info
Google Groups no longer supports new Usenet posts or subscriptions. Historical content remains viewable.
Dismiss
Dean Ford, Singer on Marmalade’s ‘Reflections,’ Is Dead at 72
7 views
Skip to first unread message
dav...@agent.com
Jan 10, 2019, 3:35:24 AM1/10/19
to
Dean Ford, Singer on Marmalade’s ‘Reflections,’ Is Dead at 72
After quick fame thanks to a big international hit and tours with the
Who and others, Mr. Ford confronted the challenge of alcoholism.
By Neil Genzlinger, Jan. 4, 2019, NY Times
Dean Ford, vocalist for the Scottish band the Marmalade, whose voice
was heard around the world on the group’s biggest hit, “Reflections of
My Life,” died on Monday in Los Angeles. He was 72.
His daughter, Tracey McAleese Gorman, said the cause was complications
of Parkinson’s disease.
Mr. Ford had a heady decade in the 1960s and early ’70s as the
Marmalade (which eventually dropped its “the”) had hits in Britain and
elsewhere in Europe, then grew even bigger with “Reflections,” a
somber ballad in which the singer examines the world around him with
dismay but also a glimmer of something positive.
“The world is a bad place, a bad place, a terrible place to live,”
sang Mr. Ford, who wrote “Reflections” with his bandmate Junior
Campbell. “Oh, but I don’t want to die.”
The song reached Billboard’s Top 10 in May 1970 after achieving even
greater success in Britain. Fame, though, proved hard to handle for
Mr. Ford, who left the group in the mid-1970s and struggled with
alcoholism. In 1986 he sought help from Alcoholics Anonymous.
One of his subsequent jobs was driving a limousine in Los Angeles, and
his passengers included celebrities like Jane Wyman, Michael Jackson
and Bob Dylan. But, he told The Scottish Mail in 2015, he never told
passengers that he was once a celebrity too.
“You’re not supposed to do that when you’re driving,” he said. “They
don’t want to hear it. If it gets back to the guy who owns the
company, you’re gone.”
Mr. Ford, though, never lost his desire to perform.
A subdued version of “Reflections of My Life” recorded in 2014 has
been viewed more than two million times on YouTube. Last year Mr. Ford
released “This Scottish Heart,” a 30-track, two-disc album.
[Dean Ford - Reflections of My Life - Produced by Joe
TansinCreditCreditVideo by joe tansin]
“Music was his life, music inspired him, music was everything to him,”
his daughter said in a telephone interview. “He wasn’t just a lead
singer; he loved playing the guitar, and he played it to my son, and
at family gatherings, barbecues. He wouldn’t go anywhere without it.”
Dean Ford was his stage name. He was born Thomas McAleese on Sept. 5,
1946, in Airdrie, Scotland, to Thomas and Elizabeth McAleese. He grew
up in neighboring Coatbridge and left school at 16 to join a band
called the Cravats. In 1963 he was recruited to front another band,
the Gaylords, but decided his name needed sprucing up.
“I thought about Dean Martin and Tennessee Ernie Ford,” he told The
Mail, “and put them together.” The group became Dean Ford and the
Gaylords.
Known for close harmonies, the band, renamed the Marmalade at the
suggestion of its record company, had modest success in 1967 with “I
See the Rain,” then hit it big the next year with a cover of the
Beatles’ “Ob-La-Di, Ob-La-Da” that went to the top of the British
charts.
The group toured with the Who and other leading acts of the day,
immersed in the wild side of rock ’n’ roll. Mr. Ford said he avoided
drugs for the most part but was derailed by alcohol.
He had married Janeanne McBaine in 1968, but the marriage broke up. In
addition to his daughter, he is survived by a sister, Liz Carson.
After leaving Marmalade, Mr. Ford also left Britain for the United
States.
“I wanted to start over,” he said in a 1998 interview. “I wanted a new
life. The trouble was, I brought myself with me.”
At one of his favorite watering holes, another regular was a woman who
often arrived at the bar beaten and bloody. One day she stopped
coming, and he assumed the worst.
“But then she turned up, and the change in her was stunning,” he said.
She told her old drinking partners that she had gone to A.A. for help.
“I think God sends us a message when we’re ready to hear it,” Mr. Ford
said. “I was ready to hear it then.”
