Mike De Albuquerque Interview by Martin Kinch

Martin Kinch: Mike,take us back to the very start of your musical career, how did it start and what was the first thing you did?

Mike De Albuquerque: The first thing I ever did was I tried to get into my school choir Martin. It was singing Benjamin Brittain and we were due to make an appearance at the Royal Albert Hall. There were twenty-two members of the choir, and I wasn't in the choir! I sat and watched rehearsals, learned all the parts, and sure enough, someone went down with flu (laughter), and I put my hand up and said I can sing any part you want, and I went in and that was the very first appearance I ever made, the Worth School Choir at the Royal Albert Hall in, blah, blah, blah, I'm not quite sure when but.....(laughter). The school connection was a friend of a friend called Ed Welch, who got a job working with United Artists and was involved in making demos. His demos required competent musicians, who charged very little, and when he heard of my abilities, and got involved in making demos, and Ed went on to do the celebrated Confessions Of A Window Cleaner film music and things for TV subsequently, but that's how I got my entree oddly enough for ELO through United Artists from the session work I did.

MK: Alright we'll talk about that later. You played in the Hair band at the Shaftesbury Theatre in the early 70's. What memories do you have of that, playing with the likes of Alex Harvey?

MDA: Yes, it seems amazing to think of myself sitting aside Alex Harvey who was known to audiences in the 70's as a wild man, a Scotsman who went absolutely wild on stage, but knowing him from the pit orchestra at the Hair musical, you wouldn't put the two together. He was timid and quiet and helpful with suggestions and making everybody at their ease. You wouldn't put that lunatic together with the quiet member of the Hair band. Absolutely amazing but he just went ballistic on stage, but as a member of a unit he was subdued and quite ordinary. Yeah, and ditto Mike Oldfield and Frank Riccotti who was the number one vibes player who I subsequently made an album with. All those guys were just in the background and reading magazines while people were taking their clothes off,and I'm getting paid for this sort of business you know!

MK: And working with Mike Oldfield as well.

MDA: Yes, I can remember Mike Oldfield starting to work on Tubular Bells and another guitar player in the Hair band coming into a room where we were all sitting, and we said where have you been Micky? He said I've been helping out on Mike's sessions, and although it wasn't called Tubular Bells, he said all I can say is he is either a genius or a madman, one or the other, and that memory abides with me when you think of the phenomenal success that was to follow.

MK: You joined ELO in 1972 when Roy Wood left, how did you get the job?

MDA: Yes, the answer to this is that I gather that when Roy had decided he was going to leave is that the Ardens had made approaches to United Artistes and did they know of any guys who could sing and play the bass in the session world who might be suitable to take Roy's place, and Ed Welch, the guy I mentioned earlier was the guy who was asked and Ed said yes I know two guys, one is Alan Gorrie who did Pick Up The Pieces and all those things, and the other was me, and I think David Arden phoned me up many, many times, I mean many times, and each time I said I wasn't interested and eventually, he insisted that I came down and met the guys, so I went not expecting to like it.

MK: Where did you rehearse in the start can you remember?

MDA: Moseley, at the Moseley Rugby Club, great place that was yeah, we had a good game of football, not much music! (laughter).

MK: The early days of ELO must hold many fond memories for you, and it must have made you proud to be associated with a band that went from playing to less than 20, to playing the massive arenas in the USA, where you played to many thousands?

MDA: Oh yeah,yes well that is fact, that's a fantastic experience to remember playing to a room full of people, in the same way that at school when you get along and there would be 25 or 30 people not even listening. I think you mentioned that time where there were 17 people, I think it was at St. Albans. That was the point when Jeff got really pissed off, because he thought it was just a waste of time. Things weren't being promoted right. The English people only liked bands like Traffic who would come on in scruffy clothes and play long solos, he thought it wasn't right. Yeah, it was a phenomenal experience going from playing to 17 people to going out to the States, and in a very quick time.

MK: Was it suprising the speed in which it happened?

