Welcome to A Breath of Fresh Air with Sandy Kaye. Hello, how are you? What have you been up to this week? I seem to have been spending a whole heap of my time cooking meals for the family. I’m not complaining.
I love when all the kids come over and expect to be fed, but I sure am feeling it. And I wonder when the time will come when they’ll start cooking for me. Do yours cook for you? I’d love to know.
Maybe send me a message through the website, abreathoffreshair.com.au. If yours do, I’m going to be sure to let my kids know that others have got it much better than me. And with that, on to today’s episode. I read a few interviews recently with Small Faces founder and drummer Kenny Jones, but I really wasn’t prepared for what a funny guy he’d be.
For those of you who don’t remember the English band, the Small Faces, they later dropped the small to simply become the Faces. The group was one of the first mod bands in the mid-sixties and featured a bunch of notorious rockers. The Rolling Stones’ Ronnie Wood, singer Ronnie Lane, Ian McLagan, later Rod Stewart, and the band’s driving force, Kenny Jones.
It’s a real pleasure to be here. Thank you very much. You’re such a legend! You had a reunion of the Faces and you were making some new music.
Right, where we’re at with the music now is we’ve recorded about, let’s say we’re halfway through the album. We’ve still got to go in the studio and do some more stuff. So we found some old stuff that has not been released and reworked some of it and got some new stuff to go on there as well, new songs.
But the good thing about the old songs that have not been released is we’ve got that lovely magic atmosphere and lovely feel to, you know, going back in time 50-odd years. I bet you never thought 50 years ago that you’d be re-releasing songs or doing it still today, did you? I didn’t think any of us would still be around. But there you go.
The way we partied. I was going to say, you lived it pretty hard, huh? Yeah. So you’d have to describe those days as the good old days, right? The good old days was in the faces, it was like having a party every day, every night, every show we did.
We were on stage and we had a party on stage and a party with the audience. The audience might as well have been on stage and we might as well have been in the audience. It was a great sort of party atmosphere and we enjoyed every moment of it.
We used to give the audience some wine and they gave us some wine. We were getting drunk together. Oh, how cool is that? So do you reckon that was a part of the secret of your success in the early days? Oh no, we just liked to drink.
As Ron says, my liver will never be the same. None of us. It’s lucky livers regenerate, isn’t it? I know.
It’s obviously not the drinking that you most missed from those days. It can’t possibly be you did enough in those days to last you a lifetime. If you had to point at something that you missed from those days, what would it be? Being younger.
I mean, the good thing is, you see, it’s still carried on over all these years because Ronnie Wood and myself and Rod Stewart and Ian McLagan when he was alive, we all used to get together at least two or three times a year, you know, to go out in the restaurant or a bar somewhere and cause havoc. You were really the naughty lads, weren’t you? So we still are when we get together, but it’s great fun being with each other. Wonderful that you’ve maintained the friendship all of these years.
Oh yeah, no, it’s great. The pandemic has slowed us down somewhat because we were supposed to get together to do a 50th anniversary tour and now it’s like three years later. So you’re waiting for 55 or are you going to go out and do it anyway? We’re going to do, no, we’re probably going to do it.
I think last time we met was only about a month ago in London and we just all agreed that we’d tour to promote the album that we’re going to come out. Oh, that’d be awesome.
Any chance we’ll see you at this side of the world? I tell you what, I’d love to come to Australia. I haven’t been there for such a long time. I’d love to come to Australia and be a part of it over there.
One of my sons is going to marry a New Zealand lady, so I’d love to play in New Zealand. Yeah, it’s been a long, long time since you’ve been here, hasn’t it? When was the last time? Do you remember? Yeah, it was with the Faces, I don’t know, 70, 71. Wow.
How is your memory these days? Fun. Yeah, no, my memory’s okay on certain days, otherwise it’s fine. But I think with age, no matter how much you’ve taken into your system, your short-term memory is not quite as good as what it used to be for sure.
No, I have a very selective memory now. Yeah, I’m told. On purpose.
I’m told. I’m older and wiser. Do you think being older and wiser now, if you had the benefit of hindsight, would you have done anything differently? I don’t think so.
