A not-so-short history
Haec forsan olim meminisse
As with women preaching and dogs
dancing:
‘It’s not done well. But it is surprising to find it done at all’ – Dr Johnson
The original members of the band, all pupils at Maidstone Grammar School (haec forsan olim meminisse – one day it will please you to remember these things - seems rather apt now) first got together in 1960: Keith Dunnell, Mike Rand, Colin Hill (all in the Fifth Form) and Tony Butler (in the Remove), so they would have been 16 or 17 years old.
They usually practised at Keith’s home in Stockbury, and their first gigs were for the local youth club in the Stockbury Village Hall. Originally just an instrumental group, they acquired a local singer ‘Mickson’ Godden, who sometimes turned up for gigs. The band was called the Tornados in those days (and Colin had ‘Tornados’ on his bass drum), before a ‘proper’ band called the Tornados (backing band to Billy Fury) achieved a hit record or two, including 'Telstar', an ode to the first video communication satellite. The ‘Tornados’ was not exactly an imaginative name since the main band in Maidstone at the time was a band called the Whirlwinds.
They changed their name to the Muskrats, at Keith’s suggestion; he was into Louis Armstrong cornet stuff. Louis and his Hot Five had had a hit with ‘Muskrat Ramble’ in 1927, which was re-released in the '60s (and can be viewed on Youtube). The band had a discussion about name and ‘Muskrats’ sounded snappy (a bit like the Beatles?).
After a short time with the band struggling and not knowing whether he was going to turn up or not, Mickson was replaced by Tony Mitchell, in effect, at a gig in St Martin’s Church Hall (he lived nearby on the Shepway estate). Tony, a local ‘hard nut’ teddy boy, rather invited himself onto the stage and proceeded to demonstrate that he was a rather good singer - he even knew what key he wanted to sing in; it was rumoured that he had in fact turned Mickson away at the door. He was quite a comfort to have around in those days.
For a time the group also had a girl singer, Valerie Whaley, whom Tony knew (their Dads were policemen) and whom they allowed to sing the occasional number.
When Keith left the band for University they were joined by Geoff Perkins who was very proud of his very fast right wrist, the ‘London Rhythm’ (the others often wondered how he had developed this skill). When Keith came back for vacations he sometimes re-joined the band.
At some point the band became known as Tony Maine and the Muskrats, following the trend in band names.
The band mostly played in local youth clubs, held in a variety of local community facilities including Stockbury Village Hall (where they started out), Detling Village Hall (just down the road), Harrietsham Village Hall, St Peter’s Church Hall (where Colin made his debut as a singer when Mickson didn’t turn up - again), Lenham Village Hall, and St Martin’s Church Hall Shepway (quite a few there) as well as mamy others. They also did a rather revolutionary gig at Maidstone Girls’ Grammar School (or was it the Boys’?).
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There were also gigs for the over 18's - several at Fant Hall, at least one at a local club in King Street (the Rat Trap, under the Flamingo coffee bar - yes, Maidstone had a Flamingo as well!) and a couple of fetes, one at Stockbury (see photo on the Home page) and one at Loose. The high points were a few gigs at the Royal Star Ballroom, including a talent show hosted by local Kent Messenger journalist, David Wigg (who went on to greater things as a rock music journalist, including TV interviews with Freddie Mercury and Brian May). A photograph of this gig (with Tony Mitchell and Geoff Perkins) appeared in the Kent Messenger when the band announced that it was suspending operations pending exams – presumably lead guitarist Tony's A levels, which dates he photograph at around May 1963. Probably the biggest gig was at the Royal Star as supporting band for Chris Farlowe and the Thunderbirds. For a period of maybe three years they kept pretty busy with gigs, probably performing one a fortnight over the period, but towards the end in the Spring and Summer of 1963 they sometimes had two or three a week. |
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For quite few early gigs they were paid nothing, but when they did start to charge the booking fee crept up from £10 to £15 to £20 a night – this in the days when the average weekly wage can’t have been much more than £20. For at least one of their later gigs at the Royal Star they were paid £50, quite a princely sum in those days, when cigarettes were about 4/- for 20 and a pint of beer half a crown.
Playing in the band was often exhausting and sweaty work. At the end of a good gig, where the crowd really had had a good time – yes, there were a few occasions like that – they would all be pretty exhausted at the end as they started to pack up the gear. But a good gig was a great buzz.
In the early days they relied on Keith’s Mum’s Morris Minor pick-up and Mike’s Dad’s car, but Colin became the main supplier of transport via his Dad’s Morris Oxford Estate. Later on Roger Wood helped out a lot with transport in his Dad’s Morris Oxford. Transport became complicated when Tony Butler's parents moved to Folkestone in 1961. For a year (September 1961 to July 1962), Tony lived in digs in on the then new Park Wood Estate, but moved back in with his parents and commuted to School by train for the next two years. Frequently, having passed his driving test fairly recently, Colin would have to run him to the nearest station – sometimes Paddock Wood (where there was a later train) to catch the last train back to the coast. On a few occasions he drove all the way and on one famous occasion crashed his Dad’s Morris Oxford at Postling Corner near Hythe. He, Tony Mitchell and Geoff Perkins spent the night on Tony's parent's floor in Folkestone.
Apart from having to cope when Mickson didn’t turn up there were occasions when one or other of us was not available. Colin could double for Mike, though on one occasion they had the bassist from the Nighthawks, and when Colin did play bass they used Dick Ely from the Nighthawks and another guy, Andy, who lived at the pub at the bottom of Gabriel’s Hill.
