IT'S A RIOT

Description

Glenda Collins (born December 16, 1943) is an English pop singer, primarily active in the 1960s. Collins was discovered by Carroll Levis, whose promotion earned her a contract with Decca Records. She released three singles with Decca that failed to chart and she was dropped by the label. Her father, acting as her manager, then recorded some demos with her and introduced her to independent producer Joe Meek, who signed her. Meek featured his house bands, The Tornados and also The Outlaws with guitarist Ritchie Blackmore, on some of her tracks. She released a total of eight singles with Meek, published by the HMV Pop and Pye labels, none of which appeared on the UK Singles Chart. After Meek's suicide in 1967, she recorded sporadically, but his death effectively ended her career and she retired in the late 1960s after a few years on the cabaret circuit. In the 1960s, Glenda Collins and The Riot Squad found a home at Joe Meek's legendary 304 Holloway Road studio. Ms. Collins was briefly associated with The Riot Squad by Meek for a planned collaborative album of covers, primarily featuring soul and R&B tracks that had been hits for other artists. Recorded in late '66/early '67, titled "It's A Riot!", and, according to the tape boxes, possibly to be released as Glenda, Nero and The Riots, the album itself was never completed and remained unknown until the recent restoration and transfer of the "Tea Chest Tapes." The six tracks on the album are less heavily processed and more relaxed than much of Meek's work, and with Glenda's now mature and soulful voice at the forefront, these live, single-take recordings hint at a new approach to production the maestro may have explored, eschewing his usual reverb-heavy, heavily layered sound for something more organic. If so, he was once again a year or more ahead of the curve, foreshadowing the back-to-basics approach that would be adopted by so many artists in the wake of psychedelic over-saturation.