by Phil Collins
Then: the Beatle dumps me off his album, and nobody tells me. First they cut me from A Hard Day’s Night, and now this. What have I ever done to the Fab Four?
The Ballad of All Things Must Pass: I wrote a story to myself to account for the events surrounding that fateful day at Abbey Road. Several stories. After all, I had thirty years to pick at the scab of that bruising and literally bloody encounter and come up with reasons for my rejection. Thirty years to explain away the fact that the leading musicians of my teenage days saw fit to give me the run-around, then dump me.
So, I told myself, here’s what happened: they had decided to go in another direction with the production of the song. Of course they had. It was Phil Spector. Notorious for it. He was a mad genius, and would one day get very much madder still.
Or: George had a new vision for the song. Bet he did. This was his big, post-Beatles statement record—triple album, twenty-eight tracks, a whole load of ideas. Naturally he was going to change his mind about how he wanted “Art of Dying” to sound.
Plus, he was George Harrison, of The Beatles. The Quiet One. He was called that for a reason. No wonder he didn’t tell me.
—
One day in 1982 I’m working at The Farm with Gary Brooker from Procol Harum on his Lead Me to the Water album. Gary asks, “Should we get Eric or George to play guitar?” Gary has spent the last couple of years in Clapton’s touring band, and he knows Harrison—he performed on All Things Must Pass as well, but at least his piano playing made the cut.
So, because he can, Gary asks both to play guitar, and both agree. When George arrives I introduce myself. “Yeah, George, we’ve actually met before…” I begin, then tell him about that May evening in Abbey Road twelve years previously.
“Really, Phil? I don’t remember that at all.”
Brilliant. A Beatle ruined my life and can recall nothing whatsoever about it. If I was feeling bad before…
At least George puts my mind at ease over another matter. Rumors had been circulating that I was going to join his old mate McCartney in Wings. There was no truth in the whispers, though it sounded like an intriguing idea. George is quick to reassure me that it wasn’t a gig I’d have wanted. Becoming the fifth drummer in Wings would have been “a fate worse than death.”
Anyway: I still do not have closure. Throughout the eighties and nineties, when things are going pretty well, still nothing can rid me of this troublesome niggle. Was I really, actually, ditched from All Things Must Pass because I was not good enough?
In 1999, I’m at Formula One racing legend Jackie Stewart’s sixtieth birthday party. I met Jackie in the gadabout eighties, and we get on famously. Jackie would take me clay-pigeon shooting, which was not really my kind of thing, and I’d get him tickets to see Genesis and invite his sons Paul and Mark to my gigs.
Cementing our friendship even further is the fact that, in 1996, I bought Jackie’s house in Switzerland. So by the end of the nineties, when he’s launching Stewart Grand Prix with son Paul, we’re great pals. I’ve never been to a Grand Prix, but George and Eric are huge fans of motor-racing. So, my wife Orianne and I are invited to these lovely weekends—go to Hockenheim and meet Schumacher, Coulthard, Barrichello and all the other top Formula One drivers. The actual race day is almost a sideshow, because you never see anything at a Grand Prix. You’re better off sitting in a caravan and watching it on TV. But the practice day and qualifying are great fun. High-speed hospitality at its finest.
So here we are at this party for Jackie’s birthday, at his new U.K. residence near the Prime Minister’s weekend retreat, Chequers, in Buckinghamshire. In attendance are lots of high rollers, royalty and racing drivers. I’m at a table with Princess Anne’s kids, Zara and Peter. Also present and correct: George.
By this point I’ve met him a couple of times with Eric. I’ve come to know him as a lovely man, and my favorite Beatle. So I’m familiar enough to offer a cheery: “Hey, George, how you doing?” And again, I casually (I hope) ask him about All Things Must Pass. But still, no memory. Nothing, nada, zip.
Maybe, thirty years on, I should, finally, take George’s solo masterpiece at its word. All things must pass, especially my rejection from one of the greatest albums ever.
The following year a music journalist approaches me at Hockenheim. Out of nowhere, he says, “Phil, you were on All Things Must Pass, weren’t you?” Inside I’m shouting, “YES! Yes, I was!” Instead I try to play it cool to this stranger and say, “Well, it’s a long story…”
Then he says, “You know George is remixing it? For a thirtieth-anniversary reissue? I know George, and since he’s got all the master tapes out, I’ll ask him if he can find you.”
