Ever Heard Of - Mynahbirds

Ambitious, charismatic and dripping in raw talent, Ricky James Matthews (b. James Ambrose Johnson, 1 February, 1948, Buffalo, NY, US; d. 6 August, 2004) didn’t take long to capitalise on his sharp looks, soulful voice and US navy uniform after he landed in Toronto in August 1964. Within weeks of his arrival, the young singer found himself fronting the aptly titled Sailorboys, a raucous R&B outfit that subsequently evolved into the Mynah Birds.

Yet, unbeknown to his musical cohorts, Matthews was a wanted man by the US authorities. His failure to report for active duty with the USS Enterprise and a fear of arrest had prompted the young singer to flee across the border. Interestingly, it was not Matthews’ first brush with the authorities, for as a teenager he had been arrested on several occasions for stealing cars. Indeed, throughout his career, Matthews would have numerous run-ins with the law, culminating in a prison sentence in the mid-1990s.

While Matthews later enjoyed a string of hits for Motown Records in the late 1970s/early 1980s as funk star Rick James, little is known about his early life, particularly his involvement in the Toronto rock scene during the 1960s. And perhaps it would have remained that way had it not been for the fact that the Mynah Birds also briefly included Canadian rock legend, Neil Young (b. 12 November, 1945, Toronto, Canada).

However, it would be a gross oversight to view the group as merely a footnote to Rick James and Neil Young’s careers. Not only did the Mynah Birds include several notable musicians who later found fame with the likes of Buffalo Springfield and Steppenwolf, but they were also the first largely white outfit to sign to Motown Records. The fact that the group’s recordings have gathered dust in the label’s vaults for nearly 40 years has merely added to the group’s legendary status.

Matthews’ earliest musical venture on the Toronto rock scene was an intriguing yet relatively short-lived affair, hatched around August 1964. While the exact details surrounding the group’s formation remain sketchy, one story goes that bass player Nick St Nicholas (b. Klaus Karl Kassbaum, 28 September, 1943, Hamburg, Germany) was playing with his band the Swinging Doors at the Café El Patio when Matthews walked into the club wearing his navy uniform. Invited to sing with the group on stage, St Nicholas was suitably impressed and took the young American under his wing, employing him as the band’s singer and prompting a name change to the Sailorboys. The other original members comprised lead guitarist Ian Gobel and drummer Rick Cameron.

Finding regular work at clubs like Café El Patio and Chez Monique’s in Toronto’s hip Yorkville district, the Sailorboys played a mixture of R&B and British Invasion covers, most notably songs by the Rolling Stones. Over the next few months, however, the band’s line up remained extremely fluid and by the end of 1964, Frank Arnel had taken over from Ian Gobel on guitar. Arnel’s arrival coincided with the addition of a keyboard player, Goldie McJohn (b. John Goadsby, 2 May, 1945), who was recruited to “beef up” the group’s sound. McJohn had previously played in Little John & the Friars and was responsible for introducing a new drummer, band mate, Richie Grand.

The line up changes did not stop there. Around December, a second singer, Jimmy Livingstone, joined the Sailorboys after sitting in with the band at a gig. Formerly the lead singer of early 1960s rockabilly outfit, Jimmy Lee & the Countdowns, Livingstone was wildly eccentric, and his strong stage presence when paired with Matthews’ charismatic personality and dynamic on-stage antics greatly enhanced the Sailorboys’ local status.

Not surprisingly, an interracial band pumping out R&B with attitude, and led by two strong singers (a la Sam and Dave) soon made people sit up and listen. One of the first people to recognise the band’s potential was American entrepreneur Colin Kerr. The owner of an intriguing store situated on Bloor Street that sold mynah birds, Kerr offered his services as a manager and quickly renamed the group after his favourite pet.

While Kerr’s support may have been welcomed on the music front, his influence over the Mynah Birds’ image in the early days was somewhat problematic. Besides the store on Bloor Street, Kerr had his own pet mynah bird called Raja, and according to Nicholas Jennings in his book, Before the goldrush, one of his first moves as a manager was to get the band to adopt Raja as its mascot. If this wasn’t bad enough, Kerr insisted that the group dress up in mynah bird colours.

Local guitarist Stan Endersby remembers seeing the group’s early line up at Massey Hall on a bill with local rivals, Jack London & the Sparrows. “Colin Kerr wanted them to have a look, so they had black Beatle boots with Cuban heels dyed yellow, black pants and yellow vests,” he says. “They really smoked that night. It was with the two singers before Ricky was doing his Mick Jagger trip.”