I mean, apart from the crooks that are around in the music industry that screwed us in the past, I’d get rid of them, straighten that one out. But other than that, I’m fairly content with what we’ve all achieved and what we’ve done. So tell me, how did you get into it in the first place? What were you doing before playing music and how did you get a break? I was kind of a little tearaway in the East End of London with all my mod friends.
We didn’t know we were mods, we just created mods. And just going up and down, causing havoc again. And I fell in love with this banjo that was hanging in a pawn shop in Bethnal Green.
And I saw it there and I thought, oh, great. Yeah, because my mate said, let’s form a skiffle group. And I said, well, what’s a skiffle group? He said, well, you get a tea chest and a broom handle, stick it in one end, one corner, and a piece of string and tie it to the corner.
And that makes a bass sound. He said, then you get your grandmother’s washboard. Washboard, yeah.
Yeah. And you get your grandmother’s thimbles on each finger tip. And you just go up and down like that.
By this time, I thought it was nuts. And did you do it? Yeah, they said, on TV tonight, there’s a skiffle group going to play. So we went back to watch it on my parents’ TV, which was like, in those days, the TV was in black and white.
And it was like looking at an eyeball. I remember well. Yeah.
So the skiffle group came on and it was Lonnie Donegan playing, rock on and on. And I just fell in love with the banjo. I went to get the banjo in the pawn shop and it had gone.
Oh, no. So I said to the guy in the shop, I said, where’s the banjo? He said, it’s the guy at the pawn shop. The guy’s paid for it and gone.
He’s taken it back home. So come get it. I can’t get it.
So I said, well, look, you know, so we walked away. And my friend said to me, you’re really upset about this, aren’t you? I said, yes, I am. I said, but, you know, what could I do? He said, well, look, my friend’s got a drum kit.
So I’ll get him to bring it around this afternoon. I said, yeah, great. So he brought it around that afternoon and it ended up being one bass drum, one floor tom-tom and two broken, one broken stick.
So I put it together and banged away, God knows what. And that’s it. That was my introduction to drumming.
So I learned to play on one and a half sticks and bits of drums. How amazing. And of course, you were still at school at this time, weren’t you? Oh, yeah.
Of course, in Aberdeen school. I eventually got, bought a drum kit in, I won’t bore you with the long story of it. I got to end up with this drum kit because I found the receipt literally the other day.
I don’t know why. It was £64, 13 shillings and tuppence. Wow, that was a lot of money in those days.
I know. I had to steal £10 out of my mum’s purse when she was at work. But you’d saved up the rest to be able to buy it? No, it was on HP.
The only HP I knew was HP Source. So was your mum mad? No, she didn’t know about it until I told her. You told her.
Then she went, oh, don’t do that, Kenny. I said to my mum afterwards, you know, when we had our first hit record, I said, that’s the best £10 you’ve ever invested in someone. Kenny Jones, you were at home bashing away on the drums, teaching yourself to play? Yeah, I used to wake up in the morning and play drums.
Our street was a terrorist house street. And it’s still there. It means terrorist houses are all joined up.
Oh, terrorist house. I thought you said terrorist. Oh, no, not terrorist.
You were the only terrorist. I was the only terrorist. Noisy terrorist, I mean.
Because basically, I used to wake up in the morning before I went to school, Just get straight on the drums, play for like half an hour and then go to school, came back at lunchtime, played all the way through lunchtime, go to school, come back again, played all the way through from like 3.30 or 4 o’clock all the way through to pull me off the drums. The neighbours were not very happy with me. I bet they were.
When did you decide that this was going to be your full-time career? I didn’t. That was it. I was possessed by drums and I just knew that that’s what I was going to do.
I just wanted it. I got introduced to different music and I eventually found a pub that had a jazz band playing in it. So I went up to this pub, which is literally around the corner from where I live, and watched the drummer.
His name was Roy and he’s a jazz drummer with a band. So I watched him for a couple of weeks and then he came over afterwards. He had a break in between the songs and he said, are you taking the piss out of me? I said, what do you mean? He said, you keep blinking at me.
I said, I know why. Because when you play, you blink, you go like that. And he went, no, I don’t.
I said, well, yes, you do. And he went, no, I don’t. So we had a good old laugh like that.
So I got to know him over the next couple of weeks. Then he made an introduction. He said, we’ve got someone, a young guy’s going to get up and play now.
