Dave Walker

Born David Walker on January 25th in the mid 1940’s in the Birmingham, England area of the United Kingdom, singer Dave Walker started his recording/performing career in the early 60’s when the Brumbeat R & B band he was fronting called The Redcaps (which also included Roy Brown & Mick Blythe on guitars and Alan Morley on drums (who went on to an early version of Chicken Shack) and most reports suggest that the band also included Mike Walter on bass and Max Broadhurst on sax.) traveled down to London to record three singles for Decca Records (who were trying to cash in on the success of The Beatles who The Redcaps had actually opened for in concert on four separate occasions). The singles were a cover of the pulsating Isley Brothers nugget “Shout” backed with an original tune written by Walker with Roy Brown called “Little things you do” (1963, catalog number: F.11716) followed by their cover of Chuck Berry’s “Talking about you” b/w “Come on girl” (1964, catalog number: F.11789) and then an original tune penned by Blythe called “Funny things” b/w “Mighty fine girl” (1964, catalog number: F.11903). However, pop sensation Lulu had beaten The Redcaps to the British charts with her version of “Shout” and as a result, The Redcaps disbanded after the above mentioned remaining two singles had not succeeded. Between 1965 and 1969 Dave was involved with a band called Beckett which also included Pete Oliver, Don Mcginty & Colin Timmons, but they never recorded. In the beginning of 1970, another Brummie named Jeff Lynne (who later went on to fame and fortune in his new brainchild band entitled Electric Light Orchestra (ELO)) had left his original brainchild band at the time called Idle Race which had built up a substantial local cult following in the Birmingham area and the rest of Idle Race wanted to carry on after the exit of Lynne. Although the other members of Idle Race could not find a songwriter/vocalist/guitarist in the league of Lynne, Walker had replaced Lynne on lead vocals and Lynne was replaced on guitar by Mike Hopkins. The rest of the line up was Roger Spencer on drums, Dave Pritchard on rhythm guitar and Greg Masters on bass. This new lineup of Idle Race recorded 2 singles for Liberty Records, a cover of Mungo Jerry’s skiffle hit “In the summertime” (The Idle Race version actually made it to number one in Argentina!) backed with an Idle Race original called “Told you twice” (1970, catalog number: LIB 9080) and a cover of 10CC’s “Neanderthal man” backed with another Idle Race original number called “Victim of circumstance” (1970, catalog number: LBF 15391) and an album for Regal Zonophone called “Time is” (1970, catalog number: SLRZ 1017). Although incorrectly credited on this album as “Richie Walker” in the liner notes, this remains the best and closest place to date to hear Dave Walker at doing what he does/likes to do musically more than any other recording he’s made (Dave wrote two tracks (“I will see you” & “And the rain”) and co-wrote two others (“Alcatraz” & “We want it all”) from the “Time is” album). Unfortunately, the album was not a commercial success and by the beginning of 1971, Idle Race had folded. At this time, guitarist Kim Simmonds, leader of blues rock boogie band Savoy Brown had just lost the rest of his band at the time (guitarist Dave Peverett, drummer Roger Earle and bassist Tone Stevens as they had gone off to form Foghat with ex-Black Cat Bones vocalist Rod Price) but as luck would have it for Kim, the late Dave Bidwell (drums) and Andy Silvester (bass) had just left guitarist Stan “The man” Webb and his band Chicken Shack and with the recruitment of Dave Walker on vocals, thus was born the most commercially successful lineup of Savoy Brown to date. They had recorded the “Street corner talking” (1971, Parrot/Deram Records) album which had included one of Savoy Brown’s biggest hits in “Tell mama” and they had headlined a tour over Rod Stewart and The Grease Band in early ‘71 as persistent touring was beginning to pay off for the Savoys. The next album “Hellbound train” (again on Parrot/Deram) was their biggest selling album to date, reaching the top 40 in the US while the title cut became a concert favorite. Ex-Bloodwyn Pig/Juicy Lucy bass man Andy Pyle had replaced Silvester in the bass stool for the next album “Lion’s share” (on which Walker had written “Denim demon” and Parrot/Deram had released this album in the Autumn of 1972) and Savoy Brown