Kerr’s manipulation of the Mynah Birds’ image could have severely dented the band’s street cred, but interestingly his “wacky” ideas soon paid off and the group won a recording deal with the Canadian arm of Columbia Records. This however, is where events become extremely sketchy. According to Livingstone, the Mynah Birds split into two groups around this time and then reformed over a matter of weeks. While it’s impossible to account for the various comings and goings, it appears from several members’ accounts that a line up comprising Matthews, Arnel and St Nicholas, together with a new drummer, Kent Daubney (b. Newark, England) was responsible for recording one track, “the Mynah Birds Song”. This soul-influenced ballad, which was recorded sometime in December, was not deemed to be strong enough for the prospective single’s a-side and by the time work began on a stronger number, the group had undergone further personnel changes.

New drummer Kent Daubney was the first to bail out and joined the Mersey-beat inspired outfit, the Liverpool Set. Around the same time, Jimmy Livingstone, Goldie McJohn and Richie Grand returned to the group’s ranks, although whether this was at the same time is unclear. Whatever the circumstances, it appears that a line up comprising Livingstone and Matthews backed by Arnel, Grand, McJohn and St Nicholas returned to the studios to record a stronger song for the single’s a-side. The result was a calypso-type number entitled “the Mynah Bird Hop” written by Kerr’s brother Ben, a former country singer and future candidate for Toronto mayor. Issued in January 1965, the single made little impact on the local charts and, perhaps not surprisingly, the group continued to shuffle the line up.

In what essentially was an exchange of bass players, St Nicholas was traded to Jack London & the Sparrows for Bruce Palmer (b. 9 September, 1946, Toronto, Canada; d. 1 October, 2004), a fabulous musician whose R&B influences brought the group a depth it had previously lacked. With Palmer on board, the band began to plug the single, appearing on CFTO’s Hi Time show. Soon afterwards, the group travelled to Montreal to play at the Esquire Show Bar, but for some unknown reason, it was not allowed to use the Mynah Birds name and performed instead as the Swinging Doors.

Jimmy Livingstone bowed out at this point and joined the Just Us, a popular Toronto outfit that featured several musicians who would later work with Matthews in his late 1960s and early 1970s projects. Richie Grand jumped ship soon afterwards to play with local group the Diplomats, his place taken by former Sailorboys’ drummer Rick Cameron.

Things were starting to get crazy and as Kerr dreamt up ever more outrageous stunts, the band decided to dispense with his services. According to Palmer, it was when Kerr asked the musicians to shave their heads so that they looked like mynah birds that the group decided he was “out of his mind”. Left to his own devices, Kerr subsequently turned his attention to his own mynah bird coffee house, which was most notable for featuring go-go dancers that performed in a second-storey glass booth visible from the street. His new project later earned notoriety for featuring topless dancers, body painting, porno films and nude chef!

The split with Kerr appears to have coincided with a major reshuffle in the Mynah Birds’ line up with Arnel, Cameron and McJohn all departing sometime in March 1965. Only McJohn maintained a significant profile, hooking up with the Sparrows after a brief stint the Diplomats alongside Richie Grand. By the time McJohn joined, the Sparrows had dispensed with Jack London and were in the process of adding German émigré John Kay. The Sparrows, subsequently shortened to the Sparrow, would ultimately evolve into heavy rock outfit, Steppenwolf in mid-1967.

Matthews and Palmer meanwhile stumbled across a Brantford, Ontario band, the Bunkies playing at a Toronto hall. Determined to continue with the Mynah Birds’ name, they poached three of the group’s members – lead guitarist Tom Morgan (b. Tom Catherwood, 4 July, 1944, Brantford, Canada), rhythm guitarist John Taylor (b. John Yachamec, Brantford, Canada) and drummer Rickman Mason (b. 2 December, 1945, Brantford, Canada). “I think Ricky and Bruce said they had just broken up their band because Colin Kerr wanted them to wear feathers and yellow boots and they said they weren’t going to do that,” laughs Mason on the chance encounter.

Eschewing the “Kerr-imposed wardrobe”, the group assumed a fresh set of clothes to match their idols, the Rolling Stones. Matthews even began to incorporate Mick Jagger moves into his performance. Peter Hodgson, bass player with local group, Jon and Lee and the Checkmates, remembers Matthews well. “Ricky hadn’t come into his own identity then. He was actually very much like Mick Jagger. He was very influenced by him, which was a funny thing to see because he was a black guy imitating a white guy.”

Matthews even began to don a black bean cap, which apparently never left his head. “He didn’t like the hair,” chuckles Tom Morgan. “The kinky hair, so he put the hat on and that’s where it stayed.” Both Mason and Morgan remember Ricky being a lot of fun, but they also remember his more mischievous side. One incident that has passed into Toronto folklore is the time when Matthews stole microphones from a famous music instrument shop.

