JOE MEEK documentary

Great article on Joe and our documentary in the January 2008 (Vol.2, Issue 57) issue of DAZED AND CONFUSED!
A Life In The Death Of JOE MEEK
This is a feature length documentary, titled "A Life In The Death Of JOE MEEK", about the life and career of one of the world's first independent record producers. We are in the very last stages of post production and hope to have it on film festival screens by January 2008. See below for a preview clip.
“Joe Meek has two legends. One is his own life, which was a bit fragmented and quite sad and would make a very good movie story and the other really is he was a totally innovative producer.”
-Simon Napier-Bell, Manager of The Yardbirds and Author of "You Don't Have to Say You Love Me", "Black Vinyl, White Powder" and "I'm Coming to Take You to Lunch: A Fantastic Tale of Boys, Booze and How Wham! Were Sold to China".
Joe was born in the small country town of Newent, England in 1929. Growing up he didn’t quite fit in with his rough and ready brothers, “Joe was an indoor boy”, “times were rough”. Joe had to pitch in with the family’s cherry orchard, although he would have much rather been “tinkering with his electrical goods” in his shed. Joe was obsessed with all things technical, even going so far as to build the first TV set in Newent. He collected old gramophones and records and set up what might have been “the first mobile disco in the UK”, amplifying the music at all the local dancehalls and church fetes. “Exhausting what he could do locally”, Joe soon “made the plunge and moved to London” to further his interest in recording.
It didn’t take long for Joe to become one of most requested recording engineers at IBC and Lansdowne Studios, fashioning top hits for Humphrey Lyttelton, Chris Barber, Lonnie Donegan, Acker Bilk, Diana Dors, Hayley Mills and Petula Clark. But Joe’s successes were marred by his reputation for being a maverick. He didn’t just capture the sounds that were being played in the studio; he altered them, which went against every rule of recording at that time. Joe often butted heads with IBC General Manager Allen Stagg - “Joe was a monster if he didn’t get his way” and in the end he decided to break away and set up his own recording studio in his apartment. This was nothing new for Joe; he had been feverishly recording at home in Arundel Gardens at night while working at the studios by day. In fact, around 1959 he recorded a “stereo space concept album” called “I Hear A New World”. It still baffles the experts on how the “stereo” aspects were achieved as the technology was scarcely used.
Joe was happy with his new set-up at 304 Holloway Road in North London, he could put as much compression on the records as he wanted but Abbey Road it wasn’t - “it looked like your grandfather’s shed”, “it was a bit of a dump really”, “I thought this is a bit Mickey Mouse, how the devil does anybody record here?” Despite this, Joe went on to write and produce many top 5 hit songs by artists such as John Leyton, The Honeycombs and The Tornados whose “Telstar” went to number 1 in the US in 1962, a first for a British group.
Joe’s studio became the place for young musicians to break in during the early to mid 1960’s and Jimmy Page, Rod Stewart, David Bowie, Tom Jones, Steve Howe and Ritchie Blackmore all passed through 304 at one time with various results!
Joe truly became the first independent pop producer by recording the songs his way and then leasing them to the record labels. But it wasn’t easy for Joe who was “the worst businessman in the world", "he had no value for money".
However by far Joe’s biggest struggle was with himself and his deteriorating mental condition. Coping with being gay at a time when it was illegal took its toll on him especially after being arrested and fueled his already present paranoia. He was known to have a short, violent temper which was enhanced no doubt by his reliance on pill popping -- and his obsession with the cosmos and the occult "he was kind of tuning into the music of the spheres – of some world out there in space or beyond the grave – that ethereality of his world” led to some very strange occurrences…
On February 3rd, 1967 Joe was found shot dead in his apartment along with his landlady Mrs. Shenton who had also been shot and later died. It is believed that Joe pulled the trigger on her and then himself, ironically 8 years to the day of the death of Buddy Holly, Joe's idol. Why he did it still remains a mystery but those close to Joe have their own surprising and controversial opinions including the only witness to the shootings Patrick Pink…
Forty years after his death, Joe Meek continues to fascinate, inspire and influence generation after generation of musicians and anyone in search of the independent spirit.
Some of the people we’ve interviewed are Joe's family, friends and colleagues at IBC and Lansdowne Studios, musicians Joe recorded including members of The Tornados (Clem Cattini, Roger LaVern, Roger and Peter Holder, Dave Watts, Rob Huxley), The Honeycombs (Anne and John Lantree, Dennis D'ell), The Syndicats (Steve Howe), The Blue Men (Dave Golding, Doug Collins), The Outlaws (Chas Hodges, Reg Hawkins, Billy Kuy, Bobby Graham), The Moontrekkers (Gary LePort, Ron Winskill), The Savages (Tony Dangerfield). Also, Big Jim Sullivan, John Leyton, Joy and Dave Adams, David John, Humphrey Lyttelton, Mike Berry, Jason Eddie, Guy and Ted Fletcher, Ricky Winter, Robbie Duke aka Patrick Pink, Meek authors Barry Cleveland, John Repsch and Duncan Eaton, Meek experts Mike Stax, John Cavanagh, Alec Palao, Kim Lowden, Mark Newson and Richie Unterberger and Meek fans Alex Kapranos (Franz Ferdinand), Keith Strickland (The B-52s), Huw Bunford (Super Furry Animals), Edwyn Collins, Graham Parker, Jennifer Gentle, author Jake Arnott, Liam Watson of Toe Rag Studios and the list goes on…