Wally Waller Interview

By Mike Stax
(Originally published in UGLY THINGS #7, 1988)
Alan Wally Waller (a.k.a. Wally Allen in his Pretty Things and Fenmen days) has led a long and varied musical career. Whether his contribution has been as a musician, songwriter or producer, his work has never been less than fascinating. Wally's musical activities began in the early sixties with local groups in his hometown of Bexley Heath, near Erith, Kent. He turned professional as the rhythm guitarist of Bern Elliott & the Fenmen when the group's first record, "Money", crashed into the British Top Ten at the end of 1963. Despite another chart entry with New Orleans in 1964, and a great EP which showcased first class beat stompers like "Shake, Sherry, Shake" and "I Can Tell", the group's overnight success was to prove shortlived, a fact that was largely due to internal strife within the band. Specifically, Bern had a monumental ego problem. The singer chose to treat the Fenmen as little more than lowly backing musicians, while he himself played the role of the star. He went so far as to insist that the band subsist on a meagre weekly wage, leaving the majority of the act's earnings to him. Under these conditions it wasn't long before the rift between the Fenmen and their lead singer grew into an unbridgeable abyss. In late '64, the Fenmen (Wally on rhythm guitar, Allan Judge on lead guitar, Eric Wilmer on bass, and John Povey on drums) decided to part company with Bern, leaving him to take on his superstar mantle alone. Without a frontman, the Fenmen capitalised on their strength in the vocal harmony field. However, despite releasing several strong singles, and being in demand for vocal session work, they seemed to be in a constant struggle to find their own identity. Chart success proved to be elusive. Their output was released somewhat sporadically (just four singles over the space of two years), and even a change of label from Decca to CBS at the beginning of 1966 did little to change their fortunes. The band's creative growth wasn't aided much by outright commercial moves like recording early versions of US hits in an effort to nab the UK chart action before the original versions reached British shores. "Rag Doll" in July 1964 (for Decca) and "California Dreamin'", in May 1966 (for CBS) showed that the group were musically very adept-particularly in the vocal department-but both were easily beaten out of the chart race by the American versions. The Fenmen seemed to be much stronger when their talent was kept on less tight of a leash, as exemplified by Wally's own composition, "Rejected", which was released in August 1966 and is generally considered to be the band's finest record. Unfortunately, at the time, the single, like its predecessors, sank with all hands. It was to be the last release from the unfortunate Fenmen. The turning point for Wally came in early 1967, a time that marked the beginning of his musical involvement with the Pretty Things. Wally and Phil May had known each other since early childhood, and they still lived in the same street. Naturally, being from the same small town, the Fenmen and the Pretty Things had been friends throughout the early and mid-sixties, even though they moved in somewhat different circles musically. The Pretty Things line-up began to disintegrate at the end of 1966 and the beginning of 1967, as first Brian Pendleton and then John Stax left the group. Phil turned to Wally for help in bolstering the troubled Emotions project. Wally began by collaborating on writing material for the album, as well as providing vocal harmonies, piano and bass on the sessions. Within a short while he had decided to quit the Fenmen and throw in his lot with the Pretties, a move that would necessitate a change of instrument from guitar to bass. At Phil's invitation, Wally brought with him Fenmen drummer John Povey, who became the Pretty Things' keyboard player in time to complete the final Emotions sessions. The addition of Wally Allen and John Povey to the Pretty Things marked the beginning of a new era for the band, and the revitalised line-up went on to record some of the most compelling work of the period. Wally adapted to his new instrument with apparent ease, and his imaginitive playing became an integral part of the group's sound. However, Wally's contribution to the Pretty Things stretched way beyond that of bass playing. Collaborating with the other band members, his skills as a composer and arranger enabled the group's material to develop at an incredible rate. Not only this, the talented vocal harmonies of Allen and Povey added an entirely new dimension to the Pretty Things sound. Throughout the group's psychedelic phase of 1967-68, Wally was a vital part of the Pretty Things composing and performing process. During this period they released the classic 45s, "Defecting Grey" and "Talking About The Good Times", as well as the landmark S.F. Sorrow LP -- an album that was the originator of the rock opera format, and one that stands today as an unequalled masterpiece. When founder member Dick Taylor left the group in 1969, Wally's