Del Bromham - Stray Interview
With some of the members being as young as 14, Stray were ahead of the game when it came to a lot of things. Early pyrotechnics and lighting rigs just to name a few, but also their incredible writing and approach to music, as well as their sense of adventure when creating together. They went on to be a powerful group releasing 7 studio albums and touring with some of the biggest names in rock and roll. I go to speak with Del about his early days, what made him pick up the guitar and navigating the music business at such an early age throughout the late 60s and all through the 70’s. Enjoy!
When and where were you born? Can you tell me what growing up was like for you? When did you first become interested in playing music and what exactly drew you to pick up the guitar? What was your first axe and what were some of the tunes you learned to play in the beginning?
Wow! That’s a question that might a take a long answer! How much time have you got? I was born on November 25th 1951 in a place called East Acton in West London UK. Music was always played in my house. My dad loved his record player and liked all types of music. I had three older brothers (I was a late arrival which I believe was unexpected). All of my brothers loved music and also bought records and my brother Allan, who was about 11 years older than me, played a guitar and formed a few bands starting with the 1950’s style Skiffle, which was popular in the UK and then Rock n Roll.
My brother and his various groups used to rehearse at our house. In the 60’s he had a guitarist named Brian Freeney. Apart from playing the popular songs of the time, Brian could play and sound like Hank Marvin, so for me it was like having The Shadows playing in your house. He also owned this lovely Hagstrom solid electric guitar. The body was gold sparkle and the neck was mother of pearl. It was a beauty. He occasionally left the guitar at the house and although I couldn’t play it as a young child, I would sit it on my lap and strum and pretend I could. Then when I was about eleven years old, one morning my brother Allan came out of his house only to find somebody had dumped an old battered acoustic guitar in his dustbin. He brought it home and gave it to me. I still have that guitar, but I have no idea what make it is or how old it might be.
It looks like the acoustic guitar which you often see in old photos of Robert Johnson. I didn’t know how to tune the guitar properly so I inadvertently open tuned it to the key of ‘E’ and began to play like that adjusting my finger to make chord shapes. Brian noticed what I was doing and showed me how to tune it properly. I soon adjusted and I don’t which to sound conceited but I don’t actually remember learning to play the guitar as such. I believe it was because I had been around music since I was a baby and not only listened but had the privilege of watching guitarists up close in the comfort of my own home. My brother Allan could see I was getting on well with this old battered guitar and it was not a five-minute wonder, so he persuaded my mum and dad to buy me a Hofner Senator guitar.
It was fitted with a pick up on it so I could plug it in to my first amplifier which was a little Fenton Weil, probably about 15 watts. One of the first songs I learnt to play was funnily enough the fits song I ever wrote myself called “Someone”. I think it was a sign of things to come where I was using the song to write songs rather than being a solo guitarist (Like Hank Marvin). Other songs I was learning to play were “Money” “What’d I say” “Long tall Sally” “Baby please don’t go”. Mainly 12 bar type songs and learning as many songs by The Beatles who were breaking it big from around 1963.
What was the local community scene like? What groups did you see early on that made an impact on you and where would you go to see those acts? What was a typical weekend like in West London back in those days?
When I was a teenager, I used to go to a youth club in East Acton, just around the corner from my house. At this time, I was too young to go to gigs, but the youth club did put on groups there and one group I remember who were a local band were ‘The Vectors’ who we were told were going to be a big band. I cannot remember a lot about their music as I was totally fascinated by seeing a live band in a venue. I remember it was exciting and loud! Louder than my mum and dads front room. I remember going on holiday to Butlins Holiday Camp and seeing a band called ‘The Committee’ who I thought were excellent. Apart from playing the obvious hit songs of the time they were also playing songs by various Motown artists and apart from the records I had never heard these type of songs played live. When I got home I searched out Tamla Motown records and from then on my love from American music, particular from the labels, Motown and Stax grew. The biggest band locally were a band called The Detours who went on to become ‘The Who’. I wonder what ever happened to them?
Were you in any outfits prior to Stray? When did you first meet your bandmates Steve Gadd, Gary Giles and Steve Crutchley? Can you tell me about your time at the Christopher Wren School in London? Its incredible that you guys started this band at just the age of 14! What led to wanting to put the group together in the first place and how did the name Stray come about? Can you tell me what those early gigs were like at venues such as Shepherds Bush Goldhawk Club and Covent Garden’s Middle Earth?
