooter, in plenty of time we thought, for the flight home. But the return flight departed from Rotterdam airport, so I had to wait a couple of hours for the next flight to London and returned alone.

We all did or said things that we may have regretted but for my part I always tried to promote the band in a positive way, as far as I was able. For example, when we first arrived in Berlin the weather was very hot and sunny. We were being interviewed and filmed by several TV and newspaper reporters.

A large fountain with water about three feet deep was adjacent. I thought it would be fun and a good move to jump in and splash about since this accorded with our image of a fun-loving ‘summertime’ band. I asked the journalists if this would be in order and they said it would be OK. So we stripped off our shirts and did exactly that. The episode was filmed and as a result we had prime-time news features on German TV that evening.

We were due to appear at the 1970 Isle of Wight festival. The massive bill seemed to comprise virtually every pop band of note at the time. Things became extremely behind schedule. As a result we never got the chance to appear. I just know that, given the opportunity, we would have been a sensation.

Anyway, I was very much looking forward to the appearance of Miles Davis. I found myself sitting next to Richard Williams, the editor of Melody Maker. I was very disappointed. Their performance was, to my ears, discordant, incoherent and unpleasant. The band included the fine double bass player Dave Holland. He was reduced to playing ‘plink-plonk’. After about 15 minutes of this, I made my apologies to Richard and left, returning to the hotel.

In September we played a gig in St Patrick’s Athletic FC stadium (Richmond Park) in Dublin. We arrived at this football stadium. There was a substantial audience and we were looking forward to the gig. The organisers had hired several stewards with Alsatians for the purpose of crowd-control; they must have anticipated some trouble. But apparently someone had sedated these dogs with a concoction of tranquilliser and aniseed.

As we played the first couple of numbers the crowd was edging closer towards the stage. Then they began to climb on to the stage, until there were quite a few of them, maybe a dozen or so, up there with us. One guy sat on my speaker cabinet and said “…don’t worry, I’ll look after you”. This made me even more terrified.

We struggled through another song and the organisers called time – I think they turned the power off. The crowd was dispersed but they seemed quite content to have heard only about three numbers. 

Michael O Hanlon is a writer who is helping Ray to write his biog; I asked him if he could explain their behaviour. He  replied “You ask whether I could explain the Dublin mentality. Sadly, after 70 years of being a Dubliner, I am hardly qualified to explain the amazing and often remarkable lunacy that can sometimes colour this rainy city!”

We gigged all over the UK. Our usual fee was £700-1000 (very good money in 1970). We were usually paid in cash. The following morning I would faithfully pay it in to the Group’s bank account. The account was controlled by the management company. I never saw any of that money again !

The U.S.A Tour: The USA tour took place in the autumn of 1970. I didn’t know it at the time, but this was the beginning of the end of my career with MJ. The tour was a bit of a shambles. Amazingly, almost no dates had been arranged so Dee Anthony managed to put together an itinerary covering most of this vast country (I’ll never understand why this was not done in advance in the UK).

With the benefit of hindsight, it would have been much more effective to have concentrated our tour on one or two States, so that we could develop a solid following there, rather than trying to cover the whole of that vast country.

I don’t think it added significantly to our presence or record sales in the U.S. But the six-week tour was a fascinating experience for me; it was a great opportunity to observe the American culture. But all the time it was overshadowed by the bad vibes within the band.

When we first arrived in NYC we stayed at a mid-town hotel. Someone told us that a guest had been found murdered in his room about six weeks beforehand. Nevertheless, our room was clean and the service reasonable. Via room-service I ordered a club sandwich. To my surprise, it was about 3 inches thick consisting of about 3 layers. Hello America !

Being in the town gave us the opportunity to do some sight-seeing. We went to the top of the Empire State building where there was a fantastic panoramic view of the city and the Hudson river. Unfortunately, it was foggy and the view was not as spectacular as it might have been.

I remember Ray and I ventured out to Times Square. It was an energising and novel place to be. But the particular thing that I remember most vividly was the sight of several knife shops, with a large array of their wares in the shop window – a sight totally unknown to us in England.

We recorded a few numbers in NYC; I don’t know if this was for Janus or a radio broadcast. But my main memory of this is being thrilled to see the jazz drummer Mel Lewis doing a session in the adjoining studio. I had recently discovered the recordings of the Thad Jones-Mel Lewis Orchestra. The band was based in NYC and contained many famous NY session musicians, including a bass player I much admired, Richard Davis.

