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[0:00] Tim Rice: Hello, this is Tim Rice, and this is my podcast, Get Onto My Cloud, episode 60.

[0:17] Tim Rice: For nearly 50 years, I have been a Sod.

[0:21] Tim Rice: Of course, by Sod, I mean a member of the Society of Distinguished Songwriters, or Sods.

[0:27] Tim Rice: The Society was founded by songwriter Mitch Murray in 1971.

[0:32] Tim Rice: Its original members were distinguished British songwriters indeed, and many more have been added to the club's ranks in subsequent decades.

[0:41] Tim Rice: By and large, but certainly not exclusively, the members of Sods are songwriters who are not first and foremost performers.

[0:49] Tim Rice: Back in the 60s and 70s, alongside the staggering success of the Beatles, Stones and Co., the traditional Tin Pan Alley role of songwriter as supplier of hits to the stars who did not write their own material was alive and extremely well.

[1:03] Tim Rice: The era of the singer-songwriter was upon us.

[1:08] Tim Rice: But plenty of extremely important and successful artists depended upon material created by the heirs to Cole Porter, Jules Stein, and Sammy Kahn, Irving Berlin, Richard Rogers, Lorence Hart, George Gershwin, Jerome Kern, to name but a few exponents of the Great American Songbook.

[1:27] Tim Rice: And of course, their British equivalents, such as Ray Noble, Tommy Connor, Michael Carr, Jimmy Kennedy, Tolshot Evans, Lionel Bart, and many more.

[1:36] Tim Rice: And the heirs to those amazing line-ups of the 40s and 50s in the UK were Sod's founder Mitch Murray, Peter Callender, Les Reed, Barry Mason, Jeff Stevens, the two Rogers, Greenaway and Cook, Tony McCauley, John Carter, Ken Lewis, Tony Hatch, Norman Newell, Bill Martin, Phil Coulter, Mike Leander.

[1:55] Tim Rice: These were the Sods in their very early days.

[1:58] Tim Rice: It was very much a society for writers who did not often venture into the spotlight.

[2:03] Tim Rice: It was very much a society that existed merely for fun and friendship.

[2:08] Tim Rice: Andrew Lloyd Webber and I had the honour of being elected a year or two later, and although it was a concept never quite up Andrew's alley, it certainly was up mine, and I've lost count of the number of great evenings I've enjoyed since 1974 in the company of some of the gents who've written so many of the most popular songs of the 20th century.

[2:27] Tim Rice: I say gents because there've never been any ladies' sods.

[2:31] Tim Rice: This is probably now illegal, but to be honest, there were comparatively few hugely successful female British songwriters who were not performers in those early days.

[2:40] Tim Rice: There was never a rule banning ladies.

[2:42] Tim Rice: In fact, there were virtually no rules about anything.

[2:45] Tim Rice: But all blokes together, even in black ties and at a decent pub, are not necessarily an irresistible draw for the opposite sex, certainly not back then.

[2:54] Tim Rice: I'm aware that whatever words I use in this paragraph will probably get me cancelled.

[3:00] Tim Rice: Besides, once a year we had a much bigger bash, Sods Ladies' Night, which over the years grew into one of the music business's biggest and most popular shindigs, at which those sods who had really wanted to be Tom Jones or Engelbert Humberdinck, or in my case, Elvis, could regale a captive audience with their interpretation of their biggest hits, often hilarious, always ecstatically received.

[3:24] Tim Rice: Nothing more ecstatically received than Barry Mason's annual rendition of Delilah.

[3:30] Tim Rice: Ladies were a crucial component of this evening, and the most appreciative of guests.

[3:36] Tim Rice: There were no particular aims to Sods beyond that of friendship and gossip, including the tales of our latest recording or songwriting triumphs or disasters.

[3:46] Tim Rice: The menus at dinners were often spectacular, the venues ditto, and many new ideas for songs or records emerged as the night wore on, with one or two even being remembered the following day, or even put into action the following month.

[4:01] Tim Rice: Following Mitch Murray, the first King Sod, also known as the Sod Father, most members have been lumbered, I mean honored, with a stretch on the throne.

[4:11] Tim Rice: Some, including Mitch, more than once.

[4:14] Tim Rice: He is, in fact, back in power as I speak.

