Pete Dello and Friends — “There Is Nothing I Can Do For You”: Brace for the Obscure (60s rock)! — August 11, 2023

THE GREATEST SONGS OF THE 1960s THAT NO ONE HAS EVER HEARD

920) Pete Dello and Friends — “There Is Nothing I Can Do For You”

Delightful whimsy from a Honeybus-man’s holiday.

Pete Dello tells us that “[T]his really is a joke song. Lewis Carroll type stuff I enjoyed writing for my girl friend at the time. It means absolutely nothing. She thought it was quite funny.” (liner notes to the CD reissue of Into Your Ears) Vernon Joynson says that “Dello was the creative force behind Honeybus (see #6, 52, 207, 434, 562, 605, 764), which he unexpectedly left just as they were taking off. . . . [H]e made this charming and very rare solo album.” (The Tapestry of Delights Revisited)

“Have you listened to every word that I have said. Then there’s nothing I can do for you.”

Craig Harris writes that:

The founder and leader of late-’60s British rock band Honeybus, Pete Dello (born Peter Blumson) has maintained a low profile since the group’s disbanding in the early ’70s. Although he released a solo album, Into Your Eyes, in 1971 . . . Dello has not recorded since. . . . Forsaking the usually club circuit, Dello and Honeybus primarily focused on studio recordings. They made a few appearances on television or special showcases, using a mellotron to reproduce the overdubbed sounds of their records. Pressured to tour, following the release of Honeybus’s only Top Ten hit, “I Can’t Let Maggie Go,” [see #6] in April 1968, Dello resigned from the band instead. Replaced by Jim Kelly, Dello devoted himself to studying music theory and learning to play the violin.

https://www.allmusic.com/artist/pete-dello-mn0000841632/biography

Dello explains his departure from Honeybus:

When “Maggie” took off, it all went badly for me, because I didn’t want to go out on the road again. The other lads in Honeybus were only earning money through touring. They had to go out and play. But I didn’t like the idea of travelling around Europe by chartered aircraft. I got completely fed up with it. I couldn’t say “no” to the gigs because it was a living for the other guys. In the end, however, I just stopped because I didn’t want to be ill again. I needed to rethink my life. I didn’t want to be on the road and risk never getting better. That’s why I left Honeybus.

But I kept writing and I had a few songs which would have been on the next Honeybus single. I was at home quite a lot of the time, so I was able to indulge myself in what they call on the Continent “whimsy”. A lot of the songs were whimsical and came out of the situation I found myself in.

I wanted to release the songs and didn’t want them hanging around. Into Your Ears didn’t do very well at the time, but I was quite relieved in a way. I was doing session work and arranging so I lived quite well. I never wanted to be “a star”.

liner notes to the CD reissue of Into Your Ears

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