The Nazz.
John Marshall Fred Stevens Dean Thomas John Cave (before he discovered literature) Nicky Nedachin
SKELETONS
Dean's career in music began when he played in a rock band called
the Nazz. The name came from the Yardbirds song, The Nazz are Blue. A
few other bands had the same idea.
For their biggest gig, where they actually headlined the show, The Nazz
were billed as The Gnats, due to the printer mishearing the name when
the booking agent phoned through the copy for the posters.
Soon after this the lead singer left, changed his name to William Shakespeare, and had a few hits in the early 70's.
The band, now called Wireless, carried on for a while with Dean
taking over the vocals, and got some extra work as a studio band doing
jingles and radio commercials at United Sound Studios.
Inspired first by Australian singer and guitarist, Terry Hannagan and
later by Taj Mahal, Dean started playing acoustic guitar and writing
songs. Also inspired by Jack Kerouac, he eventually went to America,
with the idea of doing a real life reading of Kerouac's On The Road, by
hitchhiking across the country. While 'On the Road', Dean played
acoustic sets in many US folk clubs. In New York he met Australian
singer/songwriter Stuart Ongley and landed a regular gig at a bar on
the West 70's.
When his visa ran out, Dean headed for London, where he got a deal
with a small record company, which mainly distributed American
recordings. After doing some recordings at the Manor Studio in Oxford
with most of Fairport Convention, Dean was offered a serious contract
with a large UK label.
Dean was asked to meet their main producer, Hal Shaper, a man who
had written songs for everyone from Frank Sinatra down. Hal and Dean
got on well and it looked like the deal would go ahead. Hal told Dean
that if you got a song recorded by Frank Sinatra, you could forget
about it all and retire. He also said a song recorded by Glen Campbell
was worth a cottage in the country.
Unfortunately, for various reasons, the great dream didn't happen.
Dean and Stuart practise Christmas carols for the North Devon chapter of the African Methodist Church.
Soon after this Dean started going to Paris a lot and playing in
cafes for food and beer. He then reunited with Stuart Ongley and they
played together in pubs in Oxford, Cornwall and North Devon. In London,
Dean started working in radio with the company, Radio Plan and writing
occasional stories and articles for IPC Magazines.
Dean then met the guitarist, Russ Shipton, and they formed an acoustic duo called Two Bit Band, doing blues, folk and original songs. Dean also met UK producer, Austin John Marshall around this time. He liked their music and got them some concert gigs and also got them together with David Swarbrick, Dave Pegg and Dave Mattacks from Fairport Convention to record some original songs. While recording in Shaftsbury Avenue, they were visited by some friends of Austin John's, Sandy Denny and Vivian Stanshall, which was very exciting.
Russ Shipton looks at the world from the back cover of his first book.
Although this recording session was successful, Austin John ended up
moving to Ireland and the songs were never released. Dean hopes to
redress this on a future CD. Russ was about to launch his guitar
method, Folk Styles of Today, which eventually became The Complete
Guitar Player, which went on to become the world's best selling guitar
method ever, with over 1,000,000 copies sold.
By this stage Dean was broke and couldn't hang on any longer for fame and fortune in London. To make some money and have an adventure, he got a job in the Swedish Merchant Navy as a seaman, signing on for one voyage to the Middle East. The ship arrived in Beiruit the day civil war was officially declared between the Arabs and the Israelis and was stuck there for months. Dean played his guitar every day after work for the guys and girls on the ship and dodged bullets and con-artists whenever he could get into Beirut. (It was one of those periods in life that are much better when spoken about afterwards.)
Some friends on the ship congratulate Dean for winning the best T-shirt competion.
With some money in his pocket, Dean came back to Australia and
started writing music and performing around the clubs in Sydney. He
made some recordings at JJ with Sandy McCutcheon, then a DJ, which were
played on the station. Around this time Dean started playing with
Groove Myers. They formed a duo called Deano and Groove and were very
successful as a live act, usually playing six nights a week, sometimes
in three places a night, around Sydney. Eventually the duo went their
separate ways and Dean started writing songs with fellow musician,
Andrew Thomas Wilson, through what was then ATV music. Dean finally had
a song released in London when Constant Change, written for Edith
Bliss, was released there as a single.
Another interesting project Dean became involved in was the protest
to save Luna Park in Sydney. The artist Peter Kingston asked Dean to
write a song about it and Dean performed the song with Peter and artist
Martin Sharp, outside Parliament House in Sydney. To attract media
attention, they were dressed in clown suits from Martin Sharp's
fabulous collection.
Dean also wrote the song A Whole World of People, which launched SBS and was played every day for years on SBS.Dean has also written several books. One is a work of fiction about a young blues singer and the rock and roll industry, called Morrie Klutz and The Number One Record Company, which was published by Hale and Iremonger. Another, Short Stories of Henry Lawson, is an anecdotal biography of the great Australian writer. It was published by Hodder Headline and has been translated into Japanese.
Dean’s first book. Available at selected second-hand book shops.
Other writing was published in the Australian Literary Supplement,
Billy Blue Magazine, Nation Review, various international publications,
and in an anthology of Australian writing, Bedside Blue. Dean kept on
plugging away at guitar playing and song writing. A few years ago he
was working in Melbourne for a year and joined up with Chris Grosz and
Bruce Thomas to play some blues. As they all played instruments made by
National, they called themselves The Multi-Nationals. They played
together until Dean had to come back to Sydney for family and work
reasons.
Over the years, Dean had written many songs in the blues vein and he
knew that if he didn't do something with them, nothing would ever
happen. Inspired by friends he has played with including Groove Myers,
Skip Sail, Bob Brosman and Rick Falkiner, Dean started working
seriously to get the songs and his playing together.
Consequently, Dean released his first CD, Not Really The Blues, co-produced by guitarist and friend, Doug Weaver and helped along by some great musicians, including drummer Mal Wakeford, Bass player, Marshall McAdam and Tuba player, Carolyn 'Cazzbo' Johns.
Dean’s first CD. Check it out.
Not Really the Blues has been played on many radio shows. Including The Planet, Stormy Monday, The Blues is Back, KK's Blues, The Blue Room and even The Blues Doctor on Bush Radio in Cape Town South Africa. Dean has been working on his new cd She's On the Other Side, now released on Bombora.