ROBBI CURTICE
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THE ASHMORE-PAYNE YEARS
editSongwriters since the 1960s, Rob Ashmore (born 1946) and Tom Payne (born 1948) hail from the English Midlands. They met up at Warwick School and played in local groups such as The Chosen Few, with friends such as Grev Norman, Keith (Jim) Smith, Chris Ward, Will Harvey, Mike Hazeldene and the late John Powell. They soon started writing their own material, with Rob providing the lyrics and Tom coming up with the tunes. Before long they were using mostly their own original songs in their gigs.
After some initial trips to Denmark Street to test the water they found that two music publishing companies, Mills and Pan, both wanted to publish one of their songs, “When Diana Paints the Picture”, written about Tom's girlfriend. Despite Pan Music's Gerald Benson's protests that he had already earmarked the song for Cilla Black, the boys eventually decided to sign with the bigger of the two companies, Mills Music.
So it was that Rob came to record the song, under his brand new stage name Robbi Curtice, at London's Regent Sound Studios in June 1968, on Tom's 20th Birthday. The final mix of the song was not as good as it might have been and it failed to secure a UK release. However the intended B side, “Soul of a Man”, written on the back of a cigarette packet by Rob's new managers, the record's producers Ralph Murphy and Vic Coppersmith-Heaven, proved much stronger than expected and was released in the USA on Mike Curb's Sidewalk label, part of the large Tower label. This sold very well on the West Coast of the USA.
Rob and Tom continued writing songs, including their 'musical play without dialogue' “Jonathan and Alison”, a work featuring 19 songs and telling the cautionary tale of two youngsters growing up. This was intended for television, but was turned down by ITV, with sincere regret, due to the prohibitive cost of location filming. It now features on the pair's website.
They also wrote favourites such as “Jigsaw”, “Gospel Lane”, “The Things I Do for Pamela”, “Don't Ever Ring Down tbe Curtain”, “Is Life in the Metropolis As Groovy as they Say”, “Friday Never Comes”, “A Ticket to Memphis”, “A Cry to a Face in the Crowd” and many more. This was their most prolific period, with the pair often writing three or four songs each week, using their limited home studio time to make basic recordings of each new song, usually in one take, but never having the luxury of being able to produce the finished article. By 1972, when Rob moved abroad and the pair decided to concentrate on their day jobs and families, Ashmore-Payne had well over 300 songs to their names.
More recently, another unreleased demo track “The Things I Do for Pamela” was included in the latest limited edition vinyl Fading Yellow album, released November 2011. In November 2013 “Book a Trip 2 – More Psych Pop Sounds of Capitol Records” included a version of “When Diana Paints the Picture” remixed by Steve Stanley from the original session tapes. This sounded very much better than the original, and one can only speculate what might have happened if this version had been presented for release in 1968.
New songs recently completed include “Mary Used to Play Piano”, “Passing Shadow”, “Bring Back the Sun”, “Save Me”, “Too Late”, "Nothing Special", and "Just Like the Others Do". Rob and Tom have also written a stage musical, yet to be staged, called “Moving Masterpieces”, which tells the story of how the employees and exhibits at an art gallery conspire to prevent its threatened closure. Some of the melodies from old Ashmore-Payne songs have been reworked with new lyrics for this musical.
THE ASHMORE-ESDRAFFO YEARS
Fast forward thirty years,there was an resurgence of interest in Ashmore-Payne work, most evident on the internet. First of all “Soul of a Man” began to feature on alternative sixties jukebox sites and radio stations such as Chocolate Soup FM. Shortly afterwards, “When Diana Paints the Picture” was included in Volume 3 of the Swedish rare 1960s CDs series “Fading Yellow”, and described as a “forgotten gem”. Then “Soul of a Man” and “Gospel Lane” were included in Volume 4 of the series. Both volumes are now collectors’ items.
Serge Bozon, the French film producer/director, used "Gospel Lane" in his 2007 film “La France”. After the film's UK premiere at l’institut francais in March 2008, Rob was asked to perform “Gospel Lane”, backed by Benjamin Esdraffo and his band, during a Barbara Carlotti concert. “Gospel Lane” was used in the film’s trailer and included in the CD of the film's music -"La France Chansons". Rob and Benjamin kept in touch and soon afterwards began writing songs together. Rob used the method he had always used when collaborating with Tom Payne, sending his lyrics to the composer.
Occasionally a lyric inspired Benjamin and before long several songs had been written - Benjamin would send his backing tracks across the Channel and Rob would add the vocal tracks and return them to Benjamin for mixing. In this way songs such as "Seven Years Later", "1943", "Pick Up the Phone", "Carrie's World, "The Divided City", "One Man" and "Nothing to Write Home About" were written in the next few years. In May 2023 Robbi and Benjamin released the album "Nothing to Write Home About" (Freaksville Records).