Golf International - Music Issue

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MUSIC & GOLF DOMINIC PEDLER

EAGLE

BIRDIE BOGEY

BOOGIE While both involve swing, grooves, Albatross, Eagles, Funk and Rock, golf and music are hardly the most obvious bedfellows.

Undaunted, Dominic Pedler explores the history of golf songs and other trivia linking his two favourite subjects

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LONDON FEATURES INTERNATIONAL

No signs of a 19th-Hole Nervous Breakdown as the Stones of the mid-’60s relax on the practice green.

IMAGE SUPPLIED BY THE USGA

IMAGE SUPPLIED BY THE USGA

MUSIC & GOLF DOMINIC PEDLER

Published golf music dates back to the late 19th century, with these early examples taken from the archives of the USGA Museum in Far Hills, New Jersey.

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“Golf and rock ‘n’ roll? Not logical….but it is fascinating,” muses Star Trek legend, Leonard Nimoy, when introducing Jake Trout And The Flounders’ 1998 album I Love To Play, a collection of offbeat collaborations between actors, musicians and professional golfers.

Spock was right – starting with the Flounders themselves, the US PGA Tour’s impromptu covers’ band founded by the multi-talented frontman Peter Jacobsen with fellow pros Mark Lye on guitar and the late Payne Stewart on harmonica.

In covering a selection of classic pop hits with cleverly rewritten golfing lyrics, the Flounders (with a little help from real rockers like Alice Cooper, the Eagles and Stephen Stills) did for golfers what the Beach Boys did for surfers in the ’60s and Avril Lavigne for skateboarders in the Noughties.

Admittedly, you won’t find too many shelves devoted to the dubious genre of ‘Golf Music’ in what’s left of your local record shop. But there’s a surprisingly large catalogue out there – not to mention much associated trivia that just might amuse musicmad golfers. Or, indeed, golf-mad musos.

Over the various features of this themed issue, we’ll be tipping our visors to a full set of divas and crooners, pop stars and punks, hippies and hip-hoppers, who have all combined golf and music in some way.

Beyond the songs themselves, we’ll see how golf gave the Beatles a serendipitious early break, and how even the Rolling Stones, the Sex Pistols, Oasis, U2 and McFly have their own unlikely titbits of golf trivia. Not forgetting musical mentions for pro tour stars ranging from John Daly to Michelle Wie. Confused? Then read on.

Our journey starts somewhat austerely in the archives of the USGA museum in Far Hills, New Jersey, which houses reams of printed sheet music confirming that ‘golf music’ has been around since at least the 19th century.

Those early songs and poems were mostly nostalgic ditties on the social context of the game – many of them focus-

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ing on the charms of the caddie, as shown by My Caddy from 1891, which begins: Who makes a sandy little tee And, down upon his bended knee Adjusts the golf ball carefully?

My caddy Hardly a chart-botherer (and never mind that the lyrics were made redundant the following year by the advent of the Perfectum tee peg). But here, perhaps, are the modest roots of a golf song catalogue which, more than 100 years later, now numbers in the hundreds.

By the turn of the 20th century we had elaborate musical arrangements for golf songs like The Caddy, a march and two-step from 1900, Millie –- The Caddy’s Song, published the following year, as well as Oh, How I Love The 19th Hole (When The 18th Hole Is Over).

Still, it would be over half a century before Marilyn Monroe delivered arguably music’s most memorable golfing lyric, smouldering over the exotic melody of a Cole Porter classic in the 1960 film, Let’s Make Love: While tearing off a game of golf I may make a play for the caddy But when I do I don’t follow-through ‘Cause my heart belongs to Daddy Originally written for the musical Leave It To Me, Porter took great pleasure in pointing out that My Heart Belongs To Daddy was actually more about sado-masochism than golf (though some would argue they are the same thing).

The mischievous songwriter would recount how a naive Mary Martin (who starred in the original 1938 Broadway production alongside Gene Kelly) had to be quietly explained the various lyrical doubles entendres.

Rivalling Marilyn for posterity is Bing Crosby’s delightful Straight Down The Middle – arguably the ultimate ‘proper’ golf song in terms of music, lyrics and performance. Not quite up there with composer Jimmy Van Heusen’s classics like Come Fly With Me and Call Me Irresponsible, but a charming ditty, nonetheless, concerning what we’d now affectionately refer to as an archetypal ‘Rock Hudson’: Straight down the middle, it went straight down the middle Then it started to hook just a wee wee bit That’s when my caddie lost sight of it That little white pellet has never been found to this day But it went straight down the middle, like they say The song was recorded on New Year’s Eve, 1957, and became one of Bing’s career highlights (right up there with his hole-in-one at the 16th at Cypress Point) before taking his own fairway to heaven on a Spanish golf course in October 1977.

Crosby’s heir to the crooner’s crown, Frank Sinatra, may not have had the golf bug of fellow rat packers, Sammy Davis Jnr. and Dean Martin, but Ol’ Blue Eyes still managed a convincing golf lyric in his 1941 rendition of Everything Happens To Me (written by Matt Dennis of Angel Eyes fame): I make a date for golf and you can bet your life it rains

Circular Grooves GOLF ALBUM REVIEWS

Golf concept albums date back at least to 1957’s Fore! by folk star Oscar Brand and the Sandtrappers (released on the famous Elektra label), and Larry Clinton’s Music For Tired Golfers (on MGM the following year). The most recent offerings we could find were the 2005 German import Beste Entspannungsmusik Fur Golfer, a ‘Chill Out’ Lounge collection on Manifold Records, and The Music Of Golf, a selection of melodic instrumentals by CBS composer David Barrett. By no means definitive, the following reviews nevertheless provide a snapshot of the highs and lows of golf music readily available on CD.

I LOVE TO PLAY JAKE TROUT AND THE FLOUNDERS (1998, EMI-Capitol) ALBUM COVER PHOTOGRAPHY BY CHARLES BRISCOE-KNIGHT

After the cult reception to their 1990 debut cassette (now a rare collector’s item) Peter Jacobsen, Mark Lye and Payne Stewart enlisted a team of A-list celebrities for a second stab at classic covers rewritten with golf lyrics.

Hence Alice Cooper is on hand to turn I’m Eighteen (“and I like it”) into I’m On Eighteen (“and I shanked it”), Stephen Stills delivers a side-splitting Love The One You Whiff and Glenn Frey plays searing slide as the Eagles’ Smuggler’s Blues mutates into Struggler’s Blues.

Jacobsen’s brilliant lyrics are liberally littered with in-jokes, viz. “I could maybe change my technique…and be just like Jim Furyk”. Along with great liner notes and packaging, this charming concept is completed by impromptu quips from Arnold Palmer, Bill Murray, Clint Eastwood, Greg Norman, John Daly and Fluff Cowan (who teases that even “Tiger’s thinking of starting a band”). Rating: Eagle

GOLF’S GREATEST HITS VARIOUS ARTISTS (1996, Teed Off Records) The seductive opening golf lyric in Cole Porter’s My Heart Belongs To Daddy was immortalized

by Marilyn Monroe in the 1960 film Let’s Make Love.

A carefully compiled historical snapshot of golf music over the last century embracing many of the most famous artists in the genre, including Loudon Wainwright III (Golfin’ Blues), Pete Shoemaker (Bogey Bob) and Chip Williams (No Gimmies).

Producer Richard Skelly has done his homework, blending such diverse offerings as Oscar Brand’s Fore!, a knees-up novelty from 1956, and Sittin’ In The Sandtrap, a sophisticated jazz instrumental from golf-playing vibraphonist, Milt Jackson.

Between these two extremes we’re treated to the aforementioned Golf’s A Bitch And Then You Die, Martha Stewart’s diva vocals on the jaunty Golf Widow, and Ray Reach’s rousing Straight Down The Middle (Bing Crosby’s version proved too expensive to license).

While sadly lacking in golf-rock content, this is a fascinating package for golf historians, with forensic liner notes providing numerous leads for further research. Rating: Birdie

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MUSIC & GOLF DOMINIC PEDLER

THE WORLD’S FUNNIEST GOLF SONGS THE GOLF BOY (2004, Delvian Records) The Golf Boy is Robin Lane, an American musician and producer over three decades, who follows the Jake Trout route of bastardising ten classic pop hits with his own golf lyrics. Hence the Beach Boys Surfin’ USA and Help Me Rhonda become Golfin’ USA and Help Me Find It, while Bruce Springsteen’s Born In The USA gets reborn as Born For The PGA. The latter showcases just some of Lane’s crimes against rhymes: “Tiger was born with a club in his hand/He learned to play before he could stand/He was on the golf course in his diapers/Drivin’ long and breakin’ par.”

The choice of songs is fine but the production isn’t, with sterile drum machines and cheap synths making for a lifeless listening experience.

Admittedly, George Thorogood’s Bad To The Bone is brilliantly reconceived as the greenkeeper’s lament, Mad To Be Mowin’, but the brutal murdering of the My Favourite Things melody is simply unforgiveable. Rating: Bogey

THE GOLF ALBUM BRANDON AYRE (2001, 18 Songs/Swinger Records) 20 years after his debut album of (wait for it) medical songs, this multi-talented Canadian doctor turned to his favourite game, delivering 18 originals that mix humour and slick musicianship to fairly consistent effect.

Beyond the inevitable diet of Country twang, Ayre adds enough rock, funk, blues and soul to keep things interesting. Highlights include the raunchy rock of Golf Rehab, the stunning slide solo on Practice Range and the disarming acoustic ditty, My Wife Thinks I’m Gardening.