[4:17] Tim Rice: King Sod the 51st, having been the 21st, and of course, the first.

[4:23] Tim Rice: Some Sods were primarily composers, some, such as your humble podcaster, mere lyricists.

[4:31] Tim Rice: The latter group included Don Black, Norman Newell, Herbert Kretzner, Barry Mason, and Gary Osborne, who nobly kept the society together for three consecutive years of kingship when Covid ruled and meetings were impossible.

[4:46] Tim Rice: Many Sods do both words and music and took to the stage or concert arena as well, such as Ten CC's Graham Gouldman, The Moody Blues Justin Haywood, The Shadows, Bruce Welch and Brian Bennett, and Timeless Rock and Roll legend Marty Wilde.

[5:02] Tim Rice: And Mike Bat has spent so much time on stage in a womble suit, it's extraordinary that in the daylight he's been able to write anything, let alone musicals, TV and film scores, classical works, and mega hits such as Bright Eyes and A Winter's Tale.

[5:16] Tim Rice: Mitch Murray, who is to blame for Sods, has an extraordinary list of hits to his credit.

[5:22] Tim Rice: His first was back in 1963, and it was a number one, but not in this version.

[5:36] Tim Rice: I wish I knew.

[5:39] Tim Rice: If I knew how you do it to me, I do it to you.

[5:47] Tim Rice: How do you do what you do to me? I'm feeling blue.

[5:53] Tim Rice: Wish I knew how you do it to me, but I have no blue.

[6:00] Tim Rice: You give me a feeling in my heart.

[6:05] Tim Rice: Passing through it.

[6:11] Tim Rice: Won't you tell me how do you do it? How do you do what you do to me? I wish I knew.

[6:43] Tim Rice: Give me a feeling in my heart. Do I lie like an arrow? Passing through it.

[6:49] Tim Rice: Suppose that you think you're very smart. But won't you tell me how do you do it? How do you do what you do to me? I wish I knew.

[7:03] Tim Rice: Wish I knew how you do it to me, I do it to you. Wish I knew how you do it to me.

[7:10] Tim Rice: I do it to you.

[7:24] Tim Rice: That was the Beatles, of course, singing the song that their producer George Martin assured them was a number one and a great follow-up to Love Me Do.

[7:32] Tim Rice: But they wanted to record their own songs, and quite right too.

[7:36] Tim Rice: George Martin was quite right too, as How Do You Do It rocketed to number one when he re-recorded it with Jerry and the Pacemakers, according to some charts, giving Jerry the first ever Mersey Beat chart topper.

[7:48] Tim Rice: As Please Please Me by the Beatles only got to number two.

[7:51] Tim Rice: This aberration is largely the fault of the authors of the definitive guide to the UK charts, the Guinness Book of British Hit Singles, which, as one of the authors, I dealt with in Get Onto My Cloud episode 41.

[8:04] Tim Rice: Check it out.

[8:05] Tim Rice: I seem to recall the Beatles subsequently made up for this dubious injustice many, many times during the rest of the decade.

[8:12] Tim Rice: And Mitch Murray continued to have hits.

[8:14] Tim Rice: Another UK number one with Jerry and the Pacemakers, Smash Hits with Freddie and the Dreamers, The Tremelo's, Georgie Fame, Vanity Fair, Cliff Richard, Tony Christie, and many more, including a couple of number ones in the US.

[8:26] Tim Rice: The Night Chicago Died and Billy Don't Be a Hero.

[8:30] Tim Rice: Many of his successes were written with the late Peter Callender, another delightful salt.

[8:36] Tim Rice: There isn't room in this podcast to feature even a tiny fraction of Mitch's hits, nor indeed those of any of the society's other alumni.

[8:44] Tim Rice: Andrew and I were in awe to be invited to join the dinner tables of those who'd written, and in many cases also produced the hit recordings of so many unforgettable songs, so many standards, almost before they left the writer's demo tape.

[8:58] Tim Rice: Delilah and The Last Waltz by Les Reed and Barry Mason. Winchester Cathedral and the Crying Game by Jeff Stevens, Baby Now That I've Found You and Don't Give Up On Us by Tony McCaulay.