Suddenly, I’m excited. “Oh, that’d be great.” Not just to find out what happened to it, but to have a copy of my session. “Yeah, that’d be great. ‘Art of Dying’ is the song. How long do you think it’ll take?” Needy, moi?
Still, it’s been so long, I’m not holding my breath. In my heart of hearts I don’t think I’m going to hear any more about it. Then, on the Wednesday following, I receive a little package in the post. It’s a tape, with a handwritten letter.
“Dear Phil. Could this be you? Love, George.”
I think, “This is it. Somewhere on this tape…” It’s almost like I’m holding the Holy Grail (of teenage conga sessions). “I didn’t dream it. And it’s not like George dug it up in that Tokyo record shop that’s famous for stocking every Fab Four bootleg, ever.” Because I’ve already looked in that shop and it wasn’t there. “George himself has sent me this.”
I don’t listen to it immediately. I can’t bring myself to. But eventually I step somberly into my home studio. I close the door, pull up a chair, insert the tape and press play. Lo and behold, bit of hiss, and the drums start.
Ba-da-dad doom!
Then the sound of the congas bursts out of the speakers. To trained ears the shortcomings of the wincingly arrhythmic clatter are immediately apparent. Christ almighty! Turn it off!
A hyperactive toddler had been let loose. Well, you can tell the player had some semblance of talent—it’s not completely all over the place. But it’s all over the place enough for someone in charge to say, “Get rid of that kid!”
I’m shell-shocked. I don’t remember it being this bad. My playing is too busy, too hyper, too amateur. And clearly not what was required by Messrs Harrison and Spector.
The track peters out as people stop playing. Then I hear this distinctive voice. It’s Harrison speaking to Spector. “Phil? Phil? Do you think we can try it one more time, but without the conga player?”
I rewind it four or five times until I’m sure I heard it correctly—Harrison shouting to Spector, confining me to the dustbin, my worst fears realized.
Phil? Phil? Do you think we can try it one more time, but without the conga player?
Suddenly, finally, the truth. All these years I thought—hoped—they’d gone in a different musical direction with the track. I’d consoled myself, soothed my disappointment of thirty years’ standing, with that thought. And now I realize: I was fired. They didn’t disappear to watch football, or do drugs. They were getting rid of me. Someone had said, “Lose the kid conga player. We’re disappearing.” As one would if you don’t know what to say, especially if you’re a bunch of big rock stars. You disappear and leave it to Chauffeur Martin to do the dirty work and ditch the nineteen-year-old.
A few days later I’m sitting in my youngest son Mathew’s bedroom at home. The phone rings. It’s Jackie Stewart. “Hey, Phil, how are you?” A little bit of small talk. “Thought I’d see you at the John Lennon tribute concert the other night at the Royal Albert Hall…”
“Was there a concert?” I reply, trying to sound casual. “I didn’t know.”
“Yeah, it was a great evening. A lot of drummers there.”
“Really?”
“Yep. And a lot of conga players.”
I’m confused. Since when is Sir Jackie Stewart, racin
g legend and champion clay-pigeon shooter, interested in conga players? Then he says, “I’ve got a friend of yours here, wants to talk to you.” He passes the phone over and George Harrison starts speaking.
“Hi, Phil. D’you get the tape?”
Finally, thirty years of hurt tumbles out. “You bastard, George.”
“Eh? Why?”
“Well, for thirty years I had my own version of what happened that night, and why I was chopped from All Things Must Pass. And now I realize that I was so lame that you and Phil fucking Spector fired me.”
Harrison laughs. “No, no, no! We just made that tape the other day.”
“Eh? What do you mean?”
“Ray Cooper was in, helping me remix the album. I told him to play congas badly over ‘Art of Dying’ so we could record a special take just for you!”
I’ll say it again: you bastard, George. Thirty years of roller-coaster emotion, and now here’s another lurch. That wasn’t me. It was Cooper, monkeying around with Harrison.