Chillidipper and Where Did You Get Those Pants? (inspired by Jesper Parnevik) are among the lyrical gems from an album that equally impressed golf writer Lorne Rubenstein and Canadian folk legend, Leonard Cohen.

Rating: Birdie

GOLF: GREATEST HITS VARIOUS ARTISTS (2000, The Orchard) No relation to Golf’s Greatest Hits (above), this is nevertheless another eclectic compilation covering a wide variety of styles – albeit within a frustratingly meagre nine tracks.

Teeing off with A Golfer’s Prayer, a seductively smooth jazz blues by ace vocalist Willie Maiorello, we soon encounter slick showtunes (Let’s Play Around), Latin sambas (Golfer d’Amour), jazz-funk-fusion (on the closing Par 3) as a well as the Eminem parody (Give It A Swing) whose lyrics we sample elsewhere.

Arguably the most musical of all the golf albums here, with consistenly appealing melodies and arrangements.

Would have made birdie but for that lack of back nine. Rating: Par

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I try to give a party but the guy upstairs complains I guess I’ll go through life just catching colds and missing trains Everything happens to me But golf songs are not just the stuff of faded nostalgia, and down the years have embraced everything from deep blues to raucous rap. Among the cult favourites is The Back Nine by American folk legend, Loudon Wainwright III, who philosophizes ruefully using a series of golfing metaphors: In this game you got eighteen holes To shoot your best somehow Where have all my divots gone?

I’m in the back nine now Real golfers would, of course, not only have replaced all their divots but also be on the back nine. But then Wainwright admits that he isn’t actually a golfer himself – yet couldn’t avoid the game while growing up in the golfmad community of Westchester County, New York.

“My dad was a player and I used to carry his bag and occasionally hit a bucket of balls, but I never actually got into it,” he told Billboard magazine in 1996. “The Back Nine isn’t just about golf, it was a musical meditation about the second half of life. The flag was flapping and there are storm clouds brewing. It’s definitely a parallel with life.”

Rather less profound was 1970’s Golf Girl, an affecting hippy ditty by Canterbury prog-rockers, Caravan. Rather than a remake of Root-sy Poot-sy My Golf Girl (a 1900 society two-step by Herbert Johnson), the song was written

by Kent prog-rocker Richard Sinclair about his wife-to-be, Trisha. This particular ode to a trolley dolly opened the album In The Land Of Grey And Pink with the following cringing couplets: Standing on a golf course, dressed in PVC I chanced upon a golf girl, selling cups of tea Later on the golf course, after drinking tea It started raining golf balls, she protected me Incidentally, Golf Girl would resurface in the ’80s when comedian Nigel Planer (a.k.a. Neil of The Young Ones) included a version on Neil’s Heavy Concept Album, alongside similarly psychedelic covers of Traffic’s Hole In My Shoe and The Gnome by the late Pink Floyd visionary, Syd Barrett.

It was probably the fault of the perennially uncool Neil that it would be another 10 years before golf first gained an element of street credibility with the Beastie Boys 1994 album, III Communication,

GOLF’ SWINGS PETE SHOEMAKER (1993, Extraordinary Golf Music/BMI) Conceived as a musical companion to his brother Bob’s Extraordinary Golf instruction book, it’s no surprise that we open with Remember Them All, a piss-take on trying to memorise some two-dozen swing thoughts.

Elsewhere, the early relentless emphasis on country music does grate before we embracing a variety of styles, including rock and rap, before the tender closing ballad, Magnificent.

Overall, a mixed bag with too few memorable melodies and lyrics – though Bogey Bob (a poor parody of Big Bad John) at least contains the line: ‘He thought he’d found the missing factor/next day he saw a chiropractor.’

“Non-golfers may not ‘get’ this disc,” warns one review on Amazon. I’m not sure too many golfers will either. Rating: Bogey (Bob)

being a wake-up call for golfing counterculture.

“We were playing Sega Golf – then I started playing golf for real,” drummer Mike D remembered in the March 2005 issue of Q. Among the more printable lyrics from the notorious B Boys Makin’ With The Freak Freak is the following Hip Hop stream of consciousness:

Neil of The Young Ones (a.k.a. Nigel Planer) brought golf music to ageing hippies in the ’80s when covering the psychedelic Golf Girl by progrockers, Caravan.

Pass me an iron and I’ll bust a chip shot Then you throw me off the green because I’m strictly Hip Hop….

I’m working on my driving ’cause I’m going pro I’ve got the funky fly golf gear from head to toe The Beasties would soon be featuring golf in their music videos, decorating the walls of their Los Angeles record company, Grand Royale, with golf posters and memorabilia, and even developing their own range of golf clothing.

Best of all, the Beasties kick-started a departure from the relentless reliance on country music in golf songs, paving the way for more rock, funk, blues as well as rap.

Sure enough, within a few years we had the intricate Eminem-style delivery of Daryl Hope on Give It A Swing: The ball that I’m addressin’ knows that I’m not messin’ Competition starts stressin’ when they see me on the tee I’m a true Holy roller with my golf cart stroller Don’t let the ball control ya’ let yer’ spirit run free Nominated as ‘The Worst Golf Song Ever’ by Golf magazine, in 2004 (but there are plenty worse, trust me), Give It A Swing can be found on Golf: Greatest Hits, one of the flood of dedicated golf ‘novelty’ albums released over the last decade.

Jake Trout And The Flounders got the ‘nu Golf’ genre rolling on their debut 1990 cassette, with Peter Jacobsen brilliantly reworking classic pop originals with golf lyrics that scanned effortlessly to the melodies. Among the best were Slow Play (to the music of J.J. Cale’s Cocaine), Hitting On The Back Of The Range (Otis Redding’s Sitting On The Dock Of The Bay) and Square Grooves Are Comin’ (Warren Zevon’s Werewolves Of London).

GOLF IS A CUSSIN’ GAME BRAD BELT (2001, Mad Mama Music) “Ten insane, irreverent, wacky and wonderful golf songs,” claims the product description on Amazon.com, though we’re not sure about the last adjective for an album of relentlessly samey Country fare.

Lyrics like “Golf is a cussin’ game/a red-faced, rubberneckin’ fussin’ game,” confirm that this is one for rednecks only, with singer/songwriter Brad Belt emerging as golf answer to Ray Stevens (remember The Streak?).

Only saved from Snowman status by the mildly amusing Smart Aleck Caddie. Sample lyrics include: “Now we’re not low shooters as many can atest/But we’ve got Pings and Callaways to help us do our best.”

Rating: Double Bogey

GOLF: THE MUSICAL ORIGINAL OFF BROADWAY CAST ALBUM (2004, Eric Krebbs Production) While a golf musical is an excellent concept, this production based on Michael Roberts’ book, music and lyrics misses a great opportunity with an overly highbrow treatment of the genre.

As well as the lowlights of The Golfers Psalm/Tiger Woods, the lascivious libretto of Golf’s Such Naughty Game is a painfully unsubtle tale of hookers, bulging shafts, butt sizes and balls on lips.

Elsewhere, lyrics embracing circumcision and the Gulf War lack the humility that makes golf songs bearable. The music is equally tough going, with awkward melodies aggravated by stop-start syncopations that rarely let the songs flow. “Why do a show about golf/no word I know rhymes with golf?” the opening number asks. A good question. It may have worked on Broadway but I guess you had to be there. Rating: Double Bogey

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POPPORFOTO.COM

Tony Jacklin swings into golf and music history with his album of jazz standards for CBS Records in 1971.

Jacko:

KING OF THE SWINGERS Never mind Michael Jackson, golf has its own Jacko in the form of two-time major champion Tony Jacklin, who delivered a bizarre encore to his 1970 US Open victory with an album of jazz standards entitled Tony Jacklin Swings Into.

The CBS sleeve notes to the original 1971 recording duly describe Lincolnshire’s most unlikely crooner singing “with the ease and relaxed style of a man more used to swinging a number 3 Wood than a Crotchet”.

To be fair, despite the sometimes bland production, Jacklin acquits himself respectably on the 11 tracks which, along with Come Fly With Me, The Nearness Of You and Edelweiss, includes a rendition of The Lincolnshire Poacher – the song that would provide the Scunthorpe-born star with his nickname.

“When we went on car trips mum, dad, my sister, Lynn, and me would be singing away in the car,” recounts Jacklin of his musical childhood in his 2006 My Autobiography. “I must have the songs of 200 songs etched on my brain. Practically every

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Elvis song. Sinatra’s stuff. Half the songs the great Jerome Kern wrote. I loved them all, and always seemed to get into the emotional angle of the song through the lyrics.”

In the 1979 biography of Jacklin, The Price Of

Success by Liz Kahn, he admits “I identified with Elvis Presley. I liked the way he sang and I tried to sing like him in the bath,” before going on to condemn the British mentality of “settling for second best” which he felt afflicted sport at that time. “I don’t rate that attitude. You’re as good as anyone else if you think you are. The Beatles were the best, so was Tom Jones. Being British didn’t hold them back.”

Ironically, golf-mad crooners Dean Martin and Andy Williams were also among Jacklin’s first musical influences, al though, bizarrely, his big break came after hearing an impromptu karaoke attempt

by Gary Player.

“I said to Mark McCormack that I thought I could do better than that!” Jacklin reminisced when we asked him recently about his swinging ’70s sojourn.

