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Thread: How did Mike Oldfield rope Mick Taylor into doing Tubular Bells live?

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    How did Mike Oldfield rope Mick Taylor into doing Tubular Bells live?

    So once again, someone's posted the video of Mike Oldfield playing Tubular Bells live on BBC TV, and among the musicians participating, is none other than Mick Taylor. Now, my question is, how the frell did Oldfield pull off getting one of the Rolling Stones to do that?! Has there ever been an explanation from either camp about how that came to be?!

    I reckon maybe it was something where the album came out and maybe Mick had heard it, liked it, and he got word to Oldfield that he had enjoyed it, or maybe Mick had mentioned it in an interview somewhere, which Mike took note of. Then when it was time to put an ensemble together to do it live (besides the BBC thing, they did some actual concerts with this lineup, didn't they?), Mike rings up Mick, and says "You fancy helping me do it live?".

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    Parrots Ripped My Flesh Dave (in MA)'s Avatar
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    He told him Karl Jenkins was going to be there.

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    Moderator Sean's Avatar
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    Andy Summers did it as well. Forget the reason or who put that show on.

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    Quote Originally Posted by Sean View Post
    Andy Summers did it as well. Forget the reason or who put that show on.
    Well, Andy Summers, as did Steve Hillage, did the "Orchestral Tubular Bells / Hergest Ridge" concerts in 1974-75, but he was not involved in the 1973 performances (maybe he was still living in the States ?)... Summers was playing in Kevin Coyne's band, thus part of the Virgin stable, which was probably the connection.

    No idea why Mick Taylor came to be involved in "Tubular Bells". An intriguing connection is that Keith Richards (and "bodyguards") turned up at the Gilli Smyth / Lady June part where Robert Wyatt had his accident - that's in Daevid Allen's "Gong Dreaming". Maybe it wasn't a musical connection, but being fellow clients of the same "product providers" ?
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    I have the feeling that Taylor was starting to tire of The Rolling Stones and the accompanying lifestyle. This was the beginning of him casting his net wider. He left The Stones not that long after this- they didn't even tour It's Only Rock N Roll with Taylor.

    Oldfield mentioned in an interview that Mick Jagger attended the concert performance which was broadcast on radio (Queen Elizabeth Hall, ISTR), and was very supportive and complimentary about it.

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    Quote Originally Posted by calyx View Post
    No idea why Mick Taylor came to be involved in "Tubular Bells". An intriguing connection is that Keith Richards (and "bodyguards") turned up at the Gilli Smyth / Lady June party where Robert Wyatt had his accident - that's in Daevid Allen's "Gong Dreaming". Maybe it wasn't a musical connection, but being fellow clients of the same "product providers" ?
    It seems this is correct. The following paragraph is from Wikipedia.

    “Taylor worked on various side projects during his tenure with the Rolling Stones. In June 1973, he joined Mike Oldfield onstage at the Queen Elizabeth Hall in a performance of Oldfield's Tubular Bells. Taylor was asked to take part in this project by Richard Branson as he felt Oldfield was unknown, having just been signed to Branson's fledgling label, Virgin Records. Taylor joined Oldfield once more for a BBC television broadcast in November 1973.”

    The Virgin connection also surfaces later when Taylor played on Expresso II (1978), recorded by Pierre Moerlen’s Gong.

    Separately, I also see (from Wikipedia) that Taylor appears on Little Feat’s live Waiting for Columbus album (playing slide guitar on A Apolitical Blues). I cannot remember him being credited with that (at least on the double CD version), but I may be wrong.
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  7. #7
    Quote Originally Posted by Munster View Post
    Wikipedia : “Taylor worked on various side projects during his tenure with the Rolling Stones. In June 1973, he joined Mike Oldfield onstage at the Queen Elizabeth Hall in a performance of Oldfield's Tubular Bells. Taylor was asked to take part in this project by Richard Branson as he felt Oldfield was unknown, having just been signed to Branson's fledgling label, Virgin Records. Taylor joined Oldfield once more for a BBC television broadcast in November 1973.”
    So, it was a Richard Branson connection, then. Still doesn't fully solve the mystery. Doesn't tell us how RB had "access" to the Stones, or why Mick Taylor agreed to do it.

