\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/p><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div> \t\t\t\t\tReginald Dwight, who later became Elton John, on tour with us in Simon Dupree & The Big Sound in Scotland, 1968.<\/span><\/p>\n \t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tCourtesy of Derek Shulman<\/cite><\/p>\n<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n \n\t\u2018I dunno what to do,\u2019 he confided in us. \u2018I don\u2019t really want to get married. Should I get married, should I not get married?\u2019<\/p>\n \n\tWe liked Reg but we barely knew him. How could we possibly give him advice on something so serious?<\/p>\n \t\tRelated Content<\/p>\n<\/h2>\n<\/section>\n \n\t\u2018You know, Reg, I\u2019m sure you\u2019ll do what you have to do,\u2019 I said. I knew it was hardly constructive advice, but it was the best I had.<\/p>\n \n\t\u2018Yeah, fuck it,\u2019 he said. That was the last we heard about the subject.<\/p>\n \n\tReg knew a lot about pop music and loved talking about his favorite groups. He wasn\u2019t just knowledgeable about English music. He knew just as much about what was happening in the States, though neither of us had been there yet. We bonded on the black blues we all listened to on the American Air Force Radio.<\/p>\n \n\tSome of the shows on the Scottish tour were in nearby towns. Others were a hundred miles or more apart, which required long drives in the van. Every few hours, we\u2019d stop at a caf\u00e9 to take a short break, have a coffee, and maybe take a piss. And then we get back into the van and head back out. That\u2019s when we learned another quirk about Reg.<\/p>\n \n\t\u2018Hey guys, look what I\u2019ve got,\u2019 he said one day, shaking a snow globe that probably cost about \u00a35.<\/p>\n \n\t\u2018Reg, why do you want that? Isn\u2019t it a little pricey?\u2019 I said.<\/p>\n \n\t\u2018Maybe. I dunno. I just wanted it.\u2019<\/p>\n \n\tSo it went every time we stopped. Reg always picked up something odd: commemorative spoons, a yo-yo, a candlestick. And he never worried about the price. Once, he picked up a watch that looked expensive. I figured maybe I should talk with him before he spent his entire per-diem for the week.<\/p>\n \n\t\u2018Do you think you should think about whether you really need something before you buy it?\u2019 I asked. \u2018I mean, especially if something costs a lot and you don\u2019t need it on tour.\u2019<\/p>\n \n\t\u2018I like to collect stuff,\u2019 he replied, nonplussed. \u2018It\u2019ll remind me of being on tour when I get back home and look at the stuff. Why, do you want any of it?\u2019<\/p>\n \n\t\u2018No,\u2019 I said, and I laughed.<\/p>\n \n\tI kind of felt sorry for Reg. He seemed unable to stop himself from buying useless things. Pretty soon it wouldn\u2019t matter, and he\u2019d be able to buy anything he wanted.<\/p>\n \n\tWe stayed friends with Reg after Eric returned to the group, and we frequently talked about working together in the future. Meanwhile, we swam forward with Simon Dupree, but at times it was more like treading water. We started to talk more to our brother-in-law and manager, John, and everyone at EMI about heading in a different musical direction. Understandably, they weren\u2019t too keen on the idea.<\/p>\n \t\t\t\t\t\t \n\tIn an effort to appease us, John booked us a session at Abbey Road in mid-\u201968 to record something more experimental than anything we had done and release it under another name. Ray, Phil, and I wrote a weird song called \u2018We Are The Moles,\u2019 which we structured in the style of the Beatles at their trippiest. We played droning, spacey riffs and phased the instruments in and out of the mix. We layered chiming keyboards on top and added freaky studio sound effects to the vocals, which included lines like \u2018We are the moles and we stay in our holes \/ Hiding our faces, revealing our souls.\u2019 We didn\u2019t take it seriously at all. We just had fun, and there was a fast vocal part that was a little like \u2018I Am The Walrus,\u2019 which we all thought was great.<\/p>\n \n\tIt was easy to do, and we did it quickly so we would sound spontaneous. We had a good time tapping into this strange, surreal side of ourselves. When we\u2019d finished it, we recorded a B-Side, \u2018We Are The Moles Part II,\u2019 which started with marching sound effects and then turned into this ethereal, nonsensical ditty with the three of us harmonizing the only line in the song, \u2018We are the moles,\u2019 in various ways. It ended with madcap clapping and calls for \u2018More!\u2019 which Ray and I found hysterical. We wrote the whole thing in the studio in five minutes and recorded it in 10.<\/p>\n \n\tParlophone released \u2018We Are The Moles\u2019 in 1968, and, to our surprise, it started getting airplay. The press was chattering. Everyone was trying to figure out who was in this mysterious band with no credited members. The song hit the Top 100, and when people started wondering if The Moles were The Beatles in disguise, it reached #75 and started going up the charts. We thought this might be the beginning of an anonymous side project that would be fun to do and imagined going back into the studio to record a whole album of silly, psychedelic songs.<\/p>\n\n
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