I thought, great, I’m going to watch another drummer. And he introduced me. I couldn’t believe it.
I sat behind the drum kit and I looked up at these guys and they looked like giants when I was sitting there. And then they looked down at me and they just said, everything happened in slow motion. It’s like one, two, one, two, three, four.
But it sounded like one, two, three, four. So we ended up playing and I was in heaven. The first time I played with a band, it was like breaking things with your umbilical cord, breaking all ties with the earth.
I just floated. I just got into music and then I discovered The Shadows and Jimmy McGriff and different jazz stuff. So I just discovered music generally.
And what led you to forming The Faces in 65? Well, when I was playing on that day with that band, the barman came up to me afterwards and he said, oh Kenny, that was really great, really good. He said, are you in a band? I said, no, I’m forming one now. He said, well, look, my brother has just taught guitar and he’s learning how to play it.
Shall I bring him down next week? I said, yeah, great. So the next week, in through the door walks, the barman, right behind him, his brother, that was Ronnie Lane. Ronnie and I hit it off straight away.
I kept laughing at him because he had a suit on, he looked very smart, grey suit and a shirt that sort of stuck out like that and a tie. And every time he turned, the tie would stay there like that. So I started laughing at him.
So we hit it off straight away. As a mod, there were the mods and the… Rockers. The mods and the rockers, right.
Well, I know what the rockers used to wear, what did the mods have to wear? What were you dressed as? Well, we were making up as we went along, you know, because I mean, growing up in the East End of London after the Second World War, we played on bomb ruins and stuff like that. And everyone was wearing black and white and grey. So there was no real colour.
I felt like I was growing up in black and white. And one day I went on a bus to Aldgate East and a lot of people will know where that is, if they remember. There was a shop there and it had a red Caravelle jumper in the window.
It stood out like a… I couldn’t believe it. So I thought, I’ve got to have that. So I saved up and it was 30 shillings, which is a lot of money in those days.
So I saved up over a couple of weeks and I bought this red shirt with Caravelle and I put it on and I bleached my Levi jeans, wore it, and that’s when I thought I was old. So I became a bit more stand out, you know. And you still got that shirt today? No, they sell it in Carnaby Street now.
It’s all back in fashion again. Yeah, that’s hilarious. So you started with The Faces and it wasn’t very long until you had your first big hit, was it? We had our first big hit called What You Gonna Do About It in 1965.
And I couldn’t believe it the first time I heard it on the radio. I thought, I can’t believe this. This is us.
You just don’t realise how exciting it was to hear yourself on the radio. I can’t. I’m so happy when you’re around me.
But I’m sad when you’re not there. Sing the song now. What you gonna do about it.
What you gonna do about it. Tell the truth. What you gonna do about it.
What you gonna do about it. I want you to give me your sweet, sweet kisses. I want you to hold me tight.
I want you to come when I call you. And let me walk you home at night. What you gonna do about it.
What you gonna do about it. I can imagine you’d be puffing out your chest with that first hit. What happened next? We puffed out a lot of stuff.
What happened was we insisted on writing our own material after that. So the next song we put out was a single called I Got My Own. And that flopped.
It didn’t enter the charts in the high end. I just sit here every day wondering what she’ll have to say when she reads this letter. Cos I just wrote her that I was mad.
Between the lines she’ll know I’m crying. And I can’t forget her. And it’s hurting.
Yes, it’s hurting. Deep inside me. But no one knows it.
Cos I got my baby. Don’t you know that I got my baby. You get yours.
Oh my baby. You get yours. So our manager Donald at the time was having none of it.
He said I can’t afford that to happen again. So we can’t afford, we’ve got to have a hit next time. So I’ve asked Kenny Lynch and Mort Sherman to write a song.
And so they wrote a song and it was called Sha-la-la-la-lee. Coming up, Kenny tells us about the role the Beatles played in their lives. About Ichikoo Park and how fame wasn’t all it was cracked up to be.
This is a breath of fresh air with Sandy Kaye. It’s a beautiful day. Thanks for being here.
I’m with Small Faces drummer Kenny Jones. So I’ve asked Kenny Lynch and Mort Shearman to write a song. And so they wrote a song and it’s called Shalalalalee.