I think I must have been 12 years old when my first band was called The FADS, the name comes from the initials of our Christian names i.e. Frank Allan Del Steve. I had known Frank since I was a small child and Allan and Steve I met when I started secondary school. This was my first, with Steve Gadd. My second band was me and Allan (Allan Dennis) along with Gary Giles who I had also met at secondary school. Both of these bands were school bands so it’s not like we were gigging all of the time, more for fun I guess? When I was about 14 years old my brothers group The Traders, who were a regular gigging band, for some reason their rhythm guitarist left the band about a week before they had a couple of gigs planned.
My brother suggested that they could ask me to play with them, because as I always sat in and watched them rehearse, he assured them I knew all of the songs. I admit I had never played them, but he was correct in that I pretty much new them. So I think I had one rehearsal and the following weekend I played my first semi-professional paying gig which I think was a wedding and that’s where it all started. By 1966 I wanted to form my own band playing my own songs and some of those songs I had heard like I’d heard The Committee play a couple of years before. In time as my band now called The Stray were developing, I had to leave my brother’s group The Traders in order to devote my time to The Stray which went on to be Stray. I suppose you could say that I did not only devote my time but pretty much most of my life so far.
What were those early sounds of the band like when you began in ‘66 and what were those shows like? You guys must have been the talk of the town in school! Tell me about the band and its progress leading up to ‘69 when you supported the amazing Groundhogs at the South Hall Farx Club. Can you tell me what it was to play a gig with them and what the process was for the band writing material and honing in on each individual’s craft? How did that show come about?
Well as The Stray, we soon started to play at some local social clubs and pubs in the London area. As we were only 15 years old we didn’t drink alcohol and none of us could drive. So we had to get people to take us to gigs and luckily Ritchie Cole our drummer (he replaced Steve Crutchley who went off after a few months to join a traditional jazz band) had a dad and uncles who had a family business so they kindly let us borrow one of their vans from time to time. We were playing, songs from the charts, songs from our favorite albums and right away playing a few original songs as well. Following an article in a local newspaper which had the title “Love Affair for The Strays?”, which was because the band The Love Affair where all about the same age as us had just had a number one record in the UK charts titled ‘Everlasting Love”.
Two guys Peter Amott and Ivan Mant were two up and coming music managers who were looking to manage an act an after seeing us play approached us offering us a management deal which accepted. Peter was a drummer in local band ‘The Footprints’ and Ivan was very much an ideas man, being from a marketing background he was particularly interested in the visual aspect and the show. The persuaded us to maybe play covers but do our own arrangements until we had enough of our own songs to fill a set. We soon found ourselves on the ‘serious’ rock circuit and one such gig was the Farx Club, Southall, Middlesex, just outside central London.
It was apparent that to get noticed you had to be seen at up and coming venues like The Farx. It gave you credibility to go on to another venue and so on etc. Our managers Peter and Ivan got to know the promoters and offered us a show with The Groundhogs who were quite big on the circuit at this time. We had already played on the same bill as them at a festival a couple of months before at Crawley Technical College. We didn’t really meet them at the Farx even though it was a very small venue. I think it was pretty typical of that time where bands did not mix too much with each other. I’m not saying this applied to The Groundhogs, but I believe a lot of bands did not want to associate with us as I think they thought we were just kids and even then we had a stage act dare I say more dynamic than most other bands at that time. As the years went on we got to know The Groundhogs better and over the years have played many shows together. I can say that Tony McPhee and Ken Pustelnik are both friends of mine to this day.
As we were only 15 years old we didn’t drink alcohol and none of us could drive. So we had to get people to take us to gigs
How did the deal with Transatlantic Records come about that following year in January of ‘70? Can you tell me about recording the self titled LP? How long did it take and what was your experience in the studio as well as outside during that period? Can you tell me about the songs and their meaning?
To be perfectly honest, the deal with Transatlantic Records was done by Peter and Ivan our managers at the time, so I have no idea how, or why the decision with Transatlantic was made. Peter, Ivan and the band were a close knit little family and we trusted them as we trusted each other. They said we’d been offered a recording contract and that was good enough for us. We were all about 18 years old and to be offered a recording contract of any sort was a dream come true for us. As a band we were young and totally immersed in playing live shows. As far as I was concerned I was doing what I had always dreamed of doing which was playing and earning a living in a band.
