The Ultimate Biography of The Bee Gees

by Hector Cook

  “We all get on so well, it seems the natural thing to be joining them. I feel a bit guilty about leaving Tin Tin, but I am really happy for them that their record ‘Toast And Marmalade For Tea’ is doing so well in the States. It was at 24 last week and is still going up fast. I’m happy with [The Bee Gees] style of music – I think I’m meant to play like this. And the brothers are working well together and striving for the same thing.”

  With his wife Caryl and their young daughter Emma to think of, the stability of a position in an established group made a welcome change to picking up session work. “At last I’m in a group that’s going on the road. I like the security because I have a family to look after,” he added. “Playing on stage is terribly important to me. As a musician, that’s the climax. I was afraid I wouldn’t get the opportunity to go out on the road and play, but Robert Stigwood promised there would be plenty of stage work. I thought I would be back in Melbourne in just six months, but after a couple of weeks in London I just knew I wasn’t going to go back.”

  Having already worked on Cucumber Castle and 2 Years On as an un-credited session musician, Geoff was similarly frustrated when the next “Bee Gees” LP was released in May. Due to the high predominance of Gibb compositions on it, many regard the S.W.A.L.K. album as one of theirs when it is actually the soundtrack to the Sealed With A Loving Kiss film – or Melody as it was called elsewhere in the world – initially released in Britain. The film, a sweet and sentimental drama about two 10-year-olds who declare their intention to get married, starred Tracy Hyde as Melody and Mark Lester as Daniel. It also reunited Lester with his Oliver! co-star Jack Wilde.

  The soundtrack to the film featured music by The Bee Gees, The Richard Hewson Orchestra and Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young. It contained ‘In The Morning’, ‘Melody Fair’ and ‘First Of May’, with instrumental reprises of each performed by the Richard Hewson Orchestra, as well as ‘Spicks And Specks’, ‘Give Your Best’ and ‘To Love Somebody’. For ‘In The Morning’, it was the first official release of the Barry Gibb composition from the group’s Australian days, which they had first performed for the general public at their Talk Of The Town performance with Lesley. Although the song itself was unchanged from its original 1966 recording, it was specially re-recorded for the film, and the new arrangement took it a little slower and featured some bass and piano from Maurice, as well as smoother harmony vocals. One reviewer described it as “a song worth seeing the film just to hear.”

  ‘Every Second Every Minute’ from the 2 Years On album was originally written for the film but wasn’t used. In retrospect, its aggressive vocals and raucous style would seem completely out of place in this gentle story of young love.

  Recognising the reluctance of the British public to forgive and forget the past, Robert Stigwood issued a gentle admonishment in the form of a press release to accompany the launch of their new single, ‘How Can You Mend A Broken Heart’, due out on May 28.

  ‘Lonely Days’ was the first single from the Gibb Brothers after the settlement of their family quarrel. And for anyone else the fact that it reached No. 1 in fourteen different countries, gave them their first chart-topper in the United States and became a gold for a million sales, would have been cause for unqualified rejoicing. But there was just one dark cloud. In Britain their fans, perhaps overfed on the diet of almost daily public squabbling, did not welcome them back with exactly open arms.

  Robin Gibb said, “Of course it meant a lot to us to get to number one in the States. And in terms of money it means far more than having a hit in Britain. But for me I would have sacrificed all of that to know that the fans here had forgiven us. We hope this new record will help them forget. It means more to us than I can tell you.”

  Certainly the Bee Gees fans with long memories will find something in ‘How Can You Mend A Broken Heart’ to take them back to the golden days. All of the Bee Gees’ lush romanticism is there, with the sweeping strings and Bill Shepherd’s instantly recognisable arrangements. The song was written by eldest Gibb brother Barry, together with Robin. Maurice shares the writing credits on the disc, however, with his own composition ‘Country Woman’ on the B-side. Both tracks have been selected from the twenty songs that the Gibbs wrote and recorded for us on their next album, which is titled Trafalgar.