Ray and I went to a B.B King/James Cotton gig in upstate NY which was held in a large gymnasium, part of a college. He particularly wanted to hear the James Cotton band whereas I was keen to hear B B King. We enjoyed the gig. Sometime later Ray told me that he had under-appreciated B.B King.

After a few days we were moved out to a cheaper motel in Long Island, while Dee Anthony and Eliot Cohen were arranging some dates for the band. Both Ray and I didn’t like being cooped up there. Ray says that I gave a newspaper interview in which I was alleged to have said that I didn’t like New York. Subsequently, it published an article headlined ‘New York – you can keep it’. This was a gross distortion. I love New York. It’s still the most exciting city in the world. It was home to the hallowed jazz clubs where be-bop was nurtured. Places like 52nd Street, Mintons, Birdland, the Village Vanguard were like shrines to the jazz lover.

Sadly, most of them have become victims of re-development, but the Vanguard is still going, since 1935, in its original premises (after a brief false start at another location). Anyway, what I said was that we didn’t like being stuck out in a remote place in Long Island, especially when NYC was there to be explored. As I say, it was a gross distortion. It was a case of the old   maxim: “Never let the truth get in the way of a good story.”

Marvin Schlachter, our record company producer in the U.S.A, whom I remember with great respect, was aware of the tensions within MJ. I got on well with him and the Janus Records guys. Marvin offered me membership of Potliquor – a  successful rock group from Baton Rouge, Louisiana. The band was formed by George Ratzlaff and Guy Schaeffer after the breakup of a successful cover band named the Basement Wall. I declined, wanting to stay loyal to MJ (which at the time was at the height of its popularity) – a decision which I later regretted in the light of subsequent events.

Then there was the ‘sweets’ incident in Boston. As I recall, Colin and Paul accused me of not sharing some sweets with them. That may or may not have happened. In any case, it’s playground stuff. It was either a misunderstanding or a selfish act on my part.

In Detroit we were on the same bill as Rod Stewart and the Faces. I remember meeting Rod briefly backstage before he went on. He was drinking wine straight from the bottle. We shared the same hotel as the Faces and I remember that Paul and I took part in a silly prank with them which involved making paper darts, lighting them and sending them out of the hotel window to the swimming pool below. I’m not proud of that.

Perhaps my proudest moment happened in Cleveland. I was walking around the shopping precinct near our hotel. I remember I was dressed as an off-duty pop star (whatever that may be), wearing a three-quarter length blue velvet jacket. A couple of young black guys saw me and declared “Hey, look at that dude !” I’m still trying to work out whether it was meant in admiration or contempt.

We stayed in Los Angeles for a few days and Ray relates how he stayed overnight at the house of Peter Tork, and how he slept on the floor. I had a somewhat similar experience. A lady friend insisted that we go to the Laurel Canyon home of Stephen Stills. This was quite late at night and when we arrived there was no sign of the man himself, but every room in the large house, including the kitchen, contained guys on the floor in sleeping bags. It must be a Hollywood custom. We didn’t stay long.

Our roadies managed to overturn the van in California, shattering my double bass. Surprise, surprise, Red Bus had not arranged any equipment insurance; nor did they offer me any compensation. I played the remainder of the tour on a Fender Precision bass guitar that I purchased in Hollywood.

Throughout the U.S.A tour I roomed with Ray and got on well with him. But matters soon got out of hand and it became clear that the two other members of the band wanted me out. I do not know whether this was because of personal reasons or ‘musical differences’.

At that time I had some knowledge of music harmony and had loved jazz since the age of about 14. I had played in various bands and many different music genres. I did not know much, but I think it is fair to say that my musical knowledge was beyond that of the other members. They were of the opinion that “a jazz musician” was incapable of playing their music.

For whatever reason, Ray went along with this (he later admitted that this was unfair). Barry Murray had stressed to me that it was important to be perceived as a ‘music head’. I tried to be this and maybe I came over as being a bit too arrogant.

The Sacking: Only a few days after the band returned from America a rehearsal was called. This was a call from a band that NEVER REHEARSED. So, coupled with the negative vibes I had experienced in the USA I had a very bad feeling about it. Nevertheless, although I strongly suspected it was all phoney and a set-up, I made the journey to Staines.

All I remember about it was that we started playing a routine number and after about three choruses someone (I think it was Colin) complained that there was something wrong with the rhythm. “It might be the bass…  oh yes, it is the bass.”