The song Shalalalalee was written to sound like Doowadiddy, which was number one for Manfred Mann at the time. It marked the beginning of the band’s commercial period. They turn up on a Friday night Shalalalalee, yeah I knew everything gonna be alright Shalalalalee, yeah Shalalalalee I asked her where did the water go Shalalalalee, yeah We went so crazy, I don’t know Shalalalalee, yeah Shalalalalee I held her close and I asked her if she was Gonna be my baby It felt so good when she answered me Oh yeah, oh yeah Oh yeah, oh yeah, oh yeah We recorded that song, and I’ll never forget I was getting quite busy with the song, trying to find a drum part to it.
And then Kenny Lynch said to me, pressed the buzzer on the guitar and said, Kenny, he said, whatever you do, don’t play anything you can’t mime to. And I thought, oh God, because in those days you used to mime on TV. Yeah, true.
So you did lots of TV appearances. They were the days of Top of the Pops and all of those shows, wasn’t it? That’s right, yeah. I mean, what we were talking about yesterday when I was rehearsing with another band, I think one of the things we were talking about was the fact that All or Nothing was our first number one hit.
But we shared it and made history by sharing it with the Beatles because they had Yellow Submarine out at the time. So Yellow Submarine and All or Nothing was number one spot between the two of us. I thought you’d listen to my reasoning But now I see you don’t hear a thing Tryin’ to make you see How it’s got to be Yes, it’s all right All or nothing Yeah, yeah All or nothing Come on! All or nothing For you Things could work out Just like I want them to Were they inspirational to you? You have to say yes because basically, you know, they were around at the time.
They were before us as well, and the Stones. And so, you know, you had to listen to them. And we loved the Beatles.
I mean, they’re great. I mean, everyone loved the Beatles at the time. They’re making a big statement in life.
And were you also influenced at the time by American music by starting to hear that for the first time? Yeah, without a doubt. I mean, Steve Merritt was really into all that stuff. He loved Ray Charles, you see, Steve.
He turned on to Ray Charles, and I love Ray Charles. I love Nat King Cole. That’s one of my greatest singers, Nat King Cole.
Is that right? I wouldn’t have picked that one. I know, but he’s a great singer. When did Itchy Coo Park come along? I can’t remember now.
The Faces were only 65 to 69, so obviously it was within that period of time. Within that time, anyway. But Itchy Coo Park came around because we called it a song for a laugh, you know.
Didn’t really think much of it, really. It was quite commercial, but we didn’t really… We were trying to lose our commercial image, so we didn’t kind of pass it for a bit. And it’s a song about in the east end of London, because I grew up with short trousers.
Everyone was wearing short trousers because we were all kids. And we played on these bomb ruins. And through the bomb ruins used to be these great big, horrible, stinging nails.
They used to poke out through the rubble. And if one of those caught you on the leg, you’d know it’s Itchy. Itchy Coo.
Oh, really? So it was a kind of nickname for where you used to play, Itchy Coo Park? Yeah. It was my Itchy Coo Park. And Ronnie Lane and Steve Mouw in Ilford, they came from Ilford, a bit further on.
They said, we’ve got an Itchy Coo Park as well. It was a park, but it was never really well looked after. And so lots of stinging nails in it.
And that song was one that you guys wrote? Yeah. Yeah, that’s right. So we wrote Itchy Coo Park.