  With a two-month tour of America scheduled for the autumn, it seems almost certain that this latest release will become another monster success in the U.S. charts. But this time the Bee Gees are anxiously watching the hit parade a little closer to home.

  Stigwood’s prediction for the American release would prove to be correct. ‘How Can You Mend A Broken Heart’ would surpass its predecessor in sales there, but in Britain, the response remained lukewarm.

  “The Bee Gees were always respected until the break-up. I think I lost a little respect for them when they broke up,” Geoff Bridgeford admitted. “The trouble is that they are brothers. They have hassles other groups don’t have.

  “Our tour of America was a success because there hadn’t been so much publicity about the break-up. But there’s no doubt that The Bee Gees would like to be accepted in Britain again. It would mean they had been forgiven. Still, I think they’d like to feel a little more confident of a good reception before doing a British concert. If the new single is successful, they may be tempted to try,” he added.

  Robin’s emphatic patriotism was still evident. “We want people in Britain to take us seriously now … What I mean is, we’re willing to work all the hours we can,” he said. “I’m all Churchill and the Union Jack, and I’d like to have a number one in my home country.”

  Unfortunately, regaining lost ground in Britain would turn out to be more difficult than they had anticipated. “It seems to be taking us a long time after the row to convince the public that The Bee Gees are alive and together,” said Barry. “Of course, we still have a go at each other, but we don’t argue. Arguments are a malignant growth and we crush them from the start. It’s things like that which break up groups. By no means are we on the way down. We’ve kept up our morale and the fan letters have helped.”

  Barry admitted to a certain reluctance to face the public in their homeland. “It has been too long between tours and it’s been so long since we met a British audience, I don’t know how they’ll take us. I’m nervous about it. To be honest, if we saw one of our records in the charts here, none of the number one records in all the other countries would matter a bit.”

  “If we had another hit, we could probably do another tour of England,” Maurice said. “But at the moment it’s not really worth the audience coming to see us, because they would be living on the memories of each song … I think the people in the business feel, ‘Why should they come back and try and make it again?’ We already have a reputation here as the arguing brothers. I don’t think we mishandled anything at the time of our problems because when our solo records came out, we were friends again. But stories of the arguments were still coming out. The press built it up 15 times more than it was.

  “I can see what is happening. Every time we make a record, people say, ‘That’s The Bee Gees again,’ but half the people in the country don’t think we’re still together. I’d love to do some concerts in England, but I don’t want to go on stage and do ‘Words’, ‘To Love Somebody’ … and all those old songs and have people saying ‘Do you remember that, Edith?’ It’s very hard to get back again, we want another number one before we do concerts.”

  His twin disagreed about the negative aspects of people’s memories. “There will never be a vocal change in The Bee Gees. People remember your sound and that is what they want,” Robin insisted. “They associate sounds with times in their lives; perhaps they stood in Earls Court when they heard a song and it brings back memories.

  “We’re a very closed up group. We firmly believe in what we are doing,” he added. “To us, our music is the ultimate thing – we don’t like outside influences and we don’t believe we need them. We never have and we’ve
been doing this for 15 years. You can get enough influences just by reading the papers or watching television. We’ll go on until we drop. We’ll all do separate things, but The Bee Gees will always be The Bee Gees. We’re not just a group – we’re an establishment within ourselves, and we’re a family as well. The Bee Gees are more to us than our second name. We were born into music, and we’ll go on the road even when we’re 60.”

  Maurice was disparaging about the glam rock movement that was sweeping Britain. “I’ve seen Roxy Music, David Bowie, Mott The Hoople and Alice Cooper,” he stated and, ignoring the fact that the last named was American, continued, “If you play those British artists’ records one after the other you never know the difference. Nobody will ever be as exciting as the Stones.”