“We were at Long and McQuade’s in the afternoon and unbeknown to everyone, he was apparently slipping mics in his jacket,” says Morgan. “So, we’re playing at the El Patio that night and Jack Long comes in and wants his mics back. There’s these three stands and there’s Ricky unscrewing the mics and giving them back.”

Though the new line up never recorded professionally, Rickman Mason remembers the group cutting a crude recording in a barn in Toronto’s east side. “We went to some place in Cabbagetown. They just put up some boards and walls and the guy recorded us and he gave us the slate right then and there. That’s what we had to carry with us to get work.” More tantalising is his recollection of the Canadian Broadcasting Company filming the band playing at the Devil’s Den club for a documentary. “CBC came down the stairs and filmed the whole night of us. Somewhere in their archives they have the footage of us,” he says.

Around June 1965, the band landed an important residency at the Sapphire Tavern where they performed for six months and also ventured outside Toronto to play several tours, including one in northern Ontario.

Later that winter, the Mynah Birds’ luck changed when businessman John Craig Eaton, heir to the Eaton dynasty, became the band’s financial benefactor. Eaton was eager to get a foot in the fledging Canadian rock market and one of his first moves was to buy the group new equipment and to set up an expense account. The band also acquired a new manager, a shady character known as Morley Shelman, who the musicians suspected was pocketing most of the money Eaton forwarded them.

“John didn’t want anyone knowing his involvement with the band at the time, so he used Morley as a go between,” says Mason. “His dad was a friend of John Eaton’s and lived down the street in a castle-style home on the Bridle Path. Morley basically stole the money. All the money that John Eaton said we owed him, we didn’t.”

Nevertheless, it was Morley who used his connections with Sal Mineo to pique the interest of Motown Records, which was suitably impressed by the band’s unique brand of folk-rock flavoured soul music. In January 1966, an awe struck band drove down to Detroit to audition personally for Berry Gordy and Smokey Robinson. Tom Morgan remembers the auspicious occasion clearly but came away with a bitter taste in his mouth. “I could see what was coming down the road,” he says. “Soon as [Motown] got [Ricky James Matthews] back over there, you knew where he’d end up and where everybody else would end up. Nowhere. Just by the way Motown treated people. They were only ever interested in Ricky.” Mason agrees. “That would make sense. They signed us separately, not as a band.”

The audition proved a turning point for Morgan. Refusing to sign the contract, he walked from the band. Rescue came in the form of an unlikely figure – struggling folkie, Neil Young. As Bruce Palmer remembers the fortuitous meeting, he was walking down Yorkville Avenue when he ran into Young, carrying his acoustic guitar and balancing an amp on his head, coming in the opposite direction. After exchanging pleasantries, Palmer invited Young to join the band. It seemed a ridiculous decision introducing an acoustic player into a rhythm and blues outfit. But by combining Young’s folk inflected guitar and Matthews’ R&B vocals, the Mynah Birds, as noted rock historian John Einarson aptly put it, successfully bridged the two Toronto styles – Yorkville Village’s folk and Yonge Street’s R&B.

Mason, who says he never got along with the band’s new guitarist, remembers Young’s first job with the band – the Inferno, a club on Toronto’s east side. “They put rubber gym mats out for us to play on! The first song we go to do, Neil goes up to do his lead and unplugs his guitar. He plays the whole lead without his guitar plugged in. Didn’t even know what he was doing.”

Within weeks of Young joining, the Mynah Birds flew down to Motown to begin sessions for the label under Smokey Robinson’s supervision. Since the musicians were all minors, their parents had to accompany them to Detroit to sign the contracts.

Details surrounding the group’s weeklong sessions that February are sketchy. Nevertheless, Mason remembers the label being a hard taskmaster. “Twenty-four seven, day and night until we dropped,” is how he describes the workload. “They would take us into the studio individually – I bet you I did maybe 30 tracks by myself. I still listen to Motown songs and wonder if that’s me playing on them.”

As for the Mynah Birds’ own recordings. “Neil used a 12-string a lot,” he continues. “But we never did anything as a band. It was all done in parts and they put it together. Then everybody would drop in and do songs with us, like Smokey Robinson and Tammi Terrell. They made R Dean Taylor our look after guy because he was white and Canadian too.”

Several track titles are listed under the BMI records. Somewhat surprisingly, only one track is credited to Neil Young: “I’ll Wait Forever” which is a co-write with Matthews and Motown staff writers Mike Valvano and R Dean Taylor. Both writers joined forces with Matthews and John Taylor to compose another song for the sessions – “Go On and Cry”.