role became all the more important, as creative responsibility then fell firmly upon the shoulders of he and Phil. The pair rose to the task, and more than proved themselves with the release of the brilliant Parachute LP in 1970. Wally was never more in the spotlight than on this album, even providing powerful lead vocals on several tracks. However, despite major critical acclaim, the record was not a big seller. Two strong singles, "October 26" in late 1970 and "Stone-Hearted Mama" in early 1971, followed Parachute (both featured Wally's lead vocals) but proved to be equally unsuccessful commercially. Finally, after more than four years of being a crucial part of the Pretty Things, Wally decided to throw in the towel in 1971 and move into production work at EMI. (For a more detailed account of the 1967-71 era of the Pretty Things see UGLY THINGS #6.) As a producer, Wally worked on a variety of projects in the early seventies, including the Marcus Hook Roll Band (Harry Vanda and George Young of the Easybeats), Fogg, and, most successfully, Barclay James Harvest. He also produced and played on A Major Fancy, a 1973 solo album by Barclay James Harvest's guitarist, John Lees. Pretty Things Skip Alan and Gordon Edwards also played on the record, making it a must for Pretties completists. Wally also found time to work with the Pretty Things again for the 1972 LP, Freeway Madness, which he produced under the secret identity of Asa Jones. Later in the seventies and early eighties, Wally worked once more as a musician, playing with the Fallen Angels on their 1978 LP with Phil May, and also recording material for the DeWolfe Company, both with the Fallen Angels (The Return of The Electric Banana in 1978), and on his own solo projects: the Wally Waller Band (Do It, 1978 again) and Charlie Flake (I Don't Feel Well, 1981). In 1978, the Pretty Things line-up of May/Taylor/Allen/Povey/Alan reunited for one show in Holland, a gig which was subsequently bootlegged for the Live '78 album, much to the consternation of the musicians involved. With the addition of guitarist Peter Tolson, the Pretties went on to record Crosstalk the following year. Despite its commercial strength, and excellent tracks like "Office Love", "No Future", and "Falling Again" the album failed to take the world by storm, proving once and for all that, for the Pretty Things at least, there is no justice. Wally continued to play with the Pretty Things through 1980 and 1981, after which he ducked out of sight for life in the normal world – at least for the time being. Wally Waller onstage in Zurich, Switzerland, circa 1968.
The following interview was conducted over the course of several long distance telephone conversations in 1988.
UT:	I wanted to start off by getting a bit of background. Where did you grow up?
Wally:	In Bexley in Kent -- near Erith.
UT:	You knew Phil May from a very early age, right?
Wally:	That's right. We were like bosom buddies from the age of four, really. We were separated by circumstances from the age of about nine until the age of about sixteen. It's a complicated story, but it was due to the personal circumstances of his parents, the things they were going through. We met again at the age of about sixteen when he came back to live in Erith. Of course, by then we were on differing paths, really.
UT:	How did you first become interested in music?
Wally:	I guess through records. Oddly enough, the first kind of music that really kind of tickled my ears was jazz. That was until I heard Little Richard and things like that. Things started changing.
UT:	What was your first band?
Wally:	I think it probably was the Echoes. It was just instrumental kind of guitar music ala Ventures and all that kind of stuff.
UT:	So this was like very early 1960s, when the Shadows were big?
Wally:	Oh yes, this is like sixteen year old kids copying everybody! I was the rhythm guitarist. We used to walk up and down and do all these funny steps and kicks and stuff.
UT:	What came after the Echoes?
Wally:	Maybe a couple more bands of the same ilk and then Bern Elliott & the Fenmen. That was just another little band, but we became very popular very quickly in our area. It was quite an exciting time. It was when the whole kind of explosion was happening of music in this country. We'd been doing quite well in this country and then we had a chance to go to Germany for a couple of months, and we saw bands like the Beatles and all these Liverpool bands. They were playing the kind of music we'd never heard of before. Being a port, a lot of American ships used to go to Liverpool, so they used to get a lot of really great American imported music which never came south where we lived. When we played in Hamburg, we saw these amazing Liverpool bands of the time and I heard music I'd never even thought existed before. One of the songs we heard was "Money", and we did it on our recording test (for Decca). Later, when the guy at the recording test read the titles on the Beatles' second album and he saw this song called "Money", he quickly dug out our tape and mixed it up and slapped it out. Within a week it was there!