  “We sold the same number of copies of ‘Lonely Days’ as ‘Ride A White Swan’ did, but our records weren’t in the shops that are used to make up the BBC charts,” Barry challenged. It seems somewhat ironic that Barry would get on his high horse about T. Rex’s first big hit in light of the ploy used by The Bee Gees themselves to get ‘Wine And Women’ onto the Australian charts just a few years earlier.

  * * *

  One bright spot on the horizon was their return to Australia in July for their first tour since finding international success. After being greeted by their sister Lesley and her young son Barry at the airport, The Bee Gees faced the press on their first day back in the Land of Oz.

  “We’ve been waiting for five years to tour back here,” Maurice said. “At our first hit we said, ‘Right, now let’s go to Australia.’ ”

  “But we’ve always thought it was a little bit too soon to come back,” Barry added, “because we didn’t want to come back and say ‘Hello’ and appear on shows here and there, we wanted to come back with a bang because we left with such a dent … nothing. As soon as ‘Spicks And Specks’ was number one, we made plans and we left.”

  To emphasise the change in their fortunes since they left Australia, the Gibb brothers agreed to the tour only on the stipulation that they be backed with a full orchestra for all the concerts. “I suppose you could call it value for money,” Barry explained. “It’s the only way the kids can hear the same sound we put on our records.”

  The group told the Australian press that their management had been forced to hire bodyguards for the upcoming American tour, their second that year. This was due to the activities of the so-called Rock Liberation Movement, which had started after Bob Dylan’s 1969 comeback concert at the Isle of Wight festival when thousands rioted as they tried to gain access without paying.

  The movement was clearly well organised, as highlighted by an episode on The Bee Gees’ recent American tour. According to Maurice, “They knew where we were when nobody else did. One of them phoned me when we were in Los Angeles and said he had planted marijuana in my hotel room.”

  “Bob Dylan was attacked in the US because he doesn’t practice what he preaches – freedom. It’s a kind of liberation movement,” Barry explained. “There are thousands of people involved and their main feeling is against paying money to see entertainers who sing message songs about freedom. It’s an underground movement which wants all music to be free. There have been death threats against pop stars and, when we were in New York during February, there was a bomb scare in our hotel. Death threats against pop stars are useless, and they don’t worry me. Anyway, death couldn’t be any worse than living,” he added cryptically.

  Maurice alleged that the cost of a Bob Dylan concert ticket was $20, while The Bee Gees charged only $6. “It’s the same with John Lennon and Yoko,” he added. “They say ‘Power To The People’ but charge enormous prices for seats at their concerts.”*

  The brothers joked about the fact that RSO’s status as a public company meant that anyone could now buy stock in The Bee Gees. “Our public company is worth about twenty million dollars,” Barry said. “We are major shareholders. We have enough security for us to live in comfort for twenty years or so. Once we had to pay $80 to get our photo on the front page of a magazine. Of course, then we were a struggling group in Australia, with only one hit to our name.”

  They admitted that they weren’t sure what to expect of the Australian audiences after such a long absence. They needn’t have worried. Every concert of the nine-day tour was a complete sell-out, and pleas for more encores continued long after the group had left the stage.

  Between concerts, the Gibbs found plenty of time for an exclusive interview with Go-Set magazine about their past and future projects. Referring to Sing A Rude Song, Maurice revealed, “I ended up doing a musical with Barbara Windsor, which was the worst part of my life.” However, he declared, “It was a great experience for nine weeks but …”

  “I got a lot of kicks out of going to see Maurice,” Barry said, “and Robin had his single ‘Saved By The Bell’. I had a lot of baths and waited. I produced other artists and did a lot of writing, which is in the can. I spent more time in reclusion than anything else, and I wrote and I wrote. There’s two years of writing because I didn’t do anything else.”