Although we had been in recording studios a couple of times before, this was totally different. We were about to record our first album for release on a proper record label at Sound Techniques studios in London with a record producer Hugh Murphy. By the time we began recording the first album in 1970, musically we were very tight and had been playing most of the songs we were about to record in our live shows. Actually we had too many songs, so what ended up on the album was only a small part of what we had written and had been performing live. We had become one of the busiest bands on the scene and 1970 was going to be even busier taking our music into Europe. If I remember correctly the first album took a week to record, although when I say a week it would have been five days. It was like going into the office.
The sessions would start around 10am-6pm. I think the last day we went into early evening, past 6pm anyway to finish a couple of overdubs. We played all of the songs pretty much live in the studio and replaced the lead vocals later to get better separation on the quality of the vocals and then I would over dub piano or maybe another electric or acoustic guitar. The overdubs, certainly by todays standards were minimal, perhaps that is why that album has a special quality to it even if I say so myself. I was writing most of the original songs at this time with the exception of ‘Yesterdays Promises’ which was written by Steve Gadd and the opening song ‘All in your mind’ which was written by all of us during a rehearsal where we began jamming and the song came together quite quickly. Arguably this song had become our most popular over the years. Quite something when you consider it was the first song on our first album.
I had always been interested in writing stories to music. My mind often pictures the scenes when I am writing songs such as ‘Time Machine’ which is the fascination of being able to travel back and forth in time. ‘Around the world in eighty days’ was a song sort of based on the Jules Verne story traveling the world, high in the sky and in retrospect a bit of a gamble to include on the album as it was very different to the type of music we played live. “In Reverse and Some Say” were two songs which we joined together in our stage set which always included some improvisation and when it came to make the record we decided to keep them like that rather than separate them. I think you can hear that is pretty much a live performance.
As far as I was concerned I was doing what I had always dreamed of doing which was playing and earning a living in a band
Can you tell me about the Reading Festival you guys played that following year in ‘71? The band shared the stage with some heavies acts at the time such as Van Der Graaf, Rory Gallagher, etc. what was it like to play on a bill with these guys? The band made its tv debut that year as well on the show Disco 2. What was this experience like? What was going through your mind during this period of increasing success and notoriety?
Well we never actually played at the festival in 1971. The whole thing was ridiculous. All of our equipment was set up and ready to go, when the organizers came over to our managers and told them that the show was over running so we could not play. It was crazy, this was in the afternoon and there would have been plenty of time to re-arrange other acts but they picked on us, I don’t know why, but I heard that the band that went on next instead of us who were relatively unknown but had something to do with the Marquee management agency group who organized the festival, so they went on and we didn’t. It was obvious why but there was nothing we could do about it.
However, they promised we could play the following year, 1972 which we did and if I remember correctly we went on after Status Quo who were just getting into their new look and rockier image and Roy Woods Wizard were on after us. We went down really well and even though it was daytime we still let off our pyrotechnics, smoke bombs and explosions! I had made a suit of mirrors for this show and the following tour dates so that when the lights shone on it I looked like a mirror ball which you would see in the centre of a ballroom. When the lights shone on me I looked like a human ray gun with lights reflecting off of me. This was the first time I had worn this suit and when I tried to get on stage the mirrors on the trousers were so solid I could not bend my legs so it took three roadies to lift me on.
Just like the tin man in the Wizard of Oz. Disco 2 was an amazing opportunity. There were very few, if any programs on British television which were rock shows and we had been pretty much ignored by radio too. At that time, we were selling out venues in most places going down a storm and selling albums. I think we played two songs from the Suicide album, Jericho and Son of the Father (I could be wrong?). Actually we mimed to the songs as all the acts did back then. We really thought we were on the tip of breaking big despite being ignored by the media. We knew a lot of people in the business were predicting Stray were going to be the next ‘Big Thing’. Unfortunately, due to cost cutting the BBC erased the tapes so there is no record of us playing on the BBC. The BBC replaced Disco 2 with what became the legendary tv program, The Old Grey Whistle Test. If only we had made it onto that program, what a difference that might have made?
