Chris Adamson has spent six decades working behind the scenes with some of the biggest names in music, from Pink Floyd, Fleetwood Mac and Steely Dan to the Byrds, Guns N’ Roses, Iron Maiden and AC/DC. He’s been a roadie, a tour-production chief and just about everything in between, building a career that has taken him from the back of a newly purchased van to the biggest stages in the world.
Adamson was just 17 when he got his first taste of life on the road, driving the members of his hometown band, the Rats, around Hull, England. One of those members was a young guitarist named Mick Ronson. From there, Adamson’s career grew alongside rock history, putting him in the orbit of artists including Peter Green, Roger McGuinn and Frank Sinatra.
He has been at the forefront of the touring world ever since, and his passion for the work remains as strong as it was when he started. In fact, at an age when many people would be thinking about retirement, Adamson is busier than ever.
“I’ve just finished some dates with Guns & Roses and currently doing a week with Bruno Mars,” he tells Guitar Player during a break in his hectic schedule. “And then at the start of September, I’ve got Iron Maiden for couple of shows, and after that I’m doing AC/DC.”
Guitar Player asked Adamson to take us behind the stage door and share with us stories of a few artists he’s worked for.
Mick Ronson
“He was the first person I ever worked with when I was 17. We had a band called the Rats in my hometown of Hull in England, and Mick was a guitarist in the band. It was a four-piece: drums, bass, guitar and a singer. And back then, it was all fun and weekend entertainment, and we used to just play pubs and small things, but nobody in the band had a van. So I bought one, and I used to drive him and the band about. I was a commodity. [laughs]
“We used to play a lot of Jeff Beck stuff, like ‘Beck’s Bolero.’ Mick was so into Jeff Beck, big time. He was an exceptional guitarist and used to only play Fender Stratocasters. He had two of them. He didn’t have a Les Paul when we were playing together in the Rats.
“Years later, after I’d left them, I came back to Hull to see my mom and went round to see John Cambridge, the Rats’ drummer. Mick was there, as well as this couple who were on the settee working out if they had enough money just to buy a packet of cigarettes. And it was David and Angie Bowie!
“Mick was a guy who died way before his time. Unfortunately, the majority of the band all died through cancer, due to smoking as they all smoked like chimneys. And Mick was the first one to go.”
Peter Green
“For me, Peter was the best guitar player ever, by far. He was magic. He could make a guitar sing. And he was just a really nice guy.
“We had been doing some shows in Munich at a place called the Circus Krone-Bau and we had a day off before going to Vienna. Peter went off to a commune, but it wasn’t the usual commune, with all hippies and all that sort of stuff. They were all businessmen, and they gave Peter a bad tab of acid. He was never the same person again. It completely destroyed his brain.
“He then came back with this tape of gibberish, and some strange woman that he’d just met. And from then on, when he’d do the shows, on some nights he’d be completely normal, while on other nights he just kept playing even though the band had finished the song. He would be miles away playing because the acid affected him badly.
“After he finally left the band, his parents had him committed because he was giving away all the money from his royalties. He was really messed up. He grew his fingernails really long, and ended up being a gravedigger for a while, digging graves somewhere around Wimbledon.”
Roger McGuinn
“Roger was brilliant, and a really nice, lovely guy. I worked for him for a couple of years when he was with the Byrds. We had a 12-foot truck that we used to carry the equipment in, and that was it. It was all very low-key. He hadn’t reached the level of stadiums and arenas and all that yet.
“He would play with just a little combo set-up. He would use a 12-string Rickenbacker played straight into a Fender Twin and a compressor as there weren’t many pedals and things like that around at the time. It was very straightforward. He didn’t do a great deal; he just played the guitar bits. Back in those days, you didn’t have racks of guitars like they do now where they play 20 electric guitars with the guitar tech tuning every one. All he had was a couple of guitars and that was it.
“Clarence White, the other guitarist in the band, used to have a premonition about alcohol killing him. And then one day, he got killed by a drunk. He was putting his guitars in the trunk of his car, and a drunk driver came and hit him while he was doing it.”
Frank Sinatra
“Frank was planning to retire in the 1990s and so they wanted somebody to handle the production as he was coming over to England for some shows. He did four shows at the Royal Albert Hall and four shows at the Festival Hall.
“It was fantastic. One of his management people gave me Frank’s two gold SM-58 microphones that had his name engraved in them to look after. And I can honestly say that I slept with these things under my pillow because I was that fucking paranoid of somebody stealing them or losing them! So they never left my side.
“I did get a rollicking one night from one of his people, as his mic cable was dirty. He had gotten a bit of dust on his hands because I hadn’t washed it enough. And there were certain things we had to put in his dressing room to make sure the room was how he wanted it.
“Later, my uncle’s health was deteriorating fast, and he was a huge Frank Sinatra fan. I wanted to take him to the Breeders’ Cup horse racing in Chicago. Prior to going there, I went to visit my assistant, who had gotten married, and her dad was there along with Frank. I got to chatting to Frank and mentioned that I was going to be in Chicago. And he said, ‘I’m going to be there, too.’
“About five days later, I called him and he said, ‘Yeah, I’ve got an hour. Come over to the hotel.’ So I told my uncle that we were going to this particular hotel because it had a great breakfast. And when we got there, I had to say who he was actually seeing. And so, he met him and Frank sat down and talked to us for way over two hours.
“And that’s when you found out who the real Frank Sinatra was: not all the shit you always hear about the gangster things. Frank was a very caring person.”