MDA: Well it was a fascinating period. We go from nowhere to a plane ride out to to States, to a hotel and our names are up in lights on Sunset Strip, this is all in a space of a couple of months, and then to playing to 5,000 people, and within six months we were playing to 70,000 people and so on. But I must say something that I have mentioned before, and I do feel very emphatically about is that Don Arden, ELO's manager is the reason that ELO were the size they were,because Don went to United Artists after receiving Jeff's impassioned call after that 17 person audience, that I don't want to play in England anymore, I want to play in the States. Don put his business hat on and made it all possible by going to the head of United Artists and kicking up such a row, and Don was a very impressive character, let's put it like that mildly, he was impressive, he went in there and demanded the treatment that ELO got that started us off, and made sure money was in place for our travel, for publicity, everything to smooth that way when you are trying to get your message across quickly, and you are trying to cover a big territory, Don made it all possible. There were other people I said all along who were better musicians than us and might well have been better bands but who didn't get Don Arden as a manager, and so I think credit to Don,there might have been arguments about accounting, that's another issue. He made ELO's success because he's a business man, he took something he thought was good and said yeah we can do something with this.

MK: Did you get recognised in the street?

MDA: Yeah, that got quite funny too. Again from our seventeen people in St. Albans I think it was in Philadelphia, which was one of the places that the tour took us to quite early on, and I can remember being approached on the street there by people saying I know who you are, which was very nice, but it would be very frightening over here because you would think it was Barclaycard (laughter) but over there it was very exciting.

ELO performing Roll Over Beethovenin the USA 1973

MK: You were with ELO for about three years, Why did you leave the band at that point when the band were starting to take off in such a huge way? Did you get fed up with the touring?

MDA: Principally I'd been married for a couple of years and we'd decided to start a family. I think it would be understandable to anybody who looks at the history of 70's and 80's rock and roll that being on the road is full of hazards for married men, (laughter) and I didn't think that there was any chance of keeping my marriage together and continuing to be on the road, and indeed sadly, I think two or three of the guys in ELO had their marriages split up at the time I left, so that was part of it. I can remember taking an airplane ride up to Santa Barbara which was very memorable to me. Because the weather was so bad they cancelled all the scheduled airplanes. We were determined not to let the fans down, so an eight-seater plane was hired. We jumped in the plane, we'd hardly been going a few miles when the plane kept hitting these air pockets and going up and down. Mike Edwards the cello player started to feel sick, and so did Bev. I can't remember who was sick first, but it started and more or less coincided with the next announcement from the pilot which said he had lost radio contact, at that point various people started crying, basically this got me thinking, I wonder if this is a good idea you know when you're having a family, to be doing this sort of thing. Basically it scared the shit out of us and Jeff and I came back in the back of the roadies van rarther than go back on a plane, that was very memorable to me, I remember thinking like you know my time is getting a little bit close to the margin here, we shouldn't carry on chancing it, so there was that. There was another incident that inspired me as well, my second album came out just before the third tour I did with ELO in the States and it happened without any notice. I can't remember why it happened but when I had been making an album and I put it together, and was getting ready to promote it, to suddenly get a message through from the Ardens to say we are leaving in ten days time for the States was running across my plans, and for those reasons I wanted to leave, and I told the guys, and we left on good terms - I maintain (laughter).

MK: Did you have any regrets at all?

MDA: Yes of course. Yes, I mean travelling round the world with ELO was a fantastic experience, it was fantastic to go round the States in particular. I grew to love many parts of the States, and always took the opportunity to get up early when we were travelling anywhere rather than lie in, in a sort of drunken haze, and I would sooner keep a clear head and get up early in the morning and walk round the place and talk with the workers, I really made a great effort to see the places. To me it was like one long fantastic paid holiday.

MK: So what did you do after you left ELO?

MDA: The first thing I did was start work on the next album Stalking The Sleeper. And I went literally to Soho and pressed the bell of Warner Brothers and asked to see Derek Taylor, who is the old PR guy with The Beatles, and it seems amazing now to think that I didn't have a manager, or that you can get past A & R people, but I pressed the bell and they said who is it? I said who it was, and I said I wanted to see Derek Taylor because I'd got plans to make an album, and to my disbelief, and it seems more unbelievable in the present day, he saw me, right there and then. We talked about things and he said you know we are not talking about a huge deal with lots of money, I said I know, I want to put a record together, he said no problem, and that was miraculous, anyway I put that album together, and that was great fun to do, and I continued to do the commercials which I'd always done in the past. Those sorts of things where you'd go into the studio and sing Kentucky Fried Chicken three times, and those days get paid Ł25, and then subsequently a number of thousands as the royalities came in, so that combined with being able to be at home was agreeable.

MK: Did you follow ELO's progress after you left?

