DEXYS MIDNIGHT

More please, and thank you: Dexys’ Celtic soulmates Helen O’Hara and Kevin Rowland, London, July 1982.

Tom Sheehan T WAS WHILE WALKING on Walthamstow Marshes near government-approved exercise during lockdown in 2020, TooRye-Ay Rowland. He chuckles at the

During his stroll, he’d pondered the upcoming 40th an Too-Rye-Ay, though. It’s liver a record that measured up sonically to the other hit Too-Rye-Ay Too-Rye-Ay

Ah, well.

on his constitutional in 2020. And remix One day, however, while riding a motor seemed to heal normally. So, once he was h home to London. h d an internal tear that required an immediate operation. Too-Rye-Ay is now Searching For The Young Soul Rebels ➢

➣ the exodus before Rowland paid him a visit. “He made me an offer I couldn’t refuse,” recalls such a miserable event; the band had had enough of reau, but Kevin said he couldn’t do it without me.”

Rowland told him he wanted them to write he improvised I Couldn’t Help If I Tried in a panic when asked if he had had a radical new sound for the previ unique direction.” The destination Rowland had in mind was Celtic folk Rowland, “I was thinking, Oh, OK,

Rowland, meanwhile, had been re message had been left for him from Kevin Row on the spot, agreeing to Rowland’s one stipulation. about rascal school lads slipping into adulthood. stalled at Number 16 in the charts,” recalls Rowland, thought it had a great hook. I remember thinking, People are fed up with brass, I’m going to have to do something new. I started experi .”

on cloud nine. I hadn’t seen Kevin Rowland for six months, but I young group

together,’ know but Rowland said he couldn’t hear it tape with him. So I did. The next time the radio…” er’s demo. It was lighter than the texture he’d been working on with Pater ton. He even said, ‘She might be good cepts this. “The important thing, however,” clari Rowland thinks if he’d stuck with a viola, violin and cello with Paterson’s trombone behind them talking about slagging me off. Let’s see who pulls this off.”

There are two songs on Too-Rye-Ay idea not to use. ers, because it uses three violins and a piano, creating a similar he’ll put his out.” Rowland was distraught. Little did he know that the other shoe was about to drop. ➢

B Bull M Mid left) righ Billy and pro Wils Dex Bre Don’t Stand Me Down, 1985;

Getting personal: Rowland and O’Hara take TooRye-Ay on the road; (below) “folk heroes” Brendan Behan and Ken Livingstone.

IN MARCH 1983, Dexys re-released The Celtic Soul Brothers as a single, hopeful that it might avenge its previous Number 45 position in the UK singles chart. It did: it hit Number 20. But for Kevin Rowland it represented another missed opportunity. He wanted the new song on its B-side, the conversational stroll of Reminisce (Part 1) to be the A-side. Mercury said no.

“I felt Reminisce (Part 1) was a big step forward for us,” says Rowland today. “It was new and radical, I love the rhythm section on it, the production by Colin Fairley. I’d done spoken parts of songs before but that was the frst conversation we’d incorporated into a song.”

The rambling lyric refers to a visit to Dublin Rowland had undertaken with Dexys in 1980, before the March take-of of Geno changed everything for the band.

“It was the frst time I’d been back to Ireland since I was 16 – 10 years,” say Rowland. “I was excited. I’d been reading Brendan Behan, all that. Dublin wasn’t commercialised like now and I wanted to go and look at the bars Behan may have gone to. I took a couple

asked a guy in a bar where I might fnd the spirit of Brendan Behan. He smiled and said, ‘New York.’”

After this, the song takes an unusual

“It don’t matter!”

“That was inspired by me and Helen,” says Rowland. “We were going out, but we weren’t that close. I was intense, not much fun to be around. I wanted more. That ad-lib bit is just me pouring my heart out about her.”

The eccentric end to what would have been a fairly eccentric single release by a hit band involved Rowland referring to controversial left-wing Labour head of Greater London Council (back then, efectively the capital’s mayor) as a “folk hero”.

“The ending about Ken Livingstone was because he’d been given absolute hell in England about inviting Gerry Adams over to London to discuss why the IRA wanted to bomb his city. I thought that was really brave. So Billy and I have that conversation over the ending. All scripted, of course.” y

g hislips andexclaiming

By now, he had an eight-piece band, plus a new string section, all looking to him. This added to the tension.

“I was trying hard to keep everyone together, but we were broke. Not everyone was being paid. The record label looked like they might drop us. Everyone was sick of it.”

The day in early ’82 that he brought Come On Eileen to rehearsals did not go well. Rowland didn’t have words for it yet, so he asked the band to sing the main refrain. The alto sax player, Brian Brummitt, kept doing it differently. Brian’s got an attitude, thought Rowland. “No,” he told Brummitt, “you’re singing it wrong.”

“I know what it is,” replied Brummitt. “I just don’t like it!”

Rowland snapped. “If you don’t like it then fuck off!”

Brummitt left immediately to catch a train home to Newcastle, followed out by Paterson, who drank a bottle of vodka and then returned to rehearsals to say he was also quitting.

“I’ll always regret leaving,” says Paterson, “because there was no reason to. I was drinking a lot and I was angry, confused. I let everyone down.”

Helen O’Hara couldn’t believe it. “I didn’t understand why ternally, but they had superb musicianship, focus, and an exceptional leader. There was something extraordinary there.”

