Clive Scott, the singer-songwriter-keyboardist genius behind the Jigsaw hit "Sky High," has died at the age of 64. Yes, he passed away last month, so I'm very late on this, but how many blogs are even going to mention his passing at all?
Jigsaw had been kicking around the U.K. since 1966 without making any headway on the pop charts, gaining a reputation as a strong live act and backing up the likes of Arthur "Sweet Soul Music" Conley. On the recommendation of their manager, Scott and his songwriting partner in Jigsaw, Des Dyer, the band's drummer, decided to try for a poppier sound and came out with a little gem called "Who Do You Think You Are." Jigsaw's version went nowhere, but Bo Donaldson and the Heywoods made it the followup to their Number One hit "Billy, Don't Be a Hero" and took it to Number Fifteen in the summer of '74.
Despite the success of the cover, Jigsaw was promptly dropped from their label. So the boys began recording on Splash, a label started by their own manager, and almost immediately hit big with "Sky High," which went all the way to Number Three in the fall of 1975. They had one more Top Forty hit, "Love Fire" in the spring of 1976, then that was it for Jigsaw.
Clive Scott's last words were: "The guys from Pilot live on."
2 comments:
Wow -- talk about a blast from the past!
I'm not sure why, but Sweet's "Love is Like Oxygen" always reminded me of "Sky High" -- maybe it's the absolute 100% commitment to vomit-inducing banal lyrics... :)
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