Concept Album Page

A Concept Album ...

The 'cloud' burst, and by September 1975 Bowkett, Morgan and Karas had left, but the redoubtable Crun Walter had rejoined. Peter Van Hooke, formerly in Van Morrison's band and later to be part of Mike Rutherford's chart-topping band Mike and the Mechanics was drafted in on drums. (Van Hooke was also to set up his own label, MMC, which released Andy Davis' solo album, "Clevedon Pier" in 1989.) This line-up was augmented by ex-Greenslade keyboard expert Dave Lawson for the tour in the spring of 1976, the band's first concerts since the Wembley appearance of the previous year.

In February 1976, prior to the tour, a single was released - a reggae-tinged version of Lennon and McCartney's "Hold Me Tight" backed by the brooding instrumental "Breakfast With Werner Von Braun" (an appropriate title for a release on the Rocket Record Label!). Despite radio airplay and the enthusiastic raving of John Peel (a champion of the band from the early days) the single failed to chart, but it was the forthcoming album that was drawing attention, for word was circulating that ALL WAS NOT WELL with the band's concept album, "Mr Mick".

Andy Davis said at the time,

"On "Extravaganza" we relinquished control and Rod Bowkett took over to a certain degree. He wrote lots of intricate things and it got a bit out of hand. So with "Mr Mick" we were trying to get exactly what WE wanted to do. Mutter and I talked for a long time about doing a story with music, roughly akin to "Tubby The Tuba". We started work on it with Steve Augarde, who's written a lot of children's stories and he came through with the idea of Mr Mick. He's an OAP and he's bored, but he's also a rebel."

Augarde's "Mr Mick" surfaced as a children's book in 1980 but Stackridge took Augarde's framework and developed it into something altogether darker, Mr Mick being a lonely old man uncaringly dumped in some undefined institution and left to die. (Whether it's an Old People's Home or a mental institution is left to the listener to decide). Chance takes him to the town rubbish dump and there he has imaginary conversations with other 'discarded' objects like a pair of old ballet shoes, a broken radio and a cotton-reel, each one telling of 'better days' in their respective songs. In the end. Mr Mick hears the applause of his new 'friends' and becomes a 'superstar' of the rubbish dump.

On one level, the story appears to be a whimsical throwback to earlier Stackridge recordings and the imagery appears simple ... Mick is seen as human "rubbish" to be discarded when his useful life is over. But on another level, are these the ramblings of a senile old man, destined to spend the rest of his days talking to rubbish on the town dump?