Tony Calder: Music impresario who played a part in the rise of the Beatles and the Rolling Stones

Tony Calder was the ultimate music industry all-rounder. During a career which spanned more than five decades and saw him play a part in the rise of the Beatles and the Rolling Stones, he worked as a disc jockey, manager, producer, impresario, press officer, song plugger and co-founder of the influential Immediate label with Andrew Loog Oldham.

Calder, who died aged 74, was the counterweight to the brasher, more charismatic Oldham, who, according to Marianne Faithfull, “exuded menace, shock and razor-blade hipness”. In his 1998 book Stoned, Oldham described Calder as a “passionate pragmatist”. Others were less generous. In his memoir All the Rage, published in 2000, the late Small Faces keyboard player Ian McLagan’s revealed that the band dubbed him “The Mekon” after an evil green alien in the Eagle comic. Led Zeppelin’s John Paul Jones dismissed him as “a bit of a suit”.

Born in Surbiton, on the outskirts of south-west London, to Scottish parents but raised in Southampton, Calder headed to central London at the start of the 1960s hoping to find a niche in the record business. Decca took him on as a trainee in sales and marketing, in which capacity he met Jimmy Savile, who briefly recorded for the company. He deputised for him behind the ballroom turntables at places such as Ilford, Streatham and Purley, later recalling: “It was Decca by day and Mecca by night.”

In 1962 Calder unwittingly landed a key role in breaking the Beatles. A Decca colleague, Tony Barrow, freelanced for the group’s manager, Brian Epstein, and he asked if he would prepare a press release and set up media interviews ahead of the release of their debut Parlophone single, “Love Me Do”. Calder also dispatched 100 free copies to dancehalls.

Oldham, meanwhile, had begun managing and producing the mop tops’ scruffier, less wholesome southern counterparts, the Stones. He and Calder had met in 1961 on the set of a pop film at Twickenham. By 1963 they had launched Image, a PR consultancy which handled the band’s day-to-day management as well as the press for groups such as Herman’s Hermits, The Hollies, Freddie & The Dreamers and the Beach Boys.

Calder’s friendship circle included lyricist Lionel Bart and fashion designer Ossie Clark. The firm’s office in Marylebone was at the heart of the nascent Swinging London scene. Chrissie Shrimpton, later to become a supermodel and Mick Jagger’s lover, was one of the secretaries. Stones drummer Charlie Watts lived in a flat on the floor below, while the future managers of The Who, Kit Lambert and Chris Stamp, were also residents.

Andy Wickham, a publicist with Image, remembered Calder in Oldham’s book as having a “dark Caesar haircut, glasses with outsized black frames and a rolling Hampshire burr”. Describing him as “like a dog-track bookie”, he added: “Tony ran the business side of things and bills were rarely paid.”

Simon Napier-Bell, who managed Marc Bolan and Wham!, quoted Calder in Black Vinyl, White Powder as boasting of routinely fixing the charts. Once he paid key record shops to put the Beach Boys’ “Help Me Rhonda” in their best-seller returns. “EMI called and said ‘What’s going on? The single’s in the charts and we haven’t even pressed any records yet’,” Calder said.

1965 was a pivotal year for him. He assumed the role of producer and two tracks he cut with Marianne Faithfull, “Come and Stay With Me” and “This Little Bird”, reached the UK Top 10. Then he joined Oldham in setting up Immediate, which became the template for countless independent record labels. Among their acts were the Small Faces, Fleetwood Mac, The Nice, PP Arnold, Humble Pie, Chris Farlowe and Amen Corner.

Ian McLagan’s memory of Immediate flew in the face of the company’s slogan, “Happy to be part of the industry of human happiness”. He alleged the band were not paid royalties owed to them and derided Calder’s role as being “to look after the books and play the part of the bad cop while Andrew passed joints around”.

The label ceased trading in 1970, citing financial problems. Calder soon had a short-lived liaison with the Bay City Rollers and in 1975 became CEO to Nems Records, to whom he signed Black Sabbath. Later there were two spells as manager of Eddy Grant, Calder shrewdly identifying a discarded demo, “I Don’t Wanna Dance”, as a hit. He promoted three successive No 1s for Jive Bunny & The Mastermixers during the 1980s; established a publishing company, Marylebone Music; and reunited with Oldham to write a biography of Abba in 1994.

However, it is as the latter’s foil at Immediate that Calder will be best remembered. “Tony had ears and balls,” Oldham said. “I loved him and he will be missed.”

Tony Calder, music industry executive, born 27 June 1943, died 2 January 2018