Eventually I see the funny side, especially when George confirms that—to the best of his memory—I wasn’t fired.
Did George ever tell me what happened to my actual take? No, he did not. He couldn’t remember. He had no recollection of those sessions. I believe it, but I find it hard to understand. How can you not remember making All Things Must Pass? There’s so much to remember, and yet he seemed to have forgotten most of it. Maybe if you’re a Beatle there’s too much to remember, so it’s easier to sometimes forget.
In the booklet accompanying that thirtieth-anniversary edition, released in March 2001, seven months before he died, there are new sleeve notes written by George himself. And there I am, finally: “I don’t remember it, but apparently a teenage Phil Collins was there…”
George, bless him, sent me a copy of the remixed reissue of the album. It’s brilliant, although of course it would be immeasurably improved by the inclusion of “my” version of “Art of Dying.”
I still have that comedy congas tape. It’s one of my treasures. Here’s to you, George—you lovely bastard.
Or: the beginnings of my beginnings
Spring is blossoming into summer 1970, and I can describe my mood as both blooming and withering. On the plus side, I’ve just been in Abbey Road with two Beatles and have the raw and blistered fingers and palms to prove it. As far as I’m concerned at this stage, I am a member of the all-star recording cast of All Things Must Pass. Knackered hands notwithstanding, that’s surely as good as things can get for a nineteen-year-old drummer with jittery ambition in his sticks.
On the negative side, Flaming Youth are, at best, smoldering. Ark 2 had set the controls for the heart of the sun, but had thumped back to Earth. I know I’m a good player, but I don’t imagine for one second that George Harrison is about to ask me to join his touring line-up. I need a full-time gig, or a better gig, or preferably both.
Every Thursday I hotfoot it to my local newsagent and pick up that week’s music papers—all of them. Like any football fan, I start reading from the back. I pore through the job ads, dismissing the ones that don’t fit: “Skiffle quartet seeks percussionist. Must have own washboard and teeth”; “Country band needs quiet drummer with cowboy hat.” I also study the concert listings, to see which groups are busiest with bookings. I’m keen to avoid another rehearsal-room band like the one Flaming Youth have become. I want to get out and play to people other than ourselves.
Finally, one ad catches my eye because it has a box around it, which is always a good sign (they’ve paid a bit more for that box—they must be serious): “Tony Stratton-Smith is looking for 12-string guitarist plus drummer sensitive to acoustic music.” Only one of those words applies to me, although on a good day I like to think I’m “sensitive” to my girlfriend’s needs. Acoustic music, though? That’ll be a bit of a stretch. Ultimately, I decide, “Fuck it, I’m a drummer, I’ll go anyway.”
One of the reasons for my interest is mention of Stratton-Smith. I know him from hanging about at the Russell Hotel with The Freehold. Since then he’s had some success managing The Koobas, a beat group from Liverpool, and Hertfordshire rock band The Creation—their singles “Making Time” and “Painter Man” were both big hits. I also know he’s started his own record label, Charisma.
I’m no particular fan of The Creation, The Koobas even less, but I like and respect Strat, and he likes me. His involvement suggests this band might be something more than run-of-the-mill. The next evening I track down Strat at the Marquee, one of his preferred watering holes. I buy him a drink, remind him of my credentials (“You must remember The Freehold? No?”) and attempt to fast-track myself into this band.
“No, no, no, dear boy,” tuts Strat, “these are fussy chaps. You’re going to have to call them. And you’re going to have to audition.”
These “fussy chaps,” he tells me, are Genesis. I don’t know much about them except that they’re constantly appearing in the back pages of Melody Maker—this is a busy gigging band.
I phone my old mate Ronnie Caryl. I’m thinking that if we present ourselves at this audition as a package, we’ll stand a better chance of getting the gig. He’s not hugely experienced on the 12-string, but he’s a great player and is bound to be able to rustle up the appropriate chops. Ronnie, as keen as me on an escape route from Flaming Youth, agrees.
I phone the number Strat has given me and speak to the singer with Genesis, who appears to be in charge of the auditions. He’s a soft-voiced, nervous-sounding, well-spoken chap who goes by the name of Peter Gabriel. I present my and Ronnie’s credentials, such as they are, amping up our sensitivity to acoustic music, and he tells us, with great politeness and civility, to come down to his parents’ home in Chobham, Surrey, a week from now.