[9:06] Tim Rice: You've got your troubles and I'd like to teach the world to sing by Rogers Greenaway and Cook. Let's go to San Francisco and Can't You Hear My Heartbeat by John Carter and Ken Lewis.

[9:15] Tim Rice: Downtown and Call Me by Tony Hatch. Congratulations and Puppets on a String by Bill Martin and Phil Coulter.

[9:22] Tim Rice: I could go on and on.

[9:23] Tim Rice: And that's just one or two of the early hits of some of the early sods.

[9:28] Tim Rice: As the years rolled by, new sods appeared, and others, sad to say, shuffled off this mortal coil, such as The Immortal Lionel Bart, Russ Conway, Tony Hiller, Norman Newell, Herbie Kretzmer, John Miles, Marcel Stellman.

[9:43] Tim Rice: But there are plenty still going strong.

[9:45] Tim Rice: And further songwriters extraordinaire, who I hope to see at every gathering include Frank Musker, Mike Darbo, Gary Kemp, Phil Thornalley, Tony Swain, Andy Hill, Phil Pickett, Wayne Hector, Nikki Chin, Hamish Stewart, Howard Jones, David Arnold, Ricky Wilde, Van Morrison, yes, Van Morrison, Dominic King, Nick Kershaw, Richard Kerr, David Lowe, B.A. Robertson.

[10:11] Tim Rice: Then there are those who feel perhaps like Lord Lloyd Webber, that it's not quite their bag.

[10:16] Tim Rice: But should they turn up, they'd be welcome.

[10:19] Tim Rice: Songwriters such as Guy Chambers, Jeff Wayne, Gary Barlow, Roy Wood, David Essex, Rick Wakeman, all sods.

[10:27] Tim Rice: Once a sod, always a sod, whether you like it or not.

[10:31] Tim Rice: I'm terrified of missing any sod out as I love them all equally, but my lawyers are primed to field any complaints.

[10:38] Tim Rice: As a mere wordsman, I've often discussed the possibility of writing a song or two with a tunesmith.

[10:44] Tim Rice: And indeed, thanks to Sods, I had the opportunity to do this.

[10:48] Tim Rice: However, I've never been particularly adept at writing lyrics without a theatrical or filmic background story.

[10:54] Tim Rice: I greatly admire those songwriters who can conjure up what is in effect a mini-musical in three or four minutes.

[11:01] Tim Rice: And somehow, exciting plans to write a number or two with the chap next to me at the Savoy Ornandoes rarely seem to have been fulfilled.

[11:09] Tim Rice: I have, however, written one or two one-off songs with my fellow Sods, and have already shamelessly featured a couple in previous podcasts.

[11:16] Tim Rice: With the superb musician and terrific lyricist, Mike Bat.

[11:21] Tim Rice: I was lucky enough to share in one of David Essex's biggest hits, A Winter's Tale, which graced Get Onto My Cloud 33.

[11:28] Tim Rice: We did write one other song together for Elaine Page's 1980 album, Excitingly entitled Elaine Page.

[11:36] Tim Rice: The song was called Falling Down to Earth and was produced and arranged by Andrew Powell.

[11:57] Tim Rice: You were my perfect crime. All except your time. You make as you resume your climb, and I fall down to falling down to all to love.

[12:50] Tim Rice: You were too quick for the naked eye, for you never came to rest. You gave me nothing, nothing at all, but I had your best.

[13:11] Tim Rice: Caring now, but you pass the test, and I fall down to us unfalling down to her do not fall enough too quickly the one you want walking, do not fall enough to slowly the chance it's all too rail from days of my childhood, learning thou shalt not steal.

[14:19] Tim Rice: You store my heart and then stall away. Tell me what to feel. Did you exist? Was it a dream? Oh, but the herd is ring as I fall down to eye, I'm holding down to us. Falling Down to earth, music, Mike Bat, lyrics mine. I'm still hoping for some American country star to realize that Winter's Tale could be a great holidays hit on their side of the pond. But after 40 years, I'm beginning to suspect it might not happen. With Richard Kerr, who among much else wrote the magnificent Mandy and a string of other hits for Barry Manilow, and I'll Never Love This Way Again for Dion Warwick, I wrote one of my best friends for Michael Crawford, which you might have heard on Get Onto My Cloud 31, you still can.