"REFLECTIONS OF MY LIFE" THE MARMALADE ~ 1969 - original recording
~ HQ AUDIOCreditCreditVideo by ClassicPerformances2
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xTeI65yrhGw
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/01/04/obituaries/dean-ford-dead.html
After quick fame thanks to a big international hit and tours with the
Who and others, Mr. Ford confronted the challenge of alcoholism.
By Neil Genzlinger, Jan. 4, 2019, NY Times
Dean Ford, vocalist for the Scottish band the Marmalade, whose voice
was heard around the world on the group’s biggest hit, “Reflections of
My Life,” died on Monday in Los Angeles. He was 72.
His daughter, Tracey McAleese Gorman, said the cause was complications
of Parkinson’s disease.
Mr. Ford had a heady decade in the 1960s and early ’70s as the
Marmalade (which eventually dropped its “the”) had hits in Britain and
elsewhere in Europe, then grew even bigger with “Reflections,” a
somber ballad in which the singer examines the world around him with
dismay but also a glimmer of something positive.
“The world is a bad place, a bad place, a terrible place to live,”
sang Mr. Ford, who wrote “Reflections” with his bandmate Junior
Campbell. “Oh, but I don’t want to die.”
The song reached Billboard’s Top 10 in May 1970 after achieving even
greater success in Britain. Fame, though, proved hard to handle for
Mr. Ford, who left the group in the mid-1970s and struggled with
alcoholism. In 1986 he sought help from Alcoholics Anonymous.
One of his subsequent jobs was driving a limousine in Los Angeles, and
his passengers included celebrities like Jane Wyman, Michael Jackson
and Bob Dylan. But, he told The Scottish Mail in 2015, he never told
passengers that he was once a celebrity too.
“You’re not supposed to do that when you’re driving,” he said. “They
don’t want to hear it. If it gets back to the guy who owns the
company, you’re gone.”
Mr. Ford, though, never lost his desire to perform.
A subdued version of “Reflections of My Life” recorded in 2014 has
been viewed more than two million times on YouTube. Last year Mr. Ford
released “This Scottish Heart,” a 30-track, two-disc album.
[Dean Ford - Reflections of My Life - Produced by Joe
TansinCreditCreditVideo by joe tansin]
“Music was his life, music inspired him, music was everything to him,”
his daughter said in a telephone interview. “He wasn’t just a lead
singer; he loved playing the guitar, and he played it to my son, and
at family gatherings, barbecues. He wouldn’t go anywhere without it.”
Dean Ford was his stage name. He was born Thomas McAleese on Sept. 5,
1946, in Airdrie, Scotland, to Thomas and Elizabeth McAleese. He grew
up in neighboring Coatbridge and left school at 16 to join a band
called the Cravats. In 1963 he was recruited to front another band,
the Gaylords, but decided his name needed sprucing up.
“I thought about Dean Martin and Tennessee Ernie Ford,” he told The
Mail, “and put them together.” The group became Dean Ford and the
Gaylords.
Known for close harmonies, the band, renamed the Marmalade at the
suggestion of its record company, had modest success in 1967 with “I
See the Rain,” then hit it big the next year with a cover of the
Beatles’ “Ob-La-Di, Ob-La-Da” that went to the top of the British
charts.
The group toured with the Who and other leading acts of the day,
immersed in the wild side of rock ’n’ roll. Mr. Ford said he avoided
drugs for the most part but was derailed by alcohol.
He had married Janeanne McBaine in 1968, but the marriage broke up. In
addition to his daughter, he is survived by a sister, Liz Carson.
After leaving Marmalade, Mr. Ford also left Britain for the United
States.
“I wanted to start over,” he said in a 1998 interview. “I wanted a new
life. The trouble was, I brought myself with me.”
At one of his favorite watering holes, another regular was a woman who
often arrived at the bar beaten and bloody. One day she stopped
coming, and he assumed the worst.
“But then she turned up, and the change in her was stunning,” he said.
She told her old drinking partners that she had gone to A.A. for help.
“I think God sends us a message when we’re ready to hear it,” Mr. Ford
said. “I was ready to hear it then.”
"REFLECTIONS OF MY LIFE" THE MARMALADE ~ 1969 - original recording
~ HQ AUDIOCreditCreditVideo by ClassicPerformances2
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xTeI65yrhGw
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/01/04/obituaries/dean-ford-dead.html
0 new messages