An interview with TIM ROSE So all the early people like and I wrote a couple of verses (In the Slug And Fiddle, Dylan all had options from and that arrangement of mine Sheffield. 9 February 1997) these places to come back to grew out of a living, breathing Greenwich and get three kind of working art. PT: Were you annoyed by that hundred dollars a week or noisy crowd tonight? something. So you were not aware of the TR: I can't say it. They're Nick fast rock versions of it? Cave’s regulars and it was a They did give exposure, not so No. I never heard it until mine good gig. Any time that you much the club owners because came out. Then it came out of have drinking you are going to they were just taking the walls, but I'd never heard have that. In a concert hall advantage; we were doing any of those versions before. I they have one drink before and them a favour, they were have no idea how that came maybe one drink at half time, doing us a favour of work. But about. It's really strange, there and you don't get that. But the quality musicians that is a guy who has his name on any time that you are in a pub came to New York at that the copyright, and if he did or a bar or that situation. I time, that's what it was all write it then great, but I do mean I just got back from about, that was the attraction. not think that we will ever Northern Ireland where It was Steve Stills, myself, know how two people could drinking is the national David Crosby, Richie Havens, come up with same song, but institution over there, so it's Felix Pappalardi, Eric he gets all the money. In spite tough Weisberg, Clapton coming of that, being connected with over as an unknown, Hendrix that song has helped my I think that the Irish have a started down there, so it was a career. It is still a damn good better attitude to a tune than fucking all-star list. All these song to sing and it still works. we do in england... guys were working for two or Although I didn't get the Some do, some don't. Some of three dollars a set and a money, I certainly got a the places I worked man, I hamburger or something. positive feedback from it. didn't feel this reverence for the singer or the song. They Are these the kind of guys that Is the story about Chas were just loaded. Same thing. would be sitting in your Chandler hearing your version audience as well? and then giving it to Hendrix In the big three you spent a lot Yes, we would all go and listen true? of time in Greenwich Village. to each other. And Yes, absolutely, and that's not Did you play all the legendary furthermore, at the end of a just from me, you can read gigs? night we would have our anything on Hendrix, and Yes, before Cass (Mama Cass guitars and we would go to a Chas and Jimi always Elliot) , after Cass, for years. coffee shop and we would play admitted it. When I met him The Bitter End, the Bottom and trade off and things. the first thing he said was Line, places like that. The "Thanks for Hey Joe.” I saw Night Owl, Cafe Au Gogo; all When did you first hear ‘Hey him at the Speakeasy Club in of them. They were good Joe’? London when I was promoting places to play at the time. Miami, Florida. I can never Morning Dew, and he'd Naturally the legend is much remember the singer's name, it already had Hey Joe, so he more interesting than the fact. was a friend of Freddy was introduced to me and the They were places that allowed Neil’s.....Vince Martin, I think. first thing he did was to thank us to do our own thing, and He was singing two verses of me. I said "You're welcome,” paid shit; absolute piss. They this song and I was working in gritting my teeth, thinking paid five dollars a set, so if the same club as him with yet “You're making millions and there were five guys in a band another group, and I said I'm not”, but what the hell. you made a dollar each, and "That's an interesting song, I But yes, he did acknowledge it, you did three sets a night so mean, not much to it, but did and it was acknowledged in hopefully you made three you write that?". He said "No, books about him. Literally, he dollars. But you could do that's all that I know of it, I and Chas Chandler bought the original material and they think that it's an old record and listened to it. always took an option on you, Appalachian tune. I said "Do Hendrix put his own style to so if you made it they could you mind if I take it and it, but they did the same get you back at five hundred maybe do something with it?", arrangement almost, putting dollars a week or something. he said "Go ahead". So I did, Hendrixisms in it. though, but I never fit into By that time we had so much You were signed to CBS then, that San Francisco scene. To in the can that we had but is it true that you went to be honest with you, man, I recorded, it was virtually an Elektra first? thought it was all boring shit. album, so all of the songs that Yes I had. I was working with But it caught a spark with were on the first album were the same guys that helped to people you know. Then I came not really done as an album. develop Hey Joe and Morning over here and John Peel took a There were two or three others Dew. We were working as a liking to me, but I wasn't a I had done for CBS. that are trio, but it was not working, John Peel kind of guy either, I not on the album. They were but at least I was doing wasn't artsy enough I don't really whatever was lying something. We auditioned for think. John likes what John around, to put ten or twelve Mercury Records in Florida likes, so that was not my songs out. Morning Dew was and they had the attitude that groove necessarily, and I very much taken off that rock-folk music was not going certainly wasn't top forty kind album after Episode Six over to make it. The band was of Guys and Dolls, the Move, here and Simon Dee, who was called The Thorns but we Mud, kind of stuff, yet I made one of the pirate DJs from the never recorded. We made a records. late 60s, started playing my demo and auditioned for version and called CBS in Elektra who said the same Have you any memories of London to say ‘You have this thing. About three months recording your first album? album and you should put it later CBS had signed me as a out’. And they didn't even solo artist to a wonderful Oh, largely frustration. know it. record deal of four singles. Then The Byrds came out with David Rubinson … we were so They did not even know they Mr Tambourine Man and folk- un-enamoured with the whole had the fucking album. rock was it. process that when it came to Nothing changes, and so they mixing the album he didn't missed Hey Joe. They missed My manager wrote a letter to want to do it. "I don't have the putting Morning Dew out first, Time Magazine saying that time for this - I’ve got other and they took the other song The Byrds did not invent folk- things to do." He never told and put it on a sampler, so I rock, Tim Rose did, but who me what he wasn't happy had no single on the album to the fuck cared? By that time about. He did not have... when put out, so that's really how Dylan had done his first album we recorded Hey Joe, we did it that all came about. and Tom Wilson had gone in in one evening with one or two and done Like A Rolling Stone takes, everything was live Rubinson … they did twelve with him. Simon and back then and CBS had that songs and they had six singles, Garfunkel had the Sound of single out within four days. A and B sides, and all the Silence updated in the same promotion men called and said way so that's when it began. By then, the west coast had ‘You don't know what the fuck already been saturated with you're doing, and we’re not But again, being first is not this other version. After that going to do your job for you if necessarily the most lucrative didn't happen CBS really you don't know where the position to be in, at the didn't want to do an album. single is.’ So that didn't work. beginning of the race so to They didn't speak, as you well know.