My involvement in music stated at the age of 13 when I won a role in a musical production of ‘Tom Brown’s Schooldays’ in London’s West End. To get ready for the audition my parents took me to a singing teacher to work on my voice. I nervously sang ‘Id Like To Teach the World To Sing’ for my audition piece. The director stopped me about half way through and asked me to join a few other boys who were sat in the auditorium. I was later to find out that I had been picked amongst 30 boys for the show out of 10,000 who auditioned (at least that’s what was reported in the London press).

One of the other boys, Richard Willis, became my close friend. Richard, who had already started songwriting,  introduced me to the guitar and, before I hardly knew any chords, I immediately started writing songs too. My interest in music has remained with me ever since.

The following gives a run-down of my main achievements from the most recent projects backwards.  

Current & On-Going Projects

I currently perform as lead singer and guitarist with

The Bill Legend Band

Bill was the drummer with the British 70’s glam rock band ‘T.Rex’. He played on all the top hit records and toured worldwide.

We present Bill’s life story and Christian faith, usually playing in churches around the UK. Our standard set includes  a selection of T.Rex hits along with modern worship music and a live interview with photo’s.

Having always been a huge T.Rex fan it is a dream come true to be performing with Bill who, for me, was very much part of the T.Rex sound that I love.

Pictured here with Tony Visconti who produced T.Rex & David Bowie and many others. I interviewed Bill for the DVD version of ‘Born To Boogie’ which shows T.Rex performing at Wembley, London in 1972.

T.Rex

Click on each photo to enlarge

M-Touch

I help select bands and perform in my own band for this monthly music night at The Royal Oak Pub in Yateley.

My good friend John Divall had the idea for M-Touch which was launched in January 2009 as a church based community project. This monthly music night has become the springboard for many local bands whilst raising money for local charities.

I was delighted to create the band that launched the first M-Touch (now known as Eden) and have since performed with my right hand man and ace guitarist, Steve Mann, and with The Jo Rose Band - Jo being my wife!

For me, this CD is not only the fulfilment of a life long ambition, but the songs represent some of my main musical influences. I aimed to recreate a Marc Bolan/Tony Visconti production style with plenty of double & triple tracking, background sounds & overdubs, creating a rich thick sound in the mix.  

With a band made of Jo, myself, Steve Mann & Simon Akehurst, we promoted the CD through a number of live performances, most notably at Covent Garden’s ‘Rock Garden’.  

Marc Bolan

Marc created his own

sound with his band

T.Rex who became a

key influence

in my own music &

in the production of

my ‘Star child’ CD

Matter Don’t Matter

I loved being part of this short lived band with Josie Wright (on lead vocals, Steve Mann (writing the music & on lead guitar & vocals), Simon Akehurst (on bass & vocals), Andy Smith (on drums) and myself providing a second guitar & vocals. Our most prestigious gig was performing at Greenbelt Music Festival.

Star child  CD

Having written songs for many years I had a long held dream to write, record & produce my own album. With help from some of my best and greatest friends I was able to realise this dream with a CD I entitled Starchild.

Rehearsal  CD

Following quickly  on from the Starchild CD I supplied some of the material and helped produce another CD, titled ‘Rehearsal’ for Jo Grant who later became my wife - now known as Jo Westland-Rose.

Click  hear to listen to ‘Jump’

from my Star Child CD

Click  hear to listen to segments of ‘Rehearsal’

Click  on the camera icon to see a video clip of MDM

Fools Wisdom

Fools Wisdom came from the remnants of ‘Tidal Wave’ (see below). A duo act with Dave Wheeldon ala Simon & Garfunkle style. We produced one album recorded on ‘DAT’ - the first digital recording format. We only did a handful of gig’s, but were invited to play two years running at the Jam Music Festival in Reading, England.

Tidal Wave

This was my first proper live gigging band - with my dear friends Karen & Dave Wheeldon, and Ken & Alex McWilliam. Tidal Wave was born out of a church youth project which had, at it’s largest, 150 teenagers attending each month. Dave & I wrote most of the songs - with an ever growing input from the McWilliam’s during our 3 years together in the mid 80’s.

We produced three albums which collectively sold around 2,000 copies (not bad really!) and performed maybe 100 or so gigs around England. The most notable was a charity gig for BBC TV’s Blue Peter programme. The gig was hosted by Bill Wyman of The Rolling Stones and included quite a few other ‘older names’ on the bill.  

Place Your Bookings

If you require live music for an event I can provide a selection for you to choose from:

The Bill Legend Band - Performing for church based guest events - as per details above

Eden - Performing a selection of rock & pop music ranging from 60’s, 70’s, 90’s and 2000’s (ala T.REX meets The Zutons)

Jo Rose & Band - Performing a selection of rock , pop & retro/jazz (ala Amy Winehouse meets KT Tunstall)

The Rotunds - Performing a selection of indie style funky rock covers

Dougal Rose & Steve Mann - Acoustic duo delivering rock  & pop unplugged style

Dougal Rose - The pop star !

During my late teens and early 20’s I was desperately attempting to reach pop star status - with some limited success!!

Produced by Alan Merrill

I made some demo recordings which were produced by Alan Merrill who had written ‘I Love Rock ‘n Roll’ whilst with The Arrows. This song was later covered by Joan Jet and more recently by Britney Spears.

Produced by Herbie Flowers

I was chosen to join a band put together by Herbie Flowers (one of the most well renowned session musicians) who had played for David Bowie, been part of Sky and was, at the time, bass player in Marc Bolan’s final T.Rex line up. Herbie produced two songs which I recorded at EMI Studio’s with my stage school friend Kennerley Hoyle on lead vocals, Herbie’s daughter, Janice Flowers, on drums, and myself on guitar and vocals. The recordings were never released !

Alan Merrill - in the middle

I won a publishing deal with a recording studio based in Mayfair (London) as a singer songwriter and continued recording and producing my own material.

I also produced my own pop video ‘Blue Oceans’ which I took to Australia with me and signed a recording contract with Powderworks Records in Sydney.

Click the 2 photo’s above to see Me & Kennerley (posing!). The other photo is Janice Flowers with David Essex

Radar

This was my very first musical collaboration - where my musical roots really started. Radar stood for Richard & Dougal & Robin. I met Richard Willis whilst performing in the stage musical of ‘Tom Brown’s Schooldays’ and we became best mates during the show and afterwards when we both attended The Barbara Speake Stage School in East Acton (London). Richard and I constantly wrote songs which we recorded straight on to cassette tape. Richard’s brother, Robin, later joined in and Radar was born. We had huge fun plotting, dreaming and scheming our rise to stardom! Radar never played an actual gig, but Richard and I did perform our songs at The London Hilton Hotel and Kilburn State Theatre which had one of the biggest stages in London - so we were told.

Left:

Radar in our late teens

Right:

Radar reunion in 2009

Click on the music icons to hear two Radar tracks both recorded live on to cassette tape - hence the low sound quality!

When You’re On The Streets (left icon) - Idiology (right icon)

Previous Projects

(in reverse order)

Produced by John Springate

John was the bass player and lead vocalist with The Glitter Band. I got to know him through Crocodile Music, a radio jingles company who used John’s studio in Goodge Street (London). I also rented a basement office from John when Robin Willis & I started On Yer Bike - London’s first bicycle despatch company. I recorded a song which was written & produced by John Springate & Malcom Irington (from Crocodile Music). Click on the music icon to hear the song.

The Glitter Band  

John

Springate  

Bill

Click the music icon

to hear one of my songs

produced by Alan Merrill

send me an email