In 2009 Rick Wakeman fulfilled a long-held dream when he performed his debut solo album The Six Wives Of Henry VIII at Hampton Court, the controversial 16th century king’s favourite residence. Ahead of the show he wrote for Prog about how the record came together, including his interactions with record label A&M.
Yes were on tour in the States and my manager, Brian Lane, said Jerry Moss from A&M Records wanted to see me. We went to the A&M lot, which was Charlie Chaplin’s old film studios. I hadn’t ever sat in an executive’s office before, so when they asked me if I wanted some coffee I said, “I’d rather have a Scotch.” This was back in my drinking days, and it was only nine in the morning.
Moss said A&M had an option on me, and told me, “Word in the business is that Yes is going to be a very big band. So we should probably put out a solo album.” I’d never really thought about it before, but it sounded like Christmas, so I said, “Yes please!”
I got $12,500 as my advance, which at the time came out at about £4,000. Jerry also said they’d like to give me a signing-on gift. So Brian says, “How much are you going to spend?” and it was about $1000. We were only getting $200 a week on tour, out of which came all your expenses and food.
I’d passed a used car lot and seen this battered old 1957 Cadillac, for sale at $795. Jerry said, “I’ll have someone look at it.” Brian called later and said, “They’re sending you round a hi-fi brochure. The car’s a wreck.”I said, “I don’t want a hi-fi. I want the car!“ So they got me the car and shipped it back to England. I don’t have it any more; I lost it in the first divorce. But that was my signing on fee – a limo that weighed three tons and did about three miles to the gallon.
A&M never asked me what I wanted to do, and as Yes were so busy they didn’t put me under any time constraints. They were a wonderful company. I wondered what to do; I didn’t sing, I didn’t have a band, and I didn’t know what to write. I’d had a plan a few years earlier to do Journey To The Centre Of The Earth. But there was no way that was going to happen for my first record. So I was looking around for a concept; I’ve always loved the idea of concepts.
I remember being at an airport in Richmond, Virginia, where they had a little store. This was in the days before portable cassettes, so all you could do on a plane was read. In the store they had one book called The Private Life Of Henry VIII, so I bought that. While I was reading about Anne Boleyn, a melody I’d written a few weeks before came into my head. And the more I read about her, the more this tune stayed in my head.
Then I started reading about another wife and these sounds came into my head, and the concept started to come to the fore. I came back to England, read up on Catherine Of Aragon, and decided that the music wasn’t supposed to be linked to factual matters, but would be more abstract.
I called Chris, Steve and Bill and told them what I was doing, and they were all up for it. So the recording of the first album was pretty much Yes minus Jon. Over six months or so we put together all the music with various other musicians. It was all recorded on 16-track, which was fairly new at the time and there were a lot of problems involved.
I remember very proudly taking the tapes down to A&M in London. An American lawyer had been sent over to collect the tapes. He stood up and made a little speech to about eight of us in there. I put the record on, played the first side – and there was no reaction. Then I played the second side and there was even less reaction. They had a big cocktail cabinet in the corner, so I hit that.
Then the lawyer said, “Well, this is all sounding very good, Rick, but it’ll be a big help when we can hear it with the vocals on.” And I said, “There are no vocals – it’s an instrumental keyboard album.” Like a lot of Americans he couldn’t talk quietly; he leant over to my publisher, Derek Green, and said, “Do you mean we’ve just paid $12,500 for a fucking piano player?” Derek said, “Yes, but he’s a good piano player.”
He turned back to me as if I hadn’t heard, and said, “This is going to be tremendous,” and left. The boss said to Brian, “I think we’d better have a chat.” So I’m left there all on my own. To cut a long story short, the two A&R guys came to see me and said they really liked it, and told me, “Don’t worry about those guys. All they want to hear is mainstream. We’ll give it a go for you.”
It got mixed reviews, but what made me happy was that the public got it. Worldwide it’s sold about 14 million copies. I remember collecting my platinum discs from the bloke who’d hated it. He stood up and said,“Every now and then something special lands on your desk. And the moment this landed I knew we had something really special.”
I’m standing there, absolutely gobsmacked; and as he passes me he whispers, “Don’t say a word!”
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