2007


Fans got only three new items in 2007, and only one was a full-length new song, Barry’s ‘Drown on the River’. The other two were Robin’s short theme song for The Dame Edna Treatment and the first release of a 1977 Bee Gees track, ‘Warm Ride’.

The start of the year found Barry working on songs for a country album with sons Ashley and Steve. His plans to soak up inspiration by living part time in the former Johnny Cash house in Tennessee were ruined when it burned to the ground in April 2007. Renovations had been almost completed. Probably Barry would have recorded some songs nearby while he was living in the house. One country song did see release in 2007 on iTunes, ‘Drown on the River’— and it was the only new song from either brother released in 2007.

Seemingly at loose ends without a big project, Robin wrote his first theme song for a television program. He said that was working on a book with his wife Dwina. Later in the year he recorded a new version of ‘Too Much Heaven’ with the vocal group US5. In late December he mentioned on BBC Radio that he had recorded a few new songs for a future album.

The two brothers appeared together in Miami Beach on March 4 to speak briefly at the dedication of a park in honor of Maurice. Barry told the press days later that he and Robin would reunite when they were ready to do so. Barry made his position even more clear in an interview that aired on BBC radio in April. He said that his bad feelings from the split in 1969 had never really disappeared and that he would be content to work alone now. In retrospect this long-standing grudge would finally explain his walk-off of a 1997 television interview just after the host (Clive Anderson) mentioned Robin’s solo hit ‘Saved by the Bell’ and jokingly said that he had forgotten ‘Don’t Forget to Remember’. In an interview in May Barry speculated on working with Robin after he did the country album.

The Rhino / Reprise reissue series did not continue as expected in 2007 despite the success of the first three in late 2006. What happened has not been explained. The only reissues were the Saturday Night Fever soundtrack on its thirtieth anniversary and the 1979 compilation Bee Gees’ Greatest with two bonus cuts and four ‘remixes’.


songs


SALUTE DAME EDNA
Robin Gibb
February 2007. television theme, 2007

DADDY’S LITTLE GIRL
Barry Gibb, Ashley Gibb, Stephen Gibb
no record. US copyright March 2007

SOLDIER’S SON
Barry Gibb, Ashley Gibb, Stephen Gibb
no record. US copyright April 2007

ALAN FREEMAN DAYS
Robin Gibb
album cut by Robin Gibb, 2008, 2014. written June 2007

THE HEART KNOWS
Barry Gibb, Ashley Gibb, Stephen Gibb
album cut by Olivia Newton-John and Barry Gibb, 2008. US copyright August 2007

AVALANCHE [2]
Robin Gibb, Peter-John Vettese
album cut by Robin Gibb, 2014. US copyright November 2008, June 2009.

DAYS OF WINE AND ROSES
Robin Gibb, Peter-John Vettese
album cut by Robin Gibb, 2014. US copyright November 2008, June 2009.

Barry said he wrote a country song with Alan Kendall around April that is not listed here for lack of a title.


recording sessions


Robin Gibb

Robin Gibb — vocal
others unknown
engineer: ?
producer: ?
recorded at Robin’s home studio, Thame, February and later 2007

SALUTE DAME EDNA
Robin Gibb (2007)
undated 2007
stereo 0:27, lead vocal Robin Gibb
The Dame Edna Treatment television show, March 2007
undated 2007
stereo 0:55, lead vocal Robin Gibb
The Dame Edna Treatment television show, 2007

Robin quickly wrote and recorded the opening theme song for a new series of talk shows featuring Barry Humphries’s alter ego Dame Edna Everage that started on ITV in Britain in March.

A few months later Robin recorded a second verse for a special anniversary edition of the show. The ‘complete’ piece could be heard on Robin’s web site from December 2007.


Barry Gibb

Barry Gibb — vocal, guitar
Doug Emery — keyboards
Julio Hernandez — bass guitar
Lee Levin — drums
Richard Bravo — percussion
Dan Warner as ‘Big Dan’ — guitar, banjo, mandolin
Alan Kendall — steel guitar (‘Daddy’s Little Girl’)
Richard Bravo — percussion
Ashley Gibb — percussion
producer: Barry Gibb
recorded probably 2007

DROWN ON THE RIVER
Barry Gibb, Ashley Gibb, Stephen Gibb (2006)
undated 2007
stereo 3:46, lead vocal Barry Gibb
Deal soundtrack