    The Virgin connection also surfaces later when Taylor played on Expresso II (1978), recorded by Pierre Moerlen’s Gong.
    At that point it was more of a personal connection between Pierre and Mick. Both hit it off musically when they played together in 1973, and after Taylor left the Stones, Pierre was involved in his s/t solo album, released in 1978 but recorded some time before that, possibly even before the summer 1977 sessions for "Expresso II". Taylor also appears on "Downwind".
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    Quote Originally Posted by calyx View Post
    So, it was a Richard Branson connection, then. Still doesn't fully solve the mystery. Doesn't tell us how RB had "access" to the Stones, or why Mick Taylor agreed to do it.
    In Richard Branson’s 2017 autobiography ‘Finding My Virginity’ he writes: “When Virgin Records got off the ground my number one target was always The Stones, and we got close to signing them on several occasions. In 1975 the band's manager, Prince Rupert Loewenstein, tried to fob me off by demanding $3 million. I called his bluff by saying we would offer $4 million. After rushing across Europe and calling every distributor I had ever come across, I cobbled the money together. Prince Rupert was impressed, but we had started a bidding war and eventually lost out to EMI, who upped their bid to $5 million. It put me on the band's radar, though, and they started to record at our Manor Studio in Oxfordshire. When Keith decided to go solo, we brought him to Virgin to release his albums Talk Is Cheap and Main Offender.
    When The Stones came back on the market in 1991, I was determined not to miss out again.”

    This doesn't answer everything, but presumably Branson was 'networking' during the period. It also ties in with the interesting appearance of Richards at the Maida Vale party.
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    Quote Originally Posted by calyx View Post
    So, it was a Richard Branson connection, then. Still doesn't fully solve the mystery. Doesn't tell us how RB had "access" to the Stones, or why Mick Taylor agreed to do it.
    If Sean interviews Richard Branson, those would be great questions.

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    John Greaves interview in Prog Magazine just out “Mike needed a band so he got us all roped in...Mick Taylor we didn’t know but he was brought in because Richard Branson wanted a star to sell his new product and he was great.”

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    From The Guardian article on Tubular Bells:

    Branson: "John Peel announced that he'd come across something extraordinary and played the entire album on his radio show. Mike agreed to do one concert, at London's Queen Elizabeth Hall, and we persuaded Mick Taylor from the Rolling Stones and Steve Winwood to perform with him. But on the way, he panicked and suddenly said he couldn't go on. I had an old tumbledown Bentley and pulled over and said: "If I gave you the keys to this Bentley, would you change your mind?" He did. The concert was an astounding success – standing ovations – but Mike immediately went back into his shell."

    Oldfield: "I didn't feel I could reproduce the album on a stage. Richard gave me his Bentley so I would do it, but I later discovered the car cost more to repair than it was worth. Having been seen as some village idiot, I was suddenly everyone's greatest hero. So I went to live in the Welsh hillsides, surrounded by sheep."

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    Mick Taylor was mostly a blues guitarist - but he was a very good blues guitarist, and probably had an ear second to none. And Tubular Bells might have been an interesting challenge for him: Could he learn, and credibly play, music that was quite foreign to bis usual reference points?

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    Quote Originally Posted by Baribrotzer View Post
    Mick Taylor was mostly a blues guitarist - but he was a very good blues guitarist, and probably had an ear second to none. And Tubular Bells might have been an interesting challenge for him: Could he learn, and credibly play, music that was quite foreign to bis usual reference points?
    Let's give him a little more credit as a over-all musician; he was, indeed, mostly a blues / blues - rock guitarist, but he was good enough to hold his own in the Jack Bruce Band with Carla Bley in 1975!
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    Quote Originally Posted by Steve F. View Post
    Let's give him a little more credit as a over-all musician; he was, indeed, mostly a blues / blues - rock guitarist, but he was good enough to hold his own in the Jack Bruce Band with Carla Bley in 1975!
    Well nobody gives any credit for Nick Mason either and he played with both Carla Bley AND Michael Mantler! (Just listening Michael Mantler Live from 1987 with Mason on drums)
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    Quote Originally Posted by Kcrimso View Post
    Well nobody gives any credit for Nick Mason either and he played with both Carla Bley AND Michael Mantler! (Just listening Michael Mantler Live from 1987 with Mason on drums)
    Btw. I have always wondered what happened when Mason has been painted as almost non-functional as a drummer when Pink Floyd was doing A Momentary Lapse Of Reason when he has just been playing live part that where originally played by Jack De Johnette! What the heck happened between Michael Mantler Live (1987) and A Momentary Lapse Of Reason (also 1987)?
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    Quote Originally Posted by Munster View Post

