Riley Jordan

The A&R guy from EMI was coming to see ‘my band’ in early December.  It’s was now October and I had no band.  Battle stations – code red.  I needed one set of songs, about 20 minutes, for a show case.

To Do List:

• Find a backing band
• Find a venue at short notice, preferably a venue on ‘the gig circuit’
• Get my outfit together

Firstly the band.   One of my friends brother was in a band called Bounty.  I had been out to see them play a couple of times.  They were good players and thank God they agreed to do it.  I also roped ‘Keyboard Man’ into the gig as we were becoming good friends by this stage.  I also needed a couple of backing singers so Nightingale came to the rescue as did a friend of hers who was good with harmonies.  A couple of rehearsals – no worries – under control.

Finding a venue was a hairy challenge.  I remember getting all dressed up and rocking down to the Prince of Wales in St Kilda to have a word with the manager.  I can’t remember why I chose this venue but it was certainly on the map in the music scene then and it’s even bigger now.  In those days is was a grungy old place with carpet stickier than fly paper mixed with velcro.  The manager and his secretary were surprisingly helpful.

The secretary checked the booking schedule, they had a band booked, on the date that I wanted, but they said I could do my set before band.  YES!

As I walked out the manager said to me ‘You’re a touch of Hollywood’.  I said ‘What does that mean’.  He said ‘You look like a movie star’.  OK.  All good so far.

So what to wear.  At the time Madonna was just starting to hit the scene in a big way.  I had it in my head that I would put together something funky and street so I got this jacket and ripped fabric into strips and put bows all over it.  It’s sounds better than it looks, but at the time I thought it was pretty cool.

The big day was approaching.  All was quiet on the western front.  I could only wait and hope all would go well.

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The white lines on the Hume highway stretched out languidly behind me and in teasingly front, as I sped along towards Sydney.  The country towns of  Yea, Wangarratta and Gundagai were distant memories now as I slowed down to enter the city limits at Liverpool.   This time around I had stopped at Gundagai for a break and to look at the famous statue of the Dog On the Tuckerbox.   Been there done that.

I had my new demo on cassette tape in the glove box.  I had finished it with the ‘wannabe producer’ only days ago and now I had appointments to see the A&R guys at all the major labels.

The thing I hated the most about these long trips was not the endless hours of driving but the truck stop food.  How many ways can you abuse a potato?  I was up to about 50 so far.

Once again I found myself in beige offices with record company dudes listening to my tape.  My heart was palpitating faster than one of those new fangled Roland drum machines.

This time around their ears started to twitch a little.  The EMI guy was cryptic but seemed interested.  He thought I had quite a bit of attitude – was that in a good sense or in a bad??  There was a signed picture of Chrissie Hynde from ‘The Pretenders’ on his wall.  He was the one who pushed the song ‘Don’t get me wrong’ to hit status in Australia.  EMI were also looking at signing a new band called Geisha, he told me.  All good.

I went away very unsure and it was only when I followed up that I get the lowdown on what was up.  EMI was interested, they wanted to come and see a gig in Melbourne.

I had a bite, but no band!!   AAAAHHHHHHHHHHH!!

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In all my years of doing gigs there is one bit of kit that is always in my bag.   Gaffa Tape.  It’s the equivalent of a musicians med kit in a roll and it has more uses than the latest gizmo from Danoz Direct.  This long black luscious cloth tape,  fixes loose electrical connections, tapes down unruly leads, holds up blacks, stops lights from falling of the rigg, holds together failing road cases, makes a temporary guitar strap, blacks out the light from windows and it will slice and dice if you can get up enough force behind it.

So it is with great sentimentality that I have written an ode to my love of ‘the tape’:

(Sung to the tune of Christmas Tree Oh Christmas Tree).

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Gaffa Tape Oh Gaffa Tape

By Riley Jordan

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Gaffa Tape Oh Gaffa Tape

The roadies all adore ya,

Gaffa Tape Oh Gaffa Tape,

From Sydney to California,

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Gaffa Tape Oh Gaffa Tape,

You fixed all the amps,

Gaffa Tape Oh Gaffa Tape,

You held up my pants,

.

Gaffa Tape Oh Gaffa Tape,

Audio Black Gold

Gaffa Tape Oh Gaffa Tape

My Friend on the road.

The thing about Gaffa Tape is that it is eternal, Rock Stars will come and go, technology will rise and fall, but Gaffa Tape will never die.

