senior-spectrum.com

Continued...

Smith’s return to the stage was precipitated by a simple residential move. After years of living in London, Smith packed up his family, belongings, and recording studio and relocated to the Costa del Sol region on the southern tip of Spain in search of peace, serenity and sunshine. It was after the move that Smith found himself coerced into performing again.

“People found out I was there, and I was asked to do a charity show for abused children. I’d been doing producing, songwriting, commercials, I hadn’t been on stage in 25 years. But these abused children needed more money to help them and I agreed to do it. I got some guys together, rehearsed, did the show, and managed to raise $100,000 for the kids, which was nice.

“I had such tremendous fun playing live again because I hadn’t done it in so long, so I said to the guys, ‘Shall I see if I can take it a stage further, maybe we’ll do some dates?’”

Smith said he got in contact with an American promoter “and off we went!”

“I’m having a great time and that’s what it’s about,” he said. “As long as I have fun, I’ll do it. When the fun stops, maybe I’ll stop.”

The only drawback for Smith’s return to touring is the extensive travel, though it’s admittedly not the hectic pace he and the DC5 maintained during the 1960s.

“It’s a bit exhausting, the traveling,” Smith said. “I don’t think we get paid to go on stage — we get paid to travel. One night, you’re in Chicago, the next you’re in Las Vegas, then Sacramento. That’s the tiring part, but we’re still having fun.”

Fun is the operative word for Smith when he explains why music of the 1960s still holds its appeal.

“It was a happier time than it is now. It’s happier music, and I think we bring back happy memories. In this troubled world, that’s what we all need,” Smith said. “I’m extremely proud that ‘Glad All Over’ was the first song I ever wrote and 39 years later, they’re still playing it on the radio.”

“Glad All Over” kickstarted an incredible run of success for the Dave Clark Five. From February 1964 to June 1966, the band racked up 14 Top 20 singles, a total surpassed only by the Beatles during that particular stretch.

Extensive touring and television exposure certainly helped, especially the 12 sold-out appearances at Carnegie Hall and 18 appearances on Ed Sullivan’s Sunday night variety show, both records for rock and roll acts.

On March 24, Smith returned to the Ed Sullivan Theatre at the behest of Shaffer, David Letterman’s bandleader and a fervent DC5 fan.

“Paul Shaffer said I was the one who inspired him to play the piano,” Smith said. “We were off to play a casino in Canada and he rang up and asked if I would come on the David Letterman show and take the band. Dave was ill and Paul was going to be the front man and he wanted a keyboard man for his band. They flew me back from Canada on my day off and I got to sing and play with some great musicians.”

Smith admitted to feeling a sense of deja vu upon his return to the Ed Sullivan Theatre for the first time in 36 years.

“When we got there, I remembered the makeup room, the green room and the stage, the little balcony,” Smith recalled. “It’s funny. We did 18 shows and when we finished, we would walk over and shake hands. The only thing Ed ever said was, ‘Thank you very much, boys. It was nice to have you on the show. Look forward to seeing you soon.’ That was all he said, 18 times!

“[Sullivan] was a very polite man, very kind. To play in front of 70 million viewers, you couldn’t ask for better promotion,” he said, adding that he wasn’t nervous at all. “The first time we did Ed Sullivan, it was a week after the Beatles did it. We flew in — I’d never been out of England, on a plane, or anything — I packed my job in on Friday, got on a plane on Saturday, and on Sunday, I appeared on TV before 70 million people. It was quite an experience.”

With that exposure, the Dave Clark Five introduced hits like “Bits and Pieces,” “Because,” “I Like It Like That” and “Any Way You Want It.” The latter, from late 1964, is arguably the first true “heavy metal” single.

Applebee’s restaurants recently revived “I Like It Like That” for its commercials, Joan Jett and the Blackhearts covered “Bits and Pieces” (a recent choice for commercial use by Target), and Kiss covered “Any Way You Want It” as an early album track.

“And some people call ‘Bits and Pieces’ the first punk record. It got banned because the kids were stomping on the floor in the dance halls and breaking up the floors,” said Smith, who credits the work of engineer Adrian Kerridge (in collaboration with drummer Clark’s production) as a major reason the records have ongoing appeal.

“Adrian Kerridge was responsible for a lot of the sound. Of course, we played it, but it’s what sound goes up there and what he does with it. We were only [recorded] on four tracks in those days,” Smith explained. “Adrian was like the ‘sixth Dave Clark Five’ if you like. He was brilliant.

“Our music has lasted, because, like the Beatles — if I could compare it — we didn’t sound like anybody else. That’s why they’ve lasted so long,” he continued.

Smith praised saxophonist Denis Payton for providing “a lot of power in the up-tempo records” and guitarist Lenny Davidson, who he said was “very underrated.”

“He didn’t sound like any other guitarist and didn’t do the licks that everybody else did,” Smith said. “He had his own sound.”

As did the classically trained Smith. In the liner notes to “The History of The Dave Clark Five” CD, Clark said of his lead vocalist, “Mike Smith is one of the greatest and most underrated rock and roll singers ever. He had a great mic presence, which you’re either born with, or you’re not.”

“Rock and roll isn’t something you can be taught,” Smith said. “It isn’t in a book. It has to be how you feel it. It’s in you or it isn’t in you.”

Smith opens his Rock Engine shows with “You’ve Got What It Takes,” the DC5’s last Top 10 entry, from 1967. After the hits began to wane stateside, the band’s fortunes took a turn for the better in its homeland until the members decided to call it a day for good in 1970.

After taking a year off, Smith answered a request from Tim Rice to sing on the original album for “Evita.” That was followed by a foray into writing commercial jingles and television themes, and a 1976 album collaboration with former Manfred Mann vocalist Michael D’Abo.

“We toured Europe with the ‘Smith and D’Abo’ album,” Smith said. “Then I came to America and did commercials for American Airlines, the American Beef Council, United Airlines, Xerox, MCI, McDonald’s and Coca-Cola. The beef commercial is the only one I ever sang on.”

Smith turned to production, working with Michael Ball — who did the leads for Webber and Rice works including “Les Miserables” — on his first four albums. He followed that with a collaboration with Shirley Bassey on her album, “The Show Must Go On.”

Smith still writes and records his own music, though the process is far removed from a time when the DC5 recorded and mixed its first album in one day. The band released 15 albums in America through 1968, four in 1964 alone.

“We were on tour and told that we had Monday off. We went in, sang it, mixed it, and that was it,” Smith said of the first DC5 album. “It those days, you sang and played and that was it. What you heard was what you got. We didn’t have an arranger, but fortunately, I understood music, so did Lenny and so did Denis, so that helped immensely. It just shows how inventive the guys in the band were.”

For years, the Dave Clark Five recordings have been among the most sought after by ‘60s connoisseurs for release on compact disc. A two-disc compilation was released in 1990, but is now out of print. Clark owns the master tapes.

“The last thing I knew, [Clark] was doing was putting a Dave Clark Five anthology together, but that’s a big job to do. He was talking about a couple of CDs, film, a book, everything else. That’s a couple of years ago,” Smith explained. “Hopefully some of it will come out while we’re still on this earth!”

Obviously a patient lot, Dave Clark Five fans also share in that sentiment — just ask Bernadette. In the meantime, Mike Smith’s Rock Engine is doing its part to make DC5 followers glad all over — again.