304, Holloway Road: Joe Meek's flat and experimental department. Hundreds of tunes were produced there, under low budget conditions.

Meek always had a strong fascination for unusual sounds. Some say he was obsessed by occultism and would wander around cemetaries at night, in order to record the voices of the dead. In his productions you can hear all kinds of noises: slamming doors, (reverse) toilet flushes or empty bottles used for percussion effects, thus incorporating sounds familiar from everyday life into music. Certainly avantgardists like John Cage had worked with similar concepts before, but in popular music of the 1960ies this was simply groundbreaking.

However low-budget and unusual Meek's way of producing might have been according to critics, the concept was successful and seemed to pay off - not for Meek though, as he hardly ever earned enough money to pay his rent. This certainly led to an enormous weight of frustration and depression on Meek's shoulders. More and more he would shy away from his friends and deliberately seek solitude. On February 2, 1967, Joe Meek shot his landlady whom he had loved like a mother, then shot himself. Noone ever found out what had happened, Joe Meek remained a mystery even after his death.

However, Meek has paved the way for experimental recording techniques, homerecording and the independent label-concept. A man ahead of his time.

(rh MMII)

Some of Meek's productions:

- Mike Preston "Mr. Blue", single

- John Leyton "Johnny Remember Me", single

- The Moontrekkers "Night Of The Vampire", single

- John Leyton s/t, EP

- Don Charles "Walk With Me My Angel", single

- The Tornados "Telstar", single

- The Tornados "The Sounds Of The Tornados", EP

There are a couple of Meek-tribute sites on the web. One of the best used to be Meeksville at www.meeksville.com, however their website seems to be defunct.