Hamptons Confidential: Noel Love

Welcome to our new feature in which we interview local personalities: agents, architects, interior designers, builders, anyone who plays a part in the world of Hamptons real estate. Want to get in on the fun? Drop us a line!

Few Hamptons agents have such an interesting previous career as Noel Love‘s. The Saunders agent began his career in 1965, working in the music industry for Motown Records as their New York promotion director. Noel would make sure DJs gave maximum airplay to all of the Motown artists, including the Supremes, Four Tops, Temptations, Marvin Gaye, Smokey Robinson and The Miracles, Stevie Wonder, and more. The story continues from there…

Tell us a great story about your time in the music industry.

I’ll take you back to the year 1968. I was 22 years old–over half a century ago now. I was working as national promotion director for Bell Records. Which was owned by a gentleman named Larry Uttal who was a legend in the record industry.

Larry signed a label from London, England, called DJM Records. And he put me in charge of the national print promotions in the United States. But I had to fly to London to meet the owner of the company, Dick James. But James also owned the Northern Songs publisher, which was the Beatles’ publishing company. So I flew over and he takes me to lunch. It was a private club that he belonged to. And after lunch we get in his car and we’re driving through the streets of London.

We finally pull up to these gates with some kids milling around, and we go into the building, and we’re going down hallway after hallway and then the door was opened. And I’m face to face with the Beatles. They were in the process of making the White Album. I got to spend a couple days in the studio with the Beatles, while they recorded the White Album.

Wow!

It gets better. I met a young kid in the studio who I became friends with, and he gave me a tape to bring back to America to try and sell for him to a record company. It was a song called “Regimental Sergeant Zippo.” I brought it back to America and I played it for record company vice presidents and presidents. I sent it out and nobody wanted to buy it. The kid’s name was Reginald Dwight.

Elton John!

And that’s my story. I became good friends with Elton. I was in the studio with the Beatles when they made the White Album.

I’m a collector, so I’m wondering: do you have any artifacts, like any signed records from those days, or anything like that?

I’ve got a lot of gold and platinum albums. After that I wound up being general manager of a company called Leber-Krebs Management. We managed Aerosmith, Ted Nugent, AC/DC, Def Leppard, the Scorpions. We would be accepted as producers of Beatlemania and Jesus Christ Superstar. I had my own company called Rose Promotions and I met David Krebs, and I would give him free promotion and he would give me free rent in his offices.

So we kind of bartered with each other. And it’s funny but to this day I’m still good friends with David and Aerosmith. You know, Aerosmith put “Dream On” as a single twice on Columbia Records and never made it. So I talked them into putting it out a third time and I said my partner and I’ll work it by ourselves if we get it started. You guys can jump in and finish it up, and sure enough the third time out it became a hit. And it launched Aerosmith’s career.

So how did you ever wind up in the Hamptons?

I was in California and I decided I wanted out of the music business. And I decided I was going to fly back to New York and move back to New York because I missed my children, my two sons. So I moved back to New York and I thought, before I go back to the city and go back into the music business, I wanted to go somewhere where I haven’t been.

I knew someone in the Hamptons, so I thought I’d try the Hamptons for six months. Well here I am, 25 years later, and I’m still in the Hamptons. And this is it. This is it. I started with Saunders seven years ago and Andrew and I sat down to discuss things. I didn’t want to go out. I worked for Dunemere which was bought by Brown Harris Stevens for 14 years, and I didn’t want to go out and interview with anyone in public because everyone gossips. So I went to Andrew’s house and said “OK, I think I’m ready to make the move. This is going to be the last time I ever take. This is the last job I would do for the rest of my life.” And it seems like yesterday.

It’s nice to be part of that success, and it’s what kept me from going back into the music business. I had this little house on the beach till Sandy washed it away, and my grandkids grew up on my beach learning how to kayak, flying kites, learning how to dig the clams on the sand. I am not in that house any more but still in Pine Neck.

I’ve had two incredible careers, one in music and one now in real estate. I’ve been blessed.