Of the other recordings listed under the BMI records, “I Got You In My Soul” is a Matthews-Taylor collaboration, while another Ricky James Matthews song called “Out In the Country” is a co-write with a Roderick Harrison and Ronald Madlock, whoever they were.

In later years, Neil Young talked about a song he co-wrote with Matthews called “It’s My Time”, which is reportedly among the seven tracks Young bought from Motown for his long awaited and over due box set. Rickman Mason also remembers the group cutting a John Taylor song called “Little Girl”. Neither is listed in the BMI records.

As soon as the recordings were done, however, the group ran into problems with their manager. After signing the Motown deal, the label had given the musicians an advance. The only problem was that the group never saw it – Morley Shelman had pocketed it all to fund his growing heroin addiction. When the band fired him over the missing money, Shelman extracted his revenge by informing Motown that Ricky was AWOL.

Unaware of his treachery, the group, minus Matthews, returned to Toronto confident that the album would soon be in the shops. But Motown was uneasy about dealing with someone who was wanted by the FBI and convinced the singer to give himself up to the authorities. In one of his last interviews, Matthews told writer Alex Stimmel that Motown had made him a promise that he would still have a home once he had taken care of his responsibilities. Back in Toronto, Matthews broke the devastating news to Young and Palmer, before returning to Buffalo where he was picked up by FBI officers and incarcerated in the Brooklyn Brig for over a year.

With Matthews gone and the album shelved, the remaining members were left to assess their futures. For Neil Young, his mind was already made up – the sounds that were emanating from Los Angeles captured perfectly his musical aspirations. Selling the equipment John Craig Eaton had bought them to purchase a hearse, and with Palmer in tow, Young embarked on a cross-continent trip to L.A. that resulted in the birth of Buffalo Springfield. It would be three years before Young and Palmer would see Matthews again.

But that’s not the end of the Mynah Birds story. As Rickman Mason points out, the Motown contract stipulated that the group had six-months’ of work to fulfill and pressured to honour these commitments or face being sued, he and John Taylor drafted in former guitarist Tom Morgan and two new musicians – singer Mark Smith and former Bunkies bass player John Klasen (b. Brantford, Canada) to perform as the Mynah Birds. The band resumed gigging, but Morgan soon left to be replaced by Robert Benedict. By the spring of 1967, it was all over. Around this time, Mason received an unexpected visit from Matthews, who left the Brooklyn Brig and made it back to Toronto. It would be the last time he ever saw the charismatic singer.

“We were living in Bay Ridges and Ricky snuck in the house,” says Mason. “He came to me and he said, ‘we’re going to the States and we want you to go with us’. But John [Taylor] said, ‘you’re not taking the drums’ and that was the end of my life.”

Searching out new musicians for a reformed Mynah Birds, Matthews walked into Toronto’s Night Owl club one night where his former sparring partner, Jimmy Livingstone’s latest band, the Tripp were playing. As the band’s bass player Neil Lillie (b. 27 December, 1945, Winnipeg, Canada) recalls: “After the show, Rick asked me if I wanted to sign to Motown as a member of the ‘Myna Byrds’ that he was reforming. Bill Ross was there and was joining with Al Morrison. Both had recently been members of David Clayton-Thomas’ Bossmen.”

The group also recruited a keyboard player, but Lillie can’t remember his name. What he does remember, however, is that he was too young to sign with Motown, “so we flew my Mother-in-law to the signing and she faked being his mom to co-sign the contract!”

After returning to Detroit, the band rehearsed at the recently acquired Gold Star Studio and recorded a new version of the Matthews/Young collaboration, “It’s My Time” and “tracked a few more songs” at Motown’s Hitsville Studio with R Dean Taylor in the producer’s chair. But as Lillie explains, the band soon ran into problems. “Before too long Bill Ross’ personality reared its ugly head during a rehearsal at Gold Star. He had a bad temper and it didn’t take much to set him off. He got into an argument with Rick over a guitar part, shot his big mouth off and used the ‘N’ word. Rick rolled up his sleeves and shoved Ross over Morrison’s drum set.” Morrison quit and Ross was fired.

Without a band, Matthews and Lillie returned to Toronto to reform the Myna Byrds with new players. One night, Matthews was out at the Night Owl when the police came in and took him away. “The waitress called the cops and they came and nabbed him and put him in jail,” remembers Lillie. “Apparently, while we were in Detroit, the cops were looking for him in Toronto for a breaking and entering charge. I guess Rick and a few guys broke into a clothes store in the Yorkville Village some months before and one of them got caught and fingered Rick.”

