the of mirror eye

* the flee-rekkers: sunday date (3 mb)
* the moontrekkers: night of the vampire (3 mb)
* the tornados: telstar (3 mb)
from joe meek - the alchemist of pop : sanctuary records group : cmedd 496

for the rest of the week i’ll be highlighting the works of “the alchemist of pop” - joe meek (more info here and here). he was a true studio wizard and all of his works have the same characteristic sound. a sped-up, overdriven, full-blown, echo-ey sort of sound. today will showcase some of his instrumental numbers.

the story of joe meek is both fascinating and tragic. he was arguably the first independent pop producer in britain and opened his own studio in early 1960.

by all accounts, 304 had to be seen to be believed: the floor was covered in loose, unwound tape and old spools, and there were wires, cables, leads and sundry other bits & pieces of recording equipment just lying around everywhere. the actual studio overlooked the busy great north road…and joe’s control room occupied a former kitchen behind it without visual contact with his artistes. all was done by ear, following which he would spend hours editing, mixing, remixing and overdubbing the tapes. freed from the restriction of having to work either to a brief of fixed budget, joe experimented wildly with sound and sounds-effects.

(from the liner notes)

joe meek went on to produce a number of hits including his most famous number, telstar by the tornadoes. it was so popular that it hit number one in the u.s. pop charts, a first for a british record. this tune is fantastic. it’s got a great eerie organ intro with some trebly lead guitar backed by something that sounds like a harp, but isn’t. sunday date by the flee-reckers is a sad little tune. the echo-ey guitar playing on this tune is superb. and last but not least, we’ve got night of the vampire by the moontrekkers. this one has some fantastic sound effects and, at the time, was so scary(?!!?!) that the bbc banned it…“for fear of upsetting those of nervous disposition.”

you would think that with so many of his records charting, joe meek would’ve been living high on the hog. but close listening to his songs reveal that many joe meek productions actually contain a sad tone. this is because joe was, despite all his success, a loner. it also didn’t help that he was a homosexual in a time when being homosexual was ok. there was even one instance where he was caught with another fellow, a small paragraph went into the newspaper, and he was immediately the subject of blackmailers. joe meeks popularity eventally faded (not because of his homosexuality, but because of changing tastes and trends) and that, combined with increasing paranoia and barbituate use lead to his undoing. and in 1967, he killed his landlady and then himself.

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