UT:	That must have been really exciting, you were still pretty young at this point.
Wally:	Oh yeah, it was amazing! One week you'd be bumming around your local Railway Hotel -- we used to have a gig every week at the Railway Hotel -- and the next week you're on national TV and women are tearing you to pieces. It was wonderful.
UT:	How long did Bern Elliott & the Fenmen last before the Fenmen split from Bern?
Wally:	Not very long. There was just two singles. Bern -- he was gonna be a superstar, so he thought that he should take the lion's share of the dough and we should be on wages. We didn't like that idea too much! Anyway, he didn't become a superstar, as you probably well know! (laughter) We went on to make a few records. We suddenly found that we didn't want to get another singer, so we started doing vocal stuff, harmony stuff.
UT:	How much success did you have as the Fenmen, without Bern?
Wally:	Very moderate indeed. We covered a couple of songs. While we were still with Decca we did "Rag Doll", we covered it in this country. We didn't come anywhere near the Four Seasons version; they took the market easily. We left Decca and went to CBS and we did "California Dreamin'" with a guy who professed to be somebody who recorded the Beach Boys once -- a guy called Jim Economides. I've looked through records and I can't see his name anywhere. (Economides was a Capitol house producer and Gary Usher sidekick - MS) There was another record after that on CBS, which was a song I wrote called "Rejected". I don't have a copy of it anywhere, but I'm pretty sure that was one of my first published songs. There was one other, I can't remember the exact details, but Andrew Loog Oldham had an artist called Lorraine Child that was on Decca as well, and he needed a B-side or something, so I think I wrote a song called "Not This Time", which I believe was the first song that I had published. I can't remember how the song went, but I just got this title in my mind that stuck. I'm sure it was the first one I did.
UT:	The credits on the label give the composer and musical arranger as "Fenman". Are you singing on that record? Because there is a male vocal on there too.
Wally:	You know, UT, I really can't remember. It's such a vague kind of memory. I think I'm right in saying we were there because we were her vocal backing band. So maybe it's me, or maybe it's someone else in the Fenmen, but I don't really know.
UT:	Are the Fenmen backing her musically?
Wally:	Well, I'm not sure if we did any of the actual instrumental backing. Andrew Loog Oldham and Tony Calder used to use us as a vocal backing group. I don't know if we did any instrumental backing.
UT:	Do you know of any other sessions that you might have done?
Wally:	Nothing of any great note. I can't remember any other names. I think we did some stuff for UT Leander, which I don't think ever got released. They were just kind of experiments with a vocal band approach. We did experimental sessions but I don't think anything much came out of them.
UT:	So how did the Fenmen split come about?
Wally:	Well, it wasn't terribly amicable. Toward the end of '66/beginning of '67, Phil was looking to start writing with people. I working with the Fenmen and he was working with the Pretty Things and we lived in the same street opposite each other, and whenever we were home together -- which wasn't very often -- we sat down with guitars and bummed around a bit, and we started coming up with a few songs. Phil was in the middle of making an album and wanted songs, and to my amazement he took some of the stuff that we came up with and asked me to come and do some recording with him, which was Emotions.
UT:	Did you play rhythm guitar or bass on Emotions?
Wally:	Oh, I think I was playing the bass then. I think that was the slot that was vacant, so I became a bassplayer overnight.
UT:	How did you feel about making the switch from guitar to bass?
Wally:	I was a bit apprehensive really, because it's quite a specialised thing, playing bass, and I don't think in the beginning that I probably did it justice. But I tried hard, and in the end I developed some kind of style that, I don't know … it fit the band well.
UT:	Well, definitely! You had a very distinctive style. I'd be interested to know, on Emotions, which-tracks are you on bass and which are John Stax, because I've read that most of it was John, but a lot of it sounds more like your style to me.
Wally:	When I first went into the studio on that session there were certain tracks that were down. The basic tracks were down, they needed other things on top of them; but there were certain other tracks that totally had to be recorded, and that applied to all the stuff that Phil and I had wrote together.