Despite the setback, Lillie held out hopes that Matthews would soon be released. “While Rick was in jail, we talked on the phone and I went on to put a new ‘Myna Byrds’ together to join him at Motown when he was deported back to Buffalo, New York,” he says.

Within a matter of weeks, Lillie recruited keyboard player Marty Fisher and drummer Gordon MacBain from Bobby Kris and the Imperials. He then started looking for a guitarist and was soon directed to an up and coming singer/songwriter and guitarist from Ottawa called Bruce Cockburn. “One day John Eaton came to a rehearsal and was impressed with the band,” remembers Lillie. “We just needed Rick.”

Matthews however, remained in custody, pending deportation. As the months passed, the Myna Byrds began to play some Bruce Cockburn tunes and to stay alive, started performing as the Flying Circus. When the singer finally called from Buffalo in early 1968, the Flying Circus had recently acquired a management deal with Ottawa promoter Harvey Glatt, and lined up bookings with Jimi Hendrix and Wilson Pickett. As Lillie laments, “possibly, the best ‘Myna Byrds’ ever never happened.”

Left without a band, Matthews returned to Motown’s Hitsville Studio that spring where he worked as a producer and songwriter for a number of artists, including the Spinners and Bobby Taylor and the Vancouvers. While there he struck up a friendship with a 19-year-old bass player named Greg Reeves. (see part 2 next month)

But what of the other Mynah Birds? Jimmy Livingstone continued to front the Tripp, which changed name to Livingstone’s Journey in mid-1967 shortly after Lillie took up Matthews’ offer to join the Mynah Birds. During early 1968, he appeared on local group, Mandala’s “Soul Crusade” album and then fronted his own short-lived project, New King Boiler. Later that year, he joined forces with former Tripp members, Neil Lillie and Ed Roth in Heather Merryweather and moved to Los Angeles. Unfortunately, his erratic behaviour, fuelled by drugs resulted in his departure from the band before it recorded for Capitol Records as Merryweather, although he did co-write one song on the group’s debut album. Had his work with the Tripp and Livingstone’s Journey been exposed to a wider market, it’s possible that he would now be spoken about in the same breath as the era’s other madcap luminaries, Skip Spence and Syd Barrett. He sadly passed away a few years ago.

Mynah Birds drummer Rickman Mason returned to Brantford and later played in country-rock band, Station Road with former Motherlode member and local, guitarist Kenny Marco. He currently leads his own blues band. John Taylor sadly passed away last year. Tom Morgan currently works as a security guard in Brantford.

Neil Lillie stayed with the Flying Circus until spring 1968 when he left to form Heather Merryweather. When the band moved to Los Angeles later that year, he adopted the name Neil Merryweather and cut a string of albums with the group Merryweather throughout the late 1960s, before fronting the hard rock outfits, Mama Lion and the Space Rangers. The remaining members of Flying Circus became Olivus but the group was short-lived and in the summer, Cockburn and Lillie’s replacement Dennis Pendrith moved on to join folk-rock group, 3’s a Crowd. Cockburn later established a brilliant solo career, which continues to this day. His colleagues, Marty Fisher and Gordon MacBain meanwhile, moved to England where they recorded with Peter Quaife’s post-Kinks band, Maple Oak alongside another former Tripp member Stan Endersby.

Interest in the Mynah Birds’ Motown recordings has been rekindled with news that Neil Young bought at least seven tracks from the label for his long awaited box set. Up to now, the Mynah Birds have remained largely a footnote in Neil Young and Rick James’ careers, but perhaps with the release of Young’s box set, the true legacy and potential of one of Toronto’s most intriguing bands will be fully realised.

PLEASE NOTE: The Mynah Birds’ early years are sketchy. Band members’ recollections are often contradictory and incomplete. Also, Canadian newspapers rarely publicised pop concerts or ran features on groups during the 1960s. For this reason, there may be errors and omissions in the story so I would be grateful to hear from anyone that can shed any further light on the group’s career.

Many people helped me to piece this story together. I would especially like to thank Rickman Mason and Tom Morgan for their hospitality and use of photos. Bill Munson who carried out interviews with Jimmy Livingstone, Kent Daubney, Richie Grand and Rick Cameron during the late 1970s and early 1980s and very kindly shared this information with me. I would also like to thank band members, Bruce Palmer, Nick St Nicholas and Neil Lillie (aka Neil Merryweather). Thank you also to Stan Endersby, Peter Hodgson, Carny Corbett, Larry LeBlanc, John Einarson, Mike Paxman and Nicholas Jennings.

To contact the author with corrections or additional information, email: nick_warburton@hotmail.com