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I’ve seen more bands come undone, arguing over song writing royalties, than I care to remember.  These bands are often barely playing gigs, let alone releasing records.    The problem starts when some muso’s think, that playing your parts in a song, is somehow akin to contributing to song writing.

If your in a band and your not sure if you’re entitled to songwriting royalties, here is the definitive question to ask yourself.

If I took away all parts but mine, would what was left, be recognizable as a part of that particular song?

So, if I take away all parts but the melody – great, however, if I take away all parts and just play the drum part, then can I pick the song?  If I can still recognize the song from the drum part, then that is a possible contribution, particularly if the song was written with the drummer jamming on that feel the time.  Think of ‘Queens’ we ‘Will Rock you’.  Think of the bass part in ‘Blame It On the Boogie’.

A drum part, a bass part or a guitar part, are not a part of songwriting unless they contribute a definitive hook.  Once again, as I mentioned in an earlier post, mixing experienced players with inexperienced players can contribute to confusion here, as inexperienced players often overvalue their contribution.

Don’t get me wrong, it’s absolutely okay to share songwriting royalties equally, even if there is only one ’songwriter’ in the band, but you have to ask yourself the question, what happens if the drummer leaves after three months?  Is he still entitled to royalties for songs that he didn’t actually write and do you now legally transfer those royalties to the new drummer?  If not, and the rest of the band continues on, would the old drummer still be getting royalties, even though he left the band and he is doing nothing to promote or sell the music?

One way around this problem, is for the songwriter/s, to be receiving the royalties legally on paper, and for them to give the band members their share after payment from the recording company, according to a  band agreement.  It keeps it all clean on an official level and any splits can be renegotiated as members come and go.

On the other hand, it is pretty normal for the songwriter to keep the royalties, that they are entitled to, particularly if the songs existed before the band got together and also if the songwriter writes them away from the band.  Both ways can work, but in my opinion, band members need to contribute considerably to the hooks and arrangement ideas to be entitled to receive songwriting royalties.

There are no fast and hard rules here, it’s just my opinion.  I haven’t even touched on actually negotiating songwriting splits between writers – that’s a whole other topic.  If you’re in the middle of negotiating all of this – good luck!

Note:  Songwriting royalties are different from mechanical royalties.  One relates to songwriting and the other to the artists performing those songs on record.   They are two different kinds of royalties.

Always consult with a music lawyer before making any agreements between band members or signing any publishing or recording contracts.

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This was an exciting time for me and an exciting time to be in the music scene in Melbourne.  Melbourne had a reputation of being the rock capital of Australia and indeed it was.  If you wanted to make it in music, you had to make in Melbourne.  Funnily enough, most of  the major record labels all had head offices in Sydney although Mushroom music was a very successful Australian label based in Melbourne.  Everybody wanted ‘in’ at Mushroom.

The inner-city was a hot pot of festering creativity.  Fitzroy, Brunswick, St Kilda, Collingwood, Prahran, were like beacons for young unemployed musicians leaving the suburbs looking for stardom.  If you could get a gig at the ESPY or ‘The Venue’ you were definitely in a position to be seen.

The industry ‘currency’ of the day was to know Molly Meldrum.  Molly Meldrum was one of Australia’s most successful music producers and music show hosts.  He was a force to be reckoned within the industry and was well liked and well respected.  It seems like if you ‘knew Molly’ that you could fast track your way to the top.  If I had a dollar so every musician who told me that they’ knew Molly’.

I started working with the ‘wannabe’ producer.  This new batch of recordings was really coming up well, he did have his finger on the pulse and they had that current, new edge vibe.

While all this was going on, I was still teaching singing to get by.  I had one particular students, Cary Thondan, who was my age and we had so much in common.  After class, we would sit and talk about bands and what was going on in the industry.  We also used to talk about the supernatural lot, we both found it fascinating.

He told me about this new bands that he’d seen play live and he knew a couple of the guys.  He thought they would make it really big.  They’d  just chosen a name, Hunters and collectors.  Apparently they were hunting and collecting song ideas. Too easy.

I started to notice that Cary had missed a few lessons, so I rang his number to see what was happening.  His mum answered the phone and when I asked after Cary, she burst into tears and handed the phone to her sister.  Her sister told me that Cary had died of a number of weeks ago.   She told me that Cary had spoken of me often and they did not have my number to contact me.

It was quite a few months later, that I realized that the night before Cary died, I had had this weird dream about him not being able to put on his shoes and then he drove away, with some guy at the wheel of a lovely convertible car, saying that he was going somewhere really nice.

Hunters and Collectors did go on to become very successful.

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