The early equipment was a mixed bag, with none of the amps were more than 10 watts. they even tried to use a radio at Keith's house to get a sound. Once the band started to be paid, Colin got a new a Premier drum kit to which he added various bits, including, I seem to recall, a very expensive crash cymbal complete with rivets. Mike had an Aristone bass from the earliest days (which he still has, though the neck has ‘gone’) and played through an amp which he had made from bits ‘found’ at EMI, where he worked. Keith and Tony started with quite cheap guitars, Broadways (bought from the Beehive Stores in Maidstone's Week Street - now the site of C & H Fabrics) and with, as Keith recalls, a specially designed compensated aluminium bridge which cut the strings in half. Mike remembers respraying Keith’s red to give it a ‘cooler’ appearance. It was probably at about the same time, 1961, that Tony acquired a Burns Vibra Artiste which cost his Dad £89. After he had left for University Keith acquired a Hofner Committee for 17 guineas from Selmers in Charing Cross Road (which he still has, along with an amazing collection of vintage guitars and banjos), and used it when he ‘rejoined’ the band on trips back home. Geoff had a Watkins Rapier Guitar. Apart from Mike's home-made amplifiers, they had various other amps, starting with a Watkins Dominator but eventually acquired a large and heavy 30 watt Selmer (with reverb) on castors. they also used a Selmer tape echo chamber, which was wont to go wrong from to time (mainly tape breakage). The singer sang through the echo chamber into the Selmer.
Originally their dress was pretty grey (see Stockbury Village Fete photo), with sort of Fred Perry tennis shirts. they often wore sun glasses because it was cool to do so. Those of us who smoked (Keith and Tony) also picked up the habit of sticking a lighted cigarette in the strings at the headstock of their guitars. At some stage, after Keith had left, they bought a ‘uniform’: light grey trousers, blue lapel-less jacket (a la Beatles), yellow tie, black and white striped shirt; and at some stage Tony's mother made the instrumentalists the purple velvet sleeveless ‘waistcoats’ (though without the buttons) seen in the Star Ballroom photo. Mickson, the first singer, was wont to turn up in a drape jacket (see Stockbury photo), but Tony Mitchell had a gold lame suit made for him by his mother which he would wear for the second half of the programme (dramatic entrance for, invariably, ‘Lucille’.)
There was some brief discussion about rebuilding the Muskrats after Keith and Tony left. Mike was reluctant to continue as he was already finding it difficult to make all of the gigs they were offered. The last straw was when Colin was invited to join the Brian Jenner band, a local but well-known semi-pro function and show band (late 1963). The two bands had crossed paths when performing at that Royal Star talent show. He had to learn dance music and earned the nickname ‘Bludgeonfoot’. He played regularly two or three times a week, including summer seasons at Dreamland, Margate and for a long while resident Saturday dinner-dances at the Moat Hotel, Wrotham.At Sussex University Keith played with a band which went on to be Sailor who had hits in the 70s and Affinity, a prog rock band which had a long residency upstairs at Ronny Scotts. He also got into collecting guitars and was the subject of a newspaper article some years later. Tony had no further band experience, but picked up the guitar again mainly as a result of hearing Dire Strait’s Sultans of Swing, which encouraged him to learn finger-picking. He went into collecting guitars, though in a much more modest way that Keith. Mike also had no further band experience although he is a member of an acapelo vocal group in his locality.
Colin continued to work intermittently in the music business. While with Brian Jenner's band at the Moat Hotel in late 1967 the then vocalist, Tony Ellingham, was spotted by a London agent who said ‘I'm gonna make you a star!’ He became Dorian Gray with a record contract with EMI. His second record, 'I've got you on my mind', hovered in the 30's of the hit parade for several weeks and he did a ‘Top of the Pops’. Colin and some of the other members of the Brian Jenner band left to form his backing band to enable him to tour. They did one gig in Shrewsbury before Tony decided he couldn't afford to give up the day job. He remains active semi-professionally in the Medway Towns and beyond with his band Unit 5. After Tony's decision, some of the backing band auditioned with Geraldo who was agent for P&O (Cruises, not Ferries!). They got the ‘We'll let you know...’ and didn't expect to hear anything, but over the next few months, two of the lads had joined Tony in Unit 5 and Colin had met the love of my life (ha, ha! - well 15 years), so when the offer to work on the Canberra cruise liner arrived, they had split up and were going their different ways and had to turn it down. In 1973 Colin joined up with some guys from Rochester and Gravesend to form Classic Edition, which performed as a function and show band (ballroom, dance and middle of the road, hit parade pop covers) for a couple of years before they split. Between 1983 and 1986, while teaching at Aylesford School, Colin met Nick Simms who was music teacher there and they formed a rehearsal band to give some of the kids a chance to play and sing modern music. With a variety of teachers and pupils, they performed in the DJ's break at half-termly school discos.
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The reunion came about when Tony Butler was summoned to the Old Maidstonian’s 2006 Supper to mark the 50th anniversary of his year’s starting at Maidstone Grammer School. He and Colin had also got in touch with each other through Friends Reunited but, after meeting face-to-face at the School and, courtesy of Malcolm MacCallum, Tony obtained Keith’s email address, who in turn was in touch with Mike. All attended a dinner in New College Oxford (where Tony had worked and recently retired, remaining a Fellow of the College) on 13 November 2006 and, under the influence of much too much wine (and a delicious port) decided to meet up for a practice for old times’ sake. At Colin’s suggestion, Nick was invited along to swell the sound with his keyboards. Rehearsals were initially held at Friar’s Gate Farm studios near Crowborough and more recently at Town Malling Cricket Club and Tunbridge Wells Rugby Club. The first gig for more than 44 years was in September 2007 at a party for Tony’s 40th weeding anniversary. The "World Tour' has continued with gigs at Tunbridge Wells Rugby Club, Danbury Village Hall (near Chelmsford, Essex) and now.......
The Triumphal Return to Maidstone at Fant Community Hall in May 2009