We went down really well and even though it was daytime we still let off our pyrotechnics, smoke bombs and explosions!
Can you tell me about headlining your first British tour with Red Dirt in the winter of ‘71? The band headlined with Ten Years Later in Europe for the first time that year too. Can you tell me what some of the gigs were like? Are there any shows that particularly stand out in your mind till this day? How do you guys initially meet Wilf Pine?
Well we had been touring, basically one night stands up and down the country before 1971 but a headlining tour was something quite different. It seemed we were taking a big chance doing this because the venues were quite large venues, certainly bigger than the club gigs we had been playing. I would have to say it was part of our managements plan to raise our profile particularly with the success of the first album and now with the second album ‘Suicide’. We were young and wanted to play and we trusted their guidance. Touring with TYA was a great experience and found them to be very nice guys. You have to appreciate that TYA were a huge band at that time and guitarist Alvin Lee was one of the top guitarists in the world. It was quite apparent that for whatever reason, Alvin did not appear to be getting on too well with the rest of his band. He decided he wanted to spend some time talking to us instead.
I think it was at the Vienna opera house that we had just finished our sound check when Alvin arrived and asked if we’d fancy a jam with him. I decided (maybe I was a bit scared?) not to play guitar so I sat and played Chick Churchills keyboards. It was a lot of fun and couldn’t believe what was happening! I felt very proud when he must have acknowledged that I decided not to play guitar and opted for the keys and he came over and complimented me and said something like “Hey, a multi-instrumentalist”. Afterwards Alvin mentioned that it was a few hours before show time and he asked if I fancied going to the cinema close by with his lady who I think was Suzanne? It was a surreal experience, there I was sitting in a little cinema in Austria with Alvin Lee (who I’d only met a couple of hours before and get this the film was Charlie Chaplin in ‘The Great Dictator’. We met Wilf Pine in 1973 when we toured with The Groundhogs, but I’ll come to that later.
The band recorded Suicide in March of 1971. Can you tell me about the process of recording this LP and what you guys wanted to bring to the studio that differed from the first album? Did the experience and influence of playing some of these bigger shows that you hadn’t before make an impact on the approach of making Suicide ? Can you tell me about the songs that are featured on the LP?
Hugh Murphy who produced the first album, was brought in once more to produce the second album ‘Suicide’. We were really impressed to discover that we were to record the album at the famous Olympic Studios, Barnes, London. All the great artists had recorded there and there was so much musical history that had taken place within those walls. I suppose we wanted to soak it up and hope some of it would rub off on us. We were aware that while we were there recording other big names had either just been in or were in other studios within the building, but we never got to see anyone else as we were busy making our own album which pretty much like the first album was recorded quickly maybe just a week or so if my memory serves me correctly.
We recorded in the large Studio 1 and for me it was like Aladdins cave. There was a Steinway grand piano, a Baldwin Electric Harpsichord, Hammond Organ, a couple of different make Electric Pianos and a Mellotron, which I was told was the one The Beatles had used. I had to use it and it was an orchestra at my fingertips. We used these instruments on a few of the new songs ‘Son of the father’ and ‘Dearest Eloise’ (a Steve Gadd song). We approached the recording as we had before, virtually live in the studio and adding other instruments and vocals later. I don’t think we were particularly aware at the time of the type of venues we had been playing specifically made an impact as you put it, but I am sure that the touring overall did assist or influence the way we approached the album. I can remember while recording the song ‘Suicide’, I had the guitar volume so loud, it kept over spilling into the drum and bass microphones.
So the engineer put me and my Laney 100watt amplifier and two speaker cabinets in a vocal booth on my own so as not to interfere with the other instruments. That was crazy! So something about the songs. The opening track on the album is a story about an ordinary working man who gets called up to go and fight in the war just like his father did many years before. I am sure, because I was from that post war generation, some of the stories and images in my mind had influenced the writing of this one. Natures Way was a song I wrote which I wanted to try and get that funky Hendrix style groove that he’d got on some of his songs. Lyrically just about life. Jericho was a song based on the old story from the bible about the walls of Jericho falling down. Run Mister Run was a song about a guy who went off with someone’s lady and musically I wanted an almost Creedence Clearwater groove but incorporating a guitar style similar to Carl Perkins.
