Mike McCartney's Box of Scaffold

Mike McCartney never meant to form a pop group, he was too busy cutting hair and cutting up with poets in 1960s Liverpool. But out of the chaos emerged the Scaffold: a riot of verse, vaudeville, and very British irreverence. McCartney charts the oddball origins of the trio to a surprise hit in ‘Thank You Very Much’ (yes, the Queen Mother did like it). With his trademark wit, McCartney recalls being booted and re-signed by EMI, singing under George Martin’s wing, and crossing creative paths with everyone from Brian Epstein, Spike Milligan to Michael Palin. He laments lost tapes, celebrates a new box set, and tips his hat to the Bonzos, who he lobbed in the direction of his brother Paul for the Magical Mystery Tour.

Scaffold weren’t toe tapping Merseybeat fodder, but they weren’t trying to be. They were something stranger, sillier, and, in McCartney’s telling, just as essential.