GREY GHOST
Barry Gibb, Ashley Gibb, Stephen Gibb (2006)
undated
stereo 4:20, lead vocal Barry Gibb
download, In the Now, Oct 2016

DADDY’S LITTLE GIRL
Barry Gibb, Ashley Gibb, Stephen Gibb (2007)
undated
stereo 3:13, lead vocal Barry Gibb
download, In the Now, Oct 2016

SOLDIER’S SON
Barry Gibb, Ashley Gibb, Stephen Gibb (2007)
undated 2007
stereo , lead vocal Barry Gibb
In the Now, Oct 2016

‘Drown on the River’, the first of Barry’s country songs to be released was slated to appear on the soundtrack of Deal alongside songs by various country artists. Barry mentioned some of the musicians in a chat in August. The acoustic and amplified instruments, that is the lack of synthesizers, suggested a new direction Barry was going in.

The recording dates for the other three are unknown, but from the copyright date they seems to have been among the songs Barry recorded in 2007. Unlike ‘Drown in the River’ ‘Grey Ghost’ does have synthesizer and also sitar, but on the other hand ‘Daddy’s Little Girl’ has steel guitar played by Alan Kendall in his last appearance on a Gibb recording. Two of them appeared together as downloads on barrygibb.com in late 2011, and all three finally appeared as bonus tracks on Barry’s 2016 album.

Barry said his song ‘Daddy’s Little Girl’ was inspired by his daughter’s sixteenth birthday (or rather his looking forward to it at the end of this year).


Robin Gibb

Robin Gibb — vocal
Peter-John Vettese — keyboards, drums, programming, vocal
Mark ‘Tufty’ Evans — guitar, programming
Dario Cortex — guitar
Francesco Cameli — bass
engineer: Mark ‘Tufty’ Evans
producer: Peter-John Vettese
August 2007, Sphere Studios, London

ALAN FREEMAN DAYS
Robin Gibb (2007)
undated 2007
stereo (edit) 3:39, lead vocal Robin Gibb
Songs from the British Academy volume 1, 2008
stereo 3:56, lead vocal Robin Gibb
50 St Catherine’s Drive, 2014

Robin wrote a song in memory of popular deejay and radio announcer Alan ‘Fluff’ Freeman, who died in November 2006, six years after ending a fifty-two career in radio. He started in his home country, Australia, but left in 1957. Robin would know him possibly from BBC overseas services in the 1960s and certainly, once Robin reached England in 1967, from Top of the Pops and other music shows he did for the BBC, Radio Luxembourg, and Capital Radio. Notably he played ‘Saved by the Bell’ in 1969 when Robert Stigwood was pressuring stations not to play it. Freeman is not well known in America, but he can be heard joking with the Beatles in the 1960s on the CD set The Beatles at the Beeb.

The version on Songs from the British Academy mysteriously edited out a few lines that appeared in the 50 St Catherine’s Drive version, shown here between brackets: The magic would emerge from Radio Luxemburg [ that I heard when I was younger. The more things seem to change, the more they stay the same. ] In his words, give me what I hunger.

Peter-John Vettese had recorded four songs with Robin in 1999 for the last Bee Gees project, This Is Where I Came In. They earned much praise from fans.


Robin Gibb

Robin Gibb — vocal, piano (‘Days of Wine and Roses’)
Peter-John Vettese — guitar, keyboards, drums, programming, vocal
Balmoral Highlanders — bagpipes (‘Days of Wine and Roses’)
engineer: Mark ‘Tufty’ Evans
producer: Peter-John Vettese
2007, England

AVALANCHE [2]
Robin Gibb, Peter-John Vettese (2007)
undated 2007
stereo 3:30, lead vocal Robin Gibb
50 St Catherine’s Drive, 2014

DAYS OF WINE AND ROSES
Robin Gibb, Peter-John Vettese (2007)
undated 2007
stereo 4:14, lead vocal Robin Gibb
50 St Catherine’s Drive, 2014

Robin told BBC radio in December that he was working on a new album for release in 2008. ‘Alan Freeman Days’ could have been part of it. The only title he mentioned in the interview was a re-make of his never-released 1970 song ‘Avalanche’, but it turned out to be a new song with only the title word in common. In February 2008 he mentioned on Dubai Radio a possible single of that or a new one called ‘Days of Wine and Roses’.