Over Bridge of Spice To rest my eyes in shades of green Under Dreaming Spice To Itchy Coo Park, that’s where I’ve been What did you do there? I got high What did you feel there? Well, I cried Which one did you say? Tell you why Make me feel kind To blow my mind Look at all the ducks with a bun They all come out to groove about Nice and fun and bliss I’ll tell you what I’ll do What will you do? I’d like to go there now You can miss out school What’s that? I’d like to go there now What did you do there? We don’t get high What did you touch there? We touched the sky Which one did you say? I’ll tell you why Make me feel kind To blow my mind Look at all the ducks with a bun They all come out to groove about Nice and fun and bliss It’s incredible to have grown up with a song like that I mean, in my own life and to know all of the words and have no idea what they were about Yeah, when you write a song I mean, I love songs that mean something You know, they come from somewhere You know, otherwise you just write It’s like writing fiction, you know Yeah, does Yorichiku Park still exist? No, no, because they’re built all over the East End now All the bomb ruins are gone now No more nails in there at all It’s happening in Ukraine at the moment Kenny Jones, why didn’t Steve Marriott leave the band in 69? Well, he was just as frustrated as the rest of us about this When we were playing, because we had all these screaming girls all the way through, you know, which was lovely at first Then suddenly you can’t hear yourself because of the screams, you know We had this Teenie Bopper image which we just could not shake off And so I think it got to Steve more than it got to us He just couldn’t take it anymore So he walked off stage in Alexandra Palace where we were playing and didn’t tell us That was the bit I didn’t like I can imagine the adoration about all the little Teenie Bopper girls would have been more difficult to take than it appeared I mean, from the outside it would seem so much fun and glamorous but all the time would be much… But did that challenge the seriousness? I think it wasn’t so much I mean, you have to say that it was just… That was happening to the beat, it was happening to most bands But I think what got to us more than anything was the fact that we were completely under pressure to write commercial songs, short hits Right, so it was challenging the seriousness of your musicianship Yeah, exactly So we were all good players We were still learning the craft and still learning to play with each other But this commercialism just got in the way Kenny Jones, where did you find Rod Stewart? We found him in the gutter No, I’m only joking We were in the band’s ground, Steve Mayer had gone And so that powerful voice wasn’t there anymore So we were completely lost It’s like you lost a brother Because we were all very close to each other So the Stones said Look, we’ve got a warehouse in Bermondsey in the East End of London where we keep all our stuff And we’ve got a soundproof room in there, a small room But go in there and play together until you know what you’re going to do So the three of us used to get together and just jam for a bit We just went on for a few weeks And then Ronnie Lane brought down his new next door neighbour and that was Ronnie Wood And Ronnie Wood came He said I said, have you played bass? He said, no, I’m learning to play guitar I mean, I’ve got a goal I said, I want to switch from bass to guitar So he played along with us And we just all got along like house on fire again And then that went on for a couple of weeks And then Ronnie Wood I call him Woody because there were two Ronnies in the band Woody brought down his best mate which was Rod Stewart Rod Stewart sat on the amps watching us for a couple of weeks And then, you know, we just I said, look, we’ve got to get serious here And we got outside and thought, you know we need to sing, not just keep jamming So Ronnie Lane sang and his beautiful, wonderful sounding voice he’s got It’s fresh and bright and lovely I went to watch the river But nothing still has all adjusted Seas of green and change Let’s do this on time For the world’s first vulture He’s mind upon his tackle And his words upon his mind Back at the same, I went, yeah And then Ronnie Wood sang I went, yeah, okay But you still miss this powerful voice And all the time, I’m looking at Rod sitting on the amps And I knew he was a great singer We used to go up to the pub in the middle of rehearsals Have a break And so this one time we went up to the pub And I said to Rod, can I have a private word? He said, yeah, what’s up? So I went round the corner I said, I’d like you to join the band Oh, he said, do you think the others would let me? I said, yeah And that evening, Alvin Lee was having a party Drinks by in his house So we went back there for a party I said to the guys, look, come on I’ve got, I need to talk to everyone I said, look, I’ve asked Rod to join the band And I got, oh no, we don’t want another prima donna We don’t want someone walking out on us again And I just stuck to my guns I just said no And I won Was it a good call? Rod entered the band And both Ronnie Wood and Rod Stewart Had both been with the Jeff Beck Group, hadn’t they? That’s right They were with the Jeff Beck Group And they were on a wage as well You don’t need no baggage You just feed on love All you need is faith And when the tears start falling You don’t need no ticket You just thank the Lord It was then that you changed the name From the Small Faces to the Faces Is it true you did that name change because the small faces reflected the stature of the members and you couldn’t keep the small faces because both Ronnie Wood and Rod Stewart were so tall? No, no. It’s not a true story. That’s a pretty obvious one but the truth of the matter is we managed to get a manager called Billy Gaff and he got us a deal with Warner Brothers and we went to sign the contract and I said hold on a minute.
It’s a small face deal and I said, let me go back a bit. My accountant said to me, what are you going to do now? I said, well, we’re going to get a record deal and we’re going to get an advance and all that. He said, how much are you going to get? I couldn’t think of a figure.
