Foreword
We begin this time with a little asteroidology. What actually is Minor Planet 4305?
Does astrology give you the Blues? Don't worry music lovers! This time, the Blues gives to astrology. How? Read on ...
THE BLUESMEN ERIC CLAPTON Rock musician, Eric Clapton, has an asteroid named after him. Minor Planet 4305, or 4305 Clapton, lies between Mars and Jupiter and is in an elliptical orbit around the Sun, which takes 11 days short of 5 years to complete. There I go again – doing the research so that you don’t have to. Now, as a guitarist, EC has played with many other people of the music world including The Beatles. His contribution to the White Album
was apparently voted 42nd in the October 2008 Guitar World’s top 100 guitar solos. Must have been a quiet month! Still, it probably perked up his old chum, George Harrison who wrote t. Well, I say chum but this wasn’t to last for ever because Clapton stole George’s wife later on. Anyway, take a listen to ‘While My Guitar Gently Weeps’ from The Beatles’ so-called White Album (not featured on THE BLUES WORLD OF ERIC CLAPTON [SPA 387], incidentally). I wonder if our star of The WORLD OFs wept when he realised that he would not be getting credited on the record sleeve. The album which initially brought Eric to the attention of the British music-listening public has him reading the Beano on the sleeve. Apparently, he was a bit shy and retiring when it came to having his photo taken so when the time came for the cover shots to be created, he went in to some sort of trough of pique and buried his head in his comic. The album was Bluesbreakers: John Mayall with Eric Clapton or, as it became immortalised, The Beano Album. So you see, as a strategy for hiding oneself away, it was not terribly successful.
JOHN MAYALL You probably know this about John Mayall but it really is quite impressive so I’ll say it
again. Mayall is known as the Father of British Blues and he has a fine list of
children that he brought on in his footsteps. As well as Eric Clapton, his various bands have included Peter Green (founding member of Fleetwood Mac), bass player John McVie (the Mac of Fleetwood Mac), Jack Bruce (monster bass player/vocalist of Cream), Mick Taylor (one time Rolling Stones guitar man) and Aynsley Dunbar (drummer who went on to develop an eclectic range of styles playing for such as crazy rock jazzman Frank Zappa to flautist Herbie Mann). So you see, Mrs Mayall’s little boy turned out to be the mentor for quite a troop of blues rockers. But Mayall couldn’t do this on his own. All of these musicians have another pillar of the WORLD OF series to thank for their
early leader’s ability in preparing them for their own careers. When he was a lad and the urge to produce music first hit, who did John Mayall turn to? Why,
George Formby, naturally. Yep! John Mayall subscribed to the GF Teach Yourself Ukulele correspondence course. Ah, from small acorns eh? And like Formby, John Mayall has two WORLD OFs to his name; THE WORLD OF JOHN MAYALL (SPA 47) and THE WORLD OF JOHN MAYALL VOL. 2 (SPA 138). Now, as well as the Made in England version, I am, you may have noticed, the proud owner of the German variant too. Above is shown both the front and back cover - the front features a white-on-black DECCA logo instead of the English black-on-white as well as the extra legend that states the record to be 'Music for All'. All tracks are the same on both LPs except one. Track B6 of the German record shows a refreshing change to the normal sentiment expressed in the lyrics of the blues tune and demonstrates that of some of the stricter English language tutors (and a complete disregard for that of the love song) namely, that there is no such word as 'can't'! So, to spell it out for you, the back cover and the actual label both claim that 'I Can Quit You Baby' - that is, stuff that in your pipe and smoke it … darlin'! Mind you, if my darlin' settled down after dinner by packing a pipe bowl and setting it aglow, I wouldn't hang around to fetch me down my trusty axe and amplifier to render my sentiment by way of song!
SAVOY BROWN Since 1965 until the time of writing (2018), Savoy Brown has had 61 members, including the current three plus 17 guest players. The line-ups featured from three to 11 members including said guests and, quite impressively, Mr Kit Simmons has been ever-present. They have released something like 39 LPs so I should think it was quite a daunting task choosing tracks for the WORLD OFs. As well as ‘Train to Nowhere’ SPA 34 (Post 15), the Brown appear on four other WORLD OF LPs and give us a total of seven songs; well, six really as ‘Train to Nowhere’ crops up on THE WORLD OF HITS VOL. 3 (SPA 49) as well with remaining five, including ‘She’s Got a Ring in His Nose, and a Ring on Her Hand’, coming from THE WORLD OF BLUES POWER (SPA 14), BLUES POWER VOL. 2 (SPA 63) and BLUES POWER VOL. 3 (SPA 263).
JOHNNY ALMOND
Alto saxophonist Almond also played tenor sax, keyboards and percussion, playing with the likes of WORLD OF stars Alan Price and John Mayall. With such a range of instruments at his disposal it is no surprise to know that his music is almost unclassifiable. I parked him here since he did some work with the ubiquitous John Mayall who resides above. His one tune in the WORLD OF series is ‘Voodoo Forest’ which is percussion heavy with interesting imagery if you let your mind go … or is it because my mind has half gone already? No matter. See what you think.
