I went into the Plough at Stockwell one night. Phil was playing with Peter King the alto player. I sat down almost next to Phil. He’d got his Alsatian dog tied to his cymbal stand and the dog went to sleep. Phil was thrashing away, and the dog took no notice. He was asleep for the whole session. We initially only called in for little while as we were on our way to my parents who lived in Balham. It was probably late 60s.
I remember Phil playing with Mark Murphy the American jazz singer, who’d
based himself in London from 1963. He appeared at Ronnie’s, but also at the
Bulls Head, Barnes. A friend of mine, Rocky Hudson, told me Mark was
singing away at Ronnie’s and people were talking to one another, over whoever
the artist was, they didn’t really care. They were yap, yap, yap and eventually
Mark stopped the band. ‘I’ve had enough. I’ve had enough. Don’t you realise,
what I’m doing up here is art, it’s art?’ And everybody went: ‘Urgh. Urgh.’ Phil
was the drummer with him there all week.
Copyright – Peter Dawn