A figure came into my head and I said £30,000. He went, telephone numbers, took me for an accountant. So I said, okay, right.
So when Billy Gaff went to get the deal done for Warner Brothers, he said, how much do you think I should ask for the advance? I said, well, £30,000. Not a penny more, not a penny less. So I just wanted the proofs to my accountant that we could do it.
Yeah, got it. So, I mean, you started off calling yourself The Faces. Was there a reason you called yourself The Faces? No, we didn’t.
What happened was we sat down to sign the contract with Warner Brothers and it said small faces on it. So I said, we’re not small faces. We’re a completely different band.
The small faces are finished, gone. We’ve got to get another name. So we signed you as The Small Faces because you’ve got a name.
So you can’t have the £30,000 unless you call yourself The Small Faces. So I decided, okay, the first album is going to be called Small Faces. I said, from there on in, after that, we can take the small off.
Okay. We were confused here in audience land as to why you did that. For money.
That’s a pretty good reason, isn’t it? And Kenny Jones said, what about Tin Soldier? That was another one of your huge hits. What was that one about? You have to listen to the lyrics. The sentiment is in the lyrics.
Okay. We’ll have a listen to that one now. A look in your eyes, a dream passing by a little sky.
I don’t understand. And all I need is treat me like a man. Cause I ain’t no child.
Take me like my man. I got the love that I belong to. I don’t need no.
I got the love that I belong to. I got the love that I belong to. I got the love that I belong to.
So you’ve got Rod Stewart with you. Now you become The Faces. In 1978, Pete Townsend says to you, come and join The Who.
That’s right, Keith had not long died and about three months later, I get a call from Bill Kerbyshley, The Who’s manager, saying Kenny said, I’ve come straight to the point. He said, The Who have had a meeting and they want to stay together and they want you to join the band. I said, oh great.
I said, that’s very nice of you, Bill. I said, great, I’m really flattered. I said, but I can’t.
He said, what? I could hear his chin drop on the floor. I said, I can’t do it because I’m already forming a band with our producer, Glyn Johns. We’re putting the band together, which is half American and half English.
It’s like a cross between American Eagles and UK Eagles. The faces had already fallen apart at that time. Yes, that’s right.
The faces had gone apart. Right, so how did you get together with The Who? He said, look, Pete’s coming into the office a bit this afternoon. I said, I’m always happy to see Pete because we used to work and tour together anyway.
It’s the small faces and The Who. So I knew everybody quite well, well enough anyway. So I went into the office and we had a chat for about a couple of hours, just me and Pete and Bill Kerbyshley, the manager.
We all had a great laugh. Then halfway through this meeting, Pete just said, oh Kenny, you’ve got to join them. You’re one of us.
You know, come through the ranks with us. I said, well, look, I told him I was just in the middle of forming a band and we’re just about to sign with Atlantic Records. I said, I’ll tell you what, I said, let me go and have a word with the band and see if I’m going to upset them, otherwise I won’t be able to do it.
Kenny Jones had reservations about making the decision to join The Who. He’d been close friends with Keith Moon and they’d been together the night Moon died. Hang in there to hear how guitarist Pete Townsend persuaded Kenny Jones to join the band and what important condition had to be met before Kenny would get on board.
This is a breath of fresh air with Sandy Kaye. It’s a beautiful day. Welcome back.
I’m talking with the drummer for the Small Faces, The Faces and The Who, Kenny Jones. We’ve heard about Kenny’s relationships with Ronnie Wood and Rod Stewart and how Pete Townsend convinced him to join the band after his good friend Keith Moon passed away. Now take a listen to what those days in The Who were like for Kenny.
I had massive reservations about it because I didn’t particularly want to be in that position. What happened was Keith had his funeral up in Highgate, not very far from where I live, and I didn’t want to go be part of the charade, so I took a little poem and a little wreath up to, before anyone got there, put it there and said my little piece, said my goodbye to Keith, and I left before anyone got there. And so that was that, and I put it in my mind.
We shared the same drum technician, a guy called Bill Harrison. So Bill kept saying to me, oh, you’re going to get the call one day. I said, what are you talking about? He said, no, I’m not saying a word.