JOSH WHITE
Joshua Daniel White (also known during his early performing years as Pinewood Tom and Tippy Barton) is a bit of an oddity of the WORLD OF world as he is American when our record collection comprises almost exclusively British creatures. Though Josh White’s career in music began in the 1930s when he played acoustic, finger-picking, guitar blues, his place amongst the bluesmen may be a little incongruous. Listening to THE WORLD OF JOSH WHITE (SPA 44) one detects very little that could be considered ‘the blues’. Noticing tracks such as ‘Waltzing Matilda’, Molly Malone (singing cockles and mussels alive alive-o) and ‘The Lass with a Delicate Air’ on the cover might alert an alert person that the blues don’t live here, man. It is, however, one of my favourite WORLD OF LPs with its gentle vocals and clean guitar playing. White could be sitting next to you on a rocking chair, his acoustic on his knee, waiting for you to nod off when he would slope off, his work done, leaving you dozing, warmly dreaming, saliva coursing gently down your chin. Close to bliss.
THE WORLD OF BLUES POWER As mentioned above, there are three volumes of Blues Power, THE WORLD OF BLUES POWER (SPA 14), THE WORLD OF BLUESPOWER VOL. 2 (SPA 63) and VOL. 3 (263) and there are some big blues/rock players featured on both. John Mayall’s Bluesbreakers show four times on SPA-R 14 with assistance from Eric Clapton on two occasions and Peter Green on the other two. Mayall and Clapton have their own WORLD OFs and so are covered above. It seems fitting, therefore, to begin this piece with a few words on Peter Green.
PETER GREEN Blues guitarist, Peter Green (born Greenbaum) jumped into Eric Clapton’s grave in John Mayall’s Bluesbreakers when that guitar maestro took a break, Green contributing his own style of the blues to the band’s evolution. When Clapton returned, Green moved on but was back again within a year when EC left permanently to form super-group, Cream. Within another year, however, PG left permanently to form Fleetwood Mac. If you know the John Mayall story, you’ll know that he was most likely not put out too much by all these guitarists coming and going because for Mayall, it seems, there was always another around the corner. Anyway, Green, after a bit more than two and a half years, became mentally unstable and left the Mac to play some session work and record a solo album before being committed to a mental institution. At time of writing, Peter Green has been out and about for a good few years and, after dropping out of music for a while, has a guitar back in his hand. He seemed to feel that he had a way to go before getting back up to speed with his technique, though, explaining to one journalist that he could ‘outplay Sooty but that’s it, don’t put Sweep on that xylophone whatever you do.’1 SPA-R 14 may house something of an LP obscurity in the Bluesbreakers’ ‘Out of Reach’ which was penned and sung by Green, because it was originally only released as a B-side of single ‘Sitting in the Rain’ which just didn’t sell. The song finds itself on CD reissues, however, of A Hard Road by John Mayall’s Bluesbreakers. The other tune here is ‘Greeny’ which shows up as a bonus track on CD reissues of the ‘Crusade’ album and compilation albums. I can find no reference to a vinyl release for this tune but that might just mean that I can find no reference to a vinyl release for this tune! Finally, on SPA 263 we find instrumental, ‘The Stumble’ which was an original tune on A Hard Road.
TEN YEARS AFTER
Tunes found on SPA-R 14 are ‘Spoonful’ and ‘Feel it for Me’ from the debut album called Ten Years After whilst on SPA 63 we have ‘Going to Try’ and ‘Speed Kills’ and then ‘Woman Trouble’ from Stonedhenge on SPA 263. The version of ‘Spoonful’ has the conventional tempo and mood of just about any other version of that song that you might have heard but Alvin Lee’s smooth and meaningful vocals topping and tailing another superb guitar work-out make this a unique interpretation and if long, controlled guitar wig-outs are what floats your … floating thing, this is the band for you. It is Lee’s quick-fire scatter gun attack for which he is famed but the slow blues is also a specialty. The band name, Ten Years After, came about because in 1966, when the boys were mulling this thorny subject over, it was ten years following Elvis Presley’s most successful year; the year that made the name of Alvin Lee’s hero. Check out the tracks on our two records and you’ll maybe hear Presley’s influence, not on the guitar playing, of course, but on the vocal delivery. Sadly, Alvin Lee is no longer with us but at time of writing, the band, comprising original keyboardsman, Chick Churchill and sticksman, Ric Lee (no relation) along with new boys Colin Hodgkinson on bass and mighty fine guitar wiz, Marcus Bonfanti, continue to entertain their faithful, as well as newer, younger audience with those rock hits of days gone by.
KEEF HARTLEY
Yet another member of Team Mayall, jazz-blues-rock drummer Keef Hartley joined John Mayall’s Bluesbreakers for three albums. The later, amicable split is represented at the start of ‘Sacked’, a track on the first Keef Hartley Band album Halfbreed, but does not feature here,where we can hear Keef mischievously sacking John Mayall via a phone call. The Keef Hartley Band played at the 1969 three-day hippie gig that was Woodstock which should have made their name but a career in the top echelons may have stalled due to their non-inclusion in both the video account of the festival and the three disc record set featuring much of the music played. Keef Hartley made one appearance on each of two BLUES POWER LPs plus one on THE WORLD OF PROGRESSIVE MUSIC: WOWIE ZOWIE! (SPA 34).