Paterson and Brummitt formed the TKO Horns and were immediately hired by Rowland as session players for the Too-Rye-Ay

“Kevin led rehearsals like a conductor in an orchestra,” remembers O’Hara. “It was disciplined, hard work.”

When they were fully prepped, Dexys joined Langer and W Winstanley at Genetic Studios in Berkshire to begin recording. The p producers, who’d recently enjoyed huge success with Madness, w were used to moulding an album in its entirety. This was not to be t the case on Too-Rye-Ay.

“They were stumped by how tightly rehearsed we were,” says R Rowland. “There was no work to be done, not on the sound, the songs or even the sequence, we just needed to be recorded. They’d suggest double-tracking brass and I’d say no. ‘Oh, let’s try it.’ I was used to having Jim or Kevin Archer back me up, but I was alone. T That didn’t feel great. I actually had less control now.”

Nevertheless, the recordings were smooth. “The performances

so su us

played well.” pl what he heard. “It wasn’t right. It’s so easy to fuck things up in the mix.” th t Everyone else – label, management, even the band – thought th Too-Rye-Ay remix argument. By August, Dexys had a hit on their hands re anyway. “Eileen was Number 1. I was thinking, Wow, this an is great!” is Helen O’Hara says the atmosphere immediately changed.

“ “Dexys felt lighter, happier. We’d shrunk to a nucleus, plus session players, and that diluted the intensity. Everyone was se h having fun, even Kevin.” By the time they got to Top Of The Pops for the album’s s second single, a re-recording of Too-Rye-Ay’s Van Morrison c cover, Jackie Wilson Said (“the label’s decision: big mistake”),

R Rowland was growing bored with pop stardom. At the studio h he asked a technician to hang a photo of chunky, eccentric d darts champion Jocky Wilson as a backdrop. “But people will think it’s a mistake!” came the reply.

“Yeah, that’s the joke,” replied Rowland. Now he says, “I can’t “ “Ye believe people thought we were serious. I was pissing myself.”

“Kevin could be really funny,” says O’Hara, who by this stage was in a typically intense, ultimately doomed romance with Rowland. “People miss his humour. But I sensed the end of the cycle was approaching on the second US tour of ’83. The promotion was endless and it was wearing him down.”

In New York on that tour, he took O’Hara shopping to Brooks Brothers, pointing out the button-down shirts and loafers he’d seen, hinting at the stylistic swerve he’d insist on for Dexys’ next

album, 1985’s Don’t Stand Me Down.

One afternoon at Rowland’s house in the summer of 1983, O’Hara was sitting outside when Rowland walked by carrying all the dungarees he’d worn over the last 18 months and threw them in the bin.

“That was the indication that Kevin had moved on from Too-Rye-Ay,” she says. ET, KEVIN ROWLAND NEVER TRULY MOVED ON from Too-Rye-Ay. That mix nagged away for 38 years. the Tim Burgess Twitter Listening Party for Too-Rye-Ay. It was the in too. time I had.”

“Kevin Archer called me up after the Listening Party and we had a good chat,” explains Rowland. “He said, ‘So, the sound of Celtic Soul Brothers and the build-up, breakdown, speed-up on Eileen. That’s it.’ Yeah, that’s it. He does get a sizeable percentage of the song-writing royalties, has done for many years, and a cut of the recording royalties.”

“The money helps,” agrees Archer. “Oh, it does.”

After he’d spoken to Archer, Rowland called Helen O’Hara. He was really excited. “I felt quite emotional hearing Kevin talking about remixing Too-Rye-Ay,” she says. “It e says. “It brought home how frustrating it must have must have been living with it all this time.”

Rowland told her the label were going to pay for a remix, alongside a lavish box set, and that he wanted her involved. He calls her the Ministry of Tuning. “Helen’s got great ears.”

The pair collaborated with producer Pete

e going to ox set, and lls her the at ears.” ducer Pete with Rowland mixing Don’t Stand Me Down in Me Down in a difficult recording process to a swift conclusion. They’ve maintained a close working relationship ever since. “Pete understands drama and dynamics in music,” explains Rowland. “He knows what I like.” As soon as Schwier put all the multitracks up, he realised how well the band had played. There’d be no need to re- as possible back into the songs. The principal change I hear is Kevin’s vocal. You can hear all the spirit from the recording now.”

Schwier worked on the tracks in sequence, referencing Rowland and O’Hara’s notes, methodically rebuilding each mix until he felt it was ready. Then he’d move on to the next song. When he was

“Kevin sent me a voice message straight away and you could hear the emotion in his voice. ‘I’m dancing around the room, Pete…’”

“Kevin called me in tears,” says O’Hara. “He was so happy.”

“I was tearful,” explains Rowland, “because I felt proud of it, something that had never happened before.” Too-Rye-Ay – As It Should Have Sounded also secures Dexys’ legacy for Rowland. “It’s stand up against anything else as three quality albums.”

OR KEVIN ROWLAND, THE REHABILITATION OF

Too-Rye-Ay has also unlocked Dexys’ future. Over the last year, the singer has been working on new songs for a Dexys album, sending ideas to current collaborators including multi-instrumentalist Sean Read and keyboardist Mike

album, se multi-ins - ished with music, but the Too-Rye-Ay ished with fresh creativity. fresh crea

That process has now hit the natural limit of what can be achieved remotely. He needs to meet with his band to rehearse, record. Rowland shrugs.

“You can’t rush it,” he says. “It’s frustrating but I’ll get there.”

Some wounds take a little longer to heal.

That p be achieve rehearse, “You c get there.” Some w

M