So I said, OK. I could sort of sense what was going to happen in a little bit. I just put it out of my mind.
And then I got the call from, telephone call from Bill Kerbishley, The Who’s manager. And he said, Kenny said, I’ll come straight to the point. He said, The Who have had a meeting and they decided to get together and they decided they would like you to join the band.
And they’re not thinking about anyone else at all. They want you in the band. My reaction was, oh.
I said, well, thanks, Bill. I said, but it’s very flattering. It’s very nice.
I said, but I can’t. He said, what? I said, I can’t. Well, why? Because I’ve just been forming this band with the Transatlantic Band, and so that’s what we’re excited about.
He said, well, look, Pete’s coming into the office this evening. Why don’t you come and have a chat with Pete? I said, always have a chat with Pete. It’s always good to see Pete.
So I went into the office, and we sat there for about two hours, just having a great laugh, glass of wine, and just talking about Australia, things we’ve gone up to. Then Pete just went, you’ve got to join the band. And I felt so bad about it.
So I said, all right, but I’m not copying Keith. I can’t copy Keith. I said, I’ll tell you what.
I said, let me go and have a word with the band, see if I’m going to upset them. Luckily, they were in town that night, the American side of it. So I went back to the band.
I said, look, I’ve been asked to join The Who. And they went, Kenny, you’ve got to do it. You’ve got to join The Who.
It’s like that. So they were very graceful about it. So that’s how I ended up in The Who.
I did say as a condition to Pete, I said, look, there’s no way I’m going to copy Keith Moon. There’s no way. Keith was unique.
I mean, I liked some of the fills he does, which I’d love to play here and there. The song lends itself to it. I said, but other than that, I’m a completely different drummer.
I’m a straight-A drummer. He said, no. He said, we have a chance to do something completely different.
That made my mind up for me. So I was relieved about that. I was funny at the deep end.
I knew Keith Moon’s kit. I knew it was big anyway, because I used to do it in Australia and everywhere we played around Europe. Keith would never turn up for a soundcheck.
So I was already used to it. I was already used to working with John. I used to work with Pete a lot.
Roger, not a lot, because he was a singer. So he never did sessions like that, like we did. Pete and I had worked together on demos and stuff, a bit like Ronnie.
And I did lots of sessions with Pete. And I did a lot of sessions with Entwistle, because people used to book us, and I never knew who was going to be on the session. And so John would turn up, and I’d go, hi, John.
Hi, John. So I knew everybody quite well. And we toured Australia years ago.
We got thrown out of Australia. We caused so much havoc. Pete Moon was a great friend of mine.
So he was always playing jokes on me. But he would never take the mickey out of me. He’d never take the piss out of me.
He was a great guy, because he respected me as a drummer, and I respected him. And so we had that course of drumming respect, you know. Was Roger Daltrey upset about that, that you were a straighter drummer than Keith had been? No, no, no.
What happened was, I insisted on it. I said, there’s no way I’m going to be. There’s only one drummer for The Who, and that’s Keith Moon.
Always will be in my book. So I can only do me. I can only play me.
If they ask me to join the band, I’ll play me. And of course, I’m playing to great songs, so I’m going to do the best I can. Don’t forget, Keith had only been dead a matter of months.
And all of a sudden, I’m in there. So he’d look, he’d look. It was exciting.
I learned all the songs and stuff. It started out great. We were all playing.
There was no problem. No problem whatsoever. The only hardest thing was remembering all those bloody songs.
We’re learning the repertoire. And then we started the tour. Then suddenly, you know, I had my own sort of way of playing.
And so I was kind of a little bit more busy than I should have been, because my comfort zone is playing a lot straighter than I should. But I said, I’m not going to copy Keith, and I never did. So I was a lot tighter.
So probably Roger was missing certain key moments, drum fills and stuff like that. And bits and pieces like that. And then suddenly he’d look around, expecting to see Keith, but it was me.
I think that’s what got to him. Listening to other people saying, well, he’s not like Keith. Of course I’m not going to be like Keith.