Richard and I also wrote a song entitled Nevermind, brackets, never mind, never mind, close brackets, which never got recorded by anyone, except by Richard himself on the demo, which we rather pathetically sent round to several recording stars, none of whom, apart from the very polite Marty Pellow, even acknowledged receipt. It's a tough life being a non-performing songwriter. I think that of all the songs I've written, which have never been commercially recorded, whether by a well-known singer or by Mike Tyson, my favourite is Nevermind, open brackets, never mind, never mind, close brackets. So if you want to hear it, please have a listen to Get Onto My Cloud, episode 25. It really is a great vocal and a great melody.

And the words are alright. Sods Dominic Bugatti and Frank Musker were a lethally good combination a few summers ago, writing inter alia hits for Paul Nicholas, Sheena Easton and Air Supply, and also one of the best film songs of the 80s, Dogs in the Yard, featured in Alan Parker's big movie musical Fame. As an old pal of Paul Nicholas, ever since he sang the title role in the London production of Jesus Christ Superstar back in 1972, and having got to know Dominic Bugatti through Sods, Dominic and I wrote a number for a Paul single in the 80s entitled No News. It was a fun single, but as far as the charts were concerned, no news.

[18:21] Tim Rice: And episode in my life is true. There won't be any repeat. And all your space should come back. Oh how I wish it too. I wish she never caused me in the worst. And now I'm through expecting her to end the news. And the rumor is just a rumour. The nurses there is no new news. And the rumor is just a rumor. If only she'd call and tell you it all. The nervous system is no news just a rumor. And the rumor is only a rumor. No news. What's the news? No news. What's in there? I've heard nothing of news. What's the news? I haven't heard a single word. No news. What's the news? No news. What's the news? No news. There is no news. The news is there is no news. I've heard nothing from my baby. No news with toe-tapping tune by Dominic Bugatti.

Lyric. I'm guilty. Otherwise, Sodswise, I wrote one song with the 10cc genius Graham Gouldman. Which the band recorded, entitled The Monkey and the Onion. And that also featured in Get Onto My Cloud 25. Graham wrote a number of massive hit songs even before 10cc got going, including For Your Love, Yardbirds, Bus Stop and Look Through Any Window, The Hollies, and for me his pre 10cc masterpiece, No Milk Today, recorded by Herman's Hermits. I recently hosted the London Library's Christmas party, and four Sods, Richard, Graham, Bruce Welch, and Justin Haywood, each performed one of their biggest hits, and rarely has my association with the society been more beneficial. The literary crowd were enthralled to hear the writers perform numbers they all knew and loved in an intimate setting.

[21:50] Tim Rice: So, although I haven't written very often with my fellow Sods, I would not have missed the almost 50 years of being part of the organization for anything. It's a different era now, and as far as I can tell, there aren't too many on the charts these days who don't write their own stuff, often in conjunction with about nine other collaborators, which for starters would be a problem for a modern-day Sods. After a few hits, there'd be around a hundred members. Of course, there are some very gifted songwriters around, but it does seem to me that unless you are the singer or the record producer, or sometimes a bloke who was walking past the studio at the time, it's very difficult for the equivalent of the Sods of today to exist, let alone write songs that will last and be widely covered.

However, there is no doubt that talent is still there. It always will be. Nonetheless, I think I'm glad to have been part of a group of friends of colleagues whose songs reached the world via old fashioned concepts such as gramophone records, a few radio stations, and above all, magnificent interpreters, who did not necessarily have to be the writers. I'm going to end this edition of Get Onto My Cloud with a song I had nothing whatsoever to do with, written by the recently deposed King Sod Gary Osborne, who did so much to keep Sods in touch with each other during the two years we were unable to meet in the flesh thanks to COVID. Gary has written hits with Elton John, including Nikita and Blue Eyes, and the lyrics for Jeff Wayne's monster musical Smash.

But for me, his greatest moment was his outstanding English interpretation, so much more than a translation of Véronique Samson's French hit Amoureuse, a hit in English for Kiki D. My thanks to all Sods, to Mitch and to Gary for half a century of companionship so far.

[24:41] ♪ Musical number: "Just Another Day" — performed by Tim Rice ♪

[27:59] Tim Rice: Written and presented by me, Tim Rice, and produced by the one and only Peter Hobbs.