My playing was good enough for Diz Disley with whom I had been gigging in between MJ shows. It was good enough for the hundreds of gigs, in all sorts of genres, before and after 1970. My bass playing didn’t prevent ITS from becoming a worldwide monster hit.

It’s one thing to say to a fellow musician , ‘I don’t like your playing’ or even, ‘I don’t like you’, but what was objectionable was the sneaky way it was done. I expected that from Paul and to a lesser extent from Colin, but I was disappointed that apparently Ray was happy to go along with it.

Barry Murray repeatedly told us that although we were a goodtime band it was important that we should be perceived to have a serious undertone – that we should appeal to ‘heads’. It made a lot of sense to me. I tried to follow this when giving interviews and this may have irritated them.

Another aspect which might have alienated them was the fact that, although Ray was obviously the most sought-after member of the band, I did most of the foreign interviews. I was fairly fluent in French and Spanish at that time and had a smattering of German. This may have made them think that I was trying to be superior. It seemed to me that Paul was jealous of anyone who was better at something than he.

It’s stating the obvious, but playing in a music group, like any team activity, has to be an exercise where the  players support and encourage each other. A sense of competition is all very well but it should be directed, if at all, against the opposition, not within the band.

I continually felt that my talents, such as they are, were not viewed positively but were the object of jealousy or resentment. To a certain extent Ray and I could appreciate where we were both coming from in terms of musical direction, but the others had a narrow purist conception of what was acceptable and what was not.

We were in the business of entertainment and to be successful you need the oxygen of publicity. You don’t get that by being like every other band or by conforming to the ‘norm’. It’s the fusion of talents that make a band successful; this was clearly not the case with MJ going forward.

Paul and Colin also complained about my dress, saying that I wore a black leather jacket which was not in keeping with the band’s image. If that were the case, why didn’t they specifically advise me as to how I should dress, instead of complaining behind my back ?  In fact, photo images will show that my dress was ‘appropriate’ as I saw it. In fact, I frequently wore a tailcoat on stage, an idea inherited from Joe Rush.

So Paul achieved what had been his objective almost from the very start. It was very destructive. The whole episode was disappointing, to say the least, and was a huge blow to my self-confidence. It took me a while to recover.

With hindsight, we should have sat down and calmly discussed any musical or personal problems within the band. For whatever reason, this did not happen. None of us is perfect and I guess we were all affected by the sudden fame. Most bands comprise, to a greater or lesser degree, musicians of different backgrounds and genres. The magic is in the fusion. In my opinion MJ was never the same thereafter.

Six months or so later they tried to fire Ray from the band !

It was reported thus: “Ray Dorset, the founder, frontman, and primary songwriter of Mungo Jerry, was actually sacked from his own band in late 1971 by his fellow bandmates. Following a highly successful tour, bandmates Colin Earl and Paul King orchestrated a coup and fired Dorset, intending to replace him with Dave Lambert. However, the band’s management and record label stepped in, siding with Dorset because he was the face and creative force behind Mungo Jerry’s signature sound and success.”

Subsequent to my sacking I received no support whatsoever from Red Bus (they were supposed to have been my managers). I contacted Pye Records several times in order to secure my royalty payments. They cold-shouldered me. After a few attempts, I let it go. I should have been more insistent, but at that age I was arrogant enough to believe that I would make plenty of money anyway. To this day I do not know where these royalties ended up. I now receive payments from PPL and (with Ray’s help) from BMG records. But obviously the big money would have accrued in 1970-71.

The band toured relentlessly during 1970. We (Ray) should have been given time to write new material including a follow-up song. Maybe I’m biased, but it seems to me that Red Bus could not resist the lure of the instant cash produced by touring. 

In the meantime, the Australian band ‘The Mixtures’ consequently had a hit with  The Pushbike Song which went to number one on the Australian charts in 1971 and crossed over to the UK, where it peaked at number two. The record is clearly a reproduction of the MJ sound. I don’t blame the Australians in the least. Ray had subsequent hits which reached the top 10 in the hit parade but nothing remotely compared to the magic of ITS and the original MJ line-up.

The Beatles had officially disbanded on April 9 1970. The Beatle phenomenon had been described as “Beatlemania”. 

Following our sensational success at the Hollywood Festival and the huge sales of ITS, the Melody Maker’s front page headline was “It’s Mungomania”. This was echoed by the rest of the music press. We were positioned to replace the Beatles !

Due to inept management and tensions within the band this never happened. A great opportunity lost.

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