Talkin’ about my generation Talkin’ about my generation Talkin’ about my generation, baby Talkin’ about my generation, baby Why don’t y’all fade away Don’t y’all dig what we all say Stop tryin’ to cause a big sensation Just talkin’ about my generation Talkin’ about my generation Talkin’ about my generation, baby Talkin’ about my generation Talkin’ about my generation They wouldn’t have asked me. They knew the kind of drummer I was. Yeah, they asked you for you.
I said, look, you know, I’m a straight-up drummer. I said, look, you know, I’ll do my best and fit in where I can. We can do something completely different now.
So we never ever did get around to doing something completely different. The albums I did was what they were. What do you enjoy playing on most? I think Won’t Get Fooled Again because I won’t get fooled again.
I put the cans on and what I did was I thought, what’s the most annoying click I can put it there? So I can always stay in time. When I overdubbed my click, a cowbell, boom, boom, and it’s like, boom. So whatever avenue it’s going, boom, I could hear it all the time.
With our children at our feet In the morrows beneath worship Where we go on And the man who spurned a song Says we judge it all wrong We decide and the shotgun sings the song I tip my hat to the new constitution Take a five-quarter view That’s just like yesterday And I get on my knees and pray We don’t get fooled again Knew it all along We were liberated from the fold That’s all I say History ain’t changed My family are gone In the last war Just like yesterday Kenny Jones, you were on the Tommy recording too, weren’t you? Yeah. When Key was alive, Key was out of it a little bit, so he was back and forth with his Swedish girlfriend or whatever. So I ended up playing on Tommy the soundcheck.
And when we toured together as well, I’d kind of got together just on the road and I’d just do some of the soundchecks with Key and the rest of the band. Sounds like a whole lot of fun to me. Was it? Yeah.
There’s lots of different things like that, which gave me more of a closer connection to The Who, in a sense. And I used to play on a lot of demos for The Who with me and Key. I said to Key in the first place, I said, look, I’ll be playing certain stuff because I like what Key’s played in certain things.
So I said, I’m going to try and do my best to do them in those certain places where I think anyone in the right bubble would want to do them. So I think we kind of just separated a little bit. Which was your favourite Who song? Who Are You.
Who are you? I woke up in a Soho doorway A policeman killed my head He said, you can’t go to sleep at home tonight Even if you can get up and walk I staggered back to the underground And the breeze blew back my chair Well, who are you? Who are you? Because I really want to know Who are you? It was a good time. In a sense, I came to, it was another phase in my life and I thought, well, I didn’t get chucked out of the band. It was just like, we kind of broke up a couple of years later and then we reformed again, and then we kept reforming, and again, I’m sorry, again, and reformed.
So it was a bit like that. My whole time with The Who spanned ten years, which is quite a long time. And I was forming a band with Paul Rodgers.
And you’re still playing today? Oh yeah, still playing today. And you still love it as much? Oh yeah, of course I do, yeah. It’s something, once you learn to play drums and an instrument, you know, it’s part of you, you can’t stop it.
It’s like a drug. Are you still learning, or have you totally mastered it? No, you never stop learning, you never stop learning. It’s always fun to discover new stuff like that.
So I don’t know, whatever I do, I try to analyse what I do, and I can’t really, I just play me. I’ve never had a lesson, that’s why. Funnily enough, when I used to do session work, I used to write in my own fashion of reading music, writing music.
Well, congratulations on this fabulous career that you’ve had, Kenny Jones. It’s all in the book. I can’t wait for the new Faces album to come out and to see you guys touring everywhere.
You’ve just had the most extraordinary life. I guess you were just never destined to be a teacher or a psychologist or a bricklayer or anything like that, huh? A little tea leaf. Absolutely.
Thanks so much for talking with us today, Kenny. What a pleasure. Pleasure, Sandy.
Cheers, bye. Kenny Jones’ book, Let the Good Times Roll, is out now. Look out, too, for Kenny playing with his current band, The Jones Gang.
As you’d expect, they’re pretty awesome. Thanks for your company today. If you like what you hear, maybe consider subscribing to the podcast and check out the website, abreathoffreshair.com.au. And if you have a favourite artist that you’d like to hear from, let me know that, too.
I’ll see you back again same time next week. Bye now. It’s a beautiful day You’ve been listening to Abreath of Fresh Air with Sandy Kay.
Beautiful day Oh, baby, any day that you’re gone away It’s a beautiful day