MDA: No I didn't. Not in any way, it's simply that my musical tastes were more the sort of jazzy, Marvin Gaye type things which would be the things I'd listen to. I remember ELO doing the Wembley show and everybody being astonished at the spaceship,

MK: Ok, put an end to a rumour for us now, you played on stage the night Marc Bolan played with ELO, is that right?

MDA: Yes, and it was great fun too. Again bit like the Alex Harvey thing. Marc I gather was a big fan of the ELO and what we were doing and he used to come into, I think it was Air studios, and listen and he must have threatened to come and join us one night and indeed he did. The transformation from this quiet little pixie to the guy who can get up on stage and dance. There are people like Whitney Houston for instance who can't dance, Marvin Gaye, can't dance, Jeff probably can't you know, but you put Marc Bolan on stage and the guy is a natural performer, he just made us all look like guys who shouldn't be on stage, absolute magic, jumping and leaping around and everything fantastic and he was great to have on stage as opposed to I think, Del Shannon came on one night and again his rather wooden persona like us lot who would just stand in front of a microphone, and be very good, but Marc was a performer, wow! I remember that.

MK: Eldorado was surely a major turning point in respect of the sound of ELO, the fact that Lou Clark was at De Lane Lea studios in London whilst ELO were recording Eldorado was a nice coincidence, Do you think Jeff knew what direction he wanted to take ELO in respect of the orchestration and the sound of the band?

MDA: I think that Jeff was struggling, almost from the 10538 Overture, I think he was struggling to find a direction, I actually felt that when I was in the band that the music hadn't found direction, I thought it was..... disappointing you know, as somebody who had come in and having heard 10538 Overture which was going into the charts when I joined. I mean, the second time I met the guys after a rehearsal at Mossely rugby club, and went down to Top Of The Pops to hear them do 10538 Overture, and I think I got up and played it with them or something, but that sounded great didn't it, and Boogie 1 and Boogie 2 sounded great, those were fabulous tracks, and then I'm afraid all the time I was in the band, I didn't think the material was up to it, and I thought the Eldorado thing, was again Jeff trying like mad to find a direction, there was a lot of pressure on him don't forget, you'd got all those mouths to feed, all those management people looking at you, and secretaries, and so forth you know. And you know you've got this desire to do things, without maybe the correct inspiration getting in place. I felt that again it was him pushing for a direction that still maybe wasn't there, I don't think it was until later really, that in my opinion ELO really hit their stride, and found the right substance.When things like Mr. Blue Sky came out,the audience were thrilled, where as I preferred the rough raw four piece you know, Boogie 1, Boogie 2, 10538, which was four or five cellos, that to me was the rock 'n' roll, and this was a crowd pleaser, and not so pleasing for stuffy people like me (laughter).

MK: So what do you think was your favourite track that you recorded with ELO?

MDA: Without question Showdown. I thought that Showdown was the only exception to the pieces that I had been saying, that had been a little disappointing from Jeff in my period. I thought Showdown was a masterpeice, so I'm glad to have been at least on one, that I think stands out with the rest, actually I still think it's maybe one of the best two or three that ELO have ever done, despite the fact that it's that early. And the band I've got at the moment, which is a bunch of crack, and not crap, crack (laughter), and for instance, they also rate Showdown so it's the sort of track that really stands up on it's own in my opinion, it didn't fit into concepts, it was a good stand out bluesy piece, with orchestration I think, put in a nice place, that bit (Mike sings:- der, der, der, der, der, der, derrrr) the instrumental break there is a beautiful bit of orchestration that really fits within the rock format.

ELO performing Showdown live on German TV in 1974

MK: Have you got a favourite ELO track that you weren't on?

MDA: There was one I liked, Letter From Spain, I thought that sounded nice. I also quite liked Last Train To London.

MK: I know we have both spoken before about both liking 10538 Overture as well.

MDA: Well 10538 is a classic isn't it, but so are Boogie 1 and Boogie 2.

MK: This year saw the release of The Night The Light Went On In Long Beach on CD for the first time,Do you remember much about the actual concert on the night?

MDA: Yeah, it's one of those things that everyone goes on a little nervous, so I felt that the tempos were all just a little faster, and it was a question of who could finish the song first you know (laughter).

MK: Tell us about your albums Stalking The Sleeper and We May Be Cattle But We've All Got Nmaes, a great title for an album if ever there was one. They were certainly a million miles away from the ELO sound with a jazzy more funkier feeling to them. How do you rate these albums now? Do you think they stand the test of time? Do you still listen to them?