“He said ‘Do you really think you could? Because if you do I will get CBS to do something.’ In the end we had a 35-piece orchestra, so there was no money in it after paying them off!”

Another reason to not give up your day job.

DOMINIC PEDLER MUSIC & GOLF

has ever played air guitar with a golf club”.

As well as skillfully rhyming “hay fever” with “Carnoustie” on the whacky track, Jesper Parnevik, the Divots’ lyrics plumb new depths of humility even by the extreme standards of the idiom.

Hit a Worm Burner, Oh yeah it was straight It bounced to the reds, and was well on its way Hit a Worm Burner, one guy yelled “It’ll play” Hit a Worm Burner, it rolled 70 yards away.

The Flounders peaked in 1998 with the masterful I Love To Play, one of several golf concept albums we review in a separate sidebar (see ‘Circular Grooves’).

The film Tin Cup, starring Kevin Costner, was another important landmark, with Bruce Hornsby’s Big Stick and Mickey Jones’ Double Bogey Blues helping the soundtrack to No. 85 (with a bullet) in the US charts in 1996.

Sensing a market for the ‘golf music’ genre, Teed Off Records was formed as an offshoot of BMG’s Private Music, debuting with a compilation inspired by the expertly entitled article, Music Of The Spheres, by music journalist Richard Skelly, for a 1994 edition of USGA Journal.

Among that album’s highlights was J.F. Knobloch’s reworking of his own cult country ditty, Life’s A Bitch And Then You Die: Golf’s a bitch and then you die, You don’t know when and you don’t know why You birdie 1 and then bogey 5 Where’s my ball? It’s in the ditch – golf’s a bitch Similarly rich in hacker’s laments is Pete Shoemaker’s Extraordinary Golf: Songs Of A Wonderful Game, a ’90s album that intriguingly complements the golf psychology book written by his pro coach brother, Fred, entitled Extraordinary Golf: The Art Of The Possible. (It was reissued as Golf Swings, one of the dedicated golf music albums reviewed on the previous spread.)

“The essence of music is shared experiences,” Pete Shoemaker told Billboard that year. “In golf that could be defined as the fear you have when you step up to the first tee, or the voices you hear in your head when you line up a shot.”

Others clearly suffering from voices in the head include The Mulligans, the Bay Area band behind In The Leather (1997); Don Hays with his neatly entitled, The New Course Record (1996); and the Divots, the self-styled “world’s only alternative-folk-rock-country-pop-blues-punk-golf band”.

Not to be confused with Shank, Swing & The Divots (a mid-’90s West Virginia University function band playing “golfing swamp rock”), this Massachusetts-based trio put out the 2001 album Golfsongs “dedicated to anyone who

PGA Tour stars Peter Jacobsen, Mark Lye and the late Payne Stewart, a.k.a. Jake Trout And The Flounders, on promo duty for their cult 1990s album, I Love To Play, featuring cameos from real rockers.

Just wait til you hear Ball Washer on the follow-up.

Golfsongs was apparently recorded at Bad Lie Studios, mixed at Shag Bag Studios and released on the band’s own Stiff Shaft label. Topping that is the ‘Niblick-Is-A-Giraffe’ record label (yes, really) that scored the BBC Radio 2 Album Of The Year in 2004 with folk prodigy’s Jim Moray’s Sweet England.

“I don’t know what that’s all about,” said a flumoxed Stuart Maconie on his Critical List show, a few weeks later.

Well, Stuart, a niblick is like an old-fashioned 9-iron.

If there’s one thread that characterises almost all golf music, it’s a sense of self-deprecating humour and gentle frustration with which all golfers can identify.

Yet at the other extreme from the modest Worm Burner is the self-righteous selection comprising Golf: The Musical (see previous spread) led by the tasteless Golfer’s Psalm – an agonising reworking of The Lord Is My Shepherd – that segues seamlessly into a blasphemous tribute to the world’s No.1: The Holy Ghost is good enough But who can clear it from the rough? Tiger Woods!

Who is the closest to divine?

Who leads the pack on the back nine? Tiger Woods!

Now you may think that this sounds odd But he might be the Son Of God. Who? Tiger Woods!

Come back Caddyshack, all is forgiven – yup, even that customized golf bag fitted with a car stereo, and the surreal fairway dancing scene to the disco strains of Earth Wind And Fire’s Boogie Wonderland. And that’s not forgetting those pesky gophers’ ‘choreography’ to the music of Kenny Loggins’ I’m Alright.

Talking of golf films, the Caddyshack II soundtrack would include the distinctly dodgy Hole In One, while Happy Gilmore adds to our trivia through Adam Sandler

The Caddyshack golf bag fitted with a car radio was a memorable film prop lampooning the gloriously bad taste at a fictional American country club.

Happy Gilmore flaunts the dress code when attending the pre-tournament cocktail party in the colourful 1996 film.

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MUSIC & GOLF DOMINIC PEDLER

Another brick in the wall: John Daly swung at Liverpool’s legendary Cavern club when the Open returned to Hoylake in 2006, despite having no Beatles cover in his set.

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turning up to the pre-tournament cocktail party in an AC/DC T-shirt. The film also features some great (non-golf) songs, peaking with Lynyrd Skynyrd’s mighty ballad Tuesday’s Gone over the closing credits.

With its redneck Cinderella story of loveable long-hitter making good, Happy Gilmore was surely inspired by John Daly who famously turned to music – and the guitar in particular – to keep him off the booze. Even before his Cavern sojourn at this year’s Open (see ‘The Fab Fore!’ story later), Daly had demonstrated his musical prowess, honed by years strumming songs like All My Exes Wear Rolexes in hotel rooms, in his fly-on-the-wall documentary series, The Daly Planet for the Golf Channel.

Sky Sports even used footage of Daly playing guitar to promote the 2004 BMW International, while Big John is often teamed up with rock stars in pro-ams and pro-celebrity events, including Glenn Frey of the Eagles and Darius Rucker of golf-mad US band, Hootie & The Blowfish. Cue colourful copy from assembled golf journos: “Frey, after all, has spent 30 years writing songs with Don Henley that add up to the soundtrack of Daly’s life,”

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said the Daily Mail in January 2004, before quoting a line from Peaceful Easy Feeling to capture Daly’s latest laidback routine of chilling out in his luxury motorhome when on tour.

While Daly may be tabloid favourite, he has a way to go to reach the achievements of the pro tour’s most famous musicians that include Tony Jacklin (see sidebar Jacko: King Of The Swingers) and the late Payne Stewart.

The latter was famous for his impromptu harmonica routines, the gigs and records with Jake Trout And The Flounders – as well as his Ryder Cup rallying cry when Bruce Springsteen’s Born In The USA blazed from his Belfry bedroom early one morning during the 1989 matches.

Two years later, the management at the (rather more exclusive) Monte-Carlo Beach Club had to ask Stewart to turn down the detachable speakers on his Walkman as Springsteen was again disturbing the peace. I was sunbathing a few yards away, but it wasn’t me who complained.

In town that week for the Monte Carlo Open, Stewart was again the centre of musical attention when Prince Rainier persuaded him to fetch his harmonica to entertain the party in one of the principality’s fashionable restaurants.

Rivalling John Daly as today’s top tour muso is reigning US Open champion Geoff Ogilvy. While modestly claiming “I just noodle around. I’m a 20-handicapper on guitar,” the Australian managed a credible Stairway To Heaven by his beloved Led Zeppelin, as filmed for Sky Sports last December.

Rather more modestly, Paul McGinley is a passionate fan of incendiary Irish punk band, Stiff Little Fingers, while Padraig Harrington confesses to the tour’s dodgiest taste with his love of Rammstein, the German shock-rock outfit whose on-stage antics we won’t go into here.

Similarly rebellious is Paul Casey’s admission that he disturbed the serenity of Augusta National’s Magnolia Drive on a recent visit to the Masters with the Cult’s anthemic She Sells Sanctuary blazing from the car stereo.

Three-time Masters Nick Faldo surely wouldn’t have approved, especially given his dig at Robert Karlsson dur-

Monty’s Music

Colin Montgomerie’s musical tastes are as colourful as his love life. “My first crushes were on Debbie Harry from Blondie and the blonde one out of Abba [Agnetha, in case you bump into her – Ed.],” he confessed to Jack magazine in 2003. “The Police, Dire Straits and Queen were my favourite groups. My brother and I were far too regimented to like anything as outlandish as punk music,” he continued.

In the spring of 2000, Monty selected his Desert Island Discs for Sue Lawley on Radio 4, as follows: 1. I’LL FIND MY WAY HOME - JON AND VANGELIS (1981) I’m away from home too much – I probably spend only 100 days at home a year. I’m always trying to get the first flight home.

2. WATERLOO – ABBA (1974) I watched Abba win the Eurovision Song Contest when I was 11. I think everyone’s a closet Abba fan without admitting it.

3. HAKUNA MATATA (FROM THE LION KING, 1994) It’s often the last song I play in the car before going to a tournament. It keeps me relaxed. I won the 1996 Swiss Open because of it!

4. FLOWER OF SCOTLAND (SCOTTISH NATIONAL ANTHEM) It brings back memories of winning the Dunhill Cup with Sam Torrance and Andrew Coltart, and pipe band walked up the 18th fairway at St Andrews.

5. THE GREAT ESCAPE (THEME TO THE 1963 FILM) I now take my own DVD player to hotels. I sleep better at night after a good film – and this is definitely one of them.

