Swinging London & the Wombles seen from an electric-blue Rolls-Royce. Mike Batt looks back

Mike Batt still wrestles with the emotional legacy of the Wombles, the act that simultaneously made him and cast a shadow over the rest of his career, not least his early days as a songwriter at Liberty Records, discussed here, hired after he’d answered the same ad as Elton John and Bernie Taupin, a time when A&R men wore kipper ties and had Picassos on their wall. He forged a path through psychedelia and into TV and films, taking huge financial risks with musicals, orchestral works and big-selling acts like Katie Melua, his Art Garfunkel hit ‘Bright Eyes’ eventually promoting him from the Haves to the Have-Yachts. Life, he says, has been “like running through traffic”. His memoir is just out, ‘The Closest Thing to Crazy: My Life of Musical Adventures’. All sorts discussed here including ...  … his brief satin-jacketed tenure in Hapshash & the Coloured Coat. … parallels between record producers and traffic cops. … Happy Jack and songs about outsiders. … being in Savile Row when the Beatles played the Apple roof. … life as “a square” during psychedelia. … a snatch of abandoned teenage composition ‘The Man With The Purple Hand’. … John D. Laudermilk and the magic of writing credits. … how Bright Eyes “got me into the Officers’ Mess of Songwriters”. … his publishers insisting there was a Womble on the book jacket. … “circumcising” the world in a seven-crew yacht. ... and feeling simultaneously smug and guilty when driving a Roller. Order ‘The Closest Thing To Crazy: My Life of Musical Adventures’ here:https://www.amazon.co.uk/Closest-Thing-Crazy-Musical-Adventures/dp/1785120840Find out mroe about how to help us to keep the conversation going: https://www.patreon.com/wordinyourear Get bonus content on Patreon Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.