A guitarist that the guitarist, Brian, who I told you about earlier played in my brothers group and introduced me to Carl Perkins before I could even play a guitar. Dearest Eloise is a love song which Steve Gadd wrote about writing a letter. I wrote two songs which if I remember correctly I wrote after watching some tv documentaries. One was about children, babies predominately being abandoned and what happened to them. The song was ‘Where do our children belong’. The final song on the album and the title track is ‘Suicide’.
Hastings Pier - September 2nd of 1972. Photo cred: Pete Fisher.
This caused a little controversy at the time and has done from time to time over the years. Some people misunderstood the lyrics possibly because I used the ‘N’ word (I’m trying to be politically correct here). In the 60’s and into the 70’s, particularly in America there had been race riots and people being persecuted because of their color. This song was about a young black guy and felt that his life was not worth living and the only way out for him was to commit suicide. I am no racist and I have had friends and musicians of all races and religions. It was a song, a story about another perspective of racism can affect someone on a personal level. I am a story teller and I imagine if I had been around in medieval times I would have been a wandering minstrel singing my stories.
Returning to the Reading Festival in ‘72, you guys played alongside The Groundhogs and would go on to do this once again in August of ‘73. Were you becoming particularly close with them? I find it simply incredible that you guys recorded those early records so quickly in the midst of all this. How did you guys balance touring and playing gigs with finding time to write new music and then hit the studio to record it? How did you balance your lives outside of all this for that matter!?
Most of the songs I write, well the best ones anyway, I really can’t explain where they come from. I very rarely sit down specifically to write a song. It is like magic and they can come out of nowhere at any time any place and I have to write them down. I think the busier I became and the more places I visited on tour just fueled the fire to write more songs. At this time and all through the 1970’s, we/I always had too many songs to put on an album. Speaking personally, I tried to live a life as normal as possible outside of the music world. Possibly to my detriment, I did not mix with many musicians other than my immediate band members and I never did the hanging out in clubs rubbing shoulders with celebrities. I had a close family and when not on tour we would socialize and I think that kept me pretty level headed.
Saturday Morning Pictures was released in February of ‘72. Can you tell me about recording this album? Where was the band both musically as well as mentally at this point? In what ways had Stray changed since their debut in ‘70 up until now?
By the time we were to record the ‘Saturday Morning Pictures’ album we were feeling very confident. Our career seemed to be going from strength to strength. Musically we were really tight and we had lots of new songs. We felt that this album was the one which was going to break it big time for us. We were also aware that there were those in the music business who were citing Stray to become the next Led Zeppelin, or Free. This album in retrospect was my favorite Stray album. It was just a great time to be in the band and we felt we could do anything and I have to remind myself that we were still only 20 or 21 years of age. We felt we were ready to experiment with recording techniques and pursue different styles and we were extremely lucky to work with the then up and coming recording engineer Martin Birch. It felt like Martin became the fifth member of the band and I loved working with him.
It was just a great time to be in the band and we felt we could do anything and I have to remind myself that we were still only 20 or 21 years of age
By ‘73 you guys had begun to experiment with various live musicians including Andy Powell. How did you guys initially meet him? Can you tell me about supporting Black Sabbath at the Alexandra Palace that same year? In the same year the band’s fourth LP, Mudanzas, was released that May. Can you tell me about recording and writing the songs for that record?
By this time, we had signed a new management deal with Worldwide Artists and our Personal Manager was Wilf Pine. He told me once that he signed us because when he saw us play live he thought we would be the new Black Sabbath. However, when he heard the songs we had written for the album that was to become Mudanzas he thought he’d actually signed the new Beatles (a huge compliment). It I had a couple of songs which I had already had strings and brass in mind for and Wilf had somehow met up with Andy Powell a composer and arranger who had just worked with Steve Harley for the first Cockney Rebel album. I had heard and really liked the arrangement on the song Sebastian and I felt he had that George Martin feel to his arrangements which was exactly what I had in mind particularly for my song ‘I believe it’.
Initially we were disappointed that we found ourselves still on the Transatlantic Records label as after three consecutive albums with them it did not seem like they knew how to promote us? However, Wilf had done some negotiations and we found we had a much larger budget than before. We spent a week at Escape Studios in Kent basically making demos of some of the songs and then back in London we found ourselves back in Olympic Studios. Being signed with Worldwide Artists gave us the opportunity to appear at a large festival at Alexandra Palace in London with Black Sabbath who were also signed to Worldwide.