At this point we went through the Emotions LP track by track, to try to establish which songs Wally remembered playing on and which he helped write. Although he is only credited with having co-written "There'll Never Be Another Day" and "Bright Lights Of the City" with Phil and Dick, he in fact also co-wrote "The Sun" and "House Of Ten", and possibly some of the other tracks too. In addition to playing bass on all of the songs he helped to write, Wally also remembers playing on "Children", "Growing In My Mind" and "My Time". He also provided backing vocals on most of the record.
UT:	Did you and John Povey become involved with the Emotions project at the same time?
Wally:	Phil was looking to expand the Pretty Things because John Stax had become disenchanted -- I don't know quite what had happened to John. Phil had asked me to join and he knew John Povey as well, because he'd seen the Fenmen. John was the drummer in the Fenmen, but we also used to mess about on instruments a lot and John used to do some keyboard stuff, so Phil knew he wasn't a bad keyboard player, and so he asked would he like to try and see how things worked out with the Pretty Things. So, when we came along it seemed to work out fine. So that was it. We were both in.
UT:	What do you think of Emotions?
Wally:	I don't think it's one of the better albums. I don't say that because of my limited involvement. I think the band was going through a strange time, and I think some of the orchestration, in retrospect, seemed to be, well, not really quite what was needed.
UT:	Was that like a bunch of old guys that didn't really understand?
Wally:	Oh, they were fantastic musicians! I mean, they were just reading the dots on the line. It was just an experiment that maybe wasn't entirely successful.
UT:	Where was that recorded?
Wally:	That was done in the Philips studio in Stanhope Place, just a stone's throw from Marble Arch.
UT:	What kind of equipment were you using in terms of bass and amp?
Wally:	The bass amp was a Vox, the cabinet had double 15-inch speakers, there was a pressurised cabinet. It was like a Vox 200 or something. The bass was a Fender Mustang. I used the Mustang right through until I finally got a really old Precision in about '76. It's a '58 Precision which I've still got now, it sits in a cupboard. She's a real old beastie; I love her. Anything before '76 was the Mustang. I've only owned two basses.
UT:	Tell me a little bit about how you and Phil and Dick would come up with songs, for instance, things like "Defecting Grey".
Wally:	It was a time when everybody was experimenting with different directions. I think the main inspiration for all that early stuff that I was involved in was Phil. He led the way, basically, on those songs. He was the inspiration, really, and the driving force. He got us all to work. He was very good at understanding what people were capable of doing, even if they didn't know themselves -- which applied to me!
UT:	"Defecting Grey" was originally, like, an eight-minute song, right? Was there a demo made of that?
Wally:	Yeah, there was. It was quite a long thing. I don't think we ever quite captured what the demo had. The demo maybe lacked in recording technique, but it certainly had a lot more … it hit you in the guts better. We never recreated that original feel. It's very hard to recreate things. It was done in a very small demo studio in London under very trying circumstances. But things happen. There's no way to explain it. You can go into a really beautiful studio with every gadget in the world, and you can't find that magic thing.
UT:	So when you got together with Norman Smith you completely re-cut it?
Wally:	Oh yes, absolutely. We re-cut everything.
UT:	How did the idea for S.F. Sorrow come about?
Wally:	We were in a car driving through Denmark, and we were discussing the forthcoming album we had to make, and I said something like, "Wouldn't it be nice if everything were connected -- if there was some kind of connection between everything." And from that, I think, Phil came up with the storyline, S.F. Sorrow. Then we started filling in songs around the storyline after that, and Phil would elaborate the storyline more. One kind of thing sparks off the other. Once the idea was established that we were going for something like that it was a case of songs inspiring words and vice versa.
UT:	You spent a long time working on that album, from the middle of '67 until late 1968 when it came out. Was a lot of that time spent writing the songs, or did it just take a long time to record it?
Wally:	Well, both. We were working at the same time. We'd dash off to Germany for a month, and then come back and we'd have a couple of days to sort things out with what we'd do in the studio. And then we'd do maybe a week in the studio, and then we'd have to go somewhere else. We'd do a bit of writing, and then dash back into the studio. It wasn't a concentrated effort; we were doing everything at once. I think it benefited from that, because we didn't rush into it. We had plenty of time to reflect on what we'd been doing.
