Joe Meek
"Robert George "Joe" Meek (5 April 1929 Newent, Gloucestershire – 3 February 1967 in London)
was a pioneering English record producer and songwriter.
His most famous work was The Tornados' hit "Telstar" in 1962, which became the first
record by a British group to hit #1 in the US Hot 100...
The Tornados - Telstar www.youtube.com/watch?v=YuA-fqKCiAE"...His commercial success as a producer was short-lived and Meek gradually sank
into debt and depression. On 3 February 1967, using a shotgun owned by musician Heinz Burt,
Meek murdered his landlady before turning the gun on himself...
"Meek was obsessed with the occult and the idea of "the other side". He would set up
tape machines in graveyards in a vain attempt to record voices from beyond the grave,
in one instance capturing the meows of a cat he claimed was speaking in human tones,
asking for help.
* "In particular, he had an obsession with
Buddy Holly (claiming the late American rocker
had communicated with him in dreams) and
other dead rock and roll musicians.
"His professional efforts were often hindered by his paranoia.
(Meek was convinced that Decca Records would put hidden microphones behind his
wallpaper in order to steal his ideas), drug use and attacks of rage or depression.
Upon receiving an apparently innocent phone call from Phil Spector, Meek immediately
accused Spector of stealing his ideas before hanging up angrily.
"Meek's homosexuality – illegal in the UK at the time – put him under further pressure;
he had been convicted of 'importuning for immoral purposes' in 1963 and fined £15:
he was consequently subject to blackmail.
"In January 1967, police in Tattingstone, Suffolk, discovered a suitcase containing
the mutilated body of Bernard Oliver. According to some accounts, Meek became concerned
that he would be implicated in the murder investigation when the Metropolitan Police
said they would be interviewing all known homosexual men in the city...
"The hits had dried up and Meek's depression deepened as his financial position
became increasingly desperate. French composer Jean Ledrut accused Joe Meek
of plagiarism, claiming that the tune of "Telstar" had been copied from "La Marche d'Austerlitz",
a piece from a score Ledrut had written for the 1960 film Austerlitz.
This lawsuit meant Meek never received royalties from the record during his lifetime.
"On 3 February 1967, the eighth anniversary of Buddy Holly's death,
Meek killed his landlady Violet Shenton and then himself with a single barreled shotgun
that he had confiscated from his protegé, former Tornados bassist and solo star Heinz Burt...
"He pioneered studio tools such as multiple over-dubbing on one- and two-track machines,
close miking, direct input of bass guitars, the compressor, and effects like echo and reverb,
as well as sampling. Unlike other producers, his search was for the 'right' sound rather than
for a catchy musical tune, and throughout his brief career he single-mindedly followed
his quest to create a unique "sonic signature" for every record he produced...
"Meek was one of the first producers to grasp and fully exploit the possibilities of
the modern recording studio. His innovative techniques—physically separating instruments,
treating instruments and voices with echo and reverb, processing the sound
through his fabled home-made electronic devices, the combining of separately-recorded
performances and segments into a painstakingly constructed composite recording—
comprised a major breakthrough in sound production...
"He passed up the chance to work with the then unknown David Bowie, The Beatles
(the latter he once described as "just another bunch of noise, copying other people's music")
and Rod Stewart....
"After the death of Joe Meek the thousands of recordings Meek hid at his studio remained
unreleased and preserved by Cliff Cooper of The Millionaires.
At the time of Joe's death in 1967, Mr. Cooper is said to have purchased all of Joe's recordings
for £300. These recordings were called the "Tea Chest Tapes" among fans,
as they were stored in a tea chest when Cooper took them out of his apartment...
On 4 September 2008 these unreleased recordings went up for auction in Fame Bureau's
'It's More Than Rock 'N' Roll' auction. The auction website states they fetched £200,000,
but others have said considerably more was taken. The auction site says that there are
over 5000 recordings on 1850 tapes containing recordings by David Bowie
as singer and sax player with the Konrads, Gene Vincent, Denny Laine, Billy Fury,
Tom Jones, Jimmy Page, Mike Berry, John Leyton, Ritchie Blackmore, Jess Conrad,
Mitch Mitchell and Screaming Lord Sutch..."
"Sheryl Crow claimed that her song "A Change Would Do You Good" was inspired
by an article she read about Joe Meek."
"Thomas Truax regularly performed his Meek tribute 'Joe Meek Warns Buddy Holly'
on his 2008 tours, a song apparently about Meek's supposed warning via spirit-writing
predicting Buddy Holly's death."
" * I find myself having doubts about this statement.
These days people collect EVPs in cemeteries and other haunted locations regularly.
I'm not saying that it's a good idea to go to the cemetery and do that, but people do it.
I can attest to the fact that frequently, the spirits emit a sound that sounds just like
a cat wailing, based on my own investigations of haunted places.
If you hang around long enough, it begins to sound more like the crying of a baby.
In my experience, that's about when it's a good time to vacate the premises.