This show and a show with The Groundhogs at The Fairfield Hall in Croydon, Wilf suggested we should play some of the songs from the new album Mudanzas (Spanish word meaning to move or to change) and augment the band. I imagine some of our fans did not know what was going on especially at the Sabbath show. At that time, you did not expect to see a rock band, especially Stray with backing singers a brass section along with Andy Powell on keyboards! We only played the two shows with this line up, but for me it never felt quite right and I also think that the band got somewhat drowned out by the orchestra on the album itself.
The band’s line-up remained stable until the following year in ‘74 when an additional guitarist, Pete Dyer, was added. How did you guys come across him and what led the band to add a second guitarist at this point? How did his presence and talent influence the band? What led to Steves’ departure around this time? Were you at all nervous, or overwhelmed with taking on the vocal responsibilities with Dyer?
This is where I have to mention my brothers group The Traders yet again. Steve Gadd had moved to a house in East Acton a few doors away from him lived our personal road manager Neil Darken and a few doors from him lived Pete Dyer. One day Neil asked if it was ok for Pete to come along to one of our rehearsals to meet the band and watch us rehearse, which he did. When we got talking Pete realized that Allan Bromham was my brother and he too, at the age of about fifteen played for a little while in my brothers band. He was a few years older than me so I did not remember him straight away. Pete was playing with a club band, playing rock covers and I went to see him play on a few occasions and we became good friends (and still are to this day).
It was around this time that we all noticed Steve’s attitude to performing and to the band was changing. He did not want to stand and be to just the singer he felt he should play some guitar. He was also getting involved with others outside the band who seemed to have shall we say an unhelpful influence on him. What began to happen was that on stage he appeared to concentrate so much on the guitar playing that a lot of the time he had his back to the audience. Up until this time Steve had been one of the great front men and I was more than aware many of our fans came to see him, but he wasn’t giving them the Steve they had all got to know and love. We all tried talking to him about the situation but he felt that if he didn’t play guitar someone else should. By this time Pete had become good friends with the band and did actually know a lot of Stray songs. So we invited him along to play a few shows here and there to see how it felt.
At this time Pete was not a member of the band. By the time it came to us starting work on the ‘Stand up and be counted’ album the atmosphere within the band had come to an all-time low. Steve was writing a lot of songs which were very different from what we had been playing. He didn’t appear to like anything that I wrote so would not sing them and his general attitude was somewhat uncooperative to say the least. We had been a few days into starting to record the album and I recall going home and thinking, that I would tell the others I was going to leave the band! Unbelievably within the space of about half an hour I had a phone call from Gary and then Ritchie telling me the same thing that they were going to leave the band as well. We were not recording the next day so, Gary Ritchie and me went for a meeting with our manager Wilf Pine to discuss our dilemma. Steve was an old friend and we had been so much together we did not want to be unkind but circumstances had changed.
Wilf had noticed a change in Steves attitude but said not to worry he would speak to him and manage him as a solo artist which actually made me feel much better. So we initially went into the studios to resume recording as a three piece. Gary and Ritchie clearly were looking to me to be the singer which although I had gained confidence, I never really wanted to be THE singer but maybe we could add someone else to share the vocal duties? During the recording we decided to ask Pete if he would like to join on a permanent basis and the rest is history so to speak.
Can you tell me about the band’s first American tour in ‘75 and what that was like? What led the band to transition from Transatlantic Records to Dawn Records for the release of Stand Up And Be Counted? Had you been to the states prior to that? What were those shows like as well as sharing the stage with acts such as Spirit and Canned Heat? How was the band received in the states compared to the previous tours? You guys supported Kiss on their debut tour in ‘76, correct? What were those experiences like? You guys also supported Rush, that must have been incredible! How did you guys hook up with Charlie Kray around this time?
As I mentioned earlier, for some years we had wanted to leave Transatlantic Records, but in our youth and inexperience we appeared to a have signed a really tight deal which was not in our favour. Wilf Pine our manager did persevere with them but I think even he found them difficult to work with. However somehow he managed to get us out of the contract and got us signed to Dawn Records which was the new (supposedly) rock label of PYE Records. In retrospect they were no better. When we toured with Kiss in 1976, the promoter John Curd was so disgusted by the way Dawn (PYE) were promoting our then new album ‘Houdini’ that he would not let anyone who worked for them into the Hammersmith Odeon! Kiss were great to work with and we got very friendly with Gene Simmons and Paul Stanley.
