Jigsaw (band) - Change in Musical Direction and Commercial Success

Change in Musical Direction and Commercial Success

On stage, Jigsaw were a wild rock band who had a high energy live show (drum kits were set on fire, explosions were set off as an effect, Tony Britnell performed fire eating and Clive Scott would make his Marshall stack explode and disintegrate. However, during the early 1970s they began writing and recording more mainstream pop.

Jigsaw's arrangement of the Johann Sebastian Bach tune, Jesu, Joy of Man's Desiring was featured on their 1970 debut album Letherslade Farm.

The group gives credit to their producer and manager, Chas Peate, for inspiration to get songs completed. As Jigsaw toured a lot, Scott and Dyer would write snippets of songs separately in their spare time, but, as Dyer said in an interview in the 1990s, "it was Chas who would say we're recording an album soon, you'll need 10 songs by then". The two would then combine their work together for the planned recording sessions.

As songwriters, the duo had a hit song with "Who Do You Think You Are?", which was covered by the UK band Candlewick Green in 1974. The song was further covered in the U.S. by Bo Donaldson and the Heywoods (this version made the U.S. charts), and again in 1993 by Saint Etienne. The song was also on Jigsaw's 1974 album I’ve Seen The Film, I’ve Read The Book. However, the band's own single from the album "You’re Not The Only Girl" was not a chart success and they were soon dropped by their recording label, BASF.

Wanting to carry on, the group continued to make music and signed a new deal with independent UK label Splash, which was founded by Chas Peate himself. Their first single for their new label, entitled "Sky High", was recorded for the film The Man from Hong Kong, a 1975 martial-arts action movie starring George Lazenby. Splash pressed a couple of hundred promotional copies and reaction to the song was good, especially from Radio Luxembourg which began playing the song with high rotation during its nightly English pop music broadcasts to the UK. "Sky High" subsequently made the UK Top 10 in November 1975. Chelsea Records released it in the U.S. (where Splash had no pressing plant) and it was a hit there, going to #3. The song also charted all over the world and was #1 in Japan. A famous Mexican wrestler called Mil Mascaras used "Sky High" as his theme tune. He would walk to the ring with the song playing in the background, and his popularity in Japan helped "Sky High" to become a hit twice over in that country in consecutive years.

Their album also entitled Sky High sold very well too, especially in Japan, and the next single "Love Fire" was another hit, although not in the United Kingdom. Nevertheless, "Love Fire" was followed by two new albums, one for the British market called Pieces of Magic and another for the American market simply named after the band, Jigsaw.

In 1977, the band recorded their album Journey Into Space in Los Angeles. Years later, Clive Scott revealed in an interview that the record label (Twentieth Century Fox) paid for the band to fly out to make the album, paid for their accommodation, and gave them cash advances (or, as Scott called it, “pocket money”) to live off for three months while making the record. The album was produced by Rick Jerrard who was the producer of Jose Feliciano and the person responsible for putting together Elvis Presley's Las Vegas band. However, the album was never released, much to the frustration of the group.

Jigsaw returned to Britain and scored another hit with the single "If I Have To Go Away", after which they recorded ten original songs for the film Home Before Midnight.