Trevor played guitar with Sparks on the Propaganda and Indiscreet albums.
You were in a band called Jook before Sparks.
Yes, we were signed to RCA, who were a big label, and we had four or five singles out which didn’t get any radio play. So really we just toured all the time. All of a sudden we got the gig (in 1974) supporting Sweet who were also on RCA. This was a nationwide tour and I think we would have made it after that because we were pretty sharp. We rehearsed like crazy and had special outfits made. It was about a week before we were gonna go out and Brian Connolly (Sweet vocalist) got into a fight in his local pub and somebody punched him in the throat. That was it, the tour was cancelled.
And you then got picked up by Sparks.
They had just decided that they didn’t want their bass player Martin (Gordon) and so they asked Ian (Hampton) to join Sparks. John (Hewlett, who managed both bands) was talking to them as they wanted an extra guitar player to go with Adrian (Fisher) and they said yes so I went too. It was difficult leaving the band but I don’t think there was anything else I could have done at the time. We joined in May or June (1974).
As soon as I joined we started rehearsing for the first tour (which was for Kimono). Ian and I were really good mates since Jook and had a fantastic time together in Sparks, although we were being silly and not thinking about the money. We signed the same contract as the other guys would, except it did have this thing in it where royalties didn’t come straight to us they went to the management first and it was their job to distribute it to us. We were told that until we get a really decent amount of money coming in and the band’s stable would it be OK if we had a weekly wage? Of course we said yes sure. Of course the first single and album were just huge and there must have been a lot of money coming in. But anyway because we were having such a good time we trusted everybody. Time just flew past and we never seemed to think hold on when are we going to get some money.
You and Ian got on well with Dinky and Adrian didn’t you?
Oh yes we really did. Dinky was really excellent. He wasn’t just your average rock ‘n’ roll drummer. He was absolutely perfect for Sparks. If you listen to the stuff he did, every single drum track is totally different, the feel of it, how he does it. It fits the song perfectly. He wanted to be in the band but if he’d had chance he would have been in a band like Yes, and he could have done that.
When I met Adrian I thought, ‘Oh my God, this guy’s amazing and he’s gonna think what the hell have they got this bloke in for.’ But he was the total opposite, he welcomed me with open arms, he was like, ‘Another guitar player, yeah!’ He would teach me anything I wanted to know.
He was a fabulous guitar player, just mind-blowing, I believe he was the best I have ever seen. I got to know him really well. I don’t know why he joined Sparks, I think he could see they were going to do something. He just wanted to play rock and blues, tour and be happy.
How did you work out the live guitar parts with Adrian?
A lot of it was doubling up. I played the chords and sometimes doubled up on the riffs. The solos were all Adrian’s part. It was all quite organised anyway, there was no ad-lib stuff going on.
I heard that Adrian could be very ‘lively’ on stage.
He did used to do some strange stuff on stage. He looked quite cool, he would be skipping while he was playing, head back. And also he liked a rather large amount of alcohol – usually he went through the set fine but one time we started a song and we were doing it and thinking this sounds weird what’s going on? He played it all in the wrong key, quite confidently as well. He used to have a bottle of wine before he went on, and then he would take a bottle of wine onstage with him.
Were you all treated as equal band members by Ron and Russell?
It seemed like they did, or you just presumed they did. We sort of got on because we were all pretty amiable guys and we could make them laugh. But it was definitely pretty separate really because me, Ian, Dinky and Adrian all got on so well and we would hang out together. But they wouldn’t hang out with you. While we were rehearsing or touring we would interact, but apart from that it was separate.
What do you remember about recording Propaganda?
It was recorded in several different studios actually. Ronnie would come in with a new song, they were mostly all new songs. I don’t think they actually had any in the bag. I think it’s all me on the rhythm parts. Adrian was there just for lead parts though I may have done something. He left either in the middle of the album or right after it. I can’t remember now. He wasn’t thrown out, he left before he got pushed.
The album opens with Propaganda– that incredible vocal tour-de-force.
Russell is doing all of the voices. I don’t remember them recording it.
At Home, At Work, At Play is staggering coming in next.
I think that is one of the ones with Adrian. He was sort of in and out because he was in the process of leaving the band. So sometimes he just didn’t turn up at the studio.
Reinforcements has an almost jovial feel to it at times.
I think that’s all me on guitar. It goes into a funny sort of rock chord at the end. That’s probably us lot on the backing vocals.
Thanks But No Thanks is one of my favourites.
That’s definitely Adrian on lead, those really nice high singing sort of bits. That’s a really good track.
Don’t Leave Me Alone With Her has that killer chorus.
