Marvin, Welch & Farrar: 50 years

[iefje]

It was around this period that 50 years ago, Marvin, Welch & Farrar released their first records as a vocal trio: the single "Faithful"/"Mr. Sun" in January, 1971 and their first (eponymously titled) album "Marvin, Welch & Farrar" in February, 1971.

[GoldenStreet]

There was the subsequent brief flirtation with quadrophonic sound in the production of the follow-up album, Second Opinion. It was a period of bold musical experimentation which, unfortunately, proved largely unsuccessful in commercial terms.

http://www.spaceritual.net/alexgitlin/npp2/mwf.htm

Bill

[drakula63]

Funnily enough... I was flicking through the channels late last night and discovered The Shadows Final Tour was being shown on Sky Arts. Again! I wasn't going to watch it - as I have it on DVD - but just stayed with it to watch them sing 'Lady of the Morning' and 'My Home Town'. Hank quips about 'Marvin, Welch and Farrar... Solicitors' and seems pleased that some people in the audience remember it. In my opinion, some of the best stuff they ever wrote, recorded and produced. A shame these albums weren't more popular. They should have been.

[Fenderman]

When they started performing live people would shout for Apache, FBI or the old hits, they just couldn't shake the Shadows tag so i think they started to add some Shads numbers to their shows.
It was a shame they weren't a commercial success as they released some fine music.

[Uncle Fiesta]

True, the first MW&F album is still among my favourites today

[MeBHank]

A little coincidence: a couple of days ago, prior to me discovering this thread, I was conducting my semi-regular search for a backing track for Lady of the Morning (I'm probably going to eventually make my own). One Google result that cropped up (on a website which, upon visiting, I realised has nothing to do with backing tracks) featured this article. I don't know if I agree with all the opinions/statements, but I found it an interesting read. So here you go:

Here we go with another glance into the past via our FORGOTTEN ARTISTS series, taking a look at some of the Americana musicians that may just have dropped out of people’s memories or who, perhaps, never received the appreciation their contribution to the genre deserved. This time around I’m featuring a British band that, for a very brief period, tried to create a UK version of the West Coast America close harmony sound that was proving popular at the time. An outfit that boasted some very unexpected members…

In the summer of 1970 we awoke in a strange, parallel universe; one where Hank Marvin and Bruce Welch weren’t the slightly geeky guitarists in Cliff Richard’s backing band. Neither were they in that same band who put out toe-tapping instrumentals that your parents quite liked. No, in this new reality, Marvin and Welch were two-thirds of an almost cool looking trio that appeared to be a British equivalent of Crosby, Stills and Nash. The world had gone crazy!

Marvin, Welch & Farrar were Hank and Bruce’s new venture. Bored by the erratic work pattern of The Shadows and wanting to do something different, they decided to form a new band where vocals would be much more to the fore. Marvin originally suggested a five-piece but Welch was unhappy at the idea of working in another large band, so they started working on some new songs as a duo. Marvin felt they needed a third voice to really get the harmonies going and they remembered an Australian guy who had sung in a band called The Strangers, who had been on the same bill as them on a Melbourne gig, he was also married to Pat Carroll, Olivia Newton John’s ex singing partner, and Newton-John was now engaged to Bruce Welch, so there was already a good connection. They invited John Farrar over to the UK to see if they could work together and the three gelled right from the start; the results taking many people by surprise. Their first album, simply titled ‘Marvin, Welch and Farrar’, was released early in 1971 and immediately raised a lot of eyebrows.

Nobody really knew that Marvin and Welch could sing. Yes, The Shadows did backing vocals for Cliff Richard from time to time but most audiences assumed that, because they specialised in instrumentals, there wasn’t a strong vocalist in the band. It turned out that not only could Marvin and Welch both sing but that they were both perfectly capable of doing lead and harmony vocals, to considerable effect. John Farrar was also an accomplished singer and between the three of them, they had a great sound that was very reminiscent of records that were coming out of the Laurel Canyon scene in America at the time. Not only were the vocals good but the songs they were writing were also impressive, with Marvin proving particularly prolific, having a hand in the writing of every track on the first album and being sole composer of four of them, including an early piece of ecological awareness with the song ‘Silvery Rain’, drawing attention to the environmental damage done by crop spraying – “Nothing moves now, but the swaying ripe corn/ Not a dawn is greeted with a birdsong./ There’s a feather or two from a bird that once flew/ Before a light aeroplane sprayed the fields with a silvery rain.” So far, so credible. The album even boasted a cover from top graphic designers Hipgnosis!

