TUESDAY, APRIL 22, 2008

(part 59) FRANK ZAPPA, TOM WILSON AND "COLOR HIM IN"





As I have already stated, it was FRANK ZAPPA who asked TOM WILSON at VERVE RECORDS to take a personal interest in the album COLOR HIM IN. Tom Wilson pressed Verve to lease the master from OUR PRODUCTIONS, who had produced the album, and release it, Verve agreed. In the original deal Tom got Verve to advance $10,000 to me personally, in the form of a check. I was not aware of this at the time, because neither Tom or Frank ever told me about it. When the contracts came to STEVE CLARK at OUR PRODUCTIONS the check was in with the rest of the paper work. I never saw what was sent by Verve at the time. Steve brought the check to me and said there was a mistake, that Verve had accidently put my name on the check, but that it was not mine. He told me that it was money to pay for session costs and asked me to endorse it so he could deposit it in the company account for use in paying studio costs.

Now get this, I believed him. I never questioned him for a moment, I trusted him. This is how I was treated from the beginning by Steve Clark. He was like a big brother to me from the first time I met him, and once again, as so many times before, I responded to how he treated me and not to what he was actually doing. It was not until years later when I ran into Tom Wilson that he made me aware of the facts. "Oh no Bobby, that money was for you, I made sure that Verve sent you the check personally." This was Tom's response after hearing what I have just written here about Steve Clark and his lie to me regarding the check.

As if that were not enough, Steve used that money to pay me my weekly salary for 2 years of writing songs for his publishing company SINCE MUSIC. So in essence, Steve ripped me off for $10,000 and then turned around and used it to pay me for writing songs for him. He got about 70 songs or more and it didn't cost him a penny to do it. It's a little hard to get ahead when your friends are doing this to you. Like I said, at the time I knew nothing about what had transpired between myself and my good buddy "STEVO". I was just glad that the album was getting released and concentrated on that aspect of the Verve deal.

I brought the label to Steve, the songs, me as an artist, and also paid myself with my own money to write songs for STEVE CLARK'S OUR PRODUCTIONS and SINCE MUSIC. Wow, what a deal! In copyright law there is something known as the law of copyright reversion. It is apparent to me, in light of what I have told you here, that any publishing deal I signed in 1966 with SINCE MUSIC and STEVE CLARK would be null and void on it's face, based on these facts. What Steve Clark did constituted a fraud against me as well as grand theft for taking my money. It seems that any claim of rights, by SINCE MUSIC and STEVE CLARK of my songs, would be clearly and legally beyond the pale of common sense at this point. I would be more than pleased to end up in a court of law, any where on the planet, to make my case for the rights to any and all of my songs that were and or are listed as property of SINCE MUSIC PUBLISHING. Therefore, I again lay absolute claim to each and every one of those aforementioned works, which would include all of "COLOR HIM IN".

As you have probably figured out by now, there was little in the way of fair play, when it came to Bobby Jameson and the business of music. I was unfortunate to a fault, when it came to match ups with different persons in the music business. These constant elements of trust and disappointment, over many years, were the ground work for a version of Bobby Jameson that was combative, forceful and destructive. I in no way will blame what I eventually did on others, but what I will do and am doing is lay out the impossible nature of what I had to contend with throughout the 60's.