60 FT. DOLLS
Even within the context of a website conceived with the very purpose of digging into the stories of forgotten bands - the bands I loved as a teenager and whose names should live on forever - special dispensation needs to be made for 60 Ft. Dolls. Catch me on the right day and I can make a claim for their debut album, The Big 3, being one of the most perfect first records ever made. Beloved by the music press that would in adulthood pay me a wage, forever shackled with the curse of being ‘the next big thing’, even now, after all these years, I’ve seen few bands more live and like few bands’ songs more. A bunch of those shows actually occurred when I was a teenager, in my hometown of Doncaster. You never forget your first love. And you never forget the bands who made the effort to come to a town that few came to, now or then.
Singer and guitarist Richard Parfitt’s story extends far beyond the band I came to induct into ‘Indie Heaven’. It takes in Dido, Duffy and 2000’s most notorious. Terris. But let’s start at the pearly gates, shall we…
Hello Richard. I was obsessed with 60 Ft. Dolls when I was a kid. I thought you were the absolute bollocks. How do you feel when you think about the band now?
“We’re all still good friends. It was a fastmoving time. I’m proud of the album, The Big 3. It was re-released with some John Peel sessions in 2015 on 3 Loop Music and garnered some great reviews. The band had an alchemy, in that I don’t think any of the players could be interchanged. When Mike [Cole, bassist] fell ill Japan and needed a lot of time off, me and Carl [Bevan, drums] briefly discussed the possibility of a stand-in bass player, but just as quickly discounted it. The Dolls was a short lived and brightly lit experience. A candle that burns at both ends produces a beautiful light, as they say. We were at our best when on full on rock n’ roll mode. We didn’t have any pretensions musically. Well a few, maybe.”
There was always this expectation in the nineties music press that 60 Ft. Dolls were the next big thing, certainly as far as indie bands went. Was that expectation difficult?
“We never thought we were going to be the next big thing. I would even go as far as to say we didn’t really have any expectations. But when things started happening we went with it. In those days, if the press took an interest in you, the record labels took an interest you. The only expectation we found difficult was to produce a record that would get on the radio playlists, which is something we were never able to do. Most of our plays were evening, Jo Whiley and Steve Lamacq, and John Peel, Adam Walton and Mary Ann Hobbs. BBC Radio 6 still fly the flag. And very grateful we remain to them!”
I finished Louise Wener’s book recently, Just For One Day, the one about her time in Sleeper. She’s pretty critical of Indolent in there. What are your memories of being on that label?
“I haven’t read Louise’s book, but Indolent were a major RCA ‘indie’ label run by Ben Wardle and Steve Lowes. We were signed to Indolent in the UK and Geffen in the USA, so our experience was slightly different to Sleeper’s, in that we had two label bosses. I’ve had the experience of being signed to small and big labels, and it’s true that an independent label feels much better in terms of personal relationships. They can cut their cloth to suit each act. Major labels can be brutal if you’re not bringing the moolah in. Indie labels are usually willing to talk about what they can do to make the next record work.”
You were managed by Huw Williams, from The Pooh Sticks. What are your memories of him?
“Still friends with Huw. He lives down the road. He was a good manager - in the early days especially - and being from south Wales understood us as a band. Huw is from Swansea, we were from Newport. Very smart but very tight. Tightest man in rock. Second only to Rod Stewart on a budget.”
Legend has it that you found Mike via Donna Matthews from Elastica. I was amazed to hear she played in the band for a bit. She slipped off the map when Britpop went down. Do you ever cross paths still?
“I’m still good friends with Donna. I usually see her at Christmas when she comes home to visit her mother. She’s a special person who’s had an extraordinary life. I remember her as a teenager busking in Newport town centre with her sister dressed like The Bangles. She lived above TJ’s and sold dope to the stoners and art students on the weekends. Last time I spoke to her she had just graduated with an MA from Goldsmiths and was enrolling on a PhD at Glasgow University.”
Some of the chaos 60 Ft. Dolls were ‘famed’ for, I always thought you seemed a bit irritated by. I know you were that bit older than the others, but am I off base there?
“I had 4-years on Mike and nearly 10 on Carl, who was only 18 when we started. They were also big drinkers. At that time, I was married and had a small baby, so yes. That part of the band’s story both worked for and against us. The music papers always needed a story. Who wants to read about music? I mean what can you say, except, ‘put the record on and have a listen’. Otherwise you just end up with the writers describing the drums like ‘thunder’, or the guitars like ‘screeching owls’, or something, if you get my drift. Story is good.”
The band ends in 1999, fairly unceremoniously. It was a big shock to me. What happened?
“Mike had a breakdown in Japan. Carl got married. I had my own problems. Our relationship with Indolent was not going well. It wasn’t really planned. We just stopped. Needed a break. Through it all we remained friends.”
How is Mike doing now?
“I speak to Mike a lot. A couple of times a week at least. He’s a special boy. Had his struggles but is doing well and has come through the other side. He was an alcoholic at 15 but he’s just done 6-months without touching a drop and he’s like another man. He’s 54 now.”
That’s great to hear. What about Carl? Last I heard he was painting dogs, with a twist!