EDDIE BOYD Next is Eddie Boyd who also features with three tunes; one on each of the three BLUES POWER records. Boyd was a rockabilly blues pianist who didn’t mind mixing it with top men such as Peter Green and yes, you guessed it, John Mayall and whilst there does exist versions of all three of these tunes played with the help of Green, Mayall along with Tony McPhee of Groundhogs fame, the tracks presented here are played by Boyd and his band.
CHAMPION JACK DUPREE Champion Jack Dupree appears on the BLUES POWERs with Mickey ‘Guitar’ Baker on three occasions including once where his band is credited as well. He also shows up one time on his own plus three outings with Eric Clapton on his record THE BLUES WORLD OF ERIC CLAPTON (SPA 387). Another piano-pounder, Champion Jack Dupree began as a boxer, before which, he was known as William Thomas Dupree but it was with his nom de boxing that he made his name as a barrelhouse bluesman; ‘barrelhouse’ suggests a dynamic type of blues/jazz associated with New Orleans saloons where the beverages were stored in barrels. Mind you, The Champ can also wind things down a little for some smooth slow blues on tunes like ‘Third Degree’ on SPA 63. Dupree’s guitar man on three of his tracks, Mickey (born MacHouston) Baker, spent some time in his early working life as a professional pool shark, making his money by deceiving susceptible pool players, lulling them into thinking he couldn’t play then beating them to win the prize money when enough was wagered. He could not have been that good as, when he decided to try music as a career, he could not afford a trumpet, his first choice instrument. He ended up with a guitar and did OK in the end and even now has his Complete Course in Jazz Guitar books 1 and 2 in print more than 50 years after their writing.
BIG WALTER HORTON, HOMESICK JAMES WILLIAMSON and ROBERT NIGHTHAWK
Moving on with our list of contributors to the BLUES POWER LPs, we come to Big Walter Horton, a harmonicist or, as they are more likely to say in Mississippi where our man was born, a mouth harp player. He gave up playing professionally for a few years due to ill health but was soon back at it playing along with bands such as Savoy Brown and others like Homesick James Williamson, a slide guitar player who also features on our list. Homesick James took his nickname from the title of one of his first recordings and has one song more than Horton with two here. Finally, Robert Nighthawk also has two tunes and like Homesick James above, was a slide guitarist. A quiet man, Nighthawk failed to hit the really big time that many felt was his due, largely down to his taciturnity so it’s good to have a couple of examples of his work here.
SOULSTERS
RAY CHARLES Ray Charles Robinson started going blind when he was about 5 years of age and was completely blind by the time he was seven. You won’t, however, see many pictures of the man at his piano without his grinning teeth. He was, by all accounts, a happy man
but, even though he is plinky plonked into the Soul section here, he did sing the blues, too. Check out ‘I’m Gonna Move to the Outskirts of Town’ and ‘That Lucky Old Sun (Just Rolls around Heaven all Day)’ on THE WORLD OF RAY CHARLES (SPA 361) and THE WORLD OF RAY CHARLES VOL. 2 (SPA-U 422). Charles also did Jazz; ‘Smack Dab in the Middle’ and ‘Ma (She’s Making Eyes at Me)’ (SPA 361) ‘Teardrops from My Eyes’ and ‘Sweet Georgia Brown’ (SPA-U 422). As well as the gamut of genres covered by the
Ray Charles catalogue, we should remember all of his pop charted hits such as ‘I Can’t Stop Loving You’, ‘Georgia on My Mind’, ‘Hit the Road Jack’ as well as the string-driven ‘Born to Lose’ (SPA 361), ‘What’d I Say?’ ‘Unchain My Heart’, ‘Your Cheatin’ Heart’ and Take These Chains’ (SPA-U 422). The version of ‘What’d I Say’ here is a live rendition which seems to have Ray singing the first line into a dead microphone. No matter – it is a fine interpretation of probably his most upbeat hit tune. Also, the song title ‘Take These Chains’ seems a little incomplete – I reckon it should be succeeded by ‘From My Heart’. Anyway, most of the other songs to reach the upper echelons were more country-style ballads but whatever the species of music portrayed, I reckon we can agree that Mrs Robinson’s little boy had Soul.
Now here’s another little nugget of fun for those who like this sort of thing – these LPs were released on the LONDON record label which, you’ll remember, is the imprint that records released by Decca in the United States appeared on. And that’s not all, folks.
Beneath the LONDON logo will be seen the CROSSOVER emblem. In his early thirties, Ray Charles started up his own record label. Tangerine Records was overseen by ABC-Paramount but when he left ABC, he closed Tangerine and gave birth to Crossover. Crossover is a term generally used of performers who
appeal to different audiences and I can’t think of a more appropriate title for the record label of Ray Charles. Finally, Ray turns up on THE WORLD OF YOUR FAMILY FAVOURITES (SPA-R 457) with ‘Take These Chains …’ (and happily, the song title is presented in its full glory) ‘… From My Heart’. Aaah. It is from such a morsel that a peaceful night’s sleep may at last be procured.
THE WORLD OF SOUL POWER
There is just one compilation-type LP covering Soul as a genre (SPA 124) and even then the 12 tracks are divided between just four acts. The Flirtations, The Fantastics, Clyde McPhatter and The Incrowd.
