Bee Gees Win International Award - AMA 1997

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Bee Gees: Gail Williams talks to Bee Gee Barry Gibb

By Gail Williams, The Sunday Times,
 March 6, 2005) 

 With 'Saturday Night Fever' soon to hit the Perth stage, GAIL WILLIAMS talks to Bee Gee Barry Gibb, whose music helped define an era of white satin suits, fabulous flares and strutting on the dance floor.

The Manchester-laced voice of Barry Gibb - he of the tight pants and gold chains and the hairy third of the mega group the Bee Gees - says down the phone that he still calls Australia home. The toothily handsome Bee Gee is one of the top five most successful artists in pop-music history. He's in the Rock and Roll Hall Of Fame. His face has even appeared to a British carpenter on a toasted crumpet, who immediately interpreted the vision as a sign of the second coming of Christ. But that's another story.

Let's just say that for a legion of well-worn groovers who cut their adolescent teeth on 'Spicks and Specks' Barry Gibb is an all-round icon.

But something's telling Gibb he must go home. And this time it's not to Massachusetts.

On the eve of the Perth premiere of 'Saturday Night Fever,' the musical which forever cemented him and his brothers Robin and Maurice in the annals of pop music history, he's hankering after Brisbane's Redcliffe racetrack, Bunnerong Road, Maroubra, the Palm Lounge on the Gold Coast, and the town hall at Cohuna in Victoria - all fond memories of a childhood spent penning heartfelt lyrics and putting them to upbeat tunes while dreaming of fame and fortune.

Gibb's present home of 26 years is celebrity-studded Miami, a palatial testament to a realisation of those dreams - 110 million times over. That's how many of his records - with names like 'I've Gotta Get A Message to You', 'Don't Forget to Remember', 'I Started a Joke', 'To Love Somebody', 'Massachusetts', 'Nights on Broadway' - have sold over four  decades.

Miami's nice, even with vice, but 39 years after Barry and his younger twin brothers sailed from Australia on the Fairsky hoping to make their mark on the international music scene, he wants to revisit his roots.

"Leaving Australia was the hardest thing I have ever done," he says. "They were probably the greatest years of our lives - larking around on the beach, going barefoot to school, fishing, playing on the mudflats."

Gibb is remarkably charitable seeing that the Bee Gees left Australia under a cloud of legal activity with Festival Records trying to prevent them from going.

And it was a less than enthusiastic public which saw the Gibb brothers, then aged 20 and 17, seeking new horizons despite having already written 60 songs that were recorded by others. 'Spicks and Specks', their first No. 1 single, had just taken off in November 1966.

Gibb, now 58, also reveals he will have to overcome his fear of flying - something which has plagued him since September 11 - to complete his planned Australian tour in which he will retrace the steps of the young Bee Gees who moved from Manchester to Queensland when Barry was just 11.

This, his first Australian tour since 1999, will be without Robin. While Barry was always seen as the leader of the group, it was Maurice, who died two years ago just before undergoing emergency surgery, who was the glue that bound them together.

"Robin and I won't get together to do anything," says Gibb. "We are so different as people. It was great being together as a band, but much more difficult being brothers than it was being in a band. We have no plans to do anything at the moment, but who knows?

"Right now I'm writing songs for me (as well as Sir Cliff Richard and Barbra Streisand) and I'll keep doing it for as long as I stay balanced and I don't fall over. Everything seems to be working OK at the moment. I don't want to live on past records."

It's timely that Gibb plans to tour Australia when 'Saturday Night Fever' - nearly three decades after the Robert Stigwood film hit world screens and ended up defining an era - is once again sweeping the country, this time on stage.

After a successful Melbourne season the show opens in Perth on March 15, offering the Bee Gees' disco beat for a whole new generation with hits such as 'Jive Talkin', 'You Should Be Dancing', 'Stayin Alive', 'If I Can't Have You' and "How Deep is Your Love'.

No one, it seems, is more delighted than the man who made it all possible, Robert Stigwood, who produced both the 1978 movie and the musical which premiered in London in 1998.

Stigwood, now aged 70, has been a longtime friend of Gibb's since he signed up the Bee Gees three weeks after they hit London. He saw the show recently in Melbourne and declared it the best production he'd seen.

So impressed was Stigwood with Melbourne boy Adam-Jon Fiorentino in the lead role of the disco king Tony Manero that he could be drafted for the West End production in London.

Though Gibb has seen the production half a dozen times in London and New York, he says he can easily resist the temptation to leap up and stab the air like John Travolta. Apart from the fact he was never really into disco dancing, he also suffers from rheumatoid arthritis which prohibits him from dancing.

"I never really did any disco dancing," he laughs. "I would just move around on the stage. But even now, when people see me in the street, they point upwards to the sky. It's just something I'll always have to live with.

"But it's the tennis I really miss. I didn't start playing till I was about 35 and my joints are no good. I have had an operation on my back and apparently arthritis occurs with a lot of people who have had back surgery."

Even when sitting in the audience and hearing the opening strains of 'Staying Alive' - which sold 40 million copies - Gibb barely raises a goosebump.

"I think (hearing) it's quite fun," he says. "It's great for people who love dancing. The only thing I miss on stage is the falsetto."

After the huge success of 'Saturday Night Fever', which saw them become the biggest band in the world, there was shame, stigma and ridicule as the world left disco behind. The Bee Gees never shook the disco image despite such achievements as being the only pop group to have written, produced and recorded six consecutive No. 1 hits on the US charts. Only Elvis, the Beatles, Michael Jackson and Paul McCartney have sold more records.

But their songs live on, having charmed three generations of children and they continue to be parodied in television programs from 'The Simpsons' to 'The Office'.

Gibb is intrigued, like most people, at the resurgence of the '70s - the fashion and the old bands touring.

