Neil Innes

A Tribute to Neil Innes

9 December 1944 – 29 December 2019

by Harry Pye

Neil Innes was a member of The Bonzo Dog Doo-Dah Band and The Rutles. He also collaborated with The Monty Python team and released several splendid solo albums. On Twitter, he described himself as being an, “Ego Warrior, Style Guru and fantasist.” According to the Internet his most famous quip was, “I’ve suffered for my music... now it’s your turn.” He was always brilliant company and a lovely man who never let his friends down.

On December the 29th 2019 we learned Neil had died. The Seventh Python was no more, Ron Nasty has ceased to be, the Urban Spaceman no longer existed etc. In November I’d seen him in London and he was on fine form and before Xmas we’d been swapping e-mails and doing a Q&A about his latest LP so, like Rutle fans everywhere, when I heard the news I was, “shocked and stunned.”

It’s hard to remember a time when I wasn’t a fan of Neil and his Bonzo Dog chums.

I was very young the first time I saw Neil on TV which was when he was a guest on a kids TV show called, The Wide Awake Club. I remember being impressed when he did a handstand. I managed to find a second-hand copy of, Urban Spaceman which I bought for 50p in a shop in Lewisham. The single didn’t have a picture sleeve but last November I got him to draw one for me while we sat in a pub.  Neil’s guitar solo on the b-side (In The Canyons of Your Mind) is comedy gold. It made me laugh when I was 11-year-old and it still makes me laugh as a 46-year-old - so that 50p I spent was clearly a good investment. The Internet tells me that in 1968, Urban Spaceman was a Top 5 hit and Neil received an Ivor Novello Award.  Neil had many other reasons to blow his trumpet... The Bonzos perform one of the many classic songs Neil wrote with Viv Stanshall in The Beatles film, Magical Mystery Tour. In 1973 Innes released a cracking solo album, How Sweet To Be An Idiot. When the album's title track was released as a single it failed to reach the charts but the song would become well known after it's inclusion in the film, Monty Python Live at The Hollywood Bowl.  In 1994 the melody of, How Sweet To Be An Idiot was pinched by Noel Gallagher of Oasis for their top 5 hit, Whatever. Thankfully, Gallagher came clean and Innes received royalties and a co-writing credit. Throughout the 1970s Innes continued to work with the Pythons. He collaborated with John Cleese on the song, Knights of the Round Table which features in the film, The Holy Grail. Innes shows his face in several of their movies including Terry Gilliam's film, Jabberwocky, Micheal Palin's film, The Missionary and composed the soundtrack for Terry Jones's film, Erik The Viking. Innes also collaborated with Eric Idle on the TV series, Rutland Weekend Television which led to the hit film, The Rutles: All You Need Is Cash for which Innes wrote 14 songs. Neil enjoyed success with his solo album and BBC 2 TV series, The Innes Book of Records. And in more recent times Neil was a member of The Idiot Bastard Band, and had toured with The Bootleg Beatles. 

I first met Neil about 16 years ago. I’d graduated from art school and had spent about 5 years curating art exhibitions and organising events. I sent Neil a silly fan letter which mentioned I was working on a special project that was proving to be quite expensive. I told him that I had persuaded 100 artists to make a painting of their mother and that on Mother’s Day 2004 we were going to exhibit them all in a community centre in Bethnal Green. Neil had written a great song about Mothers and I asked his permission to quote some of his lyrics (if we could get enough cash to publish a catalogue). I didn’t really expect him to reply but he did. He sent me a witty letter saying, “I’ve never been a rich man but here’s a cheque for £100”. He said he’d be delighted if we quoted his lyrics in our brochure and added that he’d come and perform the song at the opening and that he’d love to contribute a painting of his mother to the show too. That’s the kind of guy he was. Neil kept all his promises and sang great versions of Mother, Love is Getting Deeper, and One Of Those People to a very appreciative crowd. Some of the audience were like me and could recite the lyrics to his Rutles songs off by heart. And other people there had no idea who he was but loved him anyway. I remember that night feeling taken aback by his kindness and doing  my best to thank him. I told him it had been a thrill to meet him and see him perform and so on but he just smiled and started complimenting me back.

We stayed in touch and I asked him if he wanted to be in a musical evening I was organising where there would be a house band and different singers would come on and sing a song about a different part of the world. Neil wasn’t free on the date we were doing it on but told me he’d always fancied covering, “Rio” (written by Mike Nesmith of The Monkees). We agreed we’d do something about that one day when the time was right.

I saw Neil play live about ten times and he never disappointed me. He was always great as a performer and he was always generous with his time. He'd happily sign anything and chat to anyone. He once said the aim of his songs was to make people think more than once and laugh more than twice. And when he was parodying another songwriter he said it was important to be cheeky but not actually put the boot in. Neil's song, Godfrey Daniel is a wonderful piss take of Elton John's Your Song but it isn't nasty and so when Sir Elton heard it his reaction was to send Neil a big bunch of flowers in thanks for making him laugh.

Neil was one of the first people I thought of when I was asked to select some guest speakers for an event at Tate Modern. I met up with Neil who had been working with his old Bonzo pals on the brilliant For the Love of Dogs reunion CD, and we walked around Tate Modern trying to find a work he could enthuse about. Neil chose Claes Oldenburg’s  giant electric plug. After chatting about Dada, Surrealism, Pop Art and the importance of being Ernst, Neil ended his 10 minute talk by getting the crowd to join him in promising to not take themselves too seriously ...