THE FLIRTATIONS Beginning life as the Gypsies in the late 1960s, the Flirtations were a quartet comprising the three Pearce sisters, Betty, Shirley and Earnestine and Viola Billups. When Betty moved on, after a less than successful time of it in America, the remaining trio moved to England to try pastures new and, coming to the attention of the ever
alert Decca Records, were promptly signed up. Their first release in the UK was on the Parrot Record label which was a subsidiary of London Records which, at the risk of repeating myself, is the American arm of Decca. Parrot was used for a number of WORLD OF stars including the Zombies, Tom Jones, Engelbert and Lulu making their wears available to our friends over the water. Soon, the Flirtations were moved side-wards onto Decca’s Deram label releasing probably their most recognisable hit, ‘Nothing but a Heartache’ which has been adopted by the Northern Soul scenesters and though a product of the sixties, is instantly recognisable as of that modern genre. In 1974, Viola moved on to try life as a solo performer but as recently as 2009 and 2014, the threesome reunited to record new material. The three songs in our collection were all single releases from 1968 to 1970 on the Deram label and can be found on THE WORLD OF THE FLIRTATIONS (SPA 218) whilst ‘Nothing but a Heartache’ crops up on THE WORLD OF HITS VOL. 3 (SPA 49).
THE FANTASTICS … or Fantastic’s as it states on some of their early singles. Boy, that errant apostrophe is a real wind-up for grammatical pedants! Still, life continues. So, The Fantastics began life as The Troubadours and then switched to The Velours and at least these names were their own determinations. When they came to England from America, they found that they had been delivered of another new name, The Fabulous Temptations which is a fine band name, I would say, but might have caused some confusion with the other Temptations on the Motown record label. Another name change was, therefore in the offing. And lo, there was born The Fantastics. Now, at the risk of upsetting readers, it is my opinion that much of the early Fantastics tunes sound a little thin, including the three tunes here, and it was not until ‘Something Old, Something New’ written by Rogers Cook and Greenaway along with Tony Macaulay, established hit-makers, that the group became properly noticed. At least, the song reached No. 9 in the UK Singles Charts, their highest placing to that point and in fact, any point. They may not have realised at the time but this success represented their peak. They continued as prominent live crowd-pleasing performers for some time afterwards but without hit singles - I assume they were shifting a few T-shirts to make ends meet.
CLYDE McPHATTER
Clyde McPhatter was singing gospel in the early 1950s when he was head-hunted by Atlantic Records to sing lead in a new group. This turned out to be The Drifters, a doo-wop group with a hint of R&B and a dollop of soul that still perform at time of writing. After a few years, McPhatter was obliged to do his bit in the Army and so left the Drifters and, when discharged, resumed his music career as a solo performer. After flitting from one record label to another, Clyde ended up at Decca where he was looking forward to releasing a comeback album and all was going so well, until he died. He was only 39 but fell prey to the demon drink. All three tunes on SPA 124 can be found on CD compilation Please Give Me One More Chance: sadly suffixed with His Last Recordings 1968-1970. Whilst ‘Baby I Could be so Good at Loving You’ and ‘I Hear a Symphony’ meander a little to my ears, ‘Only a Fool’ is a good tight pop song leaning a little towards Northern Soul.
THE INCROWD
The Incrowd or The In Crowd have ‘Love ain’t Love’, ‘Where in the World’ and ‘Thank You Darling’ on THE WORLD OF SOUL POWER (SPA 124). They appear to have had just one chart hit, ‘That’s How Strong my Love Is’ and this only got to No. 48 in 1965.
THE WORLD OF HITS
THE WORLD OF HITS mini-series which has received mentions throughout this document, runs to seven records and contains a very eclectic mix of POP tunes from yesteryear. Some of the artists on the Hits records have their own WORLD OF and so can be found elsewhere; artists such as Cat Stevens and Amen Corner who both have four entries on the Hit List; Them, Lulu and Dana who feature twice and East of Eden, The Flirtations and Zombies who have just the one outing on the Hits LPs. The Moody Blues do not have a dedicated WORLD OF but by virtue of the size of their aura within the sphere of music, and the fact that they have a healthy three showings in amongst the Hits series, I awarded them their own showcase elsewhere.
