Richard 'Doc Spoons' Spooner used the expertise of Mike Ellis from Baskey Vintage to restore his 70's Ludwig Kit.
“I have always really enjoyed gigging my modern Ludwig kits like the Classic Maple, Epic and Vistalite, however, whilst touring Germany with The Aynsley Lister Band, I used a 70s B&O badge Super Classic kit as a hire in. I just loved the warmth and tone it gave me, I also loved those Blue and Olive badges which sent me back to my childhood watching Bonham with Zep and Terry Williams with Dire Straits pound their B&O badged monsters. So I decided I wanted to get an old 70s Ludwig to add to my growing collection and, if needs be, restore it to its former glory.
After a couple of weeks I found what I was looking for in Sheffield and drove up to collect them on the morning before a gig in Leicester. When I got back to meet the band, Aynsley looked in the boot of the car and said, “What the Hell have you bought now? You ain’t using them tonight are you?” I must admit that the two massive silver oval floor toms covered in dirt, the badly scratched and abused 14 rack tom with a Pearl mount and misfit green marching snare didn’t look much but the shells were 3 ply and it had Blue and Olive badges.
The guy who had the kit amongst lots of other vintage lovelies explained it used to belong to Mel Pritchard from Barclay James Harvest and lo and behold under some dirt and flaky silver paint, just under the maple reinforcement rings on each tom is engraved Mel P ’73. He also explained that the original matching 13 tom had been unfortunately butchered and converted into a timbale and now resided somewhere in a Sheffield working mens club. He had rescued the drums with the intention of restoring them but had no time to complete the project, so was happy I was going to take it on.
So I had a half butchered but round (ish) 14” Rack Tom, 2 very oval floor toms that I couldn’t get the heads on and an almost immaculate 1967 Marching snare, The original 24” Bass Drum was so badly damaged and fittings so corroded that it had to be skipped which was very sad but I had a vision and luckily so did Dr Mike Ellis.
After the tour finished I loaded my forlorn B&O badged haul into the car and drove south to give it to Dr Mike to see what magic surgery he could perform. After a week or so, he got back to me with a list of “works” required including stripping the 14”, filling the Pearl mount hole and rewrapping; “coaxing” the oval floor toms back into round and biggest job of all; making a replica, matching 24” bass drum.
After many weeks of toil, parts sourcing, building, TLC and expert attention, the drums were finished. It may have worked out a bit more expensive than buying a mint 1970s kit from a dealer BUT the enjoyment I have from knowing I have given this kit a new lease of life and having done 4 more tours on it all over Europe is worth much more than any money I may have saved. It has a bit of history and Mike really did a beautiful job in restoring this great set of drums to be gigged again. I am lucky have lots of drum kits but this by far and away my favorite!
I subsequently restored the marching snare to its former glory with new strainers, logos and leg guard and left it at that. To complete the drum set I have added a 402 Snare also from 1973. Another good find through a friend, the snare was Mick Tucker’s (The Sweet) main snare for much of his career in the 70s and 80s. So overall; big thanks to Mike at Baskey Vintage and no I will not sell it to you!”
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