6. ANGELS – ROBBIE WILLIAMS (1997) TWI would produce a highlights video of my Order of Merit victories and, in 1998, they played this song over footage of my [now ex-] wife.

7. CHARIOTS OF FIRE – TITLES - VANGELIS (1981) They played this at the official dinner before the 1999 Ryder Cup at Valderrama.

The lights were dimmed as we walked in…it sent a chill up my spine.

8. SAILING - ROD STEWART (1975) It was a favourite of my mother Elizabeth, who passed away in 1991. It always reminds me of her.

And let’s not forget that Monty was party to one of golf’s most rock n’n roll moments, last September, when he chartered a private jet from Munich to Glasgow to attend a Robbie Williams concert at Hampden Park. “ It was great night. I went along with my girlfriend and her children and we went backstage to chat with Robbie and show him the Ryder Cup,” said Monty when we told him about our feature. “I had to make sure I got the trophy back to Munich the next day for Woosie’s team announcement.”

Monty took some flak given that this was the night before the last round of the BMW International in which he was contending. But then given his love of Angels (and a new angel in tow) it was presumably too tempting an opportunity.

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ing Sky’s 2006 Ryder Cup coverage. “He’s Swedish and his first record he ever bought was by Rod Stewart – what about Abba?!”.

We won’t remind Nick that, back in the mid-’90s, he chose Dire Straits’ On Every Street (the pedestrian followup to Brothers In Arms) as his all-time favourite album when polled by our editor.

Nick’s not the first commentator to bring music into play.

Peter Alliss, for example, admits a surprising liking for Robbie Williams. “You know – the one with the tattoos,” was how he described the Stoke on Trent star to viewers during the BMW Championship last May, before later citing Williams’ Escapology as “one of my favourites,” on the Friday of the Open. “I’m more into the Kaiser Chiefs,” chipped in co-commentator, Mark James.

As for Fred Funk and Robert Rock, well that’s anyone’s guess.

Even managers are getting into some serious golf-andmusic multi-tasking, with Danish fixer Søren Brombjerg Johansen responsible for both rising European Tour pro, Søren Kjeldsen, and colourful Danish dance duo, Junior Senior, who enjoyed a worthy UK top-10 hit with the catchy disco pastiche, Move Your Feet, back in 2003 (resurrected recently for a Nokia advert).

Back with dedicated golf music, it seems strange that the genre is almost entirely dominated by offerings from the other side of the Atlantic. Presumably there were golfing knees-ups in the bars around St Andrews, several centuries ago, but there’s little evidence of it in the archives of the Golf Museum.

Worthy of inclusion, nonetheless, are the memories of St Andrews in 1958 when a wheelchair-bound Bobby Jones was granted the Freedom of the City while the University’s Younger Hall burst spontaneously into the old Scottish standard, Will Ye No’ Come Back Again? Among the throng was Herbert Warren Wind who wrote: “it was ten minutes before many who attended were able to speak again in a tranquil voice.”

Rather less poignantly, British golf music contributions include Songs For Swinging Golfers – essentially Christmas carols done to golf lyrics penned by a member of Ashridge Golf Club (as plugged by Peter Alliss on TV dur-

US Open champion Geoff Ogilvy, “a 20-handicapper on guitar”, delivers a single-figure rendition of Led Zeppelin’s Stairway To Heaven for Sky Sports.

IMAGES SUPPLIED BY THE USGA

Golf-themed albums date back to the 1950s with these offerings from Oscar Brand & The Sandtrappers and Larry Clinton.

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MUSIC & GOLF DOMINIC PEDLER

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ing the World Matchplay in October 2001). There are even golf carol websites offering I Saw Three Chips, It Came Upon The Fairway Clear and Whose Ball Is This? But whither Callaway In A Manger?

If you think we’ve hit rock bottom, then how about Sergio’s Song, the official ditty of the Sergio Garcia fan club, as aired somewhat inappropriately by BBC 5 Live within minutes of the Spaniard’s final-day humiliation at Hoylake last summer.

Altogether now (to the tune of You Are My Sunshine): Sergio Garcia, he drinks sangria He came from Barca to Carnoustie He’s five-foot-seven of golfing heaven Please don’t take my Sergio from me Which leaves, by default, the only highpoints in European golf music history as a pair of carefully constructed tributes to the Ryder Cup from two rather unlikely sources. Chris de Burgh’s self-penned The Ballad Of The Ryder Cup, performed for the teams at the traditional pre-match dinner at The Belfry, in 1993: This is the ballad of the Ryder Cup, a tale of derring-do Of men like Faldo, Langer, James, Olazábal, Woosnam, too

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March 2007 www.golfinternationalmag.com

When christening Augusta National’s most famous stretch, Herbert Warren Wind was inspired by Shoutin’ In That Amen Corner, a gospel standard recorded by artists such as Mezz Mezzrow and Mildred Bailey.

EMPICS.COM

When christening Augusta National’s most famous stretch, Herbert Warren Wind was inspired by Shoutin’ In That Amen Corner, a gospel standard recorded by artists such as Mezz Mezzrow and Mildred Bailey.

COURTESY OF SKY SPORTS

That epic ballad of the Ryder Cup, a tale from long ago Of birdies missed, of ladies kissed, And the shot that stole the show The song continued with an intricate yarn of Europe plotting USA’s downfall by means of spiked drinks and honey traps before the final singles, with Seve holing from the sand against Azinger in revenge for 1989. Dream on. Seve

would lose to Jim Gallagher Jnr. while Zinger’s half with Faldo in the final match ensured USA’s 15-13 victory.

Fast forward to last summer and Sky Sports’ suitably Irish take on the traditional Molly Malone (a.k.a. Cockles & Muscles) rewritten by Jason Wessely, executive producer for golf, and arranged by singer-songwriter Richard Murray.

The song formed a colourful introduction to Sky’s Ryder Cup coverage early on the opening morning – even if the video of Murray’s band was actually shot in Molly Malone’s pub in Richmond rather than Dublin. The first verse goes:

Sky Sports introduced their K Club coverage with a Ryder Cup version of Molly Malone, performed by an Irish folk band in a pub decorated with golf memorabilia.

In Dublin’s fair city, where the girls are so pretty The Ryder Cup Irish have all earned their fame.

That’s Walton and Darcy, McGinley and Christy They won it for Europe, rejoice in each name.

Alive alive oh, alive alive oh Sing Ryder Cup memories, alive, alive oh The footage cut to a live picture of Padraig Harrington at the K Club, with David Livingstone speculating “maybe he’s about to write the next verse”. But another Irishman, Darren Clarke, would go on to claim the coda.

Dominic Pedler is author of ‘The Songwriting Secrets Of The Beatles’ (Omnibus Press, 2003).

Are we not ChiChi?

THE GREAT DEVO MUG SHOT MYSTERY

One of the more bizarre golf-andmusic anecdotes involves the confusion surrounding the subtly differing images of Mexican legend, Chi Chi Rodriguez, on a pair of 1978 record sleeves from eccentric US New Wave band, Devo.

Inspired by a picture of the charismatic tour star on the packaging of a golf club headcover, the band borrowed the artwork for the UK cover of their essential third single, Be Stiff (on the Stiff record label) which, despite the golfthemed art, had absolutely nothing to do with shaft flex).

But when requesting the same image for the US version of their debut album, Q: Are We Not Men? A: We are Devo!, the president of Warner Brothers, an avid golf fan, felt it was mocking Rodriguez and proposed an alternate cover omitting the player’s trademark panama hat and changing the eyes.

The band rejected this – and even cleared the earlier art with Chi Chi himself in exchange for a couple of records. But word did not reach the record company who by then had devised a composite image that allegedly combined the golfer’s facial

features with those of various US presidents, including John F. Kennedy, Richard Nixon and Gerald Ford.

Originally flattered by the band’s interest, Chi Chi was duly bemused at the outcome, though apparently took it in good spirit.

Meanwhile, the original Rodriguez-endorsed headcover (Cobra model made by Kent Manufacturing, Ohio), in its original wrapper, remains a prized collectors item among Devo fans.

DEVO-OBSESSO.COM ARCHIVES

Who said Chi Chi Rodriguez was a mug?

These images of the golf star caused a right rumpus when Devo, the American New Wave band, wanted to use pictures of Chi Chi on the front of an album cover.

www.golfinternationalmag.com Nov/Dec 2006

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MUSIC & GOLF DOMINIC PEDLER

GOLFGAVE

RONCK

ROLL

From blues legends to boy bands, golf has been an unlikely distraction for generations of pop stars. But the rise of a younger breed of musical swingers confirms that the game is indeed the new rock ‘n’ roll. Dominic Pedler examines the cliché

Hold Me Tight. The Beatles get to grips with golf for a mid-’60s promo shoot for French Parlophone. But, John, that left-handed club will get you nowhere, man.

Opposite: With lessons from major champions, a Callaway sponsorship deal and a starring role in the All-Star Cup, 5handicap Alice Cooper is rock ‘n’ roll’s premier golf ambassador.

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“Golf is hipper now than when I was a kid,” Loudon Wainwright III told Billboard magazine on the release of Golf’s Greatest Hits, a few years ago. “When Alice Cooper started playing, the walls were broken down.”

While pop stars have been playing golf since the ’40s’ heyday of the first electric guitar legend, T-Bone Walker, Alice Cooper’s much publicised passion in the ’90s drew a line in the sand between the old and new generations of golf-playing musicians.