UT:	What was the actual recording process, as far as overdubbing and everything? How did you put that album together?
Wally:	Everything was four track, and we'd record probably bass, drums, and maybe a keyboard on one side and a rhythm instrument on the other side. That would be the original four track. Then what we would do, we'd mix those four down to two on another four track machine, so the centre tracks would be the stereo of what we'd just done, leaving us two spare tracks either side. We went through four or five generations sometimes, just doing that. Every time we went to another generation we'd put on some backing vocals or something, and then we'd have to mix down again, leaving us two spare for the stereo. And sometimes when we came to the final mix we would be adding things live on the final mix, because we couldn't get them onto the tape.
UT:	It's amazing how good it sounds, when you consider how many tape generations you must have had to go through.
Wally:	It is amazing, really, how it does stand up -- just technically, I'm not talking about the music. The quality is very good. The engineers were exquisite at Abbey Road.
UT:	Norman Smith was producing, of course, but who were the engineers?
Wally:	Peter Mew was there. I think Tony Clark as well did some. He, of course, took care of the whole of Parachute. There were one or two others. We didn't seem to worry too much in those days who it was, 'cause they were all competent. There was a good team of engineers there, and Norman Smith kind of directed things, and it didn't really matter who was twiddling the buttons.
UT:	Which of the studios at Abbey Road were you using?
Wally:	It would vary depending on what was available. There's three there of varying sizes. Studio One we didn't use, because that's the really huge one they use to record symphony orchestras and things. So we used Two and Three; Two was where most of the Beatles' stuff came out of. We'd be working there at the same time the Beatles were there, because you'd see equipment piled in the corner, and Ringo's drums lying around. They were very good, all the studios at EMI were; although they were still four-track at the time, the quality was excellent. They had fantastic technicians there, I mean not necessarily the recording engineers, but like 'boffins'. They invented things like ADT -- automatic double-tracking -- taking a tape synch-head and feeding it back to another tape recorder at various speeds -- it's almost like phasing. They invented quite a lot there -- ring modulators and all sorts of things.
UT:	Yeah, I was reading an interview with Phil, and he was saying that they were inventing stuff almost as you were recording.
Wally:	That's right. They'd come rushing in with another battery sort of wired up with transistors and plasticine holding it all together, and say "Try this!" and plug it into the desk. Sometimes it would be a dreadful failure and a puff of smoke, but sometimes it would work. There was just heaps of boffins all over the place! (laughter) These guys weren't really into the music; their minds were just really obsessed with different ways of using sound waves.
UT:	When S.F. Sorrow came out it didn't get much commercial success, but it seems like some musicians were looking to that album to borrow some ideas perhaps? How did you feel about the response the record got?
Wally:	Well, it was disappointing. It would've been nice if we had got a better response. I think it was quite good…
UT:	To say the least!
Wally:	I think Pete Townshend did actually go on record as saying he nicked the idea for Tommy. I haven't heard S.F. Sorrow recently, but I suspect it would stand the test of time.
UT:	Moving on to something else, how did you become involved with DeWolfe?
Wally:	We were approached to make a movie, What's Good For the Goose. I'm not sure how we first got involved, whether it was the film or was there something before that?
UT:	There was a couple of Electric Banana LPs before that. The first one is from 1967 and it must be from about the same time as Emotions because Reg Tilsley is involved with that one too. You had a hand in writing some of the songs on there.
Wally:	You're right. We wrote some and not others. I forget the details of that, but I believe Phil had it all arranged before I joined the band.
UT:	What exactly was involved in these DeWolfe/Electric Banana projects?
Wally:	They're a music library, as you know, and they syndicate their stuff around the world. They wanted us to put some music in their library. There were a few songs that they wanted us to do, and I mean (laughing) they weren't terribly good songs! We felt obliged to do them, but Phil refused to sing them, so I got my first shot at lead vocal on one of those: "Street Girl". It was a funny old song, really, and Phil said "There's no way I'm gonna sing this!" And I don't blame him, really. I think I did one, I think Povey did one too, and then Phil would sing our songs.
UT:	There was some really good songs on those records that I'm surprised you never recorded for your official releases, things like "Grey Skies".
