Everyone has their Itchycoo Park…




It's been building up in me this year. First it was the sight of that great wrinkly old twit sniffing the monarch’s arse for favours and complaining how poor he might get if they didn't extend performing rights royalties from 50 to 75 years in Europe. One 'Rift Pilchard', sorry Sir Cliff Richards no less. That 'Bermondsey boy' of old. Yeah right! Richards has as much in common with south London as does Tony Blair. I.e. Jack shit!
I said it was building up!
Secondly it was all those so-called new TV series like 'New Tricks' where equally old and wrinkly has beens like Denis Waterman and yes sorry, as much as I adore her, Amanda Redman, pretend they are not beyond redemption and can still hack a 20 hour day in the office or in their cases a two hour stint in makeup before solving the unsolvable crimes of TV drama.
…and did you see George Cole in that one-off 'Diamond Geezer'? and David Attenborough in that global warming thingy on the BBC? I don’t know which of them looks most walking dead! Tooth decay and old age do not flatter let me tell you! Try radio boys, where 'it don't matter no more'.
Building, building….
And now when I thought it could not get any worse, I'm going round humming the tune to the M&S TV advert and bloggy types are asking each other 'who's that tune by old boy? It's super what!'.
So now Marks and Sparks have their 'Itchycoo Park' advert playing incessantly it seems appealing for customers to 'come buy me' their rags. It's even made YouTube no less! It's a highly successful format following on from the Cockney Rebel one they did last year 'Make Me Smile'.
I don’t mind success, I love success! I don’t really mind out of work actors making a buck or two. I wish I was one and more importantly, making a bob or two. What I have to object to is not knowing the reality behind these ads or this one in particular.
I ask the question therefore of who's making the bucks from this tune 'Itchycoo Park'? (Small Faces, Immedite 1967). It's definitely not Stevie Marriot or Ronnie Lane the two former members of the band that died young and are undoubtedly sadly missed by many. They are also the writers of ' Itchycoo Park' and their estates according to Rift the Pilchard above, should be filling the coffers to overflow on this advert's TV minute mileage. We ain't no dead poet society though. What's worse we ain't no live poet society either!
I bet my next benefit cheque that none of the Small Faces alive or dead are making dosh from this ad. They never made any when they were alive and kicking so why should I believe they are making anything now. The reality of the Small Faces is they were well screwed, along with countless other good bands in the 60's, by the management and the record companies they were foolish enough to sign away their lives with in those heady pre-Itchycoo days.
Now Stuart Rose (CEO) and his band of rag trade strutters have put together a lineup of clothes (Per Una) and market them with what can only be described as typical music industry tactics of ripping off the band and banking the proceeds no questions asked guv! Small Faces, who are they anyway? Some grubby bunch of oiks from the East End I'll be bound I can hear the M&S bean counters say, as they count the profit from every dress sold under the aegis of this TV advertising campaign.
Well let me tell you Mr Rose, you and your advertising agency are still ripping off the likes of Lane and Marriot. Think hard about your dress sales. Would you be prepared to lose money on every one you sell just because you got it wrong on the contract or you didn't understand legal ease and all you ever wanted was to write songs and make good music. Get yourself high on that fact Mr Rose. For every dress you sell you get fatter and somewhere in the rag trade someone stays poor. For every record the Small Faces sold some Arden-like management and DECCA-like record co's. got obese and the rest stayed poor. 'Itchycoo Park' of course was an Immediate records release but I still wager that cheque the band or the estates get nothing from M&S's success.
Where has that happened before you may ask? It equates to the same thing that happens every day in the rag trade. Indian and other Asian suppliers of these rags for M&S. A double whammy then. Both music and rag trade bosses get rich and for that to happen others stay poor. The way of the world.
So maybe Cliff Richards has a point after all. Extending performing rights to 75 years is a good thing. Not to protect the rich and famous like Richards of course, although I do suspect his motives here. Owning an island in the Carribbean must be expensive for the poor lad! What better way to keep the status quo of 'them n us' going than relying on the law to keep us 'East End Herbert' types out of their lives forever.
After all, oiks don’t get knighthoods do they?