Finally Some Spott Farm Music you can hear (i hope)

Follow the link to my Face Book "MY BAND" page. There are  now 3 Spott Farm songs and 2 of my own songs on the player. Look for the song: "I Said She Said" 
http://www.reverbnation.com/artist/control_room/jeromejarvis#?tab=profile&subnav=profile_songs


 This is the story behind the song "I Said She Said":

In 1973 our band SPOTT FARM wanted to do a Beatles song; but it would have to be perfect as we were sticklers for performing tunes as close to the original versions as possible. (With Beatle music this is not easy). So instead we took this tune from the REVOLVER album and gave it "the Treatment" till there was little left of the song but the lyrics and a few scraps of the melody. This radical departure from the perfect copy concept was wonderfully liberating. The instrumental section is, for my money, some of the most beautiful music I've ever heard; but I may be biased.
I've done all I could to restore this recording which was taped LIVE ON THE AIR by the community radio volunteers at WIRED WORLD. RADIO WATERLOO; but the master tape was deeply flawed and phased. Just for fun I've also taken a snippet from the arrangement and turned it into a morphed-up reverse guitar intro which was never part of the song.
So this is a Spott Farm re-arrangement of a Lennon song inspired by a conversation he had with Peter Fonda who had heard Tim Leary reading from the Tibetan book of the Dead. 
If anybody wants to sue me for taking this liberty I invite them to try.
 -Jerome

SPOTT FARM'S CHRISTMAS RECORD (review)

cktimes.ca Archives for Classic Vinyl 
With John Gardiner
I'm dreaming of a Spott Farm Christmas
Tuesday, December 24, 2002


I remain a huge fan of Christmas music and our house is filled with it from early December on. Somehow, it's a very important part of the whole Christmas experience for me. But it's gotta be traditional. In fact, nothing moves me more than standing in a church and hearing an entire congregation sing Away In a Manger  or especially Silent Night.
My very favourite Christmas recording, though, is by a band that only a few of you will have heard of. Spott Farm were a bunch of local guys from up Hanover way. They were our hippie-commune band back in the old days very spiritual bunch and that carried into their music.
Anyway, they did a Christmas record one year. It featured Little Drummer Boy on one side and a medley of Christmas music on the other it was just a 45 rpm  remember? I still have mine, scratched in a merciless way, and I try to give it a listen each Christmas Eve just before bed. And it reminds me of the old days when we were young and fresh and innocent and filled with hope. Those were the days, my friends.....those were the days.


John Gardiner is a 25-year-veteran of the community newspaper business, but he is also a prolific writer of moralistic short fiction he refers to as "emotional thoughtscapes" or "adult fables". Samples of his fiction can be found at:

Melancholy Man and Minister's Son
Reality Check
Grim Faerie Tale
Once Upon a Visit
Toward the End, Oyster Boy
And It Was Christmas
From Genesis to Revelations (Chapter 1) - the novel. the rest of the novel follows month by month

He has also produced a noteworthy piece of humanist philosophy which can be found at: http://www.xs4all.nl/~aboiten/ad502.htm He welcomes comments on his work.

Jerome tells his Spott Farm story (short version)

 I was the drummer and one of the singer/composers in the
band Spott Farm from the summer of '70 till we disbanded
in the fall of '75.
 I met the band "Navel" in 1970 when they played at the
Orangeville Armories and was blown away by their spirit,
great harmonies and progressive original music. I was playing
with a local band the 4 pc "April" (or sometimes as a trio
calling itself "Jolly Green Thumb")
 We jammed with the fellows from Navel at our drop-in centre
before their gig. Shortly thereafter Navel split in two.
Dick Knechtal (guitar), Brian Mullen (Drums) , and Dennis
McLaughlin (vocals) left and Rick Hutt, Nick Paterson
and Bob Mahood stayed on.
I came to the Spott farm in July 1970 (I was 19) and we were
joined by John Lowrey from Toronto on Guitar. We played our
first gig in Listowel and Ritchie (our 1st manager) put the name
"Spott Farm" on the poster. Since that's what the farm was called,
 and how people referred to us. Otherwise we would have been
"The Wonderful Rabbits" or perhaps "Baby Tuckoo and the
Moo Cow" (!) I guess we were lucky not to have been called
"Prune Mucous" another suggested appellation for group.
 Ritchie left for the west coast (suddenly). John left to go back
home to Toronto and the 4 of us worked on our music more seriously
than any band I've ever been in. We couldn't afford to pay ourselves
salaries; but we bought a 50 lb sack of brown rice and managed to eat,
pay rent on the farmhouse and practiced 10-12 hrs a day. Some folks
continued to come by, expecting all night parties; but we soon
discouraged visitors from dropping in and would stay in the practice
room ignoring them uuntill they went away.
I guess we got a reputation as being some weird kind of cult/commune,
but really we were just struggling to pay our way by playing the best
music we could. We backed up Perth County Conspiracy and
Luke Gibson at the Harrison Legion and Kincardine Pavillion.
Before long Lorne and Chuck came in to be our roadies, Peggy found
a hundred ways to serve brown rice, Dave Scott (lead Guitar) from my
old Orangeville band came on board in the summer of '71.
The band moved out to another farm outside St Agatha to be nearer  to the
urban centre of Kitchener/Waterloo and our music teachers, gigs, and new
 manager: Donald Blair. Tom Holmes joined the group on Violin, Guitar
and Vocals. We played some higher profile concerts and broke up in the
fall of 1975.
That's as concise a history of the Spott Farm story as I can tell .