"I think people are going back to it because it was an innocent era and they just want to live through it all again," he says. "You got to dress up and wear those great big jeans and a lot of strange clothes."

These days Gibb spends his days ferrying his daughter, 13-year-old Ali - "a Justin Timberlake fan, no less" - to and from school and writing songs with his son Stevie, who is in a heavy metal band, Crowbar.

"I still write in the same way that I always did, " he says. "I have a little dictaphone and if a sound takes my fancy or if a lyric comes to me in the middle of the night I'll just record it there and then. Anything can inspire me - a conversation, something strikes you about words which can end up being a title."

Gibb attributes his creativity to being a left-hander and also to being badly scalded as a two year old.

"I was given about 20 minutes to live and I can't remember any of it," he says. "I think sometimes when you feel so much pain it gets stored away in your mind somewhere and then it comes out later in some creative way."

It's the same with the pain of his brother's death, which he says will not go away. "We were sort of like the three musketeers," he says. "We were all looking for the same thing. Suddenly one of you is not there. I have to get used to it, get on with life. Maybe the way to do it is through music - keeping the music alive."

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Bee Gees : "AT HOME WITH MAURICE GIBB"

(TG Magazine, September 1978)

"How does it feel being on top of the music business?" Maurice Gibb, one-third of the most successful act in the history of popular music, knows and answers. "Fabulous," he says, almost without thinking. But there's something hollow about the answer.

Maurice Gibb. The name - along with those of twin brother Robin and older brother Barry - is magic. Over the past two years, the Bee Gees have redefined the meaning of success. The soundtrack from Saturday Night Fever (sold exclusively on the strength of the Bee Gees' name, even though it contains only five tracks by the Gibbs) is selling so well in the United States that customers don't get a complete set of records and jacket - they get the records and a coupon which they can exchange for a jacket later when the printer is able to catch up with the demand.

In Canada, the Saturday Night Fever album has sold almost 1.5 million copies, making it the all-time best-seller in this country. Only Rumours comes anywhere close in sales - and the movie soundtrack is a double-record set selling at a much higher price.

Estimates of the Bee Gees' earnings last year alone came to something over $15 million - and that was just before the Saturday Night Fever music flung them out of the category of superstars and into a galaxy of their own.

So why shouldn't Maurice be turning cartwheels over glee? It's the same old story: success brings financial rewards on the one hand and takes away personal privacy on the other. Or, as Maurice puts it, "we're reached the point where we can't simply walk around unnoticed anymore."

There have been Bee Gees fans for years, of course. The brothers had their first major hit in 1967 and, particularly in Canada, have been stars ever since. But now, with their pictures on every magazine cover, television screen, movie poster and billboard in North America, the Gibbs can't even hide unrecognized in dark restaurants. "I can't even go out for dinner without a bodyguard," Maurice complains. "Not that I want to avoid our fans -they're great - but there are kooks who want to start a fight with someone well known just so they can brag to their friends later."

It's a summer afternoon in Miami Beach, adopted home of Maurice and Barry Gibb. (Robin has refused to leave England but spends so much time as a guest in Miami - the group records at Miami's Criterion Studios - that he may as well make it official.) The temperature is already in the high 80's (fahrenheit) and will go considerably higher before the day is over. Palm trees, a pool in the courtyard, American cars in the drive and a boat moored in the lagoon behind the house - it's a far cry from the England where the Bee Gees spent so many of their formative years.

"I need a wall and an iron gate around my house. We have to take a private plane when we travel. And there are special police patrols in this neighbourhood. I know it's hard to believe but life isn't necessarily as much fun anymore, even though our success has been fantastic."

"Practically speaking, we didn't have much alternative to moving to the States," Maurice points out. "We finally found a recording studio (Criterion) which we love. So much of our performing is done in the United States now. And there were tax reasons involved. Besides, we love the area."

For that matter, the Bee Gees always had reservations about life in England. For years, none of the important British music newspapers would say a good word about the Bee Gees. There were few honest-to-goodness Bee Gees fans in the country. Everyone there, it seemed, regarded the Bee Gees as second-string Beatles.

It wasn't a fair comment, as the more recent Bee Gees albums have proven. But, as Maurice admits, there were always similarities between the two groups. "I lived next door to Ringo. Our manager worked with the Beatles. And we both liked to use big orchestras, which wasn't like the rest of the music business. So people naturally started thinking of us and the Beatles together.

"In the rest of the world, it didn't hurt us. But, in England, there was always a wall between us and the public."

Ironically, the group which caused so many difficulties for the Gibbs back in England also wrote the music which forms the basis for the latest recording and first film appearance by the Bee Gees.

The Beatles wrote St. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band as a collection of songs which would fit nicely onto one album. There. was no continuity of theme from one song to another - "Tell me the connection between Lovely Rita Meter Maid and Lucy In The Sky With Diamonds and She's Leaving Home," Maurice challenges - just a unique collection of musical and lyrical images. When The Bee Gees' manager decided that the time was ripe for a Beatles' musical revival, he simply acquired the rights to the Sgt. Pepper name and many Beatles' songs; a writer was then assigned to put the songs into a story form suitable for filming.

The movie title itself is misleading. The songs involved do come from the Sgt. Pepper album - along with songs from several other Beatles' collections. Anything that seemed to find a niche in the writer's background was slotted in. And, according to some viewers, the movie is one of the year's masterpieces. And then there are the other viewers who regard it as a piece of junk. The truth is probably somewhere in between.

"It was easy for us to work with all those Beatles songs," Maurice admits, "because we grew up with them. We'd sing them at parties with the Beatles. And the vocal parts closely resembled the way we arranged many of our songs. Certainly it wasn't hard for us to get in the mood.