MDA: I do still listen to them. People that I know, musicians and friends like We May Be Cattle, incidentally thanks for saying you thought it was a good title, my mum came up with that title. And how she came up with that guys, is she was sitting in the queue of a local surgery, and she remembers one of the nurses coming out and issuing people with a ticket, so that whoever had this particular letter or number came next, and they must have called out a number or a letter to my mother, who can be quite stuffy, and she said really!! We may be cattle but we've all got names. Which I thought was marvellous, so I took that name, but yes, that album is one I'm particulary fond of because it has a track that was recorded by Tim Hardin called My Darling Girl, a piece that I was very happy with. And the other player that played on all the tracks, is a legend to many people in the 70's rock scene, a guy called Ollie Halsall who is the most brilliant guitarist, the most fun guy, who very sadly died of a drug overdose four or five years ago. His playing stands the test of time and even got a mention in a magazine called Guitarist. And I was just falling off to sleep one night reading some letters at the back and it said, readers of the Guitarist, all this business about Joe Satriani and Steve Vai, and all this business is such a load of old waffle, because we had a guitar player in England called Ollie Halsall, has anybody ever heard of him? If not put on a track of Michael De Alburquerque's called Say What You Want, and listen to that solo, and that was the really nice little mention for Ollie who I felt never got the recognition of the wider audience, but he was certainly known among the musicians, and I was certainly happy with that album.

MK: Is there any chance of those albums ever being released on Cd?

MDA: I think they probably will be yes, because at a certain point even those that are really of marginal interest do tend to come out and I would like to see them come out and other people have asked me so we might see if we can get something moving on that or maybe even do a limited edition of them, I might do some because I have had requests - yeah we'll do it,Watch this space !

MK: How did you get involved with Frank Ricotti and Ed Welch?

MDA: Ed Welch was,as I said, a friend of a school friend, and he was the guy who got me in the session world, and also introduced me to Pierre Tubbs who was the guy who wrote Get Right Back Where We Started From, that was the first number one I was on guys (laughter) (beating ELO to it!!) and Frank Ricotti was in the Hair band, and Frank was in his early twenties, a great jazz vibes player, the number one vibes player and a saxophonist, and his parents had THE cafe where everybody has double egg, bacon and chips up the Pentonville Road in London, and they were, I think they were Italian immigrants, so they were first generation in from Italy. It was a fantastic cafe, and right above the cafe Frank would play, I would think in the early years to the utter despair of all the clients, but subsequently I think he used to draw the crowds and people used to take longer eating their eggs and bacon. But Frank was absolutely brilliant and it was a great honour to play with him and I still see him occasionally, He's a brilliant, brilliant musician.

MK: Tell us about the Twentieth Century Steel Band and Yellowbird Is Dead, just a bit of a coincidence to Bluebird Is Dead isn't it?

MDA: This is one of Pierre Tubbs of Get Right Back To Where We Started From fame. It was one of the things that we did, I think, in his home studio in Wandsworth, a studio that I saw right back from the very beginning. Do you know that thrilling moment that you are excavating a cellar without planning permission, and bags of earth are going out of the front door, and it coincides with a visit from the local building inspector asking, just precisely, what do you think you are doing (laughter). In that studio we did the Twentieth Century Steel Band.

MK: So what about the track Bluebird Is Dead ? Was it a bit of a tongue in cheek thing?

MDA: I think it may very well might have been a little aside to it guys, just to amuse you (laughter).

MK: What do you remember about the Del Shannon sessions?

MDA: I remember them very well, Jeff idolised Del Shannon, I think probably because of the purity of his voice, and he had a lovely range and of course Jeff would have been eight years old or something at school.

MK: Apparently Del was the first person Jeff went to see in concert.