Wally:	Yeah I can't remember that one. I think that when you've made an album, you've got a lot of songs lying around, andsongs are things that don't have a long life in your brain, because when you're writing them, after a month or two you've got other songs you want to put on your next album. So you've got a certain amount of natural wastage, or what would be natural wastage. So it (DeWolfe) seemed to be a natural outlet for them anyway.
UT:	Did you record a lot of things for DeWolfe other than the material that appeared as the Electric Banana LPs?
Wally:	Personally, I did. They've got a couple of albums of my music. The first one was the Wally Waller Band, that was about '78-'79, and there was another one after that, I think I called it Charlie Flake. For some reason I wanted to call myself Charlie Flake! (laughter)
UT:	Where were the DeWolfe recordings made? Do they have their own studios?
Wally:	Well, they had a funny little studio where I did all my stuff. Since then they opened a magnificent new place in Islington, a huge 24 track multi-mixing suite. But everything I did was done in a small eight-track demo studio, just big enough to swing a cat around.
UT:	Was that where all the Electric Banana ones were done?
Wally:	Yeah, apart from one or two of the early ones, where we went to outside studios. I mean, an album was done in a day.
UT:	You just got a flat fee for them, right?
Wally:	Yeah, that's right. And then, of course, you get the royalties coming in for them throughout the years from the Performing Rights Society, our equivalent of BMI and ASCAP over there.
UT:	Between S.F. Sorrow and Parachute there was a period of about a year or so where the band released no new records or anything. I wondered why this was, because there's a lot of songs from that time that were never released.
Wally:	I can't remember the exact details, but I think EMI were as disappointed as we were with the result of S.F. Sorrow. We really wanted to be sure about the next thing we'd do. We wanted it to be really good and strong, because we were pretty sure of S.F. Sorrow, but it backfired in terms of sales. We had marvellous critical acclaim everywhere, but the sales were just not forthcoming. So I suppose in a way we really wanted the next one to be 'right'. Although, that's not to say that S.F. Sorrow wasn't right. It made us very wary, I suppose. And we were writing songs all the while, and while we were writing we weren't necessarily thinking Oh, we should start writing an album or something. Until we had a good solid basis for wanting to go into the studio and make another album, I don't think we really pushed it.
UT:	Next I wanted to ask you a bit about the Philippe DeBarges album. Who was Philippe DeBarges?
Wally:	Well, he was Philippe DeBarges -- that was his name! (laughs) He just wanted to make an album, and he conscripted Phil and I to produce it.
UT:	He was a big Pretty Things fan then?
Wally:	He was, yes. He was French, and the French are musically very insular, and it's difficult to penetrate their market at all. But he felt that, he being French, he could do something Pretty Thingsesque and maybe get it off the ground in France.
UT:	So you guys just went ahead and gave him all those great songs?!
Wally:	(laughing) Well, I don't know how great they are, but obviously if we would have felt they were that wonderful we wouldn't have given them away.
UT:	Where was the album recorded?
Wally:	That was all done at another studio close to Marble Arch, I think it was called Nova at the time. It was all done on eight-track.
UT:	What musicians did you use?
Wally:	The personnel was basically Pretty Things, with I think one or two exceptions. It wasn't always the Pretty Things line-up, but it was, more or less, most of the time.
UT:	Was Dick Taylor still with the band, or was it Victor Unitt by this point?
Wally:	I think Dickie had left by this point. I think it was Vic Unitt.
UT:	Who was playing drums? Skip or Twink?
Wally:	I think it was Skip on some tracks and Twink on others.
UT:	How come the LP was never released?
Wally:	I don't know. Philippe took the stuff away to France and, I don't know, he probably touted it around and nobody liked it.
UT:	That's too bad.
Wally:	It's hard to please the French sometimes! (laughter)
UT:	The next thing that happened around this time was that Twink made his solo album. Were you involved with that at all?
Wally:	I have a vague recollection of going along to a studio once, and playing a bit of piano on something. I think it was Twink's album. It was at Decca Recording Studios in Broadhurst Gardens, and I'm sure I played a bit of piano on something.
UT:	How about the other Pretty Things? Were they on that?
Wally:	I'm not sure. I don't think so, off the top of my head. They certainly weren't there when I was there.