What we did find ironic was that by this time Stray had dropped the pyrotechnics and smoke bombs etc as many critics said that because we were young we were not accomplished musicians, so we had to use pyros to help make our act seem better. It was one of Wilf Pines ideas to drop the pyros and let the music speak for itself. Kiss were complimented on their stage show and prior to this tour the same people were then saying ‘Well Stray aren’t as good, now they don’t use the smoke bombs’… you just can’t win! I know from my friends Guy, Paul and Keith who play with Def Leppard’s Joe Elliott in ‘The Down ‘n Outs’ that Gene went to see them on tour and was very complimentary and had happy memories of playing with Stray on their first UK tour. We had been to the USA a couple of years before our first tour and this was to record the ‘Move It’ album at Syncron Sound Studios, Hertford, Connecticut.
The tour itself was in the summer of ‘76 and lasted about 6 weeks, end of July through until end of August, beginning of September. It was so much fun and I have so many stories to tell it would take too long right now. We did a lot of traveling, play large and small club gigs. We went down well wherever we played and some places we played a couple of long sets which we hadn’t done for some while in the UK. By the time we got home to the UK we were such a tight sounding band and I for one loved the US so much, as you said we played with Canned Heat for a few nights at Alex Cooleys in Atlanta. We got on very well with them and Bob Hite and I had a few laughs together. Spirit were good also on that same bill were ‘Pacific Gas and Electric’ who at that time had the British bass player Kim Gardner playing for them. I think he was pleased to hear another English voice. While playing the Starwood in Hollywood, one evening Ozzie Osbourne came along to see us and that ended up being a wild night as was many nights were.
My heart had always been in American music and I could not really associate with much of the music that was popular in the UK at that time, so the USA for me felt like home. If I had one regret in life it is that I had the opportunity to stay in the USA when I visited LA and Hollywood in particular, but decided to return home due to commitments with the band and family. As the year drew on we recorded the Houdini album at Pye Studios Marble Arch which I thought was a good album, but Dawn Records promotion was no better than the predecessor Transatlantic and our manager Wilf Pine was spending more time away due to his other business interests elsewhere, primarily America. I think it was Wilf who suggested he amalgamate his management with his old boss Don Arden. Don had a son called David Arden who very briefly co managed us with Wilf, but that clearly was not working. I had got to know some of the people at Don Ardens office which was also Jet Records and it was suggested that I meet with Don personally to speak about management.
In brief I had been there several times for meetings which for one reason or another never happened. It was while I was there on one occasion that Charlie Kray sat down opposite me also waiting for a meeting with Don. Charlie had not long been released from prison and he wanted to secure a deal for his autobiography. We got talking and as he did not like to be kept waiting he asked if I could give him a lift home and during the journey he said he had friends in the music business who might be able to help me and the band. It was suggested that a good publicity stunt would be to announce that Charlie was now about to manage the rock band Stray. Soon we found ourselves on national television and in the National Press. Unfortunately, the connection backfired on us. Many in the music business were already wary of working with Stray as Wilf Pine had already gained a bad and somewhat dangerous reputation and then the name Kray associated with the Kray Twins and East End gangsters did nothing to help. Even Charlie admitted later in life that the name Kray prevented him from moving on.
What led to the unfortunate demise of the group in December of ‘77? You would go on to sign with Gull Records to pursue a solo career. How did the deal with them come about and what was going through your mind as you began to step out on your own? Can you tell me about recording the single, Who do you love?
Our last show was at The Nottingham Boat Club on Saturday 10 December 1977. Most of that year we managed ourselves and contacted agents and promoters who were still sympathetic towards Stray. My instinct told me that because we had no representation promoters would take advantage of the situation and offer less money in order to play. Gigs were becoming harder to get and the work situation of 1978 looked even worse. Punk was becoming really popular and although we were still only the same age as some of the punk bands, we were considered to be part of the old guard as it were. Almost following the show in Nottingham I began to receive bills and demands from various sources. We found that following the collapse of Worldwide Artists our tax and National Insurance contributions had never been paid. I was getting demands for cars purchased in the bands name and for van hire which was ridiculous because we owned our own truck. We had no alternative but to sell off our assets in order to try and repay creditors. I managed to find a solicitor and an accountant to help sort out the mess, but at the end of the day the band as such could be no more …. Well not at that time.
