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Her dad had said that she'd made her bed hard and she would have to lie in it and she was doing just that. On one of these domestic Sunday mornings, Pat woke early and prayed hard that God would send her a way out of the hell t hat she had created for herself. Her prayer was answered sooner than she had expected when she received a phone call out of the blue from one of her brother's ex-girlfriends, Maxine Smith.
Maxine Smith and Gloria Scott had arranged an audition with Ike & Tina Turner to replace the original Ikettes who were leaving. They had been stood up by a third girl and wanted Pat to go with them to the audition so that they could get the gig. With no intention of venturing into showbusiness as she had a family to look after, Pat decided to go along with them and help them out as it was a chance for her to get out of the house for a while. She lied to David so that he would watch the kids for a while and off she went. This decision was to change her life as Tina loved them and offered them the job immediately.
Tina had also suggested that they go to see her show that evening in Fresno before making up their minds. In order to attend these auditions in the first place Pat had to tell husband David a lie as he would never had agreed to it, so when she arrived home at 6am a fight ensued, but when he hit her that time it must have knocked some sense into her as from that moment she knew that the job with Ike and Tina, was the answer to her prayers. She got help from her mum and dad with the kids and she was off on tour immediately, her first gig being in Columbus, Ohio.
Pat toured with the Ike and Tina revue for a couple of years on the legendary chitterlin circuit playing all the great theatres like the Apollo in New York and the Uptown in Philadelphia and he Howard in Washington D.C. During this time she worked alongside some of the great R&B acts of our times. One night in 1966 the Revue was playing at a club called the Galaxy on Sunset Strip when in walked these two English guys. It was Bill Wyman and Charlie Watts. Tina had a record called River Deep, Mountain High that was a massive hit in Europe and the Rolling Stones had invited them over to the UK to tour with the Rolling Stones. In September 1966 they landed at London Heathrow and Pat's love affair with England had begun.
The tour was a successful one and at the end of it Mick Jagger and his then manager Andrew Oldham asked Pat to stay in London and sign to Oldham's Immediate record label as a solo artist. She did and the rest is history. She was rechristened PP Arnold by the famous Rock photographer Gered Mankowitz and her hit recordings of the Cat Stevens song, The First Cut Is The Deepest and the Chip Taylor classic ,Angel Of The Morning are indeed classics and are loved just as much today as they were back then. Her hit single penned and produced by Steve Marriott and Ronnie Lane, If You Think You're Groovy, her now legendary backing vocals on the Small Faces, Tin Soldier and Itchycoo Park and the Mick Jagger produced duet with Rod Stewart, Come Home Baby, are all evergreen mod favourites.
With her own band The Nice led by Keith Emerson, later of Emerson, Lake and Palmer fame, she toured alongside such illuminaries as Jimi Hendrix, The Small Faces, The Who, Kinks, Blind Faith, David Bowie and many, many others. The decade ended with the disintegration of Immediate Records. She then signed with the Robert Stigwood Organisation and signed to Polydor Records with Barry Gibb at the production helm. Two singles, Bury Me Down By The River and Give A Hand Take A Hand were released. A Bee Gee split interrupted the collaboration with Pat and Barry and Pat formed a band with Ashton, Gardner and Dyke with Steve Howe, who later joined Yes, on guitar.
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