‘BC’, so to speak, we had a distinctly MOR crew propping up the pro-celebrity circuits, including Glen Campbell, John Denver, Johnny Mathis, Vince Gill, Michael Bolton, Willie Nelson, Huey Lewis and Celine Dion.

Cooper’s ‘coming out’ transformed the perception of golf within the rock ‘n’ roll community.

VH-1 even gave their seal of approval with the special ‘Fairway To Heaven’ tournament in Las Vegas for a new breed of rockers that by then included Eddie Van Halen, Mick Mills of REM, Meatloaf and nu-Punk phenomenon, Green Day. And while he may have been more pop than rock, Justin Timberlake was soon getting as much TV coverage as the leaders when teeing it up at top procelebrity events on the US tour.

March 2007 www.golfinternationalmag.com

PETER NASH

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I’m on Eighteen

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(AND I LIKE IT)

In a previously unpublished conversation from the late ’90s, Vincent Furnier, a.k.a. Alice Cooper, talked to Dominic Pedler about his passion for golf I’d never even heard of golf when I was young. I grew up in the blue collar area of Detroit where we only had three sports: baseball, football and Grand Theft Auto! I only started playing when I moved to Arizona, which is obviously one of the golf capitals of the world.

I was a total alcoholic but when I came out of hospital and quit drinking, I had all this time in my hands. The worst thing that an ‘alchy’ can have is time.

I needed an activity, and golf immediately occupied me for four hours a day – or eight if I played 36 holes.

I soon found that I had natural talent for it. I’d been pretty good at baseball, so had a good eye for a ball. When I first started I could break 100 at courses like Pima Country Club (though that course is not there any more as the Apache Indians reclaimed the land).

I then went from a handicap of 26 down to six in one year. I was playing literally seven days a week, and often with professionals, so it was like having a four-hour lesson every day.

I’m privileged to have played a lot of golf with guys like Tom Lehman, Steve Jones, Johnny Miller, Paul Azinger, Howard Twitty and Woody Austin.

When I broke 70 for the first time (at Las Colinas, Dallas, Texas) I thought “That’s it, I’ve arrived!” I got my dad to take up the game when he was 65 – and he got even more addicted than me.

I never get bored with golf even when I play every day. I couldn’t do that with baseball, basketball or tennis. It’s the constantly varied challenge that’s so fascinating. My lowest ever score is 67, at Camelback Country Club, in Arizona. But the very next day I struggled to break 80.

My favourite courses are Pebble Beach, Spyglass Hill, Pine Valley and TPC Sawgrass. The hardest course I’ve ever played is Firestone Country Club in Akron, Ohio, where I was hitting driver-5-wood all day. José Maria Olazábal’s 61 there has got to be one of the all-time great rounds.

I love pro-ams. There’s pressure – but then rock ‘n’ rollers are used to performing in front of 40,000 people. I mean, what’s the worst that can happen to you? You might top your drive. It’s all showbiz, like if I fall down on stage I make sure that I do it again five minutes later so it looks like part of the show.

Golf is a great common denominator that unites people and cuts through all the class levels. When I talked to President Clinton, we didn’t mention either rock ‘n’ roll or politics. It was all ‘How can I draw it around that tree?’ and ‘What putting grip do you use?’

I played golf when it wasn’t hip, when it wasn’t cool at all. My management even said to me: “Golf is bad for your image, it’s bad for your career. The kids don’t want to see you playing golf with people that look like their fathers. It means you think like their fathers.”

I said: “Look, it’s a game. And, anyway, I have to play.”

The former Yes keyboard player, Rick Wakeman, referred to last April’s London Golf Show as “Hamley’s for unfit geezers”.

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Alice Cooper was the only shining light for the USA in their crushing defeat at the 2006 AllStar Cup.

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Back in Europe, Virgin Records even sponsored the starstudded Monte-Carlo Invitational event of 1999. It might have been won by Tommy Horton, but the Riviera’s beautiful people showed up to watch an A-list of rock stars, including Dweezil Zappa, Byrds legend Stephen Stills, and Bon Jovi drummer, Tico Torres, in the 54-hole pro-am format.

As shown by the short interview we did with him that week (see sidebar, Different Sticks), the multi-talented Torres takes his interest in golf to fascinating extremes with his grip sculptures of golfing legends.

Torres, too, was inspired by Alice Cooper, whose own golf interests go far beyond his daily 18-hole regime which, last summer, made him the USA’s only decent performer at the AllStar Cup. Despite his notorious alter ego, the real Vincent Furnier emerged as a disarmingly personable and gracious golf fan when I met him at the PGA Merchandise Show, at Orlando, a few years ago (see I’m On Eighteen).

“Rock ‘n’ rollers have made golf hip again,” Cooper says.

“Guys like Roger Waters of Pink Floyd, Iggy Pop, Eddie Van Halen, Richie Sambora, Vince Neil of Mötley Crüe and Adrian [Young, the drummer] from No Doubt. He’s probably a good seven.

“Then there’s all these guys with tattoos and long hair playing golf now. In fact, I know more bands who do play golf than bands who don’t. It’s become the rock ‘n’ roll sport, really.”

Furnier tries to keep his golfing exploits separate from his Alice Cooper identity, though notable exceptions include his cameo appearance in a Jake Trout And The Flounders video, and a cult TV commercial for Callaway Golf in the ’90s.

The latter featured the star sinking a 20-footer with the help of a live boa constrictor lying obligingly along the path of the putt.

“Ely Callaway was like a mad genius. He knew he had the best product but he wanted to have some fun with it,” Cooper says of the series of commercials which also featured saxophone star, Kenny G.

DOMINIC PEDLER MUSIC & GOLF

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Talking of Cooper’s snakes, he nominates the 90-foot anaconda he sunk at the 17th hole during the 2004 Bob Hope Chrysler Classic as his all-time most memorable shot (ESPN also made it their Play Of The Day).

Cooper also captures one essential connection between golf and music: “It’s all about rhythm. Rhythm and balance.

Johnny Miller says swing through at the same speed as you take it back and just say ‘Cin-dy Craw-ford’. That’s a good swing thought.”

Such respectability ironically qualifies Cooper (who turns 60 next February) as part of the golf establishment, with Peter Alliss devoting a chapter to him in A Golfer’s Travels following their game together in Hawaii in 1996 (when Cooper shot three over at The Challenge At Manele Bay).

Meanwhile, Cooper’s Charity Golf tournament, in Phoenix, in aid of his Solid Rock foundation, is one of several music industry golf tournaments that also include the Country Music Golf Association (in Nashville) and the Music Industry Golf Association (Austin).

Country guitar virtuoso, Chet Atkins, held his own golf tournament annually until his death in 2001, while rock god Eddie Van Halen co-founded his own event in California, in association with McDonalds.

A few years ago Eddie recounted to Guitar World how he likes to turn up incognito at pay-and-play courses around GETTYIMAGES.COM

LA. When, one day, a playing partner unwittingly sprouted the ‘Abad-day-at-the-golf-course-is-stillbetter-than-a-good-day-at-theoffice’ cliché, the rock star with 50 million album sales under his belt replied. “Maybe for you, pal, but I like my job.”

Among the many cultural landmarks that precipitated golf’s new-found fashion was Dinosaur Jnr.’s video for their 1994 single, Feel The Pain, which memorably depicted the dodgy craze of urban golf. Spike Jonze’s famous footage featured guitarist J. Mascis, overdressed in snappy golfing attire, driving a golf buggy through the streets of New York in pursuit of this hazardous new pastime.

Along with the Beasties (whose golf lyrics are mentioned elsewhere), Dinosaur Jnr. surely paved the way for the on-course exploits of “Mad” Keith Flint of The Prodigy and Chad from the Red Hot Chilli Peppers. Not to mention Gangsta rapper, Coolio, and hip hop baron, Puff Daddy (with ‘Puff Caddy’ golf shirts, incidentally, one the funkiest designs at last year’s London Golf Show).

“Golf’s very racist but I don’t give a f***. As long as I can play, I don’t care,” Coolio told the Sunday Telegraph magazine a few years ago, when revealing his hopes to start a golf school for ethnic minorities in LA’s deprived Compton district.

It was no surprise that by the turn of the millennium golf had acquired a new glossary of street slang (that even the Financial Times picked up on in February 2000) including ‘Yo!’ (Fore!), ‘Homie’ (caddie), ‘mutha’ (birdie), ‘kneecapping’ (handicap), ‘chill room’ (clubhouse) and, best of all, ‘drive-by shooting’ (a tee shot that finds the fairway).

Since then, hip-hop’s love of golf has continued unabated, with Handsome Boy Modeling School striking some promotional poses for their 2004 album, White People, decked in natty golf gear that would have done Chris Eubank proud.

Meanwhile, Celebrity Big Brother star Maggot, and bandmate Adam Hussain from Welsh hip hoppers Goldie Lookin’ Chain, are among the latest pop stars that admit to a love of the game since they were young.

Nicky Wire, bassist for the Manic Street Preachers, admits to having become hooked on golf when studying politics at Swansea University. “We used to go and play golf all the time. Not very rock ’n’ roll I’m afraid!” he says modestly referring to his former playing partner and bandmate, the seriously manic Richey Edwards who disappeared mysteriously without trace in 1995 (and also without his clubs).