The first album was critically well-received and, although they’d originally planned for the band to be a recording unit only, given the distance Farrar had come to be a part of that unit they decided to tour as well. This may well have been their biggest mistake.

While the band had no problem reproducing their sound live they didn’t think through how to approach the live circuit. This was a departure from their expected music and they needed to get out and find a new audience. Instead, they opted to appear on five TV shows as part of a Cliff Richard series on BBC TV and announced that the band would be joining a Cliff Richard Tour later in the year – where they were billed as ‘The Shadows – featuring Marvin, Welch and Farrar’. It was a disastrous strategy, as Marvin later admitted. The trio were restricted to three songs a night and fans were calling out for Shadows numbers during their set. They weren’t building a new audience and they were alienating the existing Shadows fans by not giving them the music they wanted to hear. Critics and fellow musicians all rated the band and were impressed with what they were trying to do – but the public didn’t want to know; they were too hip for the die-hard Shadows fans and Marvin and Welch were considered too mainstream for younger fans to take them seriously. Their reluctance to cut themselves loose from the Cliff Richard music machine meant the group couldn’t build the new audience they were looking for.

A second album, ‘Second Opinion’, was released in the October of 1971 and, again, the critical reception was good, both in the UK and the U.S, where it was released on the edgier Sire label (they were on Regal Zonophone in the UK) but the public response, in both markets, was disappointing. Again, the album was produced by the three musicians themselves and the quality of the recording is outstanding. ‘Second Opinion’ was subsequently voted the best-produced album to come out of the Abbey Road Studios in the 70s, and this was a vote held among the engineers and producers working at Abbey Road at the time!

The band carried on working, but they were further diluting the quality of the songs they were writing by allowing artists like Cliff Richard and Olivia Newton-John to record cover versions of them. These were invariably watered down, straight-ahead pop versions of MWF’s edgier songs (compare the CR version of ‘Throw Down a Line’ with the MWF original) and further prevented them finding the new audience they were after.

Disillusioned with the lack of commercial success Welch quit the band in 1972. Marvin and Farrar continued for a while as a duo and recorded a further album together, 1973’s ‘Hank Marvin and John Farrar’ but it proved even less successful than the previous albums and, shortly after its release, they bowed to the inevitable and incorporated Farrar into a reformed Shadows. They would continue to feature Marvin, Welch & Farrar songs as part of The Shadows set but the band’s short-lived existence was over.

In the end, you have to feel that Marvin, Welch and Farrar’s failure to find an audience was down to their lack of ambition as a band and their reluctance to stand on their own feet. They had a good sound, one that reflected contemporary trends, and they were writing good material that was being well received by critics and fellow musicians. They needed to step away from Cliff Richard, The Shadows and everything associated with that world, get into some smaller venues and start creating an interest in their new music. Maybe it wouldn’t have worked out, later tracks, like ‘Lady of The Morning’, were already starting to edge towards weaker, more pop-oriented ballads – but they weren’t prepared to take that chance and that was their undoing. The band is now just a small footnote in the history of Cliff Richard and The Shadows but, for a brief period, there was an indication that they could’ve been something more.

[Credit: https://americana-uk.com/forgotten-arti ... lch-farrar]

A couple of things I'm not sure about: 'Second Opinion', whist brilliant, probably doesn't top 'Dark Side of the Moon' or 'Wish You Were Here', for me at least. Oh, and I don't think that Lady of the Morning is 'weak' in any way. It's a wonderful piece of music, and was, IMO, one of the highlights of the 2004/5 Final Tour.

Overall I think this article is an excellent piece and a very summation of the reasons why M,W&F didn't succeed. They really deserved to. I genuinely prefer their songs over those of C,S&N(&Y). They're more listenable.

[iefje]

Overall I think this article is an excellent piece and a very summation of the reasons why M,W&F didn't succeed. They really deserved to.