That’s me doing rhythm, but the lead parts are Adrian.
Never Turn Your Back On Mother Earth is brilliant but I always feel it’s too short because I love it so much.
That’s Adrian’s fabulous solo. I have actually covered it. I always liked it and I met up with a guy called Kevin Cook, who I met through Ian Hampton. He was a big Sparks fan and he had a flat with his own digital studio. We got on really well and that was actually my start of getting things going properly for myself. One day I said I wouldn’t mind doing that, so I learnt it properly and did it and it came out quite well.
Something For The Girl With Everything is a headlong rush.
That was a new song and was rehearsed and recorded in the same place. That happened a few times. I remember putting the guitar down for it, the chuggy-chuggy thing. It’s a really manic song. The solo was Adrian.
Achoo I know has some controversy over the outro.
I was really angry they cut Adrian’s solo. I just couldn’t believe it, it was such a typical Adrian solo, just so clever, and it just fitted the rhythm of the whole thing. It was a jaunty sort of thing, almost like fast Country guitar. It was just perfect. I absolutely loved it, it was quite a long solo on the outro. We came in the next day and it was, ‘Oh we didn’t like it, we wiped it.’ I almost felt like walking out because I couldn’t believe it. It was on a par with one of my favourite solos of his which is Complaints. Replacing that amazing bit of guitar playing with sneezing. . .
Who Don’t Like Kids – I could have done without the kids on it to be honest.
I’m not too keen on that track. That might have been one that had been around for a long time in the background. I wasn’t involved in getting the kids.
Bon Voyage – Adrian Fisher’s last track, is that his solo?
That could be a string synth. Ronnie had a string synth and I ended up with it and it was great.
Next came the Propaganda tour.
I just loved the touring, I was just disappointed that Adrian had left because we were best buddies.
Ron and Russell must have realised that Adrian made a huge input on Kimono My House.
His playing is fabulous but they didn’t really appreciate it somehow, although everybody else did.
They didn’t get in another guitar player to replace him.
All I know was they were looking for another guitar player and I remember John (Hewlett) took Brian May out for dinner and asked him if he wanted to join.
So you had to cover all the guitar parts. How did you get the nod to do it and how did you cover the parts?
It was down to Dinky Diamond because everyone was scratching their heads, ‘Who the hell are we going to get as lead guitar player’, and then Dinky, and Ian I think as well, said, ‘Well, what about Trevor, he can play all the parts, He’s good enough to do it.’ I thought, ‘God, are you sure?’ But they mentioned that to Ron and Russell, we went through a few rehearsals and that was it. That’s fine, good. With Ronnie playing keyboards that took care of the rhythm when I played lead. That worked out OK. I was already playing a lot of the riffs and things as part of playing that with Adrian. This Town Aint Big Enough I knew all the lead lines and so on.
And you got to take the show to America.
One of the first things we did when I was playing on my own without Adrian. We went to Los Angeles and did live TV and it worked out great.
Your second album with the band, Indiscreet, expanded on the Sparks sound.
We should have known really that it was gonna be the last album because they knew I am sure. They didn’t really bother about the band at all. They were just so made up at working with Tony Visconti. It was recorded at his house and it was the brothers and him really getting down into the whole thing. Some of the album was really off the wall, I thought some of the songs were just weird. We weren’t so involved as before, with orchestras and Tony Visconti playing parts. There was a couple of times he (TV) did some guitar stuff but it didn’t go on. He did it to see what they thought, he multitracked himself and it sounded like something Les Paul used to play.
The album opens with one of my favourites – Hospitality On Parade. I love that glitter stomp section in it.
That was quite interesting because it was my idea to go into that bit. It wasn’t there before and I just thought that might be fun. Surprisingly, I mentioned it to Ronnie and said. ‘How about this and I went into the thing and he said, ‘yeah yeah like it. Shocked I was.
Happy Hunting Ground keeps the momentum going.
Happy Hunting Ground sounded like a band. Several of us wanted that to go out as a single and instead they released Looks, Looks, Looks.
Without Using Hands is delightfully quirky and really has that Parisian vibe to it.
It’s a very simple riff and I remember doing that. That’s a pretty freaky song.
I have to confess I still struggle to appreciate Get In The Swing.
Yes that is a funny one as well. I didn’t mind it too much after a while. I got used to it.
(We moved on to side two because Trevor had nothing much to say about Under The Table With Her or How Are You Getting Home?). Side two opens with Pineapple, which I think found its true place as a B-side.
It came out sounding really good. Most of those harmony backing vocals at the beginning are actually us, It’s me, Ian, Dinky and Mary Hopkin and it ended up sounding like the Beach Boys. It was amazing because Tony Visconti wrote the parts out for us and we were all amazed because we started to rehearse it and once we got it right I though, ‘Bloody hell we do sound like the Beach Boys’.