MDA: And you know, he was the sort of guy that you would have a little transistor, and you'd be listening in to Radio Luxembourg and you'd get Runaway, they were brilliant songs, and beautifully played, so when he met Del, I think it was a case of meeting a boyhood hero and he leapt at the chance to collaborate with him and do something in the studio. And I was asked to come up, which I did, I'm sure I can say this because Del has passed off to the happy hunting ground now hasn't he, and I'm sure he will rest in peace if I mention the payment for my time in those days. I think a session fee for three hours would have been, I guess, something like about Ł30, whereas now it might be what Ł160 or Ł170 for three hours, that sort of thing. I didn't go up to do it for the money, it was an honour and a pleasure to play for Del and I was happy to do that sort of thing, and so we went up and contributed to the sessions, and joined in, and had a good social time and so on, and at the end of the session, I packed up my equipment and Del came running over to me and he said,Mike, thank you very much indeed really kind, I said it's a pleasure, and he said, I must pay you something, and I said no it's not necessary, It's an honour and I'm glad to have been of assistance, and he said no, I insist upon it, he said a guy like you doesn't have to do this for nothing,It was his expression, which actually is wrong, because you should have the good grace, and accept a friendly contributon like that, but no Del passed a clenched hand towards my hand and folded some money into it, and then clasped my hand over this money. Now they didn't make Ł100 notes in those days, but I thought I would contain myself till I was out of sight before I inspected what he had put into my hand (laughter), guys I went out of the studio and opened my hand, and in there was a Ł5 note, (raucous laughter), which I think maybe is the difference between English and Americans, but this sent out the wrong message, but I understood (more raucous laughter), in other words your playing is crap that's all your worth (even more laughter).

MK: Tell us about Sundance, what was your involvement with that band?

MDA: I'd known Mike Hurst for many years and he was somebody who had invited me to play on sessions for various of his bands, not all of whom immediately spring to mind, but he nonetheless was a very good singer and a good ideas man, and he said, Mike, how about getting together with Mary Hopkin, you, me and Mary Hopkin and doing a three part harmony thing, I again, I think, because I like Mike, and I like Mary, I thought socially it would be fun, and it was, and we got together and did lots of TV, and we did a couple of tours. We did some recordings and they went very well, and I think the reason it broke up was because Mary became unwell again, and placed us in the position of really needing to replace her, but we didn't want to replace her, she was one of the reasons we got the band together so this was unfortunate. But I heard from Mary the other day, and she is well and living the other side of Henley and recording. And her son, by Tony Visconti, who was the early producer of T-Rex and early Move, is out in America working with his father, and it was nice to hear from Mary, she is well.

Sundance, featuring Mike De Albuquerque, Mary Hopkin and Mike Hurst
performing Cottonfields on UK TV

MK: And Mike Hurst produced The Move's "Curly"

MDA: He did,which is amazing because that's ONE of the great tracks isn't it?

MK: You also played with Maxine Nightingale on Get Right Back To Where We Started From, a great Motown feel to it, and it was a number one, I bet you were proud of that? How did you get to play with her?

MDA: We were doing a demo session in a little studio in Denmark Street, and it was one of those demo sessions where everybody goes and sits down with music in front of you, and you try and get through as many tunes as possible. Pierre Tubbs was paying for the session, and he was still at that point an employee of United Artists working for their Art Department, so he'd have been a guy on a salary, and faced with six or seven musicians in a studio. And studios always cost far too much, and I think he would have been quite tense, and I remember him coming in and saying, listen guys, I want to record in entirety, four pieces in this three hour session. That's quite possible, you just get on with it, and we recorded two pieces with Maxine and two with somebody else, and it wasn't till we started on Get Right Back that, and let me stress, it was a demo session that this multi million selling thing came out of, it wasn't, let's go and remake it, it wasn't, it was the original demo session. He came down from the control box, he said, Mike, for this one I don't want you to use your Fender bass. I have got this old bass that you can hardly tune up, and I want it because of the sound, and that was the thing that we played, that was the thing that we felt sure would have to be redone, but no, sometimes you get the magic of doing things in a hurry, and that was one case in point. So if you like, that multi million selling recording, I would think, cost him less than a Ł100 if you put the other tracks into the pudding, and do the arithmetic, which is quite stunning isn't it.

Mike (and Wilf Gibson) played on this hit by Maxine Nightingale

MK: You were involved with Violinski which sounded like a real fun project, did you have a good time with the band?

MDA: Yes, I had a great time with the band. Mik Kaminski and I got on very well, and had roomed together in ELO at a time when I had come out of shock with sharing a room with Wilf Gibson who had certain rooming habits which I found difficult to get on with, and maybe vice versa, but nonetheless, I was determined thereafter when Wilf left to only to be roomed on my own. And when Mik Kaminski joined the band, he has got this sort of funny look about him, he can see the funny side of something, and when he first met me he wasn't sure whether or not to poke fun at me, being what he considered to be stand offish in being in a room on my own, so rather than insist on me being sociable and sharing rooms, every oppertunity he and Rick Pannell the sound guy, would burst into my room and make me entertain them, so in due course I ended up rooming with Mik because I got on very well with him, and agreed with him, about activites in the rooms, like nobody touching each others towels and things like that (laughter). For instance, if anybody came into our room, anybody, somebody from the record division, Don Arden, anybody at all, Mik would say quick the towels, hide the towels just in case someone went to the loo and touched one of his towels! No, we had a lot of fun, and Mik invited me to come down to try it with the band, which I did and I liked them very much indeed, and I loved the material, and they were great musicians in the band, and it was definitely something I wanted to get involved with, I loved it.