I agree with you Justin. Hank or Bruce has also said that once they were back together again as The Shadows in 1973 and played in concert again in 1975, the fans were quite happy or rather willing to listen to Marvin, Welch & Farrar's vocal tracks too, in addition to the instrumentals.

[drakula63]

It's a good article and makes some valid points, But 'Throw Down a Line' was recorded by Cliff (and Hank) several years before the MWF version. And they are both great.

They made two big mistakes. 1) If they were going to tread the same ground as before, appearing on Cliff's TV show and appearing with him on tour, they should have just stuck with The Shadows name. They might have benefited more from the shock value of people seeing/hearing this instrumntal band from the '60s singing songs that were bang up to date and better than any of the vocals they occasionally did in the 60s. 2) Playing Batley Variety Club, etc, was also a mistake. They should have been doing folk clubs and the Cambridge Folk Festival. Easy for me to say with hindsight, of course. But I still think that by adopting either of those strategies they would have been much, much more successful. As it is, those albums are still - and always will be - well within my 'Shads' top ten.

[MartcasterJunior]

Playing Batley Variety Club, etc, was also a mistake. They should have been doing folk clubs and the Cambridge Folk Festival.

I was trying to think earlier this morning what alternative choices M,W&F could have made which would have made their career more successful, and I think a lot of it comes down to this. I've never quite bought into the "people just wanted to hear Apache" explanation as there was clearly a market for this type of material at the time (and arguably there wasn't one for guitar-based instrumentals). It must have been a difficult choice for Hank and Bruce and their management, having had an association with such a successful band and career in one genre, not to be tempted to try and pull that audience over into the new one (which by playing those sort of venues it looks like they did), whereas effectively launching a new career with a new name in a new genre meant going back to the start, playing smaller clubs and building a new audience. That would likely mean a change in income and lifestyle, and so maybe they or their management were guilty of wanting to have their cake and eat it (i.e. trade on the past reputation to retain a particular level of fame but without wanting to reference any of that earlier material)?

I'm tempted to say that they should have just kept the name of The Shadows and stuck it out for longer. It's not like other bands haven't done quite dramatic changes of style successfully.

[drakula63]

Playing Batley Variety Club, etc, was also a mistake. They should have been doing folk clubs and the Cambridge Folk Festival.

I was trying to think earlier this morning what alternative choices M,W&F could have made which would have made their career more successful, and I think a lot of it comes down to this. I've never quite bought into the "people just wanted to hear Apache" explanation as there was clearly a market for this type of material at the time (and arguably there wasn't one for guitar-based instrumentals). It must have been a difficult choice for Hank and Bruce and their management, having had an association with such a successful band and career in one genre, not to be tempted to try and pull that audience over into the new one (which by playing those sort of venues it looks like they did), whereas effectively launching a new career with a new name in a new genre meant going back to the start, playing smaller clubs and building a new audience. That would likely mean a change in income and lifestyle, and so maybe they or their management were guilty of wanting to have their cake and eat it (i.e. trade on the past reputation to retain a particular level of fame but without wanting to reference any of that earlier material)?

I'm tempted to say that they should have just kept the name of The Shadows and stuck it out for longer. It's not like other bands haven't done quite dramatic changes of style successfully.

Honestly, what I think they should have done is reverted to The Shadows name with 'Second Opinion'. Brian Bennett was back in the band by then, with Dave Richmond and Alan Hawkshaw and, assuming that he/they had agreed, then I think this would have been the best move. They must have come to realise that there was just too much resistance after their experiences surrounding the first MWF album. If it was going to work, I think it would have worked right from the word go, although I also feel that 'faithful' was a poor choice for a single; 'A Thousand Conversations' or 'Silvery Rain' would have been better. The songs and the presentation were all perfect... and the idea behind it all was good... they just needed to promote it differently. I'd also have released 'Tiny Robin' and 'Thank Heavens I've Got You' as a double A sided single in December 1971, preceded by either 'Lady of the Morning' or 'Simplify Your Head'. I'm also very much of the, er, opinion, that 'If There's Nothing Left to Say' would have made a great single. Just imagine hearing that blasting out of the radio on a Tuesday afternoon!