Mike Hay:  

I started in my first band in Cleveland, Ohio back in 1962 (The Islanders) which was composed of a drummer, a sax player, and me playing a $250 Kay electric guitar through a 15 watt amplifier. That cheap amp had some sort of electrical problem and it would just start buzzing. I would keep my foot on the top of the amp, and if it started to buzz, I would rock it back and forth until it would stop. I remember I was walking down the hall in high school and a kid walking in front of me said to his friend next to him, "You know that Mike Hay band?" The other kid said "Yes". Then he said "That's the worst band I've ever heard". It was then that I knew that I could make a name for myself. As a teenager I used to hang out in a folk club in downtown Cleveland called "La Cave". It was there that I met and talked to Gordon Lightfoot and Judy Collins (1965). That wouldn't be possible today. But at the time I was mainly interested in the folk scene, beat poetry, listening to Rock and Roll and practicing my guitar. High school was a place where I could gaze out the window, daydream about life's possibilities, and make metal sculptures in machine shop. After playing in several local bands in the early 60s, in 1964 I formed a group called the "Tree Stumps". This band became very popular and we were booked 6 months in advance at high schools around the Cleveland area, which was really unheard of at the time. But this was great time for us because the songs would come out on the radio (Beatles, Bob Dylan) and we would learn them and be playing them out that same week. No other Cleveland bands were doing that at the time. These were somewhat crazy times when we had girls yelling and screaming at us inside and guys waiting to beat us up outside on the Eastside of Cleveland, on the Westside of Cleveland we were treated much better. At one gig on the East Side a mob of girls chased us down the hallway and into the bathroom. The bass player, Gary, slipped and fell as we were being chased and we didn't know it at the time but he broke his wrist. We went to play on stage after that and a bunch of girls pulled him off the stage. We had to grab his arm, the one with the broken wrist, to pull him back. At one gig we shared the stage with another local Cleveland group called "The Grasshoppers". The bass player in "The Grasshoppers" was Benjamin Orjinkowski (later shortened to Orr), who later went on to form a group called "The Cars". We also played at place called "The Note" along with a group called "The Kingsmen" who had a hit out at the time called Louie, Louie. The "Tree Stumps" were about to sign a record contract but with the draft knocking on my front door and offers from the Marines: "We'll make a man out of you Boy!", to the Army's: "We'll give you your own rifle Boy!", I decided to buy a Gibson J-45 and join the Navy (Sep. 1965) and see the world. My first assignment in the Navy after boot camp was on the USS Talladega, a Marine transport ship. It was there that I used to sing protest songs on the fantail of the ship along with the Marines we were taking to Vietnam. One of the Marines who used to sing along was from San Francisco and used to be in group called the Beau Brummels. I hope he made it back ok. I can't say having a guitar on ship was a popular thing back then because the "Master at Arms" confiscated my guitar which I had laying on my chained up rack. He made me polish lockers the first day we landed in Hawaii after 3 weeks at sea to get it back. Yep, my guitar didn't fit into that 2 foot square locker so it was considered "gear adrift". But that was OK because after I finished polishing lockers, I was able to catch the Bob Dylan concert (1966) in Waikiki. My long time hero was right in front of me, my first concert experience. After that I was playing a constant shell game with the "Master at Arms" hiding my guitar so it wouldn't be confiscated again (Access Battle Dressing was a good place). The "Master at Arms" eventually got what was coming to him though when he came back drunk from liberty in the Philippines, cussed everyone out, fell down the stairs, cracked his head open, and was busted back to a Seaman. I then became friends with the Coreman, who also played guitar, so he would hide my guitar in the closet in the infirmary, which solved my storage problem. We would later play guitars at night take the Methyl alcohol, from the medicine cabinet, add orange juice, and make screw drivers. Yo! The bar is open, no tips required! We did that for a while until he got worried about having to explain where all the alcohol was going. Evaporated I would have said! After that 5 month tour at sea, and back in the good old United States, I was then able to hang out in Long Beach. It was there at a blood bank (Note: When you are only making $70 a month, $5 for your blood seemed like a good deal. In the Navy we called that vampire liberty) that met a bum named Ray, who was the proud owner of cards from 5 different blood banks. It was amazing this guy had any blood left in him! So there we were in this deserted car drinking wine. There was a sign on the car that was at least two weeks old left by the police saying that the car was going to be towed. Not to be too conspicuous we ended up in the only building on the Pike that wasn't torn down with a few gallons of Red Mountain Wine (great bouquet for only $1.10 a gallon), 10 bums and one old hag, singing blues songs all night long. In the morning we were all threatened to be killed with a butcher knife (jealousy over the old hag I think). Yep one of the bums came out of the kitchen with a butcher knife and said he was going to kill us all. But then he looked at me and said "You're ok so you can go". As I went to stand up the bum sitting next to me grabbed my arm sitting me back down saying, "No, he's going to stay here and die with us". So I sat back down waiting to see what was going to happen next. All the time this was happening the old hag keeps repeating "Don't worr...Expand for more