had been previewing “Lion’s Share” tracks to the summer crowds on their extensive tours in 1972 but before the 1972 fall tour had started, in September 1972, Dave Walker had quit Savoy Brown to join Fleetwood Mac as he was under the impression from Fleetwood Mac management at the time that the Mac wanted to become a more hard rocking band then they were but this was not the case. They struggled through the making of the “Penguin” album (1973, Reprise Records) with Dave really only appearing on two tracks, his self penned “The derelict” (which was still apparently unfinished on release according to some reports) and a cover of Junior Walker & The All Stars’ Motown classic “(I’m a) Roadrunner”. The subsequent tour seemed to go well though and “Penguin” was the highest charting Fleetwood Mac album in the US at the time clawing it’s way in to the top 50 but during the recording of their next album “Mystery to me”, it was mutually agreed upon that Dave Walker “did not fit in” with Fleetwood Mac and by June of 1973 he “left”. If anything was recorded by Walker for “Mystery to me”, it was not used and remains unreleased therefore there is no Walker involvement on the resulting “Mystery to me” Fleetwood Mac album. In 1974 Dave got together again with drummer Dave Bidwell & bassist Andy Silvester with ex-Fleetwood Mac guitarist Danny Kirwan (who had been fired from Fleetwood Mac himself in 1972 and Dave Walker had “replaced” Kirwan on vocals while Bob Weston had replaced Kirwan on guitar (for the above mentioned “Penguin” album), much like the Jeff Lynne replacement Idle Race situation) and they formed a unit they called Hungry Fighter. However, they had only managed to play one live gig which took place at the University of Surrey in Guildford, England (which was not recorded) before fizzling out. Dave then moved to San Francisco and had joined Raven (a band which in it’s short life had a revolving door of personnel but was fronted throughout it’s time by the late ex-Quicksilver Messenger Service guitarist John Cipollina) but most accounts suggest that Dave had never recorded with Raven due to legal difficulties the band was having but it is known that he did do some live shows with Raven (it was apparently due to these legal problems that they could not finish a record deal they were working on and the album Raven had recorded (without Walker) in 1976 was put on the shelf but did eventually get released after the band split in 1980 titled “John Cipollina’s Raven”). Walker then with some ex-Raven members joined forces with a new “revolving door” crew who called themselves Mistress. However, they encountered legal difficulties as well (and the selftitled record that was recorded by Mistress (again without Walker) in 1977 was shelved but then released in 1979 by RSO Records, nearly two years after Mistress broke up) though Walker did demo a song he had co-written for the project called “High on the ride” which did end up on the album though it is debatable as to whether the rest of Mistress used any Walker backing vocal takes from the demo sessions on the finished product or not as if they were used (once again, presumably for the legal reasons), it was an uncredited performance (if they exist on the album at all), the album did conjure up a minor hit though with the ballad “Mistaken love” scraping into the US top 50 singles chart. It was at this point that Birmingham native Tony Iommi had remembered Walker from the old Birmingham days and contacted Walker in San Francisco to ask him to come out to join Black Sabbath (as Ozzy Osbourne had just left the band). On the flight from San Francisco to London in November 1977 and for the next three weeks, Walker had written lyrics to music the rest of Black Sabbath (Iommi on guitar, Terry “Geezer” Butler on bass and drummer Bill Ward) had put together for their next album (though no Walker vocals had been recorded) and they along with Walker had then appeared on the BBC Midlands TV program called “Look hear” performing what turned out to be an early draft of a song which ended up being called “Junior’s eyes” on January 6, 1978. However, shortly after this appearance, Osbourne had rejoined the band so Dave Walker was “out”. None of the lyrics Walker had written for the resulting “Never say die” album were used as Osbourne preferred to write his own lyrics for the material though one track on the resulting album called “Swinging the chain” was sung by