UT:	Tell me a little about Parachute, how did that finally come together?
Wally:	By that time Dickie had left, so the writing was really just Phil and myself. We were sort of reasonably prolific in that time. Once again, we wanted an album with some kind of thread going through it. Well, you know what the theme of Parachute is about -- the town and the country business -- and that was Phil's idea, and it seemed like a wonderful idea to me. Off we went, and we plugged away at the songs, and they just kept coming.
UT:	How long did it take to record?
Wally:	To record? I think from start to finish it was much quicker than S.F. Sorrow; we did it all in one or two stints. It probably took a total of about a month in the studio, over the course of about two or three months, I suppose.
UT:	Were you pleased with the way it came out?
Wally:	Well, yes I was. I mean, I always have reservations, but at the time I was very happy.
UT:	Again, it got a lot of critical acclaim, but not that much in the way of sales.
Wally:	That seems to be our stock in trade! I was very excited by some of the reviews, and I thought, "Well, maybe this time we could do it." But we didn't. It sold quite well…
UT:	Yeah, but not nearly as well as it deserved to. I mean, it was certainly the best album of that year, by a long chalk!
Wally:	Well, I'm glad you think that way, UT! A lot of people, like Rolling Stone, were very kind, and they thought it was 'Album Of the Year' and all that. I don't know if it was that good, but I thought it was quite good, anyway.
UT:	Did you sing lead on 'Sickle Clowns'?
Wally:	Yes. I sang quite a lot, especially on Parachute, I was very much involved. I sang "The Good Mr Square", "She Was Tall, She Was High" and "Rain".
UT:	I never realised you sang lead on so much stuff.
Wally:	Well, it was just that sometimes when you write a song, it doesn't sound right when somebody else sings it. I mean, Phil was a fantastic singer, I think he's a much better singer than myself, but at the time it just seemed right that I should do it, so I did it. It was very exciting.
UT:	On the songs that you sang lead, were those songs that you wrote the words for, or did Phil always write the words?
Wally:	Well, I mean, Phil wrote most of the words, but when I'd write a song I'd come up with a kernel of an idea -- it would be maybe a phrase or two which Phil would kind of hook the lyrics onto.
UT:	Did you sing lead on any of S.F. Sorrow?
Wally:	Not any whole song, just cameos on songs. Oh! I sang (sings) "She's there waiting at the gate…" ("She Says Good Morning"). But mostly on that album it was just backing vocals and stuff. After Parachute I did a couple of singles: "October 26" and "Stone-Hearted Mama." It just seemed right for me to do.
UT:	Why did the band split up in '71?
Wally:	I guess it was really frustration. It was terribly difficult, because the Pretty Things are like a family, really. People come, people go, but there's a wonderful camaraderie amongst the guys. Well, not always -- everyone has fights and stuff -- but it's very difficult to come to a decision to leave a band like the Pretty Things. But in the end, the frustration was so deep. I love live work, but I've always enjoyed working in studios, and Norman Smith asked me if I'd like to work producing records at EMI, and it did sound like something I'd enjoy doing. In the event, it wasn't so enjoyable. But that's why I left the band. The band didn't actually split up. By this time we had Pete Tolson -- who was a marvellous guitarist -- and he formed a new nucleus with Phil. Although they spent a couple of months finding a new direction, and finding out what to do, they rose like the phoenix, and off they went again!.
UT:	Were you involved with the Freeway Madness LP?
Wally:	Yes, I produced it. My pseudonym was Asa Jones.
UT:	I'd heard rumours that that was really you! Did you play at all on it?
Wally:	I can't remember playing anything, I sang a few things, that's all.
UT:	Is that you singing lead on "Over the Moon"?
Wally:	Yeah.
UT:	I thought that was you. You're not supposed to even be in the band on that album!
Wally:	I was the inimitable Asa Jones, I just get the production credit.
UT:	Was the pseudonym because of you being a staff producer at EMI?
Wally:	That's right, yeah. I couldn't have my name on any other things at all or I'd get sued.
UT:	You won't get in trouble if I print it, will you?
Wally:	No, no. It's all right now; that's all forgotten about now.
UT:	What bands did you work with as staff producer at EMI?