“I solemnly swear to defend self-esteem wherever it may be without ever appearing pompous or idiotic and never to repeat parrot fashion anything I am told by anyone posing as an authority figure so help me Rhonda...”

About 7 years ago I began collaborating on a few musical projects with my friend Julian Wakeling and a brilliant saxophonist called Paul Speare. With a little help from other musical friends such as Micko Westmoreland and Horace Panter (of The Specials) I was finally in a position to contact Neil and say let’s record that version of Rio we always said we’d one day do. Recently I found an e-mail Neil sent around the time of the recording session at Julian’s house...

“Dearest H, SO looking forward to it - do I have the address? Have I had my lunch? They hide your trousers here you know...xx N" 

Horace and I both have a birthday at the end of August which is when we’d agreed to meet.  Neil being Neil, arrived at the house with a bottle of champagne for each for us and a splendid time was had by all. I collaborated with the film maker Gordon Beswick on a video for Rio which involved doing lots of paintings of Neil. One of our paintings was selected by Chantal Joffe R.A. for a special show she curated at The Mall Gallery. A free newspaper called City A.M. had a competition where one of their readers could go to the show and pick a painting they liked, which the Newspaper would pay for. Amusingly, out of the hundreds on display, the winner selected the portrait of Neil by me and Gordon.

Post Rio I invited Neil to help with an organisation called Specialised who raise money for a number of charities most notably The Teenage Cancer Trust. I invited Rat Scabies (of The Damned) to play drums and Kevin Eldon to sing and before we knew it a super group was born. Horace came up with the name, The Spammed and Micko put huge amounts of energy into finding studios, engineers, producers and making sure everyone stayed in touch. They recorded covers of various songs by Jimmy Cliff, Madness, Bob Marley, The Jam, and Marc Bolan's T-Rex. Every Spammed session was a delight. 

Neil loved everyone in The Spammed and everyone in The Spammed loved Neil. It would have been brilliant if they’d got to do some live shows but it wasn’t to be. We all feel so lucky we got to hang out with one of our heroes and take comfort in the fact he got to record one last solo album.

Neil talks about the last record, (Nearly Really) on his website:

“Last year, Steve James and I got together to plan a “New Album”. [Steve worked with me on both Rutle albums and the Innes Book of Records] We approached Pledge Music and launched a campaign. In December 2018, a target of £25,000 was reached. Musicians and Studio were booked – in Brisbane – where Steve lives. Just before setting off on January 18th – I was advised that money due would be “delayed”. There was no choice, fares were paid, accommodation arranged – I had to hope – and go. Recording began on January 24th."

To everyone's horror it was then revealed that Pledge Music had gone bust" Neil soldiered on. He told his fans, 

"Money is tight – we still have to sell enough CDs to raise the cash just to cover the postage to those who “pledged”, got refunded and then donated to GoFundMe. Yes, it is a mess. All I wanted was to share my songs – not spread gloom and disappointment. But friends tell me the album is a “joy”. Please tell your friends!"

I've heard the album and I would describe, Nearly Really as being a "joy" too. If you're a fan of Harry Nilsson, The Travelling Wilburys and albums by Dylan such as, Love & Theft then I'd say Neil's album will bring you sunshine. You can buy Nearly Really directly from Neil’s website here.

Q & A with Neil Innes

Harry Pye: What can you tell me about your new album’s opening track, Old Age Becomes Me? The style of the song reminds me a little of Leon Redbone - do you sometimes have another singer in mind when writing a song?

Neil Innes: “It was written for my 65th birthday- it just came together. I have always enjoyed a certain vintage of songs - 50’s kind of witty lyrics - like the ones Harry Nilsson covered so beautifully. I wasn’t thinking of anyone in particular, just following the chords and allowing the words to fall into place. One of the “lucky” ones!”

There are a couple of lines from Surly In The Morning that make me laugh out loud. Which lyricists or song writing heroes make you chuckle?

“Tom Lehrer - Michael Flanders - Gilbert… Shuttleworth!”

The track, Like Father Like Son features some really beautiful guitar playing - can you tell me about how you select guitarists and how you get the best out of them?

“That’s a Baritone Ukulele doing most of the work on that track - but I was so lucky to meet Warwick Scott who played guitar on everything. We didn’t talk much. Laughed a lot! Steve James said he was his “go-to” guitarist. He asked me what I liked and I mentioned Ry Cooder’s "Mambo Sinuendo” album. He hadn’t heard it so I played a bit saying how much I loved the “twangy” tones. Next thing I know he is playing all the things I like!”

Your song, The Filthy Rich? address the state of our nation and asks how many more millions do some bankers need? Are you optimistic about the future of Britain? 

“I can’t say I am optimistic - “Inequality" is up there with "Climate Change” - stinging nettles that Humanity must grasp. What we really need is “Primate Change”.  Amassing huge amounts of money is fundamentally stupid - it is only a token of exchange - you can’t eat it. “Make Sense not Money” is my slogan for the 21st Century. We all have to take responsibility for what we do to the planet and if you make a mess, don’t forget to wash your hands.”

The album ends with, Just Sitting Here - a song about enjoying the tranquility of solitude. All in all are you a happy man these days? What would make you really, really happy?

“No more questions! Seriously, I have much to be grateful for but I have also been a victim and know only too well some of the ways of the world that are considerably less than honest. Really this song is about a long relationship and facing up to the fact that one or other of you is going to be left alone - eventually. Ultimately, we are all alone - together.”

Harry Pye and Neil Innes