Irish producer who gave Imelda May big break caught up in deadly LA fires
THE music impresario who gave Imelda May her big break has revealed how the singer wept with him on the phone after he told her of the loss his house, studio and master tapes in the California fires.Coolock Rockabilly Reb Kennedy, the boss and founder of Independent LA record label Wild Records, told The Irish Sun: "This is the worst thing that has ever happened to me in my life.5Reb Kennedy's house in Pasadena before the fires5Reb Kennedy posing with Imelda May5Reb had to evacuate his home“Imelda called to see if I was okay, and we just cried together on the phone.”The Dubliner, 63, not only lost his family’s home in the fires, but also the vintage studio where he recorded over 200 albums on the Wild Records label he founded in the US.Reb told The Irish Sun: “I lost my house, my studio, and all the master tapes from all the albums I released, test pressings everything.“The saddest thing of all is that I’ve lost my entire record collection, fifty years of records since I’ve been collecting since I was a kid in Dublin”.READ MORE ON LA FIRESThe dad of one’s nightmare had began last Tuesday night when he noticed fire on distant hills while out walking his dogs.Reb told The Irish Sun: “I immediately got into my car and drove to where the fire was which was about, ten minutes away or thirty minutes away on foot.“When I got there I noticed the wind was pushing the fire away from my house so it didn’t concern me too much.“I drove back home and told my wife we would be fine. You see there were hundreds of hundreds of houses between that burning hillside and us. So I thought it would never reach us.”However hours later Reb awoke in bed at 3am, to hear alarms sounding around the area, and smoke nearby.He explained: “An alarm went off on my phone, telling us to evacuate immediately.“I thought we were being evacuated because of the smoke. What I didn’t know was that the wind had changed from 20 mph to 95 mph and the Fire Fighters couldn’t stop the fires which had burnt though all those hundreds of houses”.'COULDN'T SLEEP'Reb, wife Jenny and son Hayden fled to a property in nearby Palm Springs where they watched reports of the news on TV.Reb admitted: “We couldn’t sleep a wink. We sat there for hours watching the fires on TV and still thinking we might be okay.“I was desperate for news. I was hoping the fire wouldn’t reach us until a neighbour rang to tell me his house was now on fire and his home was one minute away from ours.“But hoping against hope, you still hoped that our house might escape. You can have nine houses burn down in a street but the tenth one survives. We hoped that would be us.”It was son Hayden’s girlfriend, still back in Pasadena who gave the family the news they were dreading.'IT'S ALL GONE'Reb said: “ She managed to get back through the police lines and fire trucks to our street, and rang to tell us ‘your house is gone. There is nothing here now. It’s all gone’.”The Dubliner compares the loss of his home, studio, and label bass to the death of his own parents.Reb said: “That’s how bad it hits me. I’m so grateful we have escaped with our lives but I have lost everything including the Tascam 388 recorder which I recorded all my acts on”.The Dubliner revealed how he had been swamped by calls from friends and musicians around the world sympathising with him and desperate to help. One of the first people to get in touch was close pal Imelda May, who was a regular visitor to Reb’s Pasadena home.Reb told The Irish Sun: “I’ve known Imelda since she was six years of age.IMELDA'S CALL“She is part of my extended family and was a regular visitor to our house in Pasadena. I booked her for the Viva Las Vegas rock’n’roll show here in April.“I cried on the phone and Imelda cried with me over what I have lost. My house, my studio, my master tapes all the vintage musical instruments I have lost”.Reb tried to return to the site of his home on Friday night but was prevented by the Fire department who have cordoned off the area.Reb said: “The house was insured but not the studio or the equipment or the master tapes.”FUNDRAISE APPEALSupporters have already set up a GoFundMe page to Help Rebuild Wild Records with fans donating worldwide.Reb told us: “This isn’t going to be the end of Wild Records. We are going to start again. There is a movie planned starring all the acts who are signed to the label and we have a table reading of that happening this weekend”.Reb told us: “Right now I am going through all these periods of grief.“The most important thing is that my wife Jenny and son Hayden and our two dogs survived this......... We got away safe from the fire but I don’t own anything right now.“I don’t own any clothes. I lost two cars.... But I can’t comprehend how much I’ve lost because every few minutes I realise something else I have lost in the fire.”'MY HOME IS JUST DUST'Reb continued: "This is not like Ireland. Californian houses are built from wood. If a house went on fire in Ireland, the roof would cave in , the glass would have exploded, the door would be burnt.But Irish houses have a strong frame. My house is just dust! It burned to dust”.Speaking previously about Reb in a doc, Imelda said: “Reb is one of my closest and dearest friends. A very creative man, he continues to fly the flag for the music he loves with extreme passion.”Dubliner Reb was part of a small group of people who started the punk scene in Dublin in the late 1970s, hanging out at Advance Records off Grafton Street.He later worked at Rough Trade Records in London and worked as a DJ, and promoter, and booked bands at clubs such as 100 Club and Dingwall’s within the Rockabilly scene.By late 1990s he moved once again, to San Francisco to become a promoter, later setting up Wild Records, an independent Los Angeles label rooted in, but not limited to, rockabilly,Reb said: "They call me the Irish Mexican (as most of the Wild bands are Mexican). The Mexican culture is very similar to the Irish culture, music in their homes, lots of family get- togethers which include drinking, the Catholic religion, and love of 50s and 60s music.“Doing this label has been my dream. But this fire isn’t going to be the end of Wild Records. We will start again”.5Reb, wife Jenny and son Hayden5The burnt ‘wild records’ sign outside Reb Kennedy home in Pasadena