"And we love the songs. There was never any thought on our parts that we shouldn't record anything that wasn't our own music. In fact, it proved to be a nice change from having to create all our own music."

Creating. The life - and death -of any musical entity depends on the creative forces. When the creative forces are strong, the musician thrives. But when the forces are weak, the career is in trouble.

The Bee Gees know what it's like to run out of creative energy. Between 1972 and 1975, the group couldn't beg a hit. They stuck closely to the ballad style which had built their reputation in the first place. But the ballad style wasn't contemporary anymore. They sounded dated.

In 1975, they made the most important decision of their career: to work with a producer named Arif Mardin, well-known for his work with soul acts like Aretha Franklin. Mardin taught the brothers how to work a dance beat into their music. ("I never knew I could play bass like I do now until Arif showed me," Maurice claims.) Then they went to work recording Main Course.

"There's a bridge that we have to cross on the way to the studio," Maurice remembers. "And every time we crossed it, the car would make a clickety-clack sound. After a few days of this, we realized that the clickety-clack rhythm was perfect for a song. And it turned into Jive Talking'." And a new career was born.

"People accuse us of being nothing more than a disco band now," Maurice says defensively. "But they don't know what they're talking about. If you listen to our records, you'll find that there's dance music. But there are also ballads like More Than A Woman. And there are some very beautiful, undanceable songs, too.

"But the key to our success, I think, is the lyrics. People can listen to our lyrics and relate to what's happening. Everyone has loved somebody. Everybody knows what it's like staying alive."

And the Bee Gees' beat is the freshest sound in years.

At one end of his house, Maurice has set up a small studio. It's full of instruments - from drums to keyboards to guitars. Maurice plays them all - and Maurice works out his musical ideas here. Right now, he's playing back some of the results from the Bee Gees' first normal recording in more than two years. Since Children of the World in 1976, the Bee Gees have released only the live album, the Saturday Night Fever recordings and now the Sgt. Pepper music. Everyone wants to know what the new album will sound like.

After a brief burst of static, the speakers roar into life. Robin is singing his heart out about "It's a tragedy" and the band is grooving more solidly than the Bee Gees have ever sounded before. The dance beat is there alright. And the bass is mixed stronger than the Bee Gees fans are accustomed to hearing. It is, in short, brilliant.

And the answer to the question everyone asks- can the Bee Gees survive? - becomes obvious. They'll survive. And the world hasn't heard anything yet; the Bee Gees are just finding their groove now.

 http://beegeesfanfever.blogspot.nl/

The Life of a Song: ‘To Love Somebody’

By Ian Mccan

Barry Gibb only revealed the inspiration for the Bee Gees’ third UK single more than 30 years after its release

©Getty

The Bee Gees in 1968, from back left: Vince Melouney, Maurice Gibb (centre), Barry Gibb; on front row: Robin Gibb, Colin Petersen

It is perhaps the mark of a great song that it fits any musical genre. If that’s true, then the Bee Gees’ “To Love Somebody” is a great song. Fans of baroque 1960s pop think it belongs to them. Soul believers swear it’s theirs. Country scions claim it, too. However, the object of the lyrics’ deep longing remained a mystery for decades.

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The Bee Gees had not been in Britain long when they recorded “To Love Somebody”, their third UK single. They had arrived from Australia in November 1966 and signed a management deal with Robert Stigwood, who found them a contract with Polydor Records. Stigwood, an astute Australian who worked for Brian Epstein, touted the Bee Gees as a rival to the Beatles, and persuaded Otis Redding that the material the brothers Gibb wrote might suit him. Redding was a beefy blues bawler from Macon, Georgia; the Bee Gees were Mancunian stick insects with nasal voices who’d grown up in Sydney. Undeterred, Stigwood told Robin and Barry Gibb that Redding liked their songs, and to write something for him. The manager arranged a meeting at the Plaza Hotel, New York, where Barry Gibb played “To Love Somebody” to Redding. But the soul giant would never sing it: he died in December 1967, six months after the Bee Gees released their version, which flopped in the UK but made number 17 on the US chart.
Other soul acts stepped into the breach left by Redding’s death. Female trio The Mirettes were first on the case in November 1967; Aretha Franklin’s backing vocalists The Sweet Inspirations gave it a touch of gospel in 1968; and Nina Simone added a funk groove a year later. In 1969 came the definitive heartbroken rendition by James Carr, another icon of southern soul. If Otis Redding had lived long enough to sing “To Love Somebody”, it might have sounded like Carr’s passionate, regretful performance. By proxy, the Bee Gees were now deeply immersed in black music — six years before they launched their disco career with “Jive Talkin’ ”.

Jamaica’s record producers never allow a knock from opportunity to go unanswered and soon created their own versions. Lee Perry supervised an up-tempo reggae interpretation by Busty Brown (a man) that sold thousands of copies to boot-wearing British brats in 1969 and 1970. Five years later, Perry produced another cover as the title track of the debut album by Bunny Clarke, soon to become the lead singer of Third World.

The song grew legs in Europe, too. With an arrangement full of harpsichord, horns and strings, Yugoslavian band Siluete tackled it in 1967; Italy’s I Califfi amended it to “Cosi Ti Amo”, which was all “Whiter Shade of Pale” organ and token psychedelic effects. There were further covers, too. In 1979 “To Love Somebody” received an earnest rendition by Hank Williams Jr, giving it country credibility. In 1990 Jimmy Somerville wove together two of the song’s paths, singing it falsetto like the Bee Gees over a reggae beat.

Only in 2001 did Barry Gibb reveal who’d stirred the emotions behind his agony in “To Love Somebody”. He hadn’t been lamenting a girlfriend or trying to walk in Otis Redding’s soul shoes. Gibb told Mojo magazine he wrote it for someone closer to home: “It was for Robert [Stigwood.] I say that unabashedly. He asked me to write a song for him, personally. It was played to Otis but, personally, it was for Robert. He meant a great deal to me. I don’t think it was a homosexual affection but a tremendous admiration for this man’s abilities and gifts.” “To Love Somebody” may have been all things to all men, but it was inspired by just one.