MK: Violinski recorded two great albums , No Cause For Alarm and Stop Cloning About, did you play on both of those ?

MDA: I played on the second one, No Cause For Alarm was Baz Dunnery who was Francis Dunnery's brother.

MK: Do you remember how the band actually came together?

MDA: Violinski I think was pretty much John Marcangelo and Mik Kaminski coming together, and John Marcangelo coming up with that wonderful instrumental, Clog Dance. I think it literally started with that piece.

MK: Mik sometimes played that live on stage with ELO Part 2.

MDA: Really! Gosh! And John plays it on his cruises round the Carribean. But let me tell you, it's quite hard to conceive he plays it at double the speed. To any readers, let me tell you that to play the melody on the piano, you have to use four fingers of your right hand, because it's a four part harmony and the intervals between your fingers have to change according to what part of the melody you are on, and if you can imagine der, der, der, der at great speed, and having to change to four fingers, minutely it's impossible, but John does it!! (Laughter). It's breathtaking.

MK: Why do you think Violinski came to an end? We hear rumours it was something about distribution problems at Jet Records, do you know anything about that?

MDA: It came to an end because we weren't getting paid! Rather than receive what bands used to get in those days advances, and off those you could live, pay your board and lodging, pay your mortgage or whatever it was. We used to get paid weekly by the record company, and the record company Jet got into trouble, now why, I don't know, but they did get into trouble and had to cease paying everybody, and no money, no band. There wasn't a way we could carry on, we tried to get other finances but it wasn't the time when we could do it.

MK: Do you keep in contact with any ELO members at all?

MDA: No I don't, but I keep in touch with John Marc of Violinski and I see him a lot, and you must meet him. He's very funny and very entertaining and very knowledgeable, so sometime we must look out for this.

MK: Tell us about the Rubber Band.

MDA: The Rubber Band came about through somebody's birthday party, and I was sitting quietly in the corner, when somebody was playing guitar, and said come on Mike, you play the guitar, and I said no I don't play the guitar at parties, and they said it would be something that would be much appreciated by our host if you did play, so I played a couple of tunes, and the guy who handed me the guitar had got a band called Gerry, no Dickey Heart and the Pacemakers, do you get the joke? This Dickey Heart and the Pacemakers was one of these bands that plays big charity balls, big birthday parties, all private functions you know, they are things that you wouldn't play every night because they usually require a fairly hefty fee. But I got involved with Dickey Heart and the Pacemakers, we split off, and myself and a guy called Tim Paine and we formed a Rubber Band, and the Rubber Band has been going now for about twelve years, and we play maybe once a month and we have just come back from Spain where we were playing for the Polo crowd, and we were playing on the beach, and that was a really great function, and it's those sort of big bashes that we do, they have as much equipment as ELO, which is the reason it costs a lot of money to put on and it's the reason we don't play every night!

MK: So, we are approaching the millennium now, what do you hope to be doing in the next few years?

MDA: In the next few years, well John Marc and I, have discussed putting something together, and so I will keep you informed about that, but John Marc has always been somebody I have particularly enjoyed playing with, as he's a great composer, and he's great fun to be with, I really hope something will come of that and that we can put some nice material together for that,and I'll be travelling with you world-wide carrying your bags to the German ELO convention !(Laughter)

Transcribed by:- Alan Heath and originally published in his King Of The Universe Fanzine in two parts in 1998 and 1999.

Mike and myself have decided to update the interview sometime soon........

This interview is © Martin Kinch and may not be reproduced in whole or part without permission
April 2004 - Mike and his ex Violinski partner John Marcangelo have been back in the studio again to record some tracks for a new album.
It will be recorded at ”Maison Publique” a studio owned by one of Mike's sons ( Mike Jnr ) and at least one of the tracks will feature the violin of the one and only Wilf Gibson.
John and Mike have also been in touch with Mik Kaminski, who has agreed to come and make a contribution to the project.

Latest - November 2007
Mike now has his own My Space page

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