5. Graham Bond OrganisationThe Sound Of ’65
I’d always played jazz – but with Graham, we decided to go commercial, do something people could relate to. For me, it started with the Alexis Korner band – four jazz and blues guys, playing together. From them, to Graham Bond, onto Cream, that was a logical progression. Every band I ever played in I always had to play a drum solo because the crowd demanded it. It was no one’s idea, it was just normal procedure for the penultimate number to be a great big drum solo. Certainly, whenever I played and whoever I played with, that was the case. Graham did have a troubled life. I saw him change. When he first appeared on the jazz scene he was very smart, a suit and tie and all that – but then he got involved with the occult, with tarot cards and that sort of thing – and then, in the end, drugs, acid. It didn’t affect his playing but it definitely affected his personality. He got left behind compared with other people in that scene that went on to big things but that was of his own doing. He became very difficult to work with. He died young, too. 36. I did the cover for that record – the lettering, and everything. Painting, that’s another of my things.