So we decide to go for it, and we go for it in Ronnie’s battered car, cramming into an ageing Morris Minor his guitars and the Gretsch drum kit that I bought from Bruce Rowland. We drive southwest out of London, headed for Surrey. We pass trees, lots of trees. I’ve seen a tree before—I’m far from worldly-wise, but I’m not that much of a plank—but this is my first inkling that I am traveling into uncharted territory. I realize I’m a city boy, and that this is very much the leafy Home Counties. Our next thought: “Wow, they’ve got some money round here.”
After some furrowed-brow map-reading and a couple of wrong turns up country lanes, we arrive at the address we’ve been given. Ronnie noses the Morris Minor up an appropriately crunchy gravel drive and we pull up outside an oversized, beautiful country pile. Our guitars and drums seem to spew out of the car, instantly making the whole scene look a lot less tidy. I’m suddenly self-conscious of my apparel. My lived-in flares and T-shirt look a little downmarket for this gig. I ring the bell, and after what seems an age a distinguished-looking, middle-aged woman opens the door. Somehow Mrs. Gabriel works out that we’re not here to sell Encyclopædia Britannica or join her bridge circle. We must be here to try out for her son’s pop group.
“Oh, do come in,” she says, smiling. “You’re a little early. Please feel free to have a swim while you’re waiting.”
I think, “Wow, trees and a swimming pool.” Things are looking up. If only I’d thought to bring my swimming trunks to this rock’n’roll audition. But trunks or not, I decide to take the plunge. If I’ve learnt anything over the last couple of years, it’s to grab any and every opportunity. Who knows if I’ll ever again get the offer of a dip in a private heated pool in the countryside. I nonchalantly slip off my jeans, leaving me in just my graying Y-fronts, and jump in. The pool is lovely. This is first-class luxury.
We’ve arrived a couple of drummers early and, as I’m splashing about, I hear my rivals go through their paces. The standard is decent and I quickly appreciate what I’m up against. I keep my head down in the water a bit longer, calming my nerves. I later discover that Peter’s father works at ATV television. Or, perhaps, owns it.
Fresh from my swim, I heave my Gretsch into the garden and, following
Mrs. Gabriel’s directions, go through to the back terrace, trying not to knock over any of the ceramics or statuary. The first person I see is a tall, distinguished-looking fellow in carpet slippers and what looks like a Noël Coward smoking jacket.
The only thing missing is a Sobranie being inhaled through a cigarette holder. He’s youthful-looking, but wonderfully casual, the kind of guy you want to be when you grow up. But if this is Peter Gabriel’s dad, how young is Gabriel?
Turns out it’s not his dad, it’s his band mate. Mike Rutherford, nineteen, is the bassist/guitarist with Genesis. Like my dad, his dad has a lot of experience of boats. Except his dad is a Royal Navy admiral.
A grand piano has been hauled onto the terrace, and hovering in the shadows, about to play it, is another chap. He introduces himself as Tony Banks, Genesis’ twenty-year-old keyboard player. My first impressions? I don’t really have any. Tony is reserved to the point of invisibility, another politely spoken young man who won’t say boo to a goose—unless, I soon find out, that goose plays the wrong chord.
Finally I meet Peter Gabriel. He’s twenty and cut from the same fine cloth as his band mates. His demeanor can be summed up as hesitant, one hand clutching the other arm at the elbow, almost shy, very embarrassed, don’t-look-at-me-I’m-not-here. He’s in charge—well, his parents are, it being their house—but doesn’t want to be seen to be in charge.
“Um,” he begins, “maybe we should go indoors and listen to the album in the living room?” These three, I later learn, are old school friends. Their alma mater is Charterhouse in Surrey, a grand and exclusive—not to mention expensive—400-year-old Church of England private boarding school of significant educational repute. It’s a boys-only establishment that, by definition, prizes tradition, heritage, discipline, sporting and academic achievement, and much arcane phraseology and terminology. Former pupils like Mike, Peter and Tony are known as Old Carthusians. Charterhouse also lays claim to having helped invent football.