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Barry Gibb - Ian Meldrum Interview

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The Bee Gees second interview about stayin alive

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the Bee Gees and their music influences

Influences:

Barry Gibb: "I like music that moves you emotionally, music where if you're in pain, it works for you. The first record I bought was 'Cryin' by Roy Orbison, and that destroyed me. I figured, 'There's a guy who's writing for people, who's writing for emotions." (1990)	Robin Gibb: "The black music grooves me, influences me the most. The three of us, still get our inspiration from black music. It's the most innovative in terms of grooves." (Still Waters Press Kit, 1997)	Maurice Gibb: "I've always admired Peter Gabriel and musicians like him, who've had longevity - I love anyone who can last this business because there's not many of us around." (Ok On Air, 2001)	Robin Gibb: "We've often been influenced by lots of music in the past and today. I think you've got to stay, at some point, true to your art, and without, you know, you've got to sail between the winds of change, and if you get too trend-orientated, you become that trend. And so you've got to really stay between them, and be influenced by them." (BBC, 2001)
Robin Gibb: "We've always been influenced by particularly American R'n'B." (BBC, 2002)	Robin Gibb: "I am a big fan of Gregorian chant." (Still Waters Press Kit, 1997)	Robin Gibb: "Barry's a great Noel Coward fan." (BBC, 2001)	Robin Gibb: "Clannad, the Irish folk group. Enya was originally a member of the group. I like their vocal sounds." (Size Isn't Everything Press Kit, 1993)
Maurice Gibb: "We love and have been influenced by many country artists particularly Roy Orbison." (Ticketmaster online chat, 1997)	Robin Gibb: "Otis Redding, for me as a singer, was the greatest, because I think soul music is a great art form of music which should go into every decade. I think it has an important role in every decade and in the future." (BBC, 2002)	Maurice Gibb: "Usually I like a total mixture ranging from classical and R&B to early stuff like the Beach Boys and Beatles." (OK On Air, 2001)	Robin Gibb: "I would say The Beatles, Otis Redding and the whole Motown scene really. There aren't so many contemporary people that would influence me, as there are just far too many cover version artists." (Top of the Pops, 2003)

Barry Gibb Album and Tour 2016 update

"Barry's album and tour 2016: (message received November 25th!!)

 no confirmations yet. still plans of releasing album first part of 2016, probably around March and plans for tour after album release in 2016. "

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Dionne Warwick "Take the Short Way Home" "Misunderstood" "Heartbreaker"(Aplauso 13-11-82)

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Dionne Warwick "Yours"(Aplauso 13-11-82)

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Titanic live concerts

TITANIC LIVE CONCERT is a show written and produced by Robin Gibb, a member of the legendary Bee Gees, who died prematurely the May 20, 2012, together with his younger son, RJ GIBB.

The project aims to pay homage to the victims of the sinking of the Titanic, the "unsinkable" ship, which sailed on April 10, 1912 from the English harbour of Southampton and sank five days later in the freezing cold and deep waters of the North Atlantic, after hitting against a massive iceberg.

The symphonic concert becomes a unique spectacle in the genre. The orchestra composed of 60 elements and 30 elements of chorus with the addition of soloist singers are incorporated in the holographic scenography, which creates a virtual environment with images and high definition video able to instil in the audience the feeling of living the experience of the Titanic in first person. A real revolution, a fundamental turning point for live show that has never before been so captivating.
The sounds of the sea and the notes of the live orchestra and choir will be the soundtrack to the projection of hologrammed dancers that will enchant the audience with a moving choreography

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Bee gees on American Music Awards

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What peers say about the Bee gees