“Carl was always drawing and painting, doing cartoons of us - usually pornographic - and pinning them up in the van. He’s a talented lad. He’s moved on from dogs to buildings and people. Buy his work. His paintings are selling for over a grand now.”
I always found it a real shame that that the second album, 1998’s Joya Magica, was kinda buried by the split. It was a good album with some great songs. How do you view it?
“I think you said it. A good album with some great songs, but inconsistent and with no collective sound. Do you want to hear a story about that album that I’ve never told before?”
Absolutely!
“We recorded Joya Magica in New York. Carl thought of the album title. It means ‘magic jewel’, and I think he took it from the back of a videogame he was playing in the studio. Anyway, after Carl flew back home, I stayed in New York to mix the record. We would finish at 9 because the producer had a newborn and he, quite reasonably, wanted to get home to see his family. I would spend the evening bar-hopping and usually ended up in Max Fish or the Lunar Lounge…”
I know them well.
“One night someone came in and sat down next to me. From the corner of my eye I recognized the Ferdinand the Bull tattoo from Elliot Smith’s Either/ Or, which had just come out - I already had the Kill Rock Stars album, the blue one. It was Elliott Smith. He had a Walkman and said he had that night finished mixing this new track for a Gus Van Sant movie [1997’s Good Will Hunting]. He played it to me and it was Miss Misery. I think I may have been the first person to hear the track outside of the studio. Anyway, this became a routine. Each night at 9 we would meet up at Max Fish and then hop over to Alphabet City. He always started full of cheer, but would gradually withdraw and then at some point later in the evening he’d disappear. A few nights into doing this he showed up covered in big purple bruises and proudly showed them off as souvenirs from the previous night. Said he got into a fight at a pool table. There was something very obviously self destructive about him. One night he came into the Lunar Lounge and just started sobbing like a child.”
That’s some sad shit.
“Anyway, just before we flew back to the UK, me, Mike and Elliott went out and got smashed. They both got into a big row over Mike being rude to one of Elliott’s friends. The last time I saw Elliott was at Dingwalls in 1998. The last of the great singer songwriters.”
That’s a great story. What did your life look like after the band ended? I believe you became a university lecturer?
“I went to university to study for a degree in English & Writing. I just needed a break. It ended up being the best three years of my life. I was 40 when I went. I recommend mature study to anyone. When I was there someone recognised me from the band and asked if I’d do some teaching on the music course. After I graduated I got lucky and manged to get a senior lectureship at Bath Spa before moving onto the University of South Wales. I’m currently at Hereford College of Arts.”
That’s very cool. You did release a solo album though, didn’t you?
“Yeah, it was called Highlights in Slow Motion and was released on Rough Trade in 2002. It did all right and was received well by the critics. You can get it on Amazon for a couple of quid if you like that sort of thing. It started as a bunch of home demos that I sent to Rough Trade and they just kept encouraging me. I think it’s got some of my best songs on there.”
What music excites you now?
“I listen to what I loved as a teenager. Hard rock. I also listen to a lot of jazz and folk. John Renbourn, Townes Van Zandt and always The Beatles. I try to listen to new stuff and students are constantly playing new bands in class, so that keeps me up to date. I usually check out what the music websites are calling The Best Of The Year and stream it. I can’t pretend to be cooler than I am because nobody would believe me and I don’t care.”
It’s an accidental segue, but… What do you remember about playing guitar on the second Dido album, 2003’s Life For Rent?
Bernard Butler’s drummer, Mako Sakamoto - a brilliant and generous man who has since sadly died - suggested to that records’ producer, Mike Hedges, that they bring me in to work on the Dido sessions. I wrote the guitar parts, arranged and played on some of the tracks and one of them was a single. It didn’t quite pay the rent for life but it got me through a financial crisis.”
Can you tell me about discovering Duffy? Which gives me a reason to embed the link to the song ‘Oh Boy’, which is beautiful and which you wrote…
“When Aimee sang it was like little birdies came out to sing. It was obvious that something had to happen, so me and Owen Powell from Catatonia did some demos and hooked her up with Rough Trade Management. She covered a few of our songs that ended up on the deluxe edition of [2008’s] Rockferry, one was the title track of a movie, and I wrote some of her b-sides. For that, my ex-wife will be forever grateful.”
You managed Terris too! Good band - and in this, a band with a genuinely great song - but for a long time, almost a allegory for music weekly folly…
“The singer Gavin [Goodwin] was from Newport and went on to do a BA, MA and a PhD in Poetry and now lectures at Aberystwyth University. He was always very philosophically sharp and intellectual in his outlook. Looking back now it seems he was well suited to academia. The rest of the band were from the valleys. Haven’t seen them since but wish them well. My feeling is that it happened too fast. There was a vacuum before The Libertines and The Strokes and the music papers were looking for a band. Terris had an intensity and a peculiar edge that divided opinion. But all the best bands divide opinion, don’t they?”
I’m going to end this with your song ‘British Racing Green’ which I’ve been obsessed with for a quarter of a century now. But also the question, is there any scenario where you could see 60 Ft. Dolls playing together again?
“No. Well, only for a laugh at somebody’s wedding or something. Some things are better left to the imagination. For a short while we were the greatest. I’d hate to spoil that fantasy. We were great and we will remain great.”