Mortlock and Underwood
From 1980 to about 2000, I played regularly as a duo with Frank Underwood. With no great orginality, we called ourselves Mortlock and Underwood. The duo mostly played blues, ragtime and folk, with Frank on guitar and
keyboards and me on fiddle, flute, mandolin, recorder, spoons, kazoo and whatever; both of us sang.
Frank and I met in Woolworths (now vanished) in Banbury, and did lots of gigs in all kinds of odd places. Most of these I cannot now remember (though Frank probably can). Some which I do remember were:
- the Bishop Blaize (now closed) at Sibford Gower. A regular spot, with regular lock-ins after the gig!
- the University of London Union, when we barely played because the act before us went on, and on, and on...
- one at Leeds University, when Tony Freeman (our roadie) built a stage entirely from beer crates and odd bits of wood. Well done, Tony!
- the 'Renaissance to Folk-Rock' concerts which we did at local schools. At Sibford Quaker School, Frank left his empty beer bottles behind after the gig, stashed under the school piano. This didn't go down well.
- not a gig, but recording at Dave Pegg's Woodworm Studios in 1980. The morning session went smoothly, but not the afternoon one. We had been foolish enough to try to match Peggy Guiness-for-Guiness in the local pub at lunchtime...
- the Railway Hotel in Hook Norton. This was one of dingiest pubs I've ever played in. Really, it isn't surprising that it closed several years back.
- Norton's Wine Bar (another one that is now defunct), in Chipping Norton, masquerading as "Luigi and the Boys"
- at the Oxford University Union, in a marquee. Frank waxed lyrical about the gents' loos there, because members of the Pre-Raphaelites had (presumably) used these facilities many years before when painting the Union's murals.
- a benefit gig for Education for Democracy in South Africa in 1990, together with (most of) Fairport Convention. At the end, we all got on stage and joined in the chorus of 'Meet on the Ledge'.
Tho' we no longer gig together regularly, Frank and me still get together (often with friends) for the occasional gig..
Next: the Rollrights duo