PETER GABRIEL: "I tried to sing a bit like Robin Gibb on the second verse (of Genesis' Silent Sun) I'm sure we would have denied it at the time"
PAUL McCARTNEY: "It was the 'mining disaster' song that Robert Stigwood played me. I said 'sign them, they're great! And they went on to be even greater"
MARC BOLAN: "I remember David Bowie playing me Space Oddity in his room and I loved it and said he needed a sound like the Bee Gees"
BONO: "In terms of bands, there are five extraordinary catalogues that make me ill with envy. It doesn't have to be said the Bee Gees are up there with the Beatles"
MICHAEL JACKSON: "The Bee Gees are brilliant" "Saturday Night Fever is what inspired me to record the Thriller album."
JOHN TRAVOLTA: "I've always felt that when Barry, Robin and Maurice get around a microphone - it's pure magic"
ROD STEWART: "They're everlasting"
CLIFF RICHARD: "They led the field in music that was totally singable and absolutely danceable"
ROBERT STIGWOOD: "I can't claim any contribution to their songwriting. I wish I could. I'd be taking their royalties"
JAMES BELUSHI: "They changed the face of music"
STEPHEN STILLS: "Barry Gibb is one hell of a record maker. And by God, he has written some damn fine songs"
MEL GIBSON: "They're the best in the business"
NOEL GALLAGHER: "I wish I had written a song like 'To Love Somebody'
BJORN ULVAEUS: "These are classic pop songs. Lennon and McCartney and the Bee Gees are the best and most consistent songwriters. I am green with envy"
ELTON JOHN: "Their concerts are the best"
GEORGE MARTIN: "I don't know anybody who can sing harmony quite so naturally as they do"
CELINE DION: "I'm a big Bee Gees fan, no party without them"
OLIVIA NEWTON JOHN: "Their music will touch me forever"
TINA ARENA: "The Bee Gees are gorgeous. They're beautiful people. I was a big 'Saturday Night Fever' fan. In terms of Aussie rock, I always liked the Bee Gees and INXS"
TONI BRAXTON: "I love them. I have all their records"
TIM RICE: "I rate the Brothers Gibb as one of the greatest songwriting combinations of the 20th century"
DESTINY'S CHILD: "The Bee Gees are Legends"
N'SYNC: "Congratulations on 'staying alive' for 35 years. You will always be an inspiration to us and future singers and songwriters"
BRIAN WILSON: "Total magic"
ALICE COOPER: "Great songwriters. I love their music"
STEPS: "I think the reason why so many people have covered their songs or done versions is because they are great songs"
BARBRA STREISAND: "I really love their music"
TERRY ELLIS: "We are big Bee Gees fans, and we always loved that song How deep is your love and always wanted to record it. It's just so sweet and sultry.  We tried to make the Bee Gees proud of us."
DANA INTERNATIONAL: "Woman in love is one of the greatest love songs ever. I always wanted to record a version of it. The Bee Gees have been an inspiration with their lovely harmonies - the pioneers of dance music."
LOUISE: "The Bee Gees are excellent songwriters and performers and I'm a great fan of disco music."
SIMON COWELL: "The songs of course, were absolutely sensational. The Bee Gees have produced so much great work, from their early pop songs, through to their disco classics."
HUMAN NATURE: "As a vocal group, they are the group we aspire to be. It's also inspirational how they have managed to have such an impact with such great songs."
SHAUN RYDER: "They're just absolutely brilliant musicians, brilliant songwriters." - Shaun Ryder (lead singer of the band the Happy Mondays)
PETER WATERMAN: "The Bee Gees filled every club I worked at. All you had to play was one of the night fever tracks every fifteen minutes, you could keep your dance floor full all night, it was fantastic! - Pete Waterman (Record producer of Kylie Minogue, Cliff Richard, Bananarama, etc.)
KYM MARSH: "They're so talented, I mean they're just phenomenonal songwriters. Everybody from all walks of life knows those songs. Everybody knows "Night Fever" everybody knows "Stayin' Alive" - Kym Marsh (Popular UK singer now in the English stage version of "Saturday Night Fever")
LEO SAYER: "Barry Gibb is an amazing writer and it was a thrill to have him write a song for me."
NEIL SEDAKA: ""They write the best songs. They are standards, evergreen and they appeal to every age group.  http://beegeesfanfever.blogspot.nl/ "

Tragedy: The Sad Ballad of the Bee Gees Part 2

http://www.abc.net.au/overnights/stories/s4350411.htm?site=melbourne


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COMMENTS ABOUT THE BEE GEES

ROBERT STIGWOOD(Bee Gees manager from 1967 to 1980) Reporter: Mr. Stigwood, what do the fans of the Bee Gees find appealing about them? Stigwood: This might sound corny, but it is their poetry. These boys are completely uneducated. They don't even know how to spell. They write the lyrics out spelled phonetically. And the simple poetry appeals to the public. Robin: We start with a title. The rest just flows from there. It's like a spiritual thing when we write. We know what the other one is thinking. Lonely Days was written in 10 minutes. (Rolling Stone, 1971)

ARIF MARDIN(producer, credited for helping create the band's signature falsetto vocal style and revitalizing their sound into a dance/R&B sound) "Usually when Barry writes the songs, or actually the three brothers write them, Barry would have the electric guitar or the acoustic guitar, and the song would take shape with the instruments they used. And Maurice would go to the piano and play the chords. It's not like one brother goes into seclusion and comes out with a song. They write them together. In the beginning their process is that they have nonsensical syllables to accomodate the melody, and then the lyrics come after that. They do the melody first. Most songwriters teams have their own system. "During the recording of Main Course I asked Barry to take his vocal up one octave. The poor man said 'If I take it up one octave I'm going to shout and it's going to be terrible.' He softened up a little bit and that's how their falsetto was born." (The Light Gibb)

ALBHY GALUTEN(co-producer with Karl Richardson of several Bee Gees and solo albums from 1976 thru 1985) "Karl, Barry and I were the main ones. We had a vibe very powerful and very creative. Maurice was usually out in the lobby holding court, drinking Perrier - which much of the time had vodka in it-, being social and hanging out. Robin was pretty active in the writing, and then he and Maurice were usually not in the studio. Robin was often not around at all, except when he came in to sing, but he often had good incisive comments, which were often quite useful and sort of objective in certain ways." DAVID FOSTER (Well known producer. He produced two songs for the Still Waters album) "They sing as magnificently now as I remember them 30 years ago. They haven't lost any range. You know, the voice is a muscle and like everything, we all get a little older, lose your range, whatever. I see no difference in the way they sing now than when I was a fan like everyone else. Next to The Beatles, they were probably the most creative group ever  http://beegeesfanfever.blogspot.nl/

Richard Wilkins catches up with Barry Gibb sept 12 2015

http://www.9jumpin.com.au/show/today/videos/4482776368001/



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Lulu Learned To Write Music By Watching The Bee Gees At Work

The Shout hitmaker, who was married to the late pop star for four years from 1969, reveals the 1970s icons taught her how to pen tracks.
She tells Britain's Attitude magazine, "I first got master classes in songwriting when I was married to Maurice - I used to sit and watch the Bee Gees write at home... So that's where I learned. I never wrote with Maurice, my brother did. I was slow, but I finally got there."


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So We Danced by Samantha Gibb produced by Lazarus

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Discovering The Bee Gees: Col Joyes’ big gamble paid off

ol Joye and The Joy Boys were pioneers in the rock industry took the Australian charts by storm in 1959. They were the first act to have three number ones in a calendar year with “Bye Bye Baby”; “Rockin’ Rollin’ Clementine” and the biggest selling record in Australia that year “Oh Yeah Uh Huh”.