Ward instead of Osbourne and another tune called “Breakout” turned out being an instrumental track which was not originally planned to be one. After his exit from Black Sabbath in January 1978, Dave Walker had more or less left the music business eventually settling in Gallup, New Mexico from 1987-1998. However, in 1986, Kim Simmonds had persuaded Dave to rejoin his revamped Savoy Brown lineup which also included Al Macomber on drums and Jim Dagnesi on bass. In 1987 they recorded the “Make me sweat” album released in early 1988 on GNP Crescendo Records followed in April 1989 by the “Kings of boogie” album (also released on GNP Crescendo). Macomber was replaced by Pete Mendillo on drums, Lou Kaplan had replaced Dagnesi on bass and Rick Jewett had augmented the lineup on keyboards for the tour that promoted “Kings of boogie” and in November 1990 a live album from this tour was released (again by GNP Crescendo) called “Live and kickin’”. In 1985 on vinyl (and then in 1989 on CD), a live recording surfaced (legally) of a Savoy Brown show from New York in the summer of 1972 which included Walker called “Live in Central park” (on Relix Records) and in the summer of 2000 a (legal) CD was released in the UK by Mooncrest Records called “Jack the toad live ‘70/’72” which were from Kim Simmonds’ personal collection of live Savoy Brown recordings. Oddly enough, they were all from the same venue (The Colosseum in Edmonton, Alberta, Canada) but different dates, one track was from a show in November 1970 BEFORE Dave Walker was in SB, seven tracks were from an October 1972 show which took place AFTER Walker had left SB (in favor of Fleetwood Mac) but it included two tracks from a March 1972 show when Walker WAS in SB so these recordings would be of interest to those who wish to investigate Walker’s works as well. However, by September 1991, Dave Walker had enough of grueling Savoy Brown tours without much money to show for it at the end of the day so he left the Savoys, and the music business, for the most part, again. He had a band called The Pleasure Chorizos in his later New Mexico days but nothing came from it. However, by the late 90’s Dave had relocated to Bozeman, Montana. It was there that he met up with an old friend from his San Francisco days called Ron Sanchez who had (and still does have) an impressive Psychedelic Garage band called Donovan’s Brain (which is another band with a “revolving door of personnel” but this time, it is intentional as they seem to favor the “open door” approach to jamming and making music with few barriers. The music the Brain were working on then had slightly harkened back to Dave’s Idle Race days and he was interested in what they were doing so he got involved with Donovan’s Brain during this time. With the “open door approach” they employ though, it is hard to say for certain if Dave Walker was/is actually a “member” of Donovan’s Brain or not. In 1999/2000 he had worked with the Brain on session for their “Tiny crustacean light show” album (originally available on Get Hip Records but now available on Career Records) on which he appears on many tracks doing much of the backing vocals and some lead vocals. He also played tambourine on a track by The Nomads (who were working in the same studio as Donovan’s Brain on May 24, 1999) called “Top alcohol” which was the “B-side” to their “The King of night train” single (on White Jazz Records). Dave also sang on a rare Brain track called “22 Lost marbles” (which appeared on a CD called “A pot by any other name” which was a free CD that accompanied issue number 30 (Spring 2001) of the independent music magazine “Ptolemaic Terrascope”) and a DB cover of a song called “The single #2” which was originally done by the band called Man and this cover showed up on a various artists Man tribute CD called “Man, we’re glad we know you: A tribute to the Man band” which was originally a privately pressed disc by www.petegifford.co.uk but is now available again through Career Records. Many tracks with Walker that were left over from the TCLS sessions are to be released in January 2003 on the next Donovan’s Brain album which is to be called “The great leap forward” on Career Records. On that same label, an album by Angie Pepper is to be released in 2003 on which Dave has done backing vocals on a track from it. The year 2003 looks promising for Dave Walker and we can only hope that we will hear more from him in the not too distant future.