The golf bug has even spread to today’s hippest bands and rising stars. Richard Archer, lead singer of the excellent Hard-Fi, was a VIP guest at a Hoylake party hosted by leading retailer american golf, while bass player Kai Stephens nominates the Tiger Woods Pro Tour 2 golf game as his favourite pastime on the tour bus. Alternative music rag,

Justin Timberlake is a regular at pro-celebrity events on the PGA Tour, including the popular AT&T Pebble Beach National Pro-Am. Chris Evans, one of several golfing DJs, produced his own golf TV series for Channel 4 in the ’90s before being voted MVP of the victorious 2005 European All-Star Cup team.

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IMAGE COURTESY OF THE GARY PLAYER ARCHIVE

MUSIC & GOLF DOMINIC PEDLER

The now legendary shot of Gary Player with Elvis Presley on the set of Blue Hawaii, in May 1961, shortly after Player’s first Masters victory.

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Artrocker, even conducted their interview with South London indie guitar outfit, Good Shoes, on a golf course as shown on the cover of their August 2006 issue.

Not that rock’s golf establishment have been completely eclipsed by the young whippersnappers. A few years ago we ran a profile on former Doors guitarist, Robbie Krieger, a regular at LA’s exclusive Riviera Country Club. Meanwhile, last May, former Yes keyboard legend, Rick Wakeman (a 13handicapper at Diss, in Norfolk) was a celebrity guest at the London Golf Show, pronouncing it “Hamleys for unfit geezers. It’s absolutely full of big boys’ toys.” As was the West London golf shop in which former Iron Maiden singer, Bruce Dickinson, had a share, a few years ago.

During the Ryder Cup coverage last September, Nick Faldo revealed that he was giving Phil Collins lessons. “He’s become a golf nutter,” said the six-time major champion of the former Genesis drummer-turned singer.

So great is today’s tide of musician golfers that Golf Digest even compiled a Top-100 list, ranked by handicap, in their December 2006 issue. Spanning every genre from rock and pop to jazz and country, it was topped by Kenny G (+0.8), with Aerosmith frontman Steven Tyler (36.4) and colourful chanteuse Pink (40.4) propping up the rear.

The standout story saw Mötley Crüe singer, Vince Neil, describe how his annual charity golf event features “porno stars, strippers and booze. You know, to get people out”.

March 2007 www.golfinternationalmag.com

No doubt there are deep sociological factors that explain the incongruous connections between golf and rock ‘n’ roll, with Nicky Wire’s perceptive suggestion that “golf makes bad people better people,” as Tim Southwell of GolfPunk magazine recounted on Radio 5 Live in Open week last July.

It’s a sentiment to which Lars Ulrich (of heavy metal monsters Metallica) can surely relate having confessed to a bit of a golf habit – among the rather more predictable ones revealed in the band’s Some Kind Of Monster film/DVD. That fly-on-the-wall ‘rockumentary’ drew widespread comparison with every rock fan’s favourite film, This Is Spinal Tap, which ironically features its own brief reference to golf.

“What’s the difference between golf and miniature golf?” asks frontman David St. Hubbins as the band browse aimlessly at the brochures in the lobby of their (double-booked) Memphis hotel. “I think…the walls,” answers bass player, Derek Smalls, with uncharacteristic logic, though band opt instead for a trip to Graceland.

And it’s no surprise that Elvis himself has his own compendium of golf trivia, starting with the handful of golf balls he bizarrely received as a gift from President Richard Nixon during his legendary 1970 trip to the White House when offering his services to the anti-narcotics campaign.

In 1992, ‘The King’ was even the subject of a modern art crazy-golf installation by abstract painter Gregory Amenoff, at Manhattan’s politics-orientated gallery, The Artists Space, complete with fairways in the shape of guitar necks.

Not forgetting that the only time Elvis set foot in Britain (when his aircraft refuelled at Prestwick on March 2 1960), his only view would have been of the hallowed dunes of the historic links as he chatted to fans through the airport fence.

Meanwhile, Elvis golf songs enjoy a genre of their own, led by film director/musician, Gus Van Sant’s The Elvis Of Golf Courses on his 1998 album, 18 Songs About Golf.

Rather more memorable is the iconic image of Elvis with Gary Player, taken on the set of Blue Hawaii, in May 1961.

“I met Hal Wallis, the movie producer, and mentioned that I was a fan of Elvis and he arranged for us to meet,” Player reminisced in Golf World, in March 1995. “He was very polite, said ‘How do you do sir?’ when introduced, and insisted on changing into a jacket.”

Too bad that Player didn’t have his green one with him, having won the Masters the previous month. And 35 years on, the South African is obviously still a fan, dubbing Tiger Woods “the Elvis Presley of golf” during an interview at the Seniors British Open at Turnberry last summer. But then Nick Price said much the same about Seve.

Player still has the Blue Hawaii photo hanging on the wall of his study – presumably in preference to the OK! magazine spread of him with former Spice Girl, Emma Bunton, to whom he gave a private golf lesson in the Bahamas a few years ago.

‘Baby’ Spice’s former partner-in-crime, Victoria Beckham, might be too cool to play golf herself, though nevertheless is on record for saying: “I’d definitely prefer Brooklyn to be a golfer – it’s a better profession than footballer.”

Ronan Keating agrees. “If I wasn’t doing what I’m doing, I would love to be a professional golfer,” the Irish pop singer told Sky during the All-Star Cup at Celtic Manor in 2005, before last year leading the Ryder Cup celebrations late into the night at the K Club.

While we’re scraping the boyband barrel, Brian McFadden’s estranged wife, former Atomic Kitten Kerry

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Katona, quipped during her bushtucker trial in I’m A Celebrity Get Me Out Of Here: “Up to that moment, the most adventurous thing I’ve ever done was crazy golf.”

She’s in good company, as crazy golf (or at least some comical posing on a putting green) is the nearest the Beatles and the Rolling Stones got to the game, though the Fab Four merit their own discussion for some bizarre golfing trivia (see The Fab Fore!).

As regards the Stones, we can’t ignore the classic sequences of Mick, Keith, Charlie, Bill and Brian in a variety of poses on a putting green for a circa 1966 promotion.

Keith would add to his golf trivia CV in the ’90s with ‘new boy’ Ronnie Wood, the pair being among the first to prop up the bar at the newly-built Rathsallagh Golf Club, just a...er, stone’s throw from the latter’s home near Dublin. A starstruck Golf Digest hack spotted the pair one evening, as recounted excitedly in the opening gambit of a travel piece on golf in Ireland.

Nor can we gloss over the street cred-crushing 1993 photo of Keef ‘n’ Ron posing with the European Ryder Cup captain, Bernard Gallacher, at a party thrown by the late Peter Cook, which Golf World ran as a double-page spread in their October issue that year.

And just what is it with disc jockeys and golf? They seem to have an almost Masonic obsession with the game.

Starting with Chris Evans who conceived, hosted and produced the six-programme Tee Time series on offbeat golfing culture around the world for Channel 4, in 1998.

Despite his subversive reputation, Evans has been fascinated with the game since he was young, and his cousin, Brian Evans, is an established club pro in the Algarve.

Chris’ finest moment presumably came in the inaugural All-Star Cup at Celtic Manor in 2005 when he was voted MVP of the victorious European team captained by Colin Montgomerie.

DJ Dread’s love of golf was the subject of a Sunday Telegraph magazine special, a few years ago, while DJ Spoony featured in our own July 2005 issue (GI 53). A 12handicapper at Stoke Park, Spoony’s CV includes playing in the dunhill links championship, broadcasting live from the

Different Sticks

FIVE MINUTES WITH TICO TORRES, DRUMMER WITH BON JOVI

When did you take up the game?

I started back in the early 1980s. [Country music legend] Willie Nelson gave me a 7-iron and a putter and I’d follow him around the golf course he owned in Austin, Texas.

Do you manage to play when you’re on tour?

I try and play once a week – even when on tour. Golf is the perfect antidote to a rock tour; you’re out enjoying nature for four or five hours. There’s a bit of a fraternity among golfing musicians: Richie [Sambora] also plays and I meet up with Steven Stills and Dweezil Zappa every year for the VH-1 golf tournament, in Las Vegas.

DJ Spoony is one of the select few to have claimed an albatross.

Tell us about your ‘golf art’.

Since 1985 I’ve been working on a series of sculptures of famous golfers’ grips. Jack Nicklaus, Arnold Palmer, Greg Norman and Gary Player have all ‘modelled’ for me. It’s called The Majors Collection. I make three of each grip: the player keeps one and the other two are auctioned for charity.

What’s your favourite course?

The Old Course at St. Andrews. I play in the Dunhill whenever I can, even though it’s around the time of my birthday. I have a great memory of hitting a 5-wood on to the green at the Road Hole during the pro-am in the late ’90s and two-putting for par. The very next hole I totally topped it and it barely made the bridge over the burn.

Who is your favourite golfer?

Ernie Els. And drummer?

Elvin Jones, in John Coltrane’s band.

Bon Jovi drummer, Tico Torres, is a veteran of pro-celebrity events including, the Monte Carlo Invitational and dunhill links championship where he made the cut last year.

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Golf, rock ‘n’ roll and comedy collide at a 1993 party as Keef ‘n’ Ron of the Rolling Stones rub shoulders with Ryder Cup captain Bernard Gallacher and host Peter Cook.

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Golf may be the last thing you’d associate with the Beatles but record collectors will know that the band dabbled dubiously with the game when on promotional duties back in the ’60s, as shown by the sleeves of two highly collectable Parlophone overseas editions issued in Italy and France.

