So at this point I have finished the Kate Bush Tour and bought my first house. Lots of pressure now as I have a mortgage.
Well, summer comes along and I have run out of money, having spent it all on an extension to the house.
I use my last £100 on a 'Freddy Laker' flight to NYC......
When I got the job with Sniff 'n' the Tears, after briefly going back to London to meet them I returned to NYC to set up the tour. I got to meet Starflight Travel and work with Gary and Brooks for the first time. I also got to stay again with Penny and Danny in Montclair. We needed a driver for our backline so I asked Danny if he'd like to do it. He said yes so I had my best pal in the States on board for the whole tour........... brilliant RIP xxx
I had this idea set in my head that I can get the job as the tour manager for Foreigner.... so I ask Peter Lubin to introduce me to Bud Prager, the band's manager, as Brockum is their merchandising company.
I stayed at the Chatellier household in Montclair with Penny and Danny and hope that the meeting will go well.....
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I got a job, not the one I went into the meeting hoping for but it's a great job. Sniff 'n' the Tears are in the Top 20 Billboard charts with a huge radio hit, Driver's Seat.
3 months work and so I flew back to meet the band and their UK manager 'Uncle" Jed Doherty. And here he is below circa 1980....
To the right here is the guy I met on the first day of this tour. He was the tour manager for Kenny Loggins, he'd started God's knows when as an LD for Steely Dan and Fleetwood Mac. He handled himself so smoothly, I loved him from day one. I've known him as a friend now for 35 years. He is the one and only Mr Jerry Levine, pictured here a few years ago now on the porch of his apartment in LA. xx
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'Driver's Seat' is a 1978 song that appears on their debut album, 'Fickle Heart'. The genesis of the song dates back to 1973 and a demo tape recorded for a French record label by singer/guitarist Paul Roberts for the band 'Ashes of Moon'. However, that band broke up and, at the suggestion of drummer Luigi Salvoni, Roberts reformed it as Sniff 'n' the Tears with guitarists Laurence "Loz" Netto and Mick Dyche and bassist Nick South.
They shopped the demo tape and signed with the small Chiswick label in 1977. One of the key decisions made during the recording of 'Driver's Seat' was to start the song with Roberts' acoustic guitar and drums and gradually fade in other instruments.
According to Paul Roberts, "Driver's Seat' isn't about driving, but rather "fragmented, conflicting thoughts and emotions that might follow the break-up of a relationship".
'Driver's Seat' reached #15 on the American Billboard Pop Singles chart in the fall of 1979.
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The last show of the tour with Kenny Loggins was very funny. I don't know who came up with the plan, but the whole band dressed up as Winnie the Poo and the fairies, so they all wore tutus and during Kenny's performance they all danced on to the stage to his utter disbelief, and then turned their backs to the audience and each guy had a letter on their backs, it read ..............T H A N K S.. K L
The night before I eventally left the band to fly home, unbeknownst to me, they bugged my room and then proceeded to try get a hooker to come back to the hotel. There was a problem though. The way they kerbcrawled the hooker went badly wrong. They ended up propositioning an undercover female cop, and just about got away with it...... that'll teach them eh!!!
Off we went on tour, firstly supporting Kenny Loggins for 25 dates, except we had a problem from the start....the truck with all our gear had disappeared from outside a motel........
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Much later on in Paul's career he dug out this photo for the front cover of the album 'Underground'. The photo is one he took of me in the driver's seat on this very tour. How about that !!!!
The band had a backline guy called Nigel, and for thee whole tour as far as I can remember Nigel wore shorts. The other thing Nigel is remembered for is the hairdo and looking like the spitting image of Rod Stewart. Girls used to come up to him in the street, or in the airport for his autograph. What do you think see below.....
This t-shirt has a story too. It was given to me on this tour by the bass player in Kenny Loggins band, George Hawkins. I was having a conversation with him about collecting shirts and he took me to his room and gave me this one straight out of his suitcase. It was the shirt that crew working for Westwood Music store in LA would wear to deliver gear to shows. It is an eight or nine colour print, really rare, and has a backstage pass printed on the back of it, see below. It would get them into any show. It's pretty worn out now but I love it to death, thank you George xx