    Separately, I also see (from Wikipedia) that Taylor appears on Little Feat’s live Waiting for Columbus album (playing slide guitar on A Apolitical Blues). I cannot remember him being credited with that (at least on the double CD version), but I may be wrong.
    There's another connection to Little Feat: Lowell George plays slide guitar on Giddy-Up from Taylor's solo-debut.

  17. #17
    Quote Originally Posted by Steve F. View Post
    Let's give him a little more credit as a over-all musician; he was, indeed, mostly a blues / blues - rock guitarist, but he was good enough to hold his own in the Jack Bruce Band with Carla Bley in 1975!
    Fair point. At any rate, I think my original question was answered. If Branson had been in contact, on friendly terms with the Stones management on other matters (specifically trying to get them signed to Virgin), it makes sense he might think "Right, we need somebody famous to take part in the live Oldfield thing" and get Taylor in.

    I have always wondered what happened when Mason has been painted as almost non-functional as a drummer when Pink Floyd was doing A Momentary Lapse Of Reason when he has just been playing live part that where originally played by Jack De Johnette! What the heck happened between Michael Mantler Live (1987) and A Momentary Lapse Of Reason (also 1987)?
    I think you're talking about two different styles of music there. It's one thing to play jazz music, and another thing to put on a set of headphones, and play along to a click track and play a really tight rhythm. I suspect that Gilmour and Ezrin probably realized, as they had with The Wall, that this record needed to be "radio friendly" (you think it was an accident Another Brick In The Wall pt. 2 and Run Like Hell have a "beat you can dance to"?). Tehy may have tried Nick out, but perhaps because it had been so long since had to play anything like that, they felt it was better to use session drummers on most of the record (or, in the case of Sorrow, a drum machine). As I recall, Nick ended up playing on Yet Another Movie, can't remember who played where on the rest of the record, but there's like three different drummers credited with playing on the record.

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    Quote Originally Posted by Kcrimso View Post
    Well nobody gives any credit for Nick Mason either and he played with both Carla Bley AND Michael Mantler! (Just listening Michael Mantler Live from 1987 with Mason on drums)
    I give Nick Mason credit! I like his playing on the Mantler live album just fine!!

    I don't think he's the greatest drummer ever, but he gets the job done and has a personal style and flair.
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    Quote Originally Posted by Dan Roth View Post
    Richard gave me his Bentley so I would do it, but I later discovered the car cost more to repair than it was worth. Having been seen as some village idiot, I was suddenly everyone's greatest hero. So I went to live in the Welsh hillsides, surrounded by sheep
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    Quote Originally Posted by Steve F. View Post
    Let's give him a little more credit as a over-all musician; he was, indeed, mostly a blues/blues-rock guitarist, but he was good enough to hold his own in the Jack Bruce Band with Carla Bley in 1975!
    For that matter, Gary Green started as a blues guitarist - you could still sort-of tell by some of his lines and phrasing with GG - and went back to playing blues afterwards. And a whole lot of the older generation of jazz musicians are and were really blues-oriented - but they weren't tied to the straight 12-bar form or even to looser versions of the I-I-IV-I-V-IV-I-I form: They could play the blues over any progression or no set progression. And, Charles Mingus was essentially a blues composer - that was the musical language he spoke, and he could turn it to making statements of awesome complexity when he wanted to.

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