  For Maurice, the future held the promises of delving more heavily into production. “I’ve always wanted to produce my wife, Lulu, on record and I’m doing that now,” he revealed. “I have a production company called Moby Productions and I’ll have Tin Tin and Richard Harris and Lu. I’ll basically stick to that. I’m more the technical side of it, I love doing tape recordings and things like that, I’ve got my own studios and I guess I just want to make good records. [‘Toast And Marmalade For Tea’] was done two years ago. It must be the only record produced two years before it’s a hit.”

  For Barry, Hollywood still beckoned. “I like acting,” he said. “Whatever happens in the future, well I’ll just wait and see but I want to do dramatic acting. We all want to …”

  “To be or not to be!” Robin interrupted.

  “We all want to in a way, but I’m a fanatic about it,” Barry continued, ignoring the outburst.

  Robin revealed a far more intriguing plan for the future. “I want to put the World Domination League on the map,” he disclosed. “So far we’ve only one member … perhaps I’ll be doing some dominating this afternoon. It’s not very popular, but I’m sure after a few years I’ll get it together. There’s a lot of dominating to do, but until then I still want to act … but that doesn’t stop me behind the scenes promoting the World Domination.”

  What more could be said?

  * * *

  The group’s concert at Melbourne’s Festival Hall on July 15 was the main focus of an ABC-TV spectacular. The producer of the show, Bruce Wilson, had accompanied them on the tour to familiarise himself with the group. “The audience was terrifically responsive,” he recalled. “Following The Bee Gees on their Australian tour, I got to know their show so well that I knew where to point the camera. The result is that we have captured on-stage jokes and conversation.”

  For native Australian Geoff Bridgeford, the tour was a chance to catch up with his family. While he was glad to be back, he said he planned to stay in Britain. “I think London is the best place in the world to live, after Melbourne,” he added diplomatically. “And London is the entertainment centre of the world for me, anyway. The challenge there for entertainers is what I imagine Hollywood would be for film stars.

  “The public have come round in the cycle, The Bee Gees have never wavered … I was a big fan long before I was in the group. I had played with them before in Australia, and I always wanted to be in the group with good songs and good lyrics. No one can touch them, and I also dug their dedication. I don’t think the group has changed – the music is more important than the line-up.”

  After the excitement of filming the television special, the Perth concert on July 17 should have proved anti-climactic. Instead, a riot broke out in the audience when, during the third last number, some young girls attempted to scramble up on to the stage. A roadie snatched one girl back and roughly threw her from the stage, injuring her
as she landed on her back. The crowd raged but seemed to calm down as Maurice told them to shut up.

  For Robin with his ill-fated New Zealand début, things began to take on a serious flavour of déjà vu. When the group returned for an encore, so did the angry mob. One young man leapt to the stage and began smashing the group’s equipment. More joined in the destruction, followed by the police. One officer was dragged from the stage but helped back up. As the first young man was arrested and led off in handcuffs, the crowd went berserk with angry cries of “Kill the pigs!” ringing out.

  The Bee Gees shunned the after show press conference. It was an unfortunate end to what began as a triumphant homecoming.

  * * *

  According to Maurice, after the Australian tour was completed, “We have about three week’s holiday, which isn’t really three weeks because we’ll be doing other things as well, and then we do a three-month tour of America which is about 38 cities and that should just about kill us.”

  “We’re looking forward to visiting the places we didn’t before, Oklahoma, Texas, Nashville,” Barry added. “We want to go south where we haven’t been before to hear the music down there.”

  The tour, with Tin Tin as the supporting act, began on August 28 and took them to 22 cities, playing 30 concerts and a guest appearance on the Tonight Show with Johnny Carson, in only 36 days. The tour concentrated this time on the eastern half of the United States, finishing up in the Midwest at Keil Auditorium in St Louis, Missouri.

  Robin joked that the punishing schedule of the tour would be “very brain draining, and our mental output and physical output will equal four nervous breakdowns. But we’ll have days off – we get back in time to see the Rolf Harris show at Christmas!”