THE WORLD OF HITS ROUND-UP SMALL FACES, MARMALADE, WHITE PLAINS, JONATHAN KING, BILLIE DAVIS and DAVE BERRY Here follows a brief round-up of the remaining acts on THE WORLD OF HITS (SPA 7), THE WORLD OF HITS VOL. 2 (SPA 35), VOL. 3 (SPA 49), VOL. 4 (SPA 83), VOL. 5 (SPA 177), VOL. 6 (SPA 258) and VOL. 7 (SPA 360). Most artists have just one entry in this mini-series but some are privileged and have up to four. Top scorers, other than those
mentioned above, are the Small Faces, four-piece chirpy cockney oik, mod-type band who had one hit (Whatcha Gonna do About It) with the original line-up, Jimmy Winston vacating the organ stool soon after, allowing Ian McLagan to join Steve Marriott, Ronnie Lane and Kenny Jones to form the band that provides ‘Sha La La La Lee’, ‘All or Nothing’, ‘My Mind’s Eye’ and ‘Hey Girl’ for our collection. Marmalade and White Plains also have four whilst Jonathan
King, along with the Brotherhood of Man (see below) have three outings on the Hits records. Marmalade (originally Dean Ford and the Gaylords) give us ‘Reflections of my Life’, ‘Rainbow’, ‘Cousin Norman’ and ‘My Little One’, all hits with the former two reaching No. 3. White Plains feature with ‘My Baby Loves Lovin’’, ‘Julie Do Ya Love Me?’, ‘I’ve Got You on My Mind'
and ‘When You are a King’. This out-and-out pop group were formed from the pop-psychedelia group The Flowerpot Men who decided, having had
success throughout the hippy sixties with such as ‘Let’s Go to San Francisco’, to move on into the seventies with a new look and sound. Jonathan King has three songs here in his own name and he wrote and produced the
Hedgehoppers Anonymous tune ‘It’s Good News Week’ as well as releasing ‘Let It All Hang Out’, Million Dollar Bash’ and ‘Lazybones’. Dave Berry and Billie Davis have three tunes also. ‘Tell Him’ was Billie Davis’ biggest hit and it is here with ‘I Want You to be My Baby’ and personal favourite ‘Angel of the Morning’. But for some fortune, these latter two tunes may not have seen the light of day as Billie, after releasing her best-seller, got bashed up in a car prang and broke her jaw – jaws being quite important to singers, things career-shaped could have turned somewhat less musical. Dave Berry had three hits peaking at No. 5 in the UK charts, all of which, ‘The Crying Game’, ‘Mama’ and ‘Little Things’, are here. But it wasn’t only the charts at home that he troubled the compilers of, he is said to have had the biggest ever hit single in Holland and Belgium with ‘This Strange Effect’ which only got to 37 in the UK.2
CHRIS ANDREWS, ARRIVAL, UNIT 4+2, THE FORTUNES and THE MOVE Chris Andrews, Arrival, Unit 4+2, The Fortunes and The Move have two songs each. Chris Andrews’ top performing singles are both here; ‘Yesterday Man’ and ‘To Whom it Concerns’. In his early days he was more of a songwriter than a singer and, after having Sandie Shaw turn down a song he was peddling it to Bill Wyman and Andrew Loog-Oldham of the Rolling Stones and it was they that suggested that the writer sing it himself. So started a promising singing career as ‘Yesterday Man’ went to No. 3. The band, Arrival, came in the front door, delivered a couple of hits and went out the back door. If you blinked at all in 1970, you probably missed them. Persons of a certain age might just remember a fine single called ‘Friends’ but I think you’d have to be a real fan to remember ‘I Will Survive’ (No, not THAT ‘I Will Survive’). ‘Friends got to No. 8 whilst ‘I Will Survive’ managed No. 16.
Unit 4+2 (originally a foursome growing to six with the addition of two others, geddit?) were short-lived and really only left the one nugget of gold behind in ‘Concrete and Clay’ which shot to no. 1. The only other song that got anywhere near the top was ‘(You’ve) Never Been in Love Like this Before’ which stalled at No. 14. Ten of their 14 releases were pretty much ignored by the record buying public and so dwindled another enterprise. The pirate radio station, Radio Caroline adopted the Fortunes second single, the not terribly well remembered ‘Caroline’ but it wasn’t until the band took on a song supplied by professional songwriters, Rogers Greenaway and Cook, that they reached pop stardom. ‘You’ve got your Troubles’ went to No. 2.
Moving on ... the Move were heavy. Listen to ‘Night of Fear’ and you’ll hear that there aren’t many gaps in the sound and this was a signature sound for many of the early hits, of which there were many including ‘Flowers in the Rain’, ‘Fire Brigade’, ‘Blackberry Way’ and ‘Brontosaurus’. One heavy dinosaur! ‘Night of Fear’ (No. 2) with its 1812 Overture riff, and ‘I Can Hear the Grass Grow’ (No. 5) were the only two biggies that were released on Deram, the progressive Decca subsidiary, and these are what we have here.