Quite apart from the novelty of seeing John, Paul, George and Ringo posing awkwardly on a golf course, McCartney’s shocking putting stance on the Italian 7-inch of Eight Day’s A Week/I’m A Loser really takes some beating. Where were Harold Swash and Dave Pelz when they were needed?

While we’re about it, look closely at the cover of Les Beatles’ Help! EP (on the opening page of this section and from the same photo shoot), where John Lennon can be clearly seen holding a lefthanded iron.

Admittedly, that particular club could have been intended for Paul (a southpaw bass player, remember) but Ringo’s wristwatch – on his right hand – gives the game away. The French have flipped the transparency, presumably to create a better visual effect, albeit at the expense of the golfing nuances.

Meanwhile, Beatles experts will know that the band’s golf connections in fact date all the way back to their pre-Quarry Men days, as John Lennon’s childhood friend Nigel Whalley recounts: “John was always the leader…he’d dare us to go with him and play on the Allerton golf course, trying to hit golf balls across Menlove Avenue [Lennon’s childhood home],” he told Philip Norman for the seminal biography, Shout! The True Story Of The Beatles. “Once the police came and chased us off.”

Whalley would soon be on tea-chest bass duties in the Quarry

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Michelle Wie revealed she was named after her parents’ favourite Beatles ballad on Rubber Soul, while (below) Scottish prodigy Carly Booth’s father, Wallace, was a Cavern Club bouncer once offered a job by the Fab Four.

PETER

THE BEATLES MAY NOT HAVE PLAYED THE GAME THEMSELVES BUT THERE IS ENOUGH INTRIGUING FAB FOUR GOLF TRIVIA TO JUSTIFY A SEPARATE DISCUSSION

NASH

The Fab Fore!

Men alongside Lennon, Pete Shotton and Ivan Vaughan (who would later introduce McCartney to the band). But, as Norman writes, “his consuming interest was golf not skiffle,” and he quickly assumed the role of band manager.

And it was through Whalley’s passion for the game that the Quarry Men played what turned out to be one their most important early gigs, at Lee Park Golf Club in 1957, where the band played for the takings of the ‘hat’ passed around the members.

One of those members, a Liverpool doctor named Sytner, had a son, Allan, who would soon invite the fresh-faced skifflers to play at a jazz club he had just opened downtown called, yup, the Cavern.

The Cavern’s unlikely connections with golf continue through one of the club’s first bouncers, wrestler Wallace Booth, father of Scottish teenage golf sensation, Carly Booth (named after the American singer, Carly Simon).

“I was on the door the night Brian Epstein first came to hear the Fab Four,” he told the Daily Telegraph in October 2005 when also referring to his memories of Cilla Black and Gerry And The Pacemakers. “And when the Beatles left Liverpool for London they asked me to become their roadie, but I was in training for the 1964 Olympics, in Tokyo, so they headed south while I stayed in Liverpool,” continued Booth who would go on to win silver at the 1966 Commonwealth Games.

The rest is history (though at the risk of contradicting a champion wrestler, history recounts that

Epstein actually first saw the Beatles at one of the Cavern’s famous lunchtime sessions on Thursday November 9, 1961, having strolled over to Matthew Street from his NEMS record shop, a few streets away in Whitechapel).

Almost half a century later, the Cavern hosted thelaunch of John Daly’s autobiography, In And Out Of The Rough, with the Wild Thing himself taking the stage for a rendition of his self-penned Lost Soul and Bob Dylan’s Knocking On Heaven’s Door.

The Daily Telegraph was not the only one underwhelmed by the lack of a Beatles selection that night, especially as Daly told the BBC’s Dougie Donnelly that week how he regarded the venue as “historic – alongside Memphis for the Blues and Nashville for Country music”.

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Clockwise from the top: I’m A Loser? It’s no wonder with that putting stance, Paul. The Beatles putt for a Parlophone Italian release.

Tragical Blistery Tour.

Sports Illustrated were among the many who couldn’t resist a Beatles theme as the Open returned to Liverpool in 2006.

Callaway’s Abbey Road mock up featuring Thomas Bjorn, Henrik Stenson and Michael Campbell among the tour pros reviving the iconic Beatles image.

The now notorious Golf Course News International cover, devised by Paul McCartney’s ex-PR manager, Geoff Baker, and allegedly inspired by Heather Mills.

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PHOTOGRAPHY BY CHARLES BRISCOE-KNIGHT

Talking of the blues, Daly could even have had a go at the Freddie King instrumental, In The Open.

The championship’s return to Hoylake was also an excuse for Callaway Golf’s Beatles-themed party, A Hard Day’s Night, attended by their top tour pros who had previously posed for a mock-up poster of the Abbey Road album cover (with the famous NW8 signpost now ‘Photoshopped’ to read Hoylake Road).

Asked to nominate his favourite Beatles song at the raffle that evening, Thomas Bjorn’s choice of Yesterday was greeted with howls of laughter given how the Dane had been narrowly pipped to the Scottish Open title just 24 hours previously.

Callaway weren’t the only ones to make the most of the Beatles connection at Hoylake last summer, with Sports Illustrated closing their Open preview issue with a spoof of the Magical Mystery Tour cover.

“Everyone talks about the Beatles,” wrote contributor Kevin Cook, “but there was another Liverpool band – one that fizzled because of its relentless focus on golf.” Cue the Foozles, whose Tragical Blistery Tour includes All You Need Is A Glove, Turnberry Fairways Forever, Roll Over Ben Hogan and (most cleverly) O.B.-La-Di, O.B.-La-Da. Meanwhile, back with British golf magazines, trade title Golf Course News International hired Paul McCartney’s ex-PR manager, Geoff Baker, to mastermind a tabloid-friendly makeover last April.

Baker cheekily admits that he based his first front cover, a glamorous shot of a “birdie babe” with a golf ball in her cleavage (at left), on Heather Mills McCartney.

And so the Beatles’ golf trivia collection looks set to continue for a while yet, with Michelle Wie revealing that she was christened after the classic ballad on Rubber Soul.

The Beatles and golf? It seems these are words that go together well.

2005 London Golf Show and honouring an appearance in last October’s Golf Broadcasters v.

Golf Writers match despite a clash with his Strictly Come Dancing rehearsal.

Spoony helps promote the Golf Foundation’s Roots initiative, and he’s even had an albatross: holing his 4-iron second shot at a par-five while on holiday in Milan [Albatross? Peter Green and Public Image Limited would be proud.]

Still with DJs, Virgin Radio’s Christian O’Connell admits to being “totally hooked” on golf to the point where his “pride and joy” Callaway Fusion woods were the subject of the ‘I Can’t Live Without’ column in the Mail On Sunday’s Live magazine, this summer.

“My wife caught me wiping away specks of dirt from the clubheads using my daughter’s baby wipes,” confessed O’Connell who regularly watches the Golf Channel and nominates P.G. Wodehouse’s golf-themed The Clicking Of Cuthbert as his favourite book.

But it’s not all sex, drugs, rock ‘n’ roll and golf within the music scene, as shown by a few notable dissenting voices.

For instance, there’s Bono of U2, who told the Murrayfield audience at the 2005 G8 concert about the logistical difficulties of fraternising with world leaders: “There’s a rule in U2…you can get away with anything in our band except you can’t play golf.” And to think he used to rant about global warming and starvation.

The same goes for Oasis, with Noel Gallagher bemoaning to Word that brother Liam had “dressed like a gay Spanish golfer” at their City of Manchester Stadium gig on July 2, 2005. Not that we’ve seen too many golfers of any nationality (or disposition) decked out in white floppy hat, faded jeans, red leather jacket and outsize shades.

Meanwhile, John Peel would be spinning in his grave at the thought of rock stars playing golf. At least the late, great DJ was spared the ignominy of a retirement playing the game he so derided in an interview shortly before his death in 2004.

Yet Peely himself would surely have been amused by the obscure 1979 single, Playing Golf (With My Flesh Crawling) by experimental post-punk band, The Family Fodder. Precisely the type of self-indulgent, avant garde, indie-label fare he favoured at the time, we bet there’s a copy still lurking in his collection.

Finally, while there’s no evidence that Kurt Cobain played golf, the news of his suicide on April 9, 1994 was enough to steal the headlines in even the Augusta Chronicle during Masters week.

“He’s gone and joined that stupid club,” the Nirvana singer’s mother was infamously quoted that day, referring to the select group of rock stars dead at the age of 27 (Hendrix, Paperback Joplin, Jones and Morrison Writer: among them).

The 2003 Having immersed myself in tome, The Songwriting the Masters while in Georgia Secrets Of The that week, reporting on what Beatles, was would soon be José Maria penned by a Olazábal’s first major victory, golf journalist. just for a second back then I thought she was referring to the Augusta National.

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HITWITM E H YOUR

RHYTHM STICK

OUR MUSIC AND GOLF THEMED ISSUE WOULDN’T BE COMPLETE WITHOUT AN EQUIPMENT SECTION. SO HERE IS AN OFFBEAT MUSO SLANT ON EVERYTHING FROM CLUBS AND BALLS TO BUGGIES AND BALL MARKERS – NOT FORGETTING A FEW FAMOUS MUSICAL CRIMES AGAINST GOLF FASHION

Nike’s Mojo golf ball: just perfect for those with the blues on the greens.

Golf’s cultural shift in recent years is neatly captured by Ogio’s Punk Rock golf bag, a special limited edition from their 2006 range.

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SO, NIKE are cool, but who’d have thought they’d go so far as to evoke the spirit of Delta bluesmen Muddy Waters and Robert Johnson when launching a golf ball?