Wally:	I did things like Barclay James Harvest, and I also did a solo album with John Lees -- he was the lead guitarist with Barclay James Harvest. I did all kinds of funny stuff. There was a band called Fogg as well, and the Marcus Hook Roll Band. There were quite a few, but I found it very frustrating working at EMI. I thought I made some quite good records, but the organisation was so big you kind of got lost in it. I mean, to try and get a good budget out of somebody for promotion and stuff, because it was an 'in house' production, nobody thought it was that good to start with. They'd much rather put their faith in an inherited hit from America -- like all the Tamla Motown stuff. They'd much rather spend their money promoting that kind of stuff than to promote the homegrown talent, because they didn't trust it.
UT:	I'm curious to know more about the Marcus Hook Roll Band, wasn't that a couple of guys from the Easybeats?
Wally:	Yeah, that was George Young and Harry Vanda. I did quite a lot of stuff with them which came out. I even went to Australia and made an album. George Young, he's the brother of Angus Young from AC/DC, and also Malcolm Young -- he was part of the Marcus Hook Roll Band too. It was an experiment; it didn't really work, but I thought they wrote good songs.
UT:	Did you meet them when they were still in the Easybeats?
Wally:	No. Somebody came to me with the songs when I worked at EMI, and there was one or two I liked, so we got together and started making a record.
UT:	On the liner notes to The Albert Archives they mention that the project was a bit of a booze-up!
Wally:	hey're good drinking boys, and with boys that are heavy drinkers, if you gotta stay with 'em, you gotta stay with 'em, you know what I mean? (laughs) You can't produce from afar.
UT:	While we're on the subject, the Pretty Things have always had a reputation as being a bunch of drunkards. I wondered how that could be true for those late '60s albums when there was more precision involved in the arrangements?
Wally:	Quite a lot of the reputation was forced upon us by the press. Obviously we're no bunch of angels, and we never have been. We've never been really naughty boys, but we liked to have a good time, and it went right through. We used to go out to the clubs right after the sessions at Abbey Road and get really messed up, but you wouldn't have to be at the studio until 2:30 the next afternoon, so it was all right. We'd never get wrecked when we'd be doing something serious -- getting our act together as it were -- but when you're out of school it's alright.
UT:	So there was never any drinking or anything like that going on at the studio?
Wally:	Well, I mean no one was paralytic on the floor! Yes, there was drink, but it was very sensible. They'd know when they'd had enough because they'd fall over! There were plenty of roadies to hold us up! (laughter)
UT:	Later on you became involved with the Pretty Things again, for their reunion in 1978. The band reformed for a one-off show in Holland, and you got bootlegged. What do you feel about that?
Wally:	It was set up as a bootleg right from the start. I mean, the guy conned us. But we've been conned so many times! The whole thing was good fun, to get the whole thing on the road again and do it. That was all it was meant to be: a fun weekend. They said, "Come over. We'll pay all your expenses. You can have a party, and play some stuff." That was all it was. It was a very ill-rehearsed, good fun gig
UT:	A bit later there was the Crosstalk album. Were you disappointed that that wasn't more successful, because it seemed like that was a really strong commercial album?
Wally:	Well, yeah. I'm always disappointed. I don't think that any of the albums have been bad. When you're involved with something, and you've worked with it for a month or two, it does get under your skin. You think, Yeah, I think this ain't half bad. Inevitably, you are disappointed (with sales). It does come as a bit of a surprise.
UT:	So what have you been doing since Crosstalk?
Wally:	Well, apart from DeWolfe, I've done a few jingles and things like that. I haven't really done much, musically. I'm not involved actively in music anymore, unfortunately.
UT:	Given the chance, would you like to get involved in something, musically, again - -such as the Pretty Things?
Wally:	Oh yeah, I'm sure. It's a question of finances, really. It's something I find very difficult to do part time. If I've come home and I've been doing something else all day, it's very difficult to sort of put on your 'musical hat' and write a couple of songs. Some people can, but I can't do it -- it's gotta be all or nothing.
UT:	Looking back on your times with the Pretty Things and the Fenmen, how do you feel about all those days?
Wally:	Oh, I have a very warm feeling about them all. I love music, and I've loved being involved with it. I don't regret one single minute.