Gordon Mills - Biography

Biography

Mills's parents met and married in India when his father was serving in the British Army. They returned to Britain shortly after Gordon's birth. An only child, Mills was taught to play the harmonica by his mother, Lorna.

At age 15, Mills joined a group playing in pubs and clubs in the South Wales Valleys. At age 17, he was called up for National Service and served in Germany and Malaya.

Returning to the UK, he competed in a harmonica championship event organised by Hohner at the Royal Albert Hall in London. He came second, qualifying him to represent the UK in the European final which he then won. Invited to join the Morton Fraser Harmonica Gang, he met musicians Don Paul and Ronnie Wells with whom he formed a trio known as The Viscounts. One song "Who Put the Bomp (In The Bomp, Bomp, Bomp)" became a minor hit in the UK Singles Chart. Their cover of "Short'nin' Bread" also had some success.

Mills wrote some songs, with his first "I'll Never Get Over You", recorded by Johnny Kidd and the Pirates, reaching number 4 in 1963. In the space of a year he wrote three more hits "Hungry For Love", "Jealous Girl" and "Three Little Words". "I'm The Lonely One" gave Cliff Richard a Top 10 success in 1964.

At a party given by singer Terry Dene, Mills met model Jo Waring and they married two years later. Their daughter Clair, then three years old, became the subject of a 1972 song by Gilbert O'Sullivan.

One night Mills was in Cwmtillery, where Tommy Scott and the Senators were performing, featuring a new young singer with the name of Tom Woodward. Mills became Woodward's manager, and took the young singer to London. He also renamed him Tom Jones. Mills gave other pop music stars their stage names, such as Engelbert Humperdinck (born Arnold George Dorsey), and Gilbert O'Sullivan (born Raymond Edward O'Sullivan).

Mills got the newly named Tom Jones a recording contract with Decca and although Jones first single Chills and Fever released in late 1964 was not a hit Decca gave them another chance and Jones had a go at a song turned down by Sandie Shaw, the song was It's Not Unusual which propelled him into the top reaches of the charts. Mills then wanted to break Jones into recording film soundtracks but after the relative failure of the James Bond theme song "Thunderball" another approach was needed. A solid song was needed as Jones's chart placings had begun slipping; Jones loved the song "Green Green Grass of Home" and had ideas to record it. Mills envisioned it differently and it went on to become one of Jones's signature tunes. The next step was to break Jones into Vegas; Mills gambled everything on this and it paid off. Jones became one of the biggest attractions in Vegas, making Mills one of the most important people in the music industry. At this time MAM Records was the biggest and most powerful record company in the United Kingdom.

In 1965 Mills started working with Gerry Dorsey, a singer who had been around for a long time without major success, changing his name to Engelbert Humperdinck and with television exposure on a Sunday night in 1967 at the London Palladium a new star was born. Between 1967 and 1972 Mills had the biggest stars in the world under his control both in his own image. Jones was Mills sexual side and Humperdinck was his sophistication. By 1973 however both Jones's and Humperdinck's record sales had dropped dramatically but Mills had found new talent with Gilbert O'Sullivan who kept MAM as the biggest record company. But when his success started to fade there was no replacement. By 1978 Jones was reduced to making country albums for the American-only market, Humperdinck had left Mills and O'Sullivan was not in any commercial projects. MAM was taken over by Chrysalis Records. Without the record company it was back to being Mills and Jones.

After Mills' death, "It's Not Unusual" was re-released and Tom Jones found himself back in the charts.

Mills also produced Gilbert O'Sullivan, most notably the song "Clair," which is named for Mills' daughter. However, things later turned sour, as O'Sullivan discovered his recording contract with MAM Records greatly favoured the label's owner. Litigation followed, with prolonged argument over how much money O'Sullivan's songs had earned and how much of that money he had actually received. Eventually the court found in O'Sullivan's favour, awarding him seven million pounds sterling in damages.

Mills owned the biggest private zoo in the world. The previous record holder, millionaire playboy John Aspinall, belonged to the same gentlemen's club as Mills and there was a clear rivalry between them.

Mills died of stomach cancer in 1986, at the age of 51 and is buried in Burvale Cemetery, Hersham.