‘Get your mojo working’, ran the marketing blurb for their 2003 Mojo ball named after the much misunderstood symbol of voodoo culture and targeted at a hip new generation of young golfers.

While a mojo is technically a preparation of natural roots and potions used by superstitious African-Americans usually as a lucky charm, Nike (like Austin Powers) would go on to stretch the definition to cover anything they felt like. By the time of the follow-up Mojo Kaarma ball, their PR men were clearly under their own spell. As shown by their 2005 press release: “Mojo is a roadie for a rock ‘n’ roll icon. Mojo was a knockout in Manila but never a guest at Watergate. Mojo writes the songs that make the whole world sing. Mojo knows how to boogie. And Mojo is going to make every golfer an offer he can’t refuse.”

Still, Nike weren’t first equipment company to use some ‘musical marketing’ for a new golf ball. When Maxfli debuted their first Revolution model at Birmingham’s Eurogolf Show in the mid-‘90s they hired leading tribute band, the Bootleg Beatles, for their private industry party.

You guessed it – they kicked off with a rendition of the Beatles 1968 classic track.

With all that extra spin, the Revolution no doubt had John Lennon spinning in his grave that night.

One rock ‘n’ roller not averse to a bit of equipment product placement is Huey

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Lewis, a celebrity endorsee for Callaway Golf in the 1990s, alongside Alice Cooper and saxophone star, Kenny G. Too bad that Lewis’1986 song It’s Hip To Be Square was 20 years too early to market the company’s square-headed Big Bertha FT-i Fusion Monster driver currently the talk of the equipment market.

Driver technology has indeed come on since Lewis’ platinum-selling album, Fore!, arguably the most commercially successful album with a golf-themed sleeve, which pictures the singer holding an old persimmon driver.

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ALBUM COVER PHOTOGRAPHY BY CHARLES BRISCOE-KNIGHT

You never know, that very club just might have been one of those from the workshop of expert clubmaker, Peter Broadbent, who can boast his own slant on golf equipment and music.

An accomplished guitarist in his own right, Broadbent, who was a master craftsman to stars like Nick Faldo in the days before metalwoods, went on to write the excellent 1997 retrospective on the life and guitar styles of jazz guitar pioneer, Charlie Christian.

Broadbent would no doubt be the first to be amused by the new Jazz Golf range of ladies’ clubs designed by former LPGA star, Sandra Post, that come in Harmony, Melody and Ensemble models.

For those looking to kit themselves out completely in musicinspired golf gear, you could put what we’ve got so far in Ogio’s Punk Rock golf bag, launched at the 2005 Munich Golf Europe show, complete with garish graphics for golfers who prefer the spikes on their heads rather than their shoes.

Along with the Nike and Maxfli golf balls referred to earlier, be sure to stock up with some from the Las Vegas Hard Rock Hotel which, as well as the logo, sport Ian Drury’s Hit Me With Your Rhythm Stick mantra.

For gloves, the muso’s choice has to be FootJoy, taking inspiration from Caroline Corr who shuns dedicated drum gloves in favour of a pair of WeatherSof GTX when behind the Corrs’ kit.

Finally, you could ‘accessorize’ with Brush-T tee-pegs invented by the late Richard Crouse who, as a guitarist, worked with the Eurythmics, Sham 69 and Peter Gabriel, and plectrum-shaped ball-markers by Jim Dunlop, who dabbles in the golf industry as well as making the finest nylon guitar picks in the business.

For apparel, you could track down one of the limited edition golf polo shirts launched to promote Robbie Williams’ 2001 album, Swing When You’re Winning. On no account follow Huey Lewis’ example of dodgy leather trousers as worn on the aforementioned Fore! sleeve, which constitute the worst breach of golfing dress code (literally) on record.

Let’s hope that Lewis (who, talking of crimes of fashion, was once caddied for by Nick Faldo wearing a wig)

Huey Lewis’ persimmon driver on the sleeve of Fore! clearly dates this million-selling ’80s album with his band, The News.

Former persimmon master craftsman, Peter Broadbent, turned his hand to jazz guitar and music writing as metal sounded the death knell for wood.

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Clockwise from the top: The Maxfli Revolution ball was launched to the strains of a Beatles tribute band playing the 1968 John Lennon classic.

Smell the glove. Caroline Corr favours FootJoy golf gloves when behind the Corrs’ kit.

Striking the right note for lady golfers, Jazz Golf offers sets of clubs in Harmony, Melody and Ensemble models.

Viva Las Vegas. The Hard Rock Hotel offers a range of golf mechandise for rock ‘n’ rollers.

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The most collectible of all golf-themed record sleeves, just 72 copies were printed of this seminal Sex Pistols bootleg with its golf punk sleeve.

managed a makeover from Izod in January, when he headlined a rock concert sponsored by the sports clothing company at the recent PGA Merchandise Show in Orlando.

Too bad that today’s trendy golf fashion brands, like Izod and J. Lindeberg, weren’t in business back in the ‘70s. They might also have managed a makeover for Ian Hodges of punk band, The Worst, pictured on a Lancashire putting green replete in leather jacket, chains and safety pins for what has become the most collectable of all golf-themed record sleeves.

Known affectionately as the Golf Punk album (long before the magazine of the same name), the charmingly offbeat sleeve houses the 12-inch vinyl bootleg of the Sex Pistols’ legendary gig at the Manchester Lesser Free Trade Hall of June 1976. One of this ultra-rare limited edition of just 72 copies fetched £250 on e-bay, last March.

Hodges’ choice of golfing apparel was eclipsed only by singer Mariah Carey, famously turned away from a US club for wearing a collarless shirt (this was before Tiger at the 2004 Masters). The golf-playing chanteuse apparently returned to the course in hot pants and heels, later telling a New York radio station: “I have previously gone out on the links in hot pants and heels and barely anything on – and nobody seemed to mind then.”

Quite apart from the dress codes, Mariah was reminded

by The Scotsman of the rules regarding unaccompanied female golfers at Muirfield and Royal Burgess when planning a game in the Edinburgh area during her 2003 tour.

Talking of etiquette, we can’t ignore the left-field golfing artwork of the Film-Maker single by The Cooper Temple Clause, the indie-prog outfit who enjoyed 15 minutes of fame in 2002. In an arbitrary take on the title (and bearing

ALBUM COVER PHOTOGRAPHY BY CHARLES BRISCOE-KNIGHT

Above: McFly drove Club Car to the top of the charts when filming the video for Obviously, their 2003 No. 1 single, on the fairways of Pennyhill Park.

Left: The Cooper Temple Clause brought Reading Golf Club an unexpected 15 minutes of fame in 2002 with the cover of their Film-Maker single.

Below left: PowaKaddy made Ronan Keating a custom golf trolley with an mp3 player hidden in the handle.

tantric sex, we find the following line delivered with impressive vocal precision: Gonna get a set a’ better clubs Gonna find the kind with tiny nubs Just so my irons aren’t always flying off the backswing

no relevance whatsoever to the song itself), the sleeve recounts how: “In the early hours of Saturday morning, Dawn Tyson and Liz break into Reading Golf Club – another pristine, commuter belt shrine to casual racism and Masonic business.

The girls steal two golf carts and drive them at speed across the green, swerving in front of one another. Dawn rolls her car at the 18th.”

Hardly the script for a blockbuster, while – rather than Reading – surely Temple Golf Club (just a few miles east and even handier for Shepperton Film Studios) would have been a more appropriate venue.

Incidentally, the Club Car brand of golf carts used here enjoyed a rather more successful piece of musical product placement in the video for Obviously, the No. 1 UK hit for teen rock band McFly in the summer of 2004.

Filmed on the 9-hole course at Pennyhill Park in Surrey, the video captured 18-year-old Tom Fletcher, Danny Jones, Harry Judd and the 16-year-old bass player, Dougie Poynter, hurtling around the fairways in two Club Car Precedents (which they manage to keep on four wheels).

‘Club Car are Top Of The Pops’ ran the press release as the single topped the charts and the video became the most requested on music TV channel, The Hits, that July.

Meanwhile, a lyric about golf equipment can be found on a No. 1 hit courtesy of Canadian novelty rockers, the Barenaked Ladies, who’s catchy One Week topped the US chart (for, prophetically, one week) in early 1999.

Among the seemingly random references to everything from sushi and The X-Files to Andrew Lloyd Webber and

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Famous for her dubious dress codes, Mariah Carey was reminded by The Scotsman of the rules regarding female golfers at some Edinburgh courses.

“Tiny nubs”? Sounds like distinctly non-conforming equipment to us – unless the songwriter, Ed Robertson, had in mind the TaylorMade Nubbins putter, released that same year with its ping pong bat-style, rubber nub face-insert which promised extra topspin.

While we’re on tenuous technology trivia (but swiftly avoiding Into The Groove and Theme From Shaft), let’s close with the confusion surrounding the title of Permission To Land, the 2003 platinum-selling debut from Lowestoft rockers, the Darkness.

“I actually wanted to call the album Persimmon [sic] To Land,” quipped frontman Justin Hawkins camply on a Channel 4 documentary in 2004.

For such a lightweight metal band, you’d think he’d have gone for titanium.

Never Mind The Ball Markers. The Sex Pistols and Oasis are among the bands gracing some of golf’s rock ‘n’ roll minutiae.

Ian Poulter is among the growing band of tour pros favouring the latest Oakley Thump Pro sunglasses with built-in mp3 player.

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