My friend Jesse Hector, who has died aged 78 after a heart attack, was one of the great unsung heroes of British rock’n’roll.
In the early 1970s, he was the charismatic leader of a series of high-voltage bands that anticipated both the hard-edged glam style of Slade and punk. Crushed Butler, Helter Skelter and the Hammersmith Gorillas successively showcased Jesse’s scintillating guitar playing, ferocious vocal style and dynamic live stage presence.
After a raucous cover of the Kinks’ You Really Got Me in 1974, in 1976 the Gorillas lined up with the nascent punk era via a show-stopping set at the Mont de Marsan punk festival in France, where Jesse developed a cult following. TV appearances followed and the Gorillas achieved their greatest profile with their classic singles She’s My Gal and Gatecrasher in 1977. Mark Perry described Jesse in the punk fanzine Sniffin Glue as “a cross between Jimi Hendrix and Noddy Holder”.
The 1978 LP Message to the World, Jesse’s definitive statement, married the energy and attitude of punk with a ferocious crusading belief in the spiritual power of rock’n’roll. However, after the death of his friend and bandmate Alan Butler in the early 1980s, Jesse retired from music.
Born in Kilburn, north-west London, the son of Doll (Dorothy), a seamstress, and Harry, a toolmake, in 1956 Jesse discovered Elvis and rock’n’roll. Having acquired a guitar and some tutoring, he appeared at the 2i’s club as a teenager, and in 1961, still only 14, cut an EP with his Rock & Roll Trio, one of very few authentic pre-Beatles British rock recordings.
A mooted session with the producer Joe Meek failed to materialise and, having spent the 1960s drifting through the London music scene, observing the likes of the Jimi Hendrix Experience and Small Faces’ Steve Marriott, Jesse emerged with Crushed Butler, Helter Skelter and then the Hammersmith Gorillas, with whom he would achieve his greatest success.
He returned in the mid-90s with two new bands, the Sound and the Gatecrashers, and proved he had lost none of his trademark guitar chops, vocal gymnastics and hypnotic stage presence.
After a few years, he once again retreated to the life of an office cleaner, but Jesse remained a totemic figure to a hardcore of true believers and continued to be seen regularly in north London record shops, and at his local pub, the Spread Eagle in Camden Town, where I met and got to know him.
Jesse’s brother Alan died in 2009. He is survived by his nephew, George.
