Gilbert - The Boxing Ring King Source: Jackie Writer: Dick Tatham Date: 1974   "I've got news for you all..."   He remembers perking up with interest as his Mum came into the room saying those words.  He crowded round her with his brothers and sisters... "We're going to live in England.  Your Dad's taken a job in Swindon..."   Gilbert O'Sullivan recalls he heard the news with mixed feelings.  It was 1958 and he was eleven years old.  He had lived all those years in Waterford - the town in Southern Ireland famed for its glassware.   He belonged to a large Catholic family.  He had spent many a pleasurable hour wandering along the banks of the river which ran through the town, and had came to know and love the surrounding countryside.   He was happy as he was.  One part of him didn't want to leave.  Yet another part thought it would be exciting to try something new.  Who knew what fate might bring in England?   His real name was Ray...Raymond Edward O'Sullivan...Today the star who is Gilbert looks back on that important move the family made 16 years ago...   "My Dad worked in the slaughterhouse of a meat factory in Waterford.  My Mum ran a sweet shop.  Home was a council house in the Cork Road".   "The Swindon job came up because Dad's firm also had a factory there.  Dad asked for the move because the money would be a lot better in Swindon."   Gilbert went to St. Joseph's Comprehensive in Swindon.  His best subject by far was art.  He began to think he might make a career in it.   He was also finding himself increasingly interested in pop music.   As for silent movies, he had been fascinated by them for a long time.  Charlie Chaplin, Buster Keaton and the Keystone Cops being his favourites.   He was a bright athletic lad - already showing skills as a boxer.   All seemed well in his world - he was really happy with his two sisters and three brothers.   But in 1960, not all that long after they had settled into their new home, a shadow fell on the O'Sullivan family.   Gilbert's father became ill.  For a time he struggled on at work.  When he had to give up and it was obvious he wasn't getting any better, it became clear there was something seriously wrong.   "I remember my mother breaking the news to us that Dad had died," says Gilbert.  "It was a terrible blow to us, as you can imagine."   "My Mother had to take a job.  She worked terribly hard to bring us up well."   He found himself increasingly keen and successful as a boxer...His skill took him beyond the school and into public amateur contests - of which he was to have nearly 50.   "My best year", he recalls, "was between the ages of 14 and 15.  I got as far as the quarter-finals of the Amateur Boxing association junior championships."   "I forget where the fights in my section were held.  Possibly somewhere in Wales.  I know I had hopes of making the semis and finals at the Albert Hall.  But I ran up against a really tough bloke and was stopped in the second round."   Gilbert's Mum wasn't slow to notice his interest in music.  She decided it was a good idea for him to learn piano.  She bought an old upright for £5 and put it in the front room.  She arranged for Gilbert to have lessons.  They didn't last long.   "The trouble," Gilbert recalls, "was that the teacher would show me scales and then play a piece of music - telling me to take it home and learn it.   "I'd turn up the following week and play the piece.  But I hadn't needed to bother about the notes.  I'd simply remembered what she had played and went over it again by ear.   "When the teacher latched on, she was very nice about it.  She told Mum lessons were a waste of money.  So I carried on playing by ear.   "Then Mum bought me a guitar for Christmas.  She sent me to a classical teacher in Swindon.  I'm left-handed and she tried to make me play right-handed.  It didn't work out.   "In any case, classical pieces weren't my taste in music.  I was more interested in pop tunes like "FBI" and "Man Of Mystery"."   What fired Gilbert's zest for music far more powerfully than anything before was the burst to fame of the Beatles early in 1963.  They were young.  They were fresh and down-to-earth in outlook.   A captivated Gilbert not only bought their discs but began to compile a scrapbook of Beatles photos and press cuttings.   Meanwhile his painting and drawing had won him a place at Swindon Art College.  He started there in September 1963.  His aim: to be a graphic designer.   "The great thing about the Beatles," he recalls, "was they inspired so many people to form groups.  I hadn't been long at art college when I decided to try and form one."   "But could I get other blokes to join me?  And if I did, would we be a flop with audiences?  I just had to find out."   TO BE CONTINUED.......

Down in the garden shed something stirred Source: Jackie Writer: Dick Tatham Date: 1974   Despite Gilbert's misgivings, he had been able to get a group together from blokes he knew in a local youth club and they went over quite well in their first show and during other dates they played at local events.   The group was called The Doodles and Gilbert was the drummer.  But about seven months later, after he had became a student at Swindon Art College, Gilbert joined another club group - The Prefects.  Again, he was the drummer.   "The Prefects quite often played at places like approved schools, borstals and children's mental institutions," Gilbert recalls.  "Usually there were good audiences and I was glad to be gaining experience."   "We were all mad about The Beatles but didn't try to copy them as everyone else seemed to be doing that.  We copied another group The Searchers.   "With The Prefects I began to get the urge to write songs.  But I couldn't come up with a good melody.  There was a Liverpool group, The Dennisons.  They had recorded what I thought was a great song 'Be My Girl'.  The Dennisons weren't all that well known.  I was sure the others in The Prefects wouldn't know the song.   "So I borrowed the tune and wrote words to fit it.  Full of hope, I played the song to the others - saying I'd written the whole thing.   "They said, ' It's a great tune, but the words are terrible'.  I was down in the dumps for ages after that."   Gilbert eventually picked himself up, however, and began slogging away at songwriting.  What he recalls as his first real song was 'Ready Miss Steady' which he still likes very much.   Gilbert left The Prefects and joined another band, Rick's Blues.  In Rick's Blues he learned a lot about drums, piano and music in general.  Gilbert split with the group eventually, owing to a difference in music outlook.   He decided the time had come to concentrate on songwriting, but a problem arose with the arrival of the family television...   "The telly was in one corner of the front room, the piano in another.  Obviously Mum and the others couldn't concentrate on the box while I was playing.  The telly couldn't very well go.  The piano did - into the garden shed.   "I played very loud.  I also played very long.  I would get home from college and bang away till late at night on occasions.  Neighbours kept yelling at me to pack up."   But Gilbert's urge to write was too strong to be quelled by the neighbours.  soon he had equipped himself with a tape recorder on which he put his songs, sung to his own piano accompaniment.   During his last year at art school he began sending tapes to famous disc producers in London.  But they would come back months later - obviously unopened.   "I decided," says Gilbert, "I would have to go to London to try and get my tapes to people by direct personal contact.   "After working hard at art college I passed my exams as a graphic designer.  Then I told my mother of my decision to try a career in music.   "At first she was very put out.  But I pointed out that my efforts at college hadn't been wasted.  'If I fail to make it in music,' I said, 'I shall have another career on which to fall back'."   Gilbert came to London late in 1966.  With him came two mates from Swindon - both interested in careers outside music.  They took a furnished flat they had seen advertised in an evening paper.   Gilbert got a temporary job behind the men's counter in C & A's over the Christmas period.   Going into C & A's was a stroke of luck for Gilbert.  Working in the same department was a singer named Mike Ward.  Mike and Gilbert soon became mates.   Mike explained his discs were being produced by a Stephen Shane who worked at the publishing firm April Music.  They were released by CBS.   Said Gilbert, "I suppose you wouldn't take my tapes in to see if anyone's interested?"   "Why not?" replied Mike.  "It might lead to something - who knows?"   It did lead to something...   April Music signed Gilbert as a songwriter.  They had him make demos of some of his songs.   When Christmas was over Gilbert got a job as a postal clerk wait an oil company for £10 a week.   Meanwhile Gilbert and his friends had given up the flat and Gilbert found himself all alone in a bedsitter in Pembridge Villas.   TO BE CONTINUED......