A poet, a comic, and a musician walk into a room… The Scaffold was hardly an ordinary band. In fact, it wasn’t a band at all. Yet Roger McGough, John Gorman, and Mike McGear (a.k.a. McCartney, a.k.a. Paul’s younger brother) of Liverpool released singles on Parlophone produced by Sir George Martin, had a chart-topping hit, and sold out such esteemed venues as the Queen Elizabeth Hall on London’s South Bank. Their thirteen-year time together outlasted The Beatles. Now, Cherry Red’s Esoteric Recordings imprint has released one of the year’s zaniest and most…
With a Little Help From Their Friends: Esoteric Reissues “McGough and McGear” In Mono and Stereo
The original 1968 LP issue of McGough and McGear reprinted a handwritten list of “People on a Train.” These famous people included Jimi Hendrix, Spencer Davis, Gary Leeds of the Walker Brothers, Dave Mason, John Mayall, Graham Nash, Paul Samwell-Smith, Jane Asher and a certain Paul McCartney. The train, in fact, was the studio where Roger McGough and Mike McGear – real name, Mike McCartney – recorded their only album as a duo. The unconventional yet accessible art-rock classic, produced in part by the future Sir Paul and featuring all of those…