They had many more hits and another number one in 1960 with “Yes Sir That’s My Baby”. But they had to wait until 1973 for their final number one hit, “Heaven Is My Woman’s Love” another top selling Australian song of the year. But perhaps Col Joye’s biggest contribution to the Australian music scene started at a party on the Gold Coast in 1961. At about 3am he was about to leave when he was told to hang around to hear these three local kids performing, at 3.15 they performed and Col joys one word reaction was “Knockout!”

The trio comprised of twins Robin and Maurice Gibb and their elder brother Barry. Col invited them to perform with him at a Church gig the following day, when he decided to tape them. Col recalls “I still have that tape somewhere it starts ‘Hi my name is Barry Gibb and I live at 23 Cambridge Avenue, Surfers Paradise and my first song is Let Me Love You’”. Col Joye took the tape to Festival Records who told him that groups don’t sell (big mistake) but convinced them to sign the boys saying he would produce them himself. “They had this magic sound and there was something about them and they knew when to harmonise the melody and they all did it naturally” Col states. They moved into Col’s house and he introduced them to Bandstand but he admits he did not have the expertise to get their sound on disc, so they went off to London.

When they arrived there they were met with the news that “Spicks And Specks” was top of the charts in Australia. They were signed by Robert Stigwood, a director of NEMS Enterprises, a company owned by Beatles Svengali Brian Epstein. The trio was supplemented with Aussie friends Colin Petersen (you may remember him as Smiley in the Australian movie) on drums and Vince Melouney on guitar. They had their first big international hit as The Bee Gees with “New York Mining Disaster 1941”. Their second record “To Love Somebody” was not a big hit but 
produced some incredible covers by
Nina Simone, Eric Burdon & The Animals and Janis Joplin.

source: http://www.startsatsixty.com.au/

 
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Official trailer of JOY, with TO LOVE SOMEBODY of the Bee Gees

Joy Posted October 21 2015 — 9:08 AM EDT Related 'Joy' trailer:



 Jennifer Lawrence can't always get what she wants Jennifer Lawrence on the 'Joy' of working with David O. Russell



How does director David O. Russell want people to react to the new trailer for his film, Joy? “I want it to be unexpected,” he says. “I want people to see that it’s exciting and that it’s emotional and it’s intense and it’s funny and it’s new. It’s something we’ve never done before.” The trailer for Joy – in theaters this Christmas – certainly takes a much deeper dive into Russell’s latest film starring Jennifer Lawrence, an epic journey examining one woman’s life from age 10 to age 40 as she becomes the matriarch of her family.

“It’s about emotion and about people and humanity and what is ridiculous and ordinary about them but where that becomes extraordinary and magical. That’s that place where we live,” says Russell. It’s a much more grown-up Lawrence than we’re used to seeing, and in this two-and-a-half minute clip her character laughs, cries, gets married, dances, reloads a shotgun, puts her head down in despair, and gets downright Don Corleone-y when she warns a family member to never speak on her behalf about her business. Returning Russell players Robert De Niro (with an excellent line about a gas leak) and Bradley Cooper join Edgar Ramirez, Diane Ladd, Virginia Madsen, and Isabella Rossellini in the cast.

And like previous Russell films (and Russell film trailers), music plays an important role. “Music is extremely important,” says Russell. “It makes things happen! It’s the harmonic trifecta of emotion. If it envelops you, you can forget time

. It’s part of the process of always trying to make things unexpected.” Unexpected like… using the Bee Gees? Russell laughs and points out that using “To Love Somebody” in Joy is the third time he’s used the Bee Gees in his films: In 2010’s The Fighter, Christian Bale and Melissa Leo sang “I Started a Joke” together in a car, while 2013’s American Hustle used “How Can You Mend a Broken Heart” to great effect. “The Bee Gees are operatic and fun and poppy but also serious,” says Russell. “They’re not cynical. It takes great courage to be sincere and put your heart out there. That’s what I love about them.” Joy is out in theaters on Christmas Day. Watch the new trailer above

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List of Bee Gees TOP 10 Awards

Below is a list of the Top 10 awards won by the Bee Gees throughout their years as one of the most celebrated musical groups in the world.
 
10) Billboard’s Top Pop Producers:
Although Billboard did not have a televised awards show back in the ‘70s, they still highlighted the year’s greatest musicians within the magazine. In 1978, the Bee Gees scooped up several awards including the year’s Top Pop Producers.


9) Billboard’s Top Pop Albums Artist
The brothers also wrapped up their ultra-successful year winning the title of Top Pop Albums Artist.
 
8) Grammy for Best Arrangement for Voices
The group that defined disco dominated the 1979 Grammys. The Bee Gees took home the award for Best Arrangement for Voices for their catchy hit “Stayin’ Alive.” In total, the pop stars walked away with an impressive five awards making them the second group or duo to win five Grammys in a single night (the first was Simon & Garfunkel in 1971).


7) Grammy for Album of the Year
The Saturday Night Fever album won Album of the Year in 1979 and was the first movie soundtrack to ever win this coveted Grammy. The album was comprised of several Bee Gees songs including “Stayin’ Alive”, “You Should Be Dancing”, “Jive Talkin”, “More Than a Woman”, “Night Fever” and “How Deep Is Your Love.” The brothers also wrote and produced several tracks on the soundtrack.


6) Songwriters Hall of Fame
In 1994, the Bee Gees were recognized for their genius lyrics when they were voted into the distinguished Songwriters Hall of Fame.
 
5) Rock and Roll Hall of Fame
Over a decade later, the Bee Gees joined other legendary artists in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. It was about time!


