along so well and we decided to drop out, as it happened, one by one. The planwas that I was going to carry on writing songs with the new incarnation of the band and I was actually present at the audition for Annie Haslam, but in the end I lost touch and they were quite capable of writing their own songs.


SD: Is it possible to point to any shows in the ’60s that stand out from all the others? JM: Yes! Inevitably there were a few really great shows (even though we played so many). One that comes to mind is on the tour with The Rolling Stones when we had Jeff and Jimmy in the band. We played a show in Cardiff where the band really did click which was quite unusual with both of them playing. We got a huge ovation right before the Stones were due on which was very unusual. There were also a few magical shows with the Jeff line-up (which was my favourite line-up) ranging from a small club in Hollywood to The Richmond Blues Festival. The sound was very good and we all played together very harmoniously and yet inspirationally all at the same time.


SD: The ’66 LP Yardbirds (or “Roger The Engineer” as it’s become known) remains one of the beat group era’s most pivotal releases, giving many their first taste of full-on hard-rock, experimental pop, prototype psychedelia and a lot more besides. How difficult was it to capture some of the group’s more way out sounds, given that you didn’t have terribly long in which to record? JM: Even though we didn’t have very much time we found ourselves in a relaxed atmosphere with an engineer (Roger!) who was very sensitive to our sounds. Some of the songs we played live and re-worked for the album and the rest of them we made up at the time, all putting our own ideas in the pot… and it was just one of those moments that worked! From my angle we worked quite a lot on the drum sound and for the first time used quite a few mikes on the kit.


SD: What are your favourite tracks on the LP? JM: My favourites were ‘Over, Under, Sideways, Down’ because it worked well as a collaborative song and came together really nicely. Also ‘Jeff’s Boogie’, which had some nice spontaneous moments. We had great fun with ‘He’s Always There’ with the semi- Latin rhythm feel, which recently got picked up by The Pussycat Dolls who sampled the beginning for their hit ‘When I Grow Up’.


SD: You’ve played with lead guitarists all of whom later became revered throughout the world: Eric Clapton, Jeff Beck and Jimmy Page. Were you ever aware of their emergent virtuoso status when you were all thrashing away at The Crawdaddy and The Marquee? JM: When we all played together as a band with any of the lead guitar players we were just a band where everyone was equal and each person had their role to play. All these guitar players were –in retrospect –finding their footing while playing with The Yardbirds. The only one who was almost established was Jimmy Page, in terms of being a leading session player. He expanded his style during his time with us and even more afterwards. Eric and Jeff also found their individual virtuoso sounds once having left.


SD: Of the original ’60s line-ups of The Yardbirds, which for you was the most exciting/thrilling to play with? JM: As I said earlier for me it was the line- up with Jeff Beck, myself, Paul Samwell- Smith, Chris Dreja and Keith Relf.


SD: There’s an ’89 Keith Relf single on the MCCM label featuring the tracks ‘Together Now’ (recorded using the name Together in ’68) and a wonderfully ethereal piece called ‘All The Falling Angels’, taped just 12 days before Keith was fatally electrocuted playing guitar at home. The drummer was unknown at the time of release. I’ve always wondered whether it could’ve been Jim McCarty?


JM: The drummer was in fact not myself and I don’t know who it was. At the time


in Toronto called Oasis and in the early ’90s Louis Cennamo and I collaborated on some ethereal music under the name Stairway. Oasis put out one of these collaborations called ‘Raindreaming’.


SD: Pianist Donald Quan also plays a major role. Did the recordings turn out as well as you expected them to? JM: After a rather frustrating visit to my home in France in 2004 when none of the equipment I had hired worked, we sat down to look at some of his DVDs and I was entranced by the light touch of Donald who was playing piano with Ron on flute. We got to talk about the various musicians he knew in Toronto and that got me thinking… then when I’d accumulated a few pieces of music I decided to go to Toronto.


SD: A lot of the lyrical ideas on the album deal with change. ‘Living From The Inside Out’ is very upbeat and ‘Hummingbird’ possesses an almost spiritual brilliance. Would you care to elaborate? JM: Well, part of my own journey since leaving The Yardbirds originally in ’68, when I was going through some pretty difficult and dark times personally, has been a profound spiritual exploration of myself and my understanding of things around me. It feels to me that life has changed since then, and somehow I don’t feel so connected to, nor responsible for, the un-doing of things as perhaps my generation was once upon a time.


Keith and I slightly lost touch with each other for some reason. I found it very difficult to work with him at that time.


SD: You’re the featured lead vocalist on one or two of the early Renaissance songs. Did you do much lead vocal work in the group? JM: Yes I did feature on a couple of Renaissance songs, for example ‘The Golden Thread’. Keith did encourage me to sing. After the group broke up in ’71 I went on to form the band Shoot which I thought would be a vehicle for my own songs. Of course I sang all the songs on the album.


SD: Armageddon, the group Keith would lead in ’75, featured most of the earlier Renaissance players. Were you asked to be part of that set-up or had your paths diverged somewhat at that time? JMc: Keith formed Armageddon around the same time as I was working on the Shoot project. At the time I wasn’t actually invited to play with them. The Armageddon sound was a little bit heavy for me at that time.


SD: Jumping forward to the new album, Ron Korb plays flute and other wind instruments, bringing lots of colour and depth to the tracks. How long have you been collaborating with him? JM: Ron originally had a small record label


SD: I also sense a lineage that recalls the pastoral beauty of such unlikely merrie England musical bedfellows as Robert Wyatt, a Floydian air, and even, dare I say, snatches of Brian Eno. Do you see anything of this in your work? JM: It’s very interesting that you say that because quite a few people have mentioned particularly the Floyd after hearing this new CD and also there has been comparisons made to Robert Wyatt (another singing drummer!) I can’t say honestly that I have been aware of this but I am not at all unhappy by the comparisons.


SD: How did you end up with ex-Genesis man Steve Hackett playing lead guitar on ‘Living From The Inside Out’? JM: I’ve known Steve for quite a while. He was my neighbour when I lived in Richmond. We invited him to play a couple of tracks on the Box Of Frogs project in the ’80s. He seemed to enjoy it and we enjoyed working with him. With ‘Living From The Inside Out’ I just thought that ’70s-style progressive guitar would fit the song perfectly and naturally thought of Steve. I was honoured that he was up for it.


SD: How do you regard your musical relationship with Chris Dreja? You’re the only two original Yardbirds left! JM: Chris and I always considered ourselves the “back room boys” of The Yardbirds and I’ve always found him to be very steady and consistent within the band even though we go off and do our own creative things as well. The exciting thing is now that we’re joined by a group of younger players. This all makes playing a real pleasure again.


• 21


Photo courtesy of Easy Action Records


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