Stray would pick up off and on from the early 80’s up until the early to mid-90s. What were some of the projects you were working on in the midst of all these transitions? Were you pursuing, or working on other things outside of music?
In March 1978, I sold up and moved out of London to Bletchley in Buckinghamshire. My name and associations made it difficult for me to get a new musical position. For a while I worked for Hammond Organs who had coincidentally moved to Bletchley. I recorded three songs as demos at Escape Studios in Kent, one of the songs which was my composition ‘Who do you love’. My friend and former bass player with the band Strife, Gordon Rowley had signed his new band Nightwing to Gull Records and he suggested that I speak to David Howells who was the boss of Gull. He loved the song and thought it would make a good single.
I put together a new 3-piece band with Rom Parol on drums and Stuart Uren on bass guitar (Stu would later work with me on various projects including a new line up of Stray) and we were booked into Morgan Studios, London with a young up and coming engineer, Chris Tsangarides who went on to work with artists such as Thin Lizzy, Gary Moore, Judas Priest and many others. The single was released and we played various gigs up and down the country. Gull Records mentioned that although Stray were known as a live band we had never released a live album. Gary Ritchie and Pete had been playing some shows with two other guitarists a I was already out with my own band. As it transpired the Stray without me had finished their run of shows so I approached them to see if they fancied getting together with me again to record a “Live at The Marquee’ album which we did and Gordon Rowley engineered and produced it.
That was a strange period for me because Pete was no longer playing guitar and was singing all of the songs, so I played all of the guitar parts and backing vocals. We played a few shows and even did a short tour of Spain with Baron Rojo. When this finished I found myself working at White Trax Studios, nr Banbury where I engineered and produced various bands and artists. In 1987 I formed a band with Gordon Rowley and his drummer from Nightwing, Steve Bartley which we called the project Razorback. We played a few gigs and recorded an album, but unfortunately due to Gordons ill health we had to stop. The album did get released on Angel Air Record some years later in 2015, but there was by now another band called Razorback so it was released under the name/title BRB Razorback ‘First Bite’. In 1993 a couple of promoters asked if I could get the original band back together again with Steve Gadd back on vocals.
This was short lived and after a few gigs we went our separate ways. One agent asked if I would be interested in playing some shows as Del Bromhams Stray? As the other guys had no intention of playing as Stray as such I formed a band and for a few years it was Del Bromhams Stray, but after a while promoters tended to drop my name from the billing and it has been just Stray ever since. When it was the 50th anniversary of the bands formation, I was already booked to play a show at The Borderline in London 2016. I managed to persuade all of the original members to play a few songs on the night. The show was advertised and sold out way in advance and we played a set with no rehearsal after a gap of 23 years.
What do you mind yourself reflecting on the most throughout your musical career? What is your favorite Stray song and album that you recorded? In what ways had Stray changed since their debut in ‘70 up until recording the last LP, Houdini?
My favorite song is something I don’t think about very often, but I suppose if I had to choose it would be ‘Time Machine’ from the first album. I think musically and lyrically it encompasses everything that Stray were about. I think ‘Saturday Morning Pictures’ is my favorite Stray album. You ask about how Stray have changed, which is difficult to answer. I suppose if I was a journalist writing a piece I would say the original line up was about youth, excitement, trying to explore any musical avenues which come along. We never really thought it wasn’t possible to at least attempt anything we wanted to. I suppose that’s part of the reason we called ourselves Stray, because we stray down any path which arrived at our door. Actually the last LP of the 70’s was in fact ‘Hearts of Fire’ and I think that as the song writing was predominately my work, I wanted to write songs that were more concise and would hopefully last the test of time.
Is there anything else you would like to further share with the readers?
Well for your readers you are already fans of the band, I would like to thank you for your support, because without you there could be no band. For those who may catch up with use following this article, I do so hope you like what you hear and it’ never too late and hopefully the songs will never date and like I said before will last the test of time, long after I am gone.
I wanted to write songs that were more concise and would hopefully last the test of time