4) Grammy for Best Pop Vocal Performance by a Duo or Group
Feb. 23, 1978 was a monumental day for Robin and his brothers. They beat out some stiff competition when they received their first Grammy. The award was for Best Pop Vocal Performance by a Duo or Group for the Bee Gees’ single “How Deep is Your Love.” The other artists nominated for this category included Fleetwood Mac and Eagles.


3) Grammy for Best Pop Vocal Performance by a Duo or Group
One of their five awards won at the 1979 Grammys was Best Pop Vocal Performance by a Duo or Group for Saturday Night Fever. The trio was the first group to receive this award two years in a row since the Carpenters won in 1970 and ’71.


2) Grammy for Producer of the Year
Besides swiping up several awards in 1979, the Bee Gees made history when they became the first musical group to win the Grammy for Producer of the Year.


1) Grammy Legend Award

 Just six weeks after the upsetting death of Robin’s fraternal twin, Maurice, the Bee Gees were presented with the prestigious Grammy Legend Award in 2003. They are the only group or duo to receive this honor. This award has been given to iconic solo artists such as Elton John and the late Michael Jackson.




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"IT'S THE SONG, NOT THE GROUP SAYS BARRY GIBB"

(Beat Instrumental, 13 May 1968)


In only a shade over a year, the Bee Gees have made an enviable impact here in Britain. They’ve also shaken a lot of people by cutting across established lines of a group career. Like releasing no less than six singles in 12 months; and by launching a tour with a Royal Albert Hall orchestra of some 67 musicians behind them.
They are five boys with a nice and uncontrived line in modesty and a built-in sense of perfectionist ambition. But are they going TOO far in their efforts to please?
GERMANY


Barry says “In Germany, then at the Albert Hall and later on the tour, we carried a large orchestra with us. Okay, at the Albert Hall we gave the cynics a certain amount of ammunition. An RAF band, a choir, a near-symphony orchestra … it was obvious that some knockers would say we over did it – and worse that we got ourselves out numbered simply because we couldn’t depend on our own music to get us through.
“But this is surely unfair thinking. My feeling is that it is the song, not the group that sells records nowadays. If a really established group came out with a very bad song, their disc sales would slump. With us, we’ve been on the big ballad scene. Except for ‘Words’, it worked out for us. But to present those big rather sad songs on record, you have to have a full scale arrangement. And we think it is only fair to go as far as possible to present those same sounds on stage.
“We’re spending the money, remember. We could go on, just guitar and drums and do the same dreary old thing and make much more. Thinking big must produce, in the end, big results. Taking a big orchestra round the country causes problems, especially with small stages but problems can always be overcome.”
NEW GROUPS
Few new groups have come up in the past couple of years with built-in scream appeal. With the Herd, Peter Frampton was hailed as the new hysteria-gatherer but he’s already fed up with the title “Face of 1968” – and anyway only the Bee Gees get the real hit records to go with the incredible audience reaction. Says Barry “This is fine, but I think we score because we are five members of equal status. We all have an individual following. No one is picked out to the detriment of the others. I have a fear about someone being built up, ballyhooed, because pop history proves that the public tend to build up, then knock down.


ATTACKED
“But we’ve been attacked for apparently never changing our style. Well, remember that we write all our own material. We try for unusual song lyrics, but obviously we have a bias towards one particular style of song.
“On our last single, it was going to be ‘Singer Sang The Song’ as the A-side. But we heeded the criticism. We switched to ‘Jumbo’, which is a distinct change of direction for us. A simple sort of idea – every kid has an imaginary pet animal – but scored differently. As it happened, lots of people thought we were wrong to change … said they preferred ‘Singer’ even if it was on the same lines as earlier ones. So it becomes a double A-side. But when we study other groups, like the Walkers – we KNOW the dangers of staying on one direction.”
Behind the Bee Gees, of course, is Robert Stigwood, who spares no expense in projecting the biggest possible image for the boys. Says Barry “It’s not a question of trying to show anybody else up. We’re not the flash-Harry types. We don’t even like the flashy clothes that some groups do. But we feel we have this debt to people who buy our records … and are determined to give them the best possible sound.


ROCK REVIVAL
“I don’t know about this so-called rock revival. I feel that it’s never been away. Certainly the Beatles have generally been on a rock scene most of the time – but obviously up-dated. However there are outside influences. Indian music was one, definitely, Robin and I hope to go to Egypt as soon as the tour is over and study history over there and also see what there is in Egyptian music. It’s distinctive. It could easily fit into a modern pop idiom.”
Barry, clearly a deep thinker about the pop scene, said he didn’t agree that it was almost impossible for a group to make it big these days. “You have to have a basic talent and also the right promotion” he said earnestly. “Promotion is all-important. Not in the matter of gimmicks and stunts, but in doing the right work at the right time. We built our reputation on the Continent and in Germany and our tours have been ambitious, whether you like what we do on stage or not.
“Then there is a special TV spectacular, Cucumber Castle, for which we’re writing the music. We do what we think boosts our career – avoid the danger of sitting back and saying ‘Right we’re number one so there’s nothing more to do’. Our film, with Johnny Speight writing the script, has been thought about very carefully. One bad film by a pop group and you’re virtually out. People remember a failure, even if it is in the middle of a lot of triumphs”.
It’s been a long haul since the Gibbs were simply the Gibb Brothers and playing for pennies hurled into a stock-car arena in Australia. And in one year of British residency, they’ve done more than virtually any other group in showing themselves to the public … on stage and on record.
Added Barry by way of a parting shot “We don’t mix much in the business. We have our own ambitions for 1968 and what matters most is achieving them without shouting around too much beforehand”.