There follows a list of everyone who has just one entry over the seven volumes on THE WORLD OF HITS records and their songs in order of their appearance:
Los Bravos – Black is Black The Honeybus – I Can’t let Maggie Go The Tornados – Telstar Crispian St Peters – The Pied Piper The Nashville Teens – Tobacco Road Whistling Jack Smith – I was Kaiser Bill’s Batman The Attack – Hi-Ho Silver Lining The Casuals – Jesamine Donnie Elbert – Without You Twinkle – Terry Cryin’ Shames – Please Stay Timebox – Beggin’ The Poppy Family – Which Way you Goin’ Billy The Applejacks – Tell Me When The Flowerpot Men – Let’s Go to San Francisco Pinkerton’s Assorted Colours – Mirror Mirror Thin Lizzy – Whiskey in the Jar Bloodstone – Natural High David Bowie – Laughing Gnome Junior Campbell – Hallelujah Freedom Candlewick Green – Who do you Think you Are? Peter Skellern – You’re a Lady Lieutenant Pigeon – Mouldy Old Dough The Goons – The Ying Tong Song
POPSTERS BROTHERHOOD OF MAN Most would think of the Eurovision Song Contest-winning song ‘Save Your Kisses for Me’ when regarding The Brotherhood of Man pop group but THE WORLD OF BROTHERHOOD OF MAN (SPA 279) comprises the original line-up several years before Euro stardom beckoned. This briefly included a couple of pop titans in Roger
Greenaway and Tony Burrows both of whom left soon after ‘United We Stand’ became their first hit. Greenaway played a major role in the UK pop scene in the 60s and 70s creating myriad songs with writing partner Roger Cook including tunes for WORLD OF stars Engelbert Humperdinck, Tom Jones and Blue Mink, one permanent member of which was, Roger Greenaway himself. Tony Burrows must be a record breaker (as well as a record maker) because he can quite rightly claim to be a one-hit-wonder …… 5 TIMES! He hopped, skipped and jumped from pop group to pop group, contributing to a single hit and moving on. Apart from Brotherhood of Man, only one of these bands feature on WORLD OFs but let’s list ‘em anyway:
Edison Lighthouse (Love Grows Where my Rosemary Goes)
White Plains (My Baby Loves Lovin’)
First Class (Beach Baby)
The Flowerpot Men (Let’s Go To San Francisco)
The Pipkins (Gimme Dat Ding)
It’s White Plains who star in the WORLD OFs, incidentally. If you are a certain age, these songs will return you to a time when the sun always shone before cares and fears were invented (except, possibly, Gimme Dat Ding). Stay a while. Don’t rush back to the present time. Share with me one of my personal favourite pop tunes; the Brotherhood’s ‘United We Stand’ which also appears on THE WORLD OF HITS VOL. 4 (SPA 83). A pop masterpiece from the swelling orchestral introduction to the chorusic fadeout. The full 2 minutes and 52 seconds! Yes, chorusic. Why not? Write a book and you can make up adjectives, too! Anyway, within this short tuneful period, there are just two verses and six choruses but, for my part, I reckon more would be less. A perfect pop parcel. The LP also includes the lovely, lush pop of Where Are You Going to My Love (also on THE WORLD OF HITS VOL. 5 [SPA 177]), ‘California Sunday Morning’ which also crops up on THE WORLD OF HITS VOL. 6 (SPA 258), a couple of rockers and the sad song of someone who died and no-one cared. A truly emotional rollercoaster.
MARMALADE
Scottish pop band The Marmalade had 11 Top 40 UK hit singles, six of which were on Decca, all of which feature on THE WORLD OF THE MARMALADE (SPA 470). 1972 release, ‘Radancer’ (No. 6) was backed with two songs, the first of which, ‘Sarah’ also appears. The first of our six is ‘Reflections of my Life’ (No. 3) which appeared towards the end of 1969 but their very first shot at pop stardom as The Marmalade was back in
1966 with ‘It’s All Leading up to Saturday Night’ though they had to wait a couple of years before achieving their first Top Ten smash which was ‘Lovin’ Things’. Prior to this they had four singles as Dean Ford and the Gaylords, Dean Ford being the assumed name of lead vocalist Thomas McAleese. The Marmalade hit the pinnacle just once and this was with Paul McCartney song, ‘Ob-La-Di-Ob-La-Da’. The remaining four charting tunes which can be found on SPA 470 are ‘Rainbow’ (No. 3), ‘My Little One’ (No. 15), ‘Cousin Norman’ (No. 6) and ‘Back on the Road’ (No. 35). They continued releasing singles until the mid-1980s, the last being ‘Golden Shreds’ which was a hits medley, and, at time of writing, are still touring their hits from the sixties having called themselves simply Marmalade since 1973. Junior Campbell, who has a song, ‘Hallelujah Freedom’, on THE WORLD OF HITS VOL. 7 (SPA 360), was a founder band member. His tune, incidentally got to No. 10 in the UK charts and is accompanied on HITS VOL. 7 by ‘Cousin Norman’.
ANTHONY NEWLEY Actor, singer, songwriter, film score writer and performer in rock ‘n’ roll, musicals and cabaret – Anthony Newley was quite ubiquitous in the fifties and sixties. Newley crops up twice in the WORLD OF series with THE LONELY WORLD OF ANTHONY NEWLEY (SPA 185) and THE ROMANTIC WORLD OF ANTHONY NEWLEY (SPA 45). It shouldn’t really surprise you that the collection of tunes for lonely singers is particularly dreary with lyrics like, ‘Rain, rain don’t go away, rain all night and rain all day. Rain, oh rain stay with me, keep my tears company’. The closing track is ‘The Party’s Over’ and I
suppose it could be put down to the success of the record that I was pleased that my listening experience was over, too. Like yer man says in ‘I’ll Teach You How to Cry’ he’s ‘pretty good at being blue’. Still, now we can move on to something a little more jolly; Anthony Newley’s romantic world. So, let’s listen to the LP opener – hmmm, nice enough intro and now the words. ‘What now my love? Now that you have left me. How can I live through another day, watching my dreams turn to ashes ….. Oh Toe knee, Toe knee … where will your misery end? Next track as it happens. Strawberry Fair, originally a nineteenth century folk song, was a hit for Newley that got to no. 3 in the UK charts. It is a song telling of the chance meeting, whilst on his way to the fair of the title, with a golden-haired maiden who was off to the fair to vend her wares (cherries, roses, strawberries, that sort of thing). Turns out that the blue-eyed seller had plenty of strawberries and so offered some to her new friend/stalker but, oh no, our hero was after something more and by the end of the song was himself offering a gold ring and a visit to the church that very afternoon. Anthony changed some of the words for gentle comedic effect, for example, substituting ‘daisies’ in the original for ’wotsit’ and ‘oojahs’ in the line ‘Singing singing buttercups and daisies’ as well as
inserting hurried spoken phrases such as, ‘so I says to this bird’ … and then proceeding to advise her of his innermost thoughts. Finally, where the earlier versions tail off with a ‘Ri fol, ri fol, tol de riddle dee, Newley cannot resist getting the last word by saying with a chuckle, ‘Shan’t be round tomorrow – the dog has pinched all the strawberries!’ Not really sure what that bit is all about but perhaps we can agree not to investigate this last comment just in case. And don’t let’s get started on ‘ri fol’ and tiddle dee’ or whatever. Anyway, whilst the above could be said to be a story of romance , as required by the title of the LP, it is difficult to see how ‘Yes, We Have No Bananas’ and ‘Pop Goes the Weasel’ fit in but fitted in they are. The banana song is basically about a greengrocer who just could not say that, ‘No, I have none of those today’ preferring instead, ‘Yes, I have none of those today’ and then decoying with the advice that he has ‘cucumbers in unlimited numbers’. I’m not sure he’d like the Trading Standards office to investigate that claim, however and ‘Pop Goes the Weasel’; just a bunch of nonsensical verses which end in the title as if that explains everything. I suppose it all depends on one’s definition of ‘romantic’, though. As well as the love aspect, dictionaries suggest stuff like ‘fanciful’, unrealistic’ and ‘impractical’ so maybe in the wider understanding of the word, any thought on the subject is fair game.