Tits is another one I can take or leave. I find it a bit irritating with the histrionics in the vocals.
It was pretty typical, they liked to put a bit of shock into people.
Another skip and Trevor next commented on In The Future.
It reminds me of Something For The Girl With Everything. It’s so fast. It was unusual to play, we had a funny time with the chords.
I love Looks, Looks, Looks but it must have been a tough one for the band to like . . .?
It does grow on you but it could have been anybody. We didn’t play on it.
The final track is Miss The Start, Miss The End
That was a strange one. We later felt that there might have been a hint to the band in the lyrics, because we had missed the start and the end.
There was a non-album B-side to Get In The Swing called Profile.
Yes I remember doing that. There were one or two that were written for Kimono and didn’t make it, They ended up as B-sides.
You promoted the album on TV and then on tour.
We did Looks, Looks, Looks on TOTP live with an orchestra and Tony Visconti conducted it. I had to learn all the chords for that as I hadn’t played it before. I played on an acoustic and it all seemed to mesh together well. We also did it on Supersonic – the Mike Mansfield show.
You left the band at the end of the American tour in 1975.
I think it was in San Diego. It literally ended right there. We’d played the gig and we were sitting around in the morning after breakfast. John Hewlett came in and said, ‘That’s it lads it’s all over.’ Ron and Russell were already on their way back to Los Angeles. It was a shock.
You three then got back together with Adrian to record at Island.
Island Records were very nice to us and said, ‘Do you want to do any stuff on your own?’ We went in and did a cover and we weren’t sure about it, so I started writing and we recorded about four tracks. They were my songs. After that, I got resigned to Island, so it made it different for me. I played them Crazy Kids and they wanted to record it so they signed me for a one single deal.
You also tried recording with your former manager.
Yes, John Hewlett wanted to be a singer. We went over to Woodstock in America, stayed there for two months and recorded an album. That was me playing bass again, Adrian Fisher playing guitar, Dinky on drums.
Ron and Russell had one more album left for Island on the contract. What we got was an album I think you guys would have loved to play on.
Yes definitely, we could have done Big Beat.
What are your thoughts about them now?
Ronnie’s quite a genius really, to be able to write as many songs with complicated lyrics. I have to hand it to him because the lyrics are so clever. Russell’s like the pretty guy standing out the front singing and that’s about it. It’s Ronnie’s unique talent that makes Sparks what it is.
They’re not my favourite people I’m afraid, not just because they threw us all out of the band although in fact they just left. They walked away without paying us.
Adrian was the only sensible one in the band because his best friend was a reasonably well known manager who managed Clapton and those sort of people. The manager told his friend he was joining and the guy said, ‘Well just bring the contract back to me before you sign it.’ so he changed it so that his royalties went straight to him. I remember him getting his quite large cheques and stuff. He was quite happy to leave, he got a payment for leaving, a few grand for his work on Propaganda.
Some time after leaving the band I had a giant bill from the Inland Revenue. I went to see the accountant and found I also owed Island Records £19,000 from royalties. They had left all the expenses to the guys in the band. I worked out in my head that in 1975, that money would have bought me a large house in Cheam and that house now would be worth over a million. It’s unbelievable isn’t it. A tough deal.
About ten years ago one of my mates who’s a studio engineer he got himself a manager and he mentioned it (lack of royalties) to him and he said, ‘What, they didn’t get any royalties, that’s ridiculous?’ So he went to Island Records and looked at the stuff and there was about nine grand or something left over. So he got it and apparently it was a normal sort of contract except that the royalties went to the management and it was the management’s duty to pay the people. And the reason all the time I was in the band I didn’t say what’s happening with the money was because the manager was John Hewlett and he was my best friend since I was twelve years old. |So I didn’t even question it. Anyway now I receive my royalties although I think there was a hell of a lot went missing.
Did it affect the others as well?
I was very friendly with Dinky. I saw him after the band and I think that did ruin him, the last straw.
Have you seen Sparks since you left?
I agreed to go to a Sparks gig just to see what it was like. I thought I might have seen them afterwards but surprisingly the night we went they weren’t accepting any visitors backstage.
I think they have a good idea of what I feel because I did an interview with Ugly Things magazine in America and they ran about seven or eight pages of my life story. When the guy who interviewed me had finished editing it he called me up and said, ‘Do you want me to write up everything you said?’ He said should I take out anything you said about Sparks and I said no leave it all in. They probably read it. But I just said it as it was. I had just been completely ripped off.