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Musician-songwriter Stephen Gibb got a hard-rocking start sept 29 2015

Stephen Gibb, son of Barry Gibb of the Bee Gees, has written music and toured with his father for so many years now one might think that the Miami Beach musician was a Bee Gee by birth.
To some extent, Gibb’s early arts awakening was informed by the pop, R&B and dance music he heard around the house from his prodigious dad and his late uncles, Robin and Maurice Gibb. Together, the Brothers Gibb, along with their late youngest brother Andy, wrote the soundtrack for multiple generations dating back to the 1967 release of Bee Gees 1st. Made-in-Miami ’70s and ’80s classics like Jive Talking, the Saturday Night Fever tunes, Shadow Dancing, the music Barry wrote and produced for Barbra Streisand’s landmark Guilty album and You Win Again cemented the trio’s legacy.

Stephen Gibb is writing songs for his solo album, as well as writing and playing with his father Barry Gibb of the Bee Gees on a new album, both due in early 2016. Stephen Gibb

“In my situation I was surrounded by music, always, and had a feeling that this was where I was supposed to be, but I never had the ‘light bulb’ situation,” Gibb says.
But the rocker, 41, also recalls one formative moment — the night the Army called in 1979. The Kiss Army.

“My dad took me to go see Kiss, the Dynasty Tour at the Hollywood Sportatorium, when I was six years old, and that lit the obsession, that fire for music. I went from Kiss to listening to all kinds of music: Led Zeppelin. Black Sabbath. Ozzy Osbourne — he was a big influence. I was into that hard rock thing,” Gibb says.

"To be in a room with him, writing songs, is a dream come true.
Stephen Gibb, on writing songs and playing music with his father Barry Gibb"

His next awakening was explosive and lasting.

“I was at my next door neighbor’s house, and he had a band,” Gibb recalls. “I was probably 13. I heard Eruption by Van Halen, and at that point I remember picking up this guy’s guitar and I had him play it again — louder, louder, LOUDER — and at that point all I wanted to do was play guitar and play music, and I really didn’t look back.”
Later, Gibb played in various hard rock bands, including the Underbellys and 58 with Mötley Crüe’s Nikki Sixx in the ’90s. Lately, he’s backed friends in Saigon Kick and Jasta. Since 1997, he’s joined his father on stage at Bee Gees and solo shows, including a recent performance earlier this year for the Miami Beach centennial.
On Saturday night, Gibb will perform with Saigon Kick at Duende, a street festival on SW Second Avenue near Revolution in Fort Lauderdale, to celebrate Broward County’s 100th anniversary. He and the band are expected to go on around 10:30 p.m. on the East Stage.
Gibb is currently recording songs with longtime collaborator Bobby MacIntyre at Studio 71 in El Portal for a solo album due early next year. He is also writing and playing on a Barry Gibb solo album also due in early 2016.
“I think it will blow people’s minds. It will be something different than people are expecting from him and yet, it’s him,” he says.
The surge in songwriting adds to a growing catalog of songs the younger Gibb has written for other artists.
Would you believe this Eruption-loving, hardcore rocker co-wrote precious metal (of the platinum kind) for Barbra Streisand? Yes, that Barbra Streisand of “soft as an easy chair” balladry. Father and son co-wrote melody-rich pop songs for her 2005 Guilty sequel, Guilty Pleasures.
Confounding expectations is a Gibb hallmark, he explains.


“It’s the need to continually challenge yourself artistically and surpass what you’ve done before,” Gibb explains. “I know, for myself, I’m always seeking to do things that are out of my comfort zone, and the greatest gift playing with my dad is that it is so far away from anything I was doing growing up. Making music these days is not an easy thing, it’s the hardest it’s ever been. But the truth is I couldn’t imagine doing anything else.”

© Howard Cohen

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Barry Gibb at ONJ Gala Dinner 2015 part 2

© unknown

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Barry Gibb at Olivia Newton John cancer and Wellness charity gala septh 19TH 2015

 


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Barry Gibb Bee Gees Way Redcliffe Qld. on Today Show 14/9/15

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Bee Gees fever sweeps Brisbane as Barry Gibb makes star appearance

 Starts at Sixty Writers


It’s the town that holds Barry Gibb’s heart north of Brisbane, and yesterday it was Bee Gees fever in Redcliffe as thousands of people flocked to see their star.
The small city of Redcliffe, 30 minutes north of Brisbane, is where it all began for the Bee Gees, as it was there in the seaside suburb of Scarborough that the three brothers, Barry, Maurice and Robin Gibb, signed their very first music contract.
Over the next five decades they became one of the world’s greatest performance artists and songwriters.
In February 2013, Barry Gibb and Moreton Bay Regional Council unveiled a new statue and walkway called Bee Gees Way to honour the band and the most famous Redcliffe residents.
But this year, Bee Gees Way underwent stage two of its development, and Barry Gibb was there to talk about his early years and meet and greet the tens of thousands of fans that gathered along Redcliffe’s beachfront.
ABC reports the new display will feature a glass structure holding a replica of the original contract that the Gibb brothers signed in Oxley Avenue in Redcliffe.
Earlier in the week, Barry said, “I knew what was there with stage one but this will be a surprise for me with stage two,” he said.
“I’ve been giving input all along whether they were silly comments or not”.
He also talked about Moreton Island, which is visible from the shore of Redcliffe.

“After 57 years I went to Moreton Island, I had never been there … I would look at it in the distance,” he said.

“[During the trip] I have learnt that it was a defence centre in World War II, I never knew that before.
“So many things I hadn’t known, it’s such a beautiful beautiful place”.
“Ultimately I didn’t want to leave Redcliffe, because my heart is where the home is, and this is where my home is,” the 69-year-old singer-songwriter said.
“So there’s always going to be a big chunk of me in Redcliffe”.
Take a look at some of the pics of Barry – one of Starts at 60’s writer’s friends got to meet him! How great does he look?




http://www.startsatsixty.com.au/entertainment/bee-gees-fever-sweeps-brisbane-as-barry-gibbs-makes-star-appearance


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