So, now, calm down everybody. We’ve had our fun. I feel it is only fair that I select a couple of tunes for suggested future listening if one should feel so inclined. ‘And the Heavens Cried’ from the Romantic World record is a pretty strong song, I reckon and ‘I See Your Face before Me’ from the Lonely World disc has interesting tempo changes.
TERESA BREWER
Whilst not the only one (Josh White for example) Ms Brewer is unusual within the world of WORLD OFs as she is not British but American. Theresa Veronica Breuer, as she was born, has more than one voice and all are in evidence on THE WORLD OF TERESA BREWER (SPA 523). She preferred to sing ballads but it was the more baby-
voiced songs that became hits such as ‘Choo’n Gum’ and ‘Molasses Molasses’. In fact, Brewer had just one ballad that made the charts and that was a song called ‘Longing for You’. Unfortunately, whilst the former two songs feature on the LP, the latter does not. You do, however, get ‘You’ve got me Crying Again’ which is a bit more grown up but then you also get ‘Cincinnati Dancing Pig’! One might feel that you get quite a lot of this and not very much of that. Anyway, when Brewer was about 18 she signed for the American arm of the Decca record label, London. The first three releases flopped but the fourth, ‘Copenhagen’ fared better. Or rather, the flip side did. ‘Music, Music, Music’ sent the record gold, selling over a million but it could maybe have sold more if not for a worker’s strike at the Decca plant in the UK at which the disc was pressed. That need not concern you now, my friend, as both tunes await you on the record.
THE WORLD OF POP HITS COMPILATIONS Mention has been made of the records comprising compilations of pop hits by various artists throughout the above but we should just finish off this section with a quick
run-through of the goodies not yet brought to your att
a set of five LPs entitled GOLDEN DECCADE (SPAs 477 to 481). Apart from the
catalogue numbers and main cover colour, the records are distinguishable by the dates in the top right hand corner of each cover, for example, SPA 477 features tunes from ‘1960-1’ whilst SPA 481 has music from ‘1968-9’. As in similar cases, there are some artists here that will have their own WORLD OF records in our collection and so may be discussed elsewhere. Artists such as: Billy Fury, Tommy Steele and The Bachelors. In fact, Billy Fury is one of the performers who appears three times amongst the DECCADE series along with Dave Berry, Billie Davis and Tom Jones all of whom we have covered already. Those with two entries in the DECCADEs are Tommy Steele, The Bachelors, Val Doonican, The Fortunes, Zombies, Engelbert Humperdinck, Alan Price, Lulu, Kathy Kirby The Nashville Teens and Brian Poole and The Tremeloes though actually one of those appearances is of The Tremeloes without Brian. Of these, only the latter two acts do not show up elsewhere so …
THE NASHVILLE TEENS
As well as the two songs in the DECCADEs, The Nashville Teens contribute ‘Tobacco Road' to THE WORLD OF HITS VOL. 2 (SPA 35). On GOLDEN DECCADE (SPA-R 480), we have ‘The Biggest Night of Her Life’ along with a stab at Bob Dylan’s ‘All Along the Watchtower’. The latter lends more faithfulness to Dylan’s vocal styling than to probably the most well-known other cover version, that by Jimi Hendrix. The instrumental back-up is pretty spare as well with a heavy, simple guitar phrase and clunking piano accompaniment at the intro and throughout during pauses between verses; the piano continues with its 4-note ascendances all over the verses, too. The Teens started in 1962 and ended … well, they haven’t yet. At time of writing, original vocal lead, Ray Phillips still presents the band which features drummer of more than 40 years, Adrian Metcalfe. Hailing from Weybridge one might wonder where the Nashville bit came from. Well, it comes simply from the title of a favourite Everly Brothers tune, ‘Nashville Blues’. Over the years, the Teens have bothered the UK singles charts little with just two top ten hits, John D Loudermilk’s ‘Tobacco Road’ and ‘Google Eye’. ‘Tobacco Road’ reached No. 6 whilst ‘Google Eye’ got to No. 10 but both had extended stays in the charts; 13 weeks and 10 weeks respectively.
