chs 1 through 10-6

Early Groups

Eric Clapton and Dave Brock

Dave Brock was born August 25, 1941, which made him close to four years older than Eric Clapton. He received a banjo at age twelve and gradually switched to the guitar. He was an early appreciator of Fats Domino, which led him to some of the early blues artists.

While a young Eric Clapton was struggling with his steel-stringed guitar, Brock was coming of age in Feltham, Middlesex. While he was becoming an adept guitarist, when he reached eighteen he got a real job. First, he worked as a capstan setter and then as an animator for Larkin Studios. Gradually, he began playing music in the evenings at various clubs.

Rather than forming a formal group, he engaged in busking with a number of friends. Busking is performing for pay in public but without a formal contract or promise of pay. The most common type of busking is found on street corners, where musicians play for tips. Usually their guitar case or some like container is left open with the hope of contributions. The second type of busker plays in clubs with the hope of being paid by the patrons. This is the type of busking at which David Brock became proficient.

He would have a rotating cast of friends who would accompany him. Keith Relf, Mike Slattery, Jeff Watson, and a young Eric Clapton would all be his partners. Hundreds of artists, both American and British, would begin their careers in this manner. Joan Baez, Jimmy Page, Jimmy Buffett, Judy Collins, Joni Mitchell, Paul Simon, Bob Dylan, and many more would play for pay at the beginning of their career.

Brock and Eric Clapton would never formalize their relationship, but their performing as a duo enabled Clapton to get his first taste of live performances and begin to develop the ability to play with another person.

Many times when a major star has a professional relationship early in his or her career, the other person disappears from music history. Not so with David Brock. He would form the short-lived Dharma Blues Band and then the Famous Cure. He would spend time busking around Europe before returning to the developing psychedelic scene in England.

Brock and old friend Mike Slattery would meet bassist John Harrison and form a new group. Drummer Terry Ollis plus friends Nick Turner and Michael Davies would also join. Nick Turner would name the band after clearing his throat, which was known as Hawking. It may not be pretty, but the shortened form became Hawkwind.

Dave Brock may not have climbed to the mountaintop like his main former busking partner, but he was able to make a very good living.

The Roosters

Thousands and probably tens of thousands of bands were formed in Great Britain and the United States during the sixties. A very select few would go on to lasting fame and fortune. A small percentage would become semifamous due to a lucky hit song but would quickly fade away.

Most communities have a band or two that make a part-time living from performances at bars, weddings, and birthday parties. Most such bands come together for a time, rehearse, never earn a dime, never perform, and then disappear into the mists of time.

There have been several groups that have taken the name the Roosters. There is a Japanese punk rock group with a constantly changing lineup. Soul star Jerry Butler was a member of the Roosters but changed the named to the Impressions, which was in retrospect an excellent idea. There was a late sixties Roosters based in L.A. who had a near hit with “Love Machine” issued on the Philips label. Future Bread member James Griffin wrote the song, and it is labeled a Snuff Garrett production.

The British Roosters came into being in early 1963 at the Prince of Wales Pub in New Malden when guitarist Tom McGuinness met fellow guitarist Eric Clapton. The meeting occurred because McGuinness’s girlfriend had been a classmate of Clapton’s at Art College. McGuinness allowed Clapton to audition for his group, and he passed with flying colors.

The Roosters consisted of vocalist Terry Brennan, drummer Robin Mason, and piano player Ben Palmer, in addition to the aforementioned guitarists. The group did not have a bass player. The hidden key in this short-lived band was Palmer, who would become Clapton’s lifelong friend and would accompany him on his Greek venture, which is another story.

The Roosters would only last from January to August. They practiced incessantly but played live sparingly and then in small upstairs rooms in small pubs. Still, Eric Clapton was a real band member for the first time and was learning his craft.

The British Roosters may not have recorded nor played to large crowds, but they have gone down in rock ’n’ roll history as one of the training grounds for Eric Clapton.

Casey Jones and the Engineers

Mississippi John Hurt is recognized for immortalizing the American railroad man in song. John Luther “Casey” Jones (1863–1900), worked all his life for the railroad system in the United States. His fatal claim to fame came as the engineer of Cannonball Express passenger train that was traveling seventy-five miles per hour toward a stalled freight train. Instead of jumping from the train and saving himself, he remained at the controls and managed to slow the train to thirty-five miles per hour. While it still plowed into the other train, all the passengers were saved. Casey Jones was killed instantly.

Brian Casser would use this story to name his second band. His first group, Cass and the Casanovas, was popular in the Liverpool music scene 1959–1960. Unfortunately for him the other three members of the group decided to carry on without him and unceremoniously dumped him from his own band. He would go on to manage the Blue Gardenia Club in London.

By 1963, the music scene and the Beatles were exploding in London. Casser thought it would be a good time to form another band, and so Casey Jones and the Engineers were born. He recruited bassist Dave McCumisky and drummer Ray Stock but was in need of two guitarists. Tom McGuinness and Eric Clapton were two guitarists in need of a band.

Clapton’s time with the group would be very short. He would last for seven performances and depart due to the pop nature of the band. Still, it would provide him with his first taste of touring.

The young Eric Clapton was unemployed again and waiting for the phone to ring. Ring it did, and this time Keith Relf was at the other end of the line.