US5

Izzy Gallegos — vocal
Jay Khan — vocal
Richie Stringini — vocal
Vincent Tomas — vocal
Chris Watrin — vocal
Robin Gibb — vocal
others unknown
engineer: ?
producer: ?
possibly October 2007, Germany

TOO MUCH HEAVEN
Barry Gibb, Robin Gibb, Maurice Gibb (1978)
undated 2007
stereo, lead vocal Richie Stringini, Vincent Tomas, Chris Watrin, Jay Khan
A side, November 2007

US5 are a vocal group formed by boy-band mogul Lou Pearlman for the German television show Big in America in 2005. Barely known in the US or Britain, they are a major chart act in Germany and Europe. All seven singles in two years went top 5 in Germany. This recording with Robin on guest vocal was their eighth single.

Robin does not sing any lead vocal. He sings a few lines solo as a backing vocalist, and the video shows him singing harmony with Richie Stringini and the group.

The brothers dedicated songwriter royalties for this song to UNICEF before the release of the original Bee Gees version in 1978, and by 2007 it had earned more than $15,000,000.


Jamie Jo

Jamie Jo Harris — vocal
Barry Gibb — vocal
others unknown
engineer: possibly John Merchant
producer:
possibly 2007, probably Miami

U TURN ME ON
writers unknown
undated
stereo, lead vocal Jamie Jo
A side, September 2008

Barry sings backup vocals, possibly added to a previously recorded track. The recording date is unknown but Jamie Jo was promoting the recording at the Winter Music Conference in Miami in March 2008, making 2007 likely, or earlier. According to publicity from that time, Barry asked her to let him produce some tracks, of which this one was selected for the forthcoming album In Violet which is described as if it was completed before March. A review of ‘U Turn Me On’ from March does not mention the Barry backing vocals.

Jamie Jo’s press release bio in 2008 says that she had given sample recordings to Barry as early as 1996, and that she had worked with him and John Merchant (possibly only the sessions for ‘U Turn Me On’, but unspecified). The bio says the connection was through her parents, unnamed, but they are wealthy Miami residents Mel and Fran Harris, whose philanthropic work includes the Love and Hope Ball that Barry has been involved with for years. The bio also says that Jamie Jo had a song used in a commercial for Burdines department store— so did Samantha Gibb’s band Luna Park, in 1998.


selected record releases


Bee Gees : First / Remastered and Expanded
US: Reprise, January 2007; UK: Reprise, January 2007.

(same as in the The Studio Albums 1967-1968 box set)

Bee Gees : Horizontal / Remastered and Expanded
US: Reprise, January 2007; UK: Reprise, January 2007.

(same as in the The Studio Albums 1967-1968 box set)

Bee Gees : Idea / Remastered and Expanded
US: Reprise, January 2007; UK: Reprise, January 2007.

(same as in the The Studio Albums 1967-1968 box set)

The three albums that were in the The Studio Albums 1967-1968 box, now released separately.


A Song for My Father
US: 180 Music, February 2007.

  54 Seconds : RUN TO ME

Robin’s son Spencer recorded ‘Run to Me’ as his contribution to a collection called A Song for My Father. Spencer’s band 54 Seconds have been active in the Austin, Texas, music scene since 1997, with a changing cast that always includes Spencer and Stewart Cochran. This recording, made sometime in 2006, features Spencer Gibb (vocal, guitar), Stewart Cochran (keyboards), Rachel Loy (bass), and Jeff Botta (drums).

Spencer’s recordings are not otherwise shown here because he has worked separately from his father and uncles. This is the first song written by any of them that he has recorded. By this date 54 Seconds had released four studio CDs of songs written by Spencer and were awaiting release of another that was completed in July 2006.


Arctic Tale
US: Bulletproof, July 2007.

  Barry Gibb : UNDERWORLD (2006)

First CD release of ‘Underworld’, recorded in 2004 and released on iTunes in 2006. This was the soundtrack album to the film Arctic Tale, with songs by various artists including Brian Wilson and Aimee Mann. But Barry’s song is ‘not featured in the film’, so its inclusion appears to be the result of a business deal.


Robin Gibb Presents : LIPA Two Years On
download: LIPA Records, July 2007.

01 Alyssa Bonagura: SOMEDAY SOMEWHERE
02 Miss Afrika : HOLD
03 Katie Miller : YOU FALL I FALL
04 Christelle Pimpernell : NEVER!
05 Duncan Ross : ANYONE LIKE THAT
06 Duncan Ross : TIP FROM THE BOOK

Once again (see 2006) Robin selected songs written and recorded by students at the Liverpool Institute for Performing Arts. Once again, the virtual cover again has a photo of Robin, and the title is almost that of a Bee Gees album.

(The 2008 selection was made by Fran Healy from the band Travis. Play. Stop. Rewind. was released in May 2008.)


Saturday Night Fever
US: Rhino, August 2007; UK: Rhino, August 2007.

(same as the previous CD release)

A straight reissue of the classic soundtrack album, on one disk. Noted because it got a moderate publicity push on the 30th anniversary. Nothing new was included. For the Bee Gees songs see Bee Gees Greatest, next month (below).


Barry Gibb : single
download: iTunes, August 2007

  DROWN ON THE RIVER

The first of Barry’s country songs to be released was available only on iTunes, although it was supposed to be also on a soundtrack album scheduled for release the following month. Deal was held back until 2008.


Bee Gees Greatest
US: Rhino, September 2007; UK: Rhino, September 2007

01 JIVE TALKIN’ (1975)
02 NIGHT FEVER (1977)
03 TRAGEDY (1979)
04 YOU SHOULD BE DANCING (1976)
05 STAYIN’ ALIVE (1977)
06 HOW DEEP IS YOUR LOVE (1977)
07 LOVE SO RIGHT (1976)
08 TOO MUCH HEAVEN (1979)
09 (OUR LOVE) DON’T THROW IT ALL AWAY (1979)
10 FANNY (BE TENDER WITH MY LOVE) (1975)
11 WARM RIDE
12 STAYIN’ ALIVE

01 IF I CAN’T HAVE YOU (1977)
02 YOU STEPPED INTO MY LIFE (1976)
03 LOVE ME (1976)
04 MORE THAN A WOMAN (1977)
05 REST YOUR LOVE ON ME (1978)
06 NIGHTS ON BROADWAY (1975)
07 SPIRITS (HAVING FLOWN) (1979)
08 LOVE YOU INSIDE OUT (1979)
09 WIND OF CHANGE (1975)
10 CHILDREN OF THE WORLD (1976)
11 YOU SHOULD BE DANCING
12 IF I CAN’T HAVE YOU
13 NIGHT FEVER
14 HOW DEEP IS YOUR LOVE
15 STAYIN’ ALIVE

Reissue of the 1979 2-LP set, remastered and with bonus cuts. Bee Gees Greatest consists of highlights from their three late 1970s albums Main Course (1975), Children of the World (1976), and Spirits Having Flown (1979), together with non-album cuts from the same period including all the songs from the Saturday Night Fever sessions (1977).

The original LP release contained the four songs from Saturday Night Fever and two others from the sessions: ‘If I Can’t Have You’ (a B side) and ‘Don’t Throw It All Away’ (released for the first time on Greatest). This reissue adds the only other song started at the sessions, the previously unreleased ‘Warm Ride’ (later recorded and released by Andy Gibb). However little attention is drawn to this, because the cover reproduces the original, and there are no liner notes. Since the group had decided in 1977 not to release ‘Warm Ride’, it was left in an unfinished state, and that should have been explained here.

Also generally available for the first time on this CD reissue is a seven-minute edit of ‘Stayin’ Alive’ that had been available on a promo 12-inch in 1978. This and ‘Warm Ride’ are placed at the end of CD 1. At the end of CD 2 are totally new ‘remixes’ of five songs. The remix of ‘Stayin’ Alive’ includes a few seconds of intro not heard on the other mixes.

This set should sound better than the original CD release mastered more than twenty years earlier, and it does have greater clarity especially at the top and bottom ends. But like many contemporary CDs its sound has been compressed to play as LOUD as possible. The sole saving grace is that many of the Galuten-Richardson songs did not have much dynamic range to begin with. Still it is disappointing that fans will have to wait for some other unplanned reissue to get the songs sounding the way they should.


US5 and Robin Gibb : single
Germany: Triple-M, November 2007.

A TOO MUCH HEAVEN
2 EVERY OTHER DAY
3 TOO MUCH HEAVEN
4 TOO MUCH HEAVEN
5 [ CD-ROM content ]

US5 and Robin Gibb : single
Germany: Triple-M, November 2007.

A TOO MUCH HEAVEN
2 I’M WITH YOU
3 TOO MUCH HEAVEN
4 [ CD-ROM content ]
5 [ CD-ROM content ]

On two singles, five versions of ‘Too Much Heaven’, both leading off with the radio edit. The first single has a remix and a ‘piano reprise’, while the second has another remix and a music video version. Available in Germany, Austria, and Switzerland.