THE TREMELOES Now here’s a top pop act. The Trems, with and without Brian Poole, scored twice at No. 1 (‘Do You Love Me?’ and ‘Silence is Golden’) with 9 other top 10s. The band were all in their teens when they got together in 1958 and were soon intriguing staff at Decca who were after adding a rock band to their roster, and so invited them in for audition. The timing made a bit of sense for the record label as they already had a band try-out lined up and so would only need to drag staff in for one session rather than two. Happily, when it came to decide which band to take on, the Tremeloes were the winners. At the time, Decca must have thought that they were winners as well having had the chance to reject the original band of interest. Silly name, anyway – The Beatles, indeed. So, the Tremeloes it was though Decca fancied having a named member, as was the trend at that time, so they were rechristened Brian Poole and the Tremeloes. Hmmm. One wonders who they would have chosen in the event that the other band had pulled it off. Anyway, seven years after kicking off as a quintet, The Trems were playing as a quartet with the departure of Brian Poole, who may have considered that he was leaving a sinking ship because, as yet, success was looking increasingly unlikely. Even worse, Decca dropped them, too. This unhappy situation was maybe, however, the best thing that could have happened as soon they were enjoying the success, news of which this section started. Now for the list of those artists with just a single entry in the DECCADES: Bryan Johnson – Looking High, High, High Dorothy Squires – This Place called Home Ken Dodd – Once in Every Lifetime Joe Brown – The Darktown Strutters’ Ball Julie Andrews – Tom Pillibi Max Bygraves – Fings ain’t Wot they Used to Be Anthony Newley – Why Lyn Cornell – Never on a Sunday Georgia Brown – As Long as He Needs Me Eden Kane – Well, I Ask You The Tornados – Telstar Heinz – Just Like Eddie Clodagh Rogers – Believe Me I’m No Fool Karl Denver – Wimoweh Jet Harris & Tony Meehan – Diamonds Unit 4+2 – Concrete and Clay The Applejacks – Tell Me When Marianne Faithfull – As Tears go By Los Bravos – Black is Black David Essex – The Day the Earth Stood Still Donald Peers – Was it Yesterday Tam White – Girl Watcher The Casuals – Jesamine Bruce Forsyth – When You gotta Go Noel Harrison – Young Girl (of Sixteen) Marmalade – Reflections of My Life THE NEW FACES THE WORLD OF THE NEW FACES: FROM THE SATURDAY CROWD (SPA 56) features four of the Scottish vocal trio’s seven Decca singles, namely ‘We Can Get There by Candlelight’, ‘Someday’, If You Love Me’, and ‘Happy the Heart that I Own’ along with the B-sides of the latter two. There are also two flip-sides on their own; ‘Carnival Day’ and ‘Danny Boy’ though ‘Danny Boy’ was on the A-side of a promotional single. The final 45 of the seven does not feature at all as its release date was 1970 and our LP
came out a year earlier. Still, what we have is a record of largely happy, care-free, upbeat pop songs which ought cause offence to no-one. The Saturday Crowd was a popular variety show from 1969 to the early seventies with regular contributions from such as comedy from actress Sheila Bernette and Leslie Crowther; song and dance from WORLD OF’s Peter Gordeno and song from Lonnie Donegan, Susan Maughan and The New Faces who named themselves after a regular column in the music paper, Record Mirror. Through the upheaval of many line-up changes, the group continued performing with one ever-present member, Charles Mackay. One of the line-ups temporarily changed their name to Mahogany and entered Thames TV talent show, Opportunity Knocks in 1976. The following year, the name returned to New Faces, probably with a couple of … er … new faces.
EUROPE AND BEYOND MAURICE CHEVALIER Think of French chanteur, Maurice Chevalier and you think of his straw hat. Not straight away, obviously. First, you’ll think of little girls and then maybe the hat. Perhaps I should explain right away, for those of you that I have successfully confused, that ‘Thank Heaven for Little Girls’ is a song written for the stage show,
Gigi, which has the singer stating right from the off that every time he sees a little girl, he can’t resist a joyous urge, and this song is perennially linked to Maurice as he was the first performer of it. Anyway, in case anybody is interested, I’ll return to the hat. Even more perennially linked to Chevalier is the straw hat – I say ‘even more perennially’ because whilst he was about 70 years of age when first singing the above-mentioned song, he was only in his teens when procuring his first straw hat. You’ll not find many photos of M Chevalier without his trademark boater, though I notice that he is hat-free on the cover of his record here and that he conformed to convention during his time in the French Army by donning regulation army-issue headgear. THE WORLD OF MAURICE CHEVALIER (SPA-R 146) hosts several of Chevalier’s early songs which were responsible for attracting international acclaim, though not the one above. We have signature tunes ‘Mimi’, ‘Louise’ (prefixed by the word ‘Ma’ on cover and label) and ‘Valentine’ plus others that you’ll feel that you have known for years. CATERINA VALENTE Caterina was highly thought of during her career as she performed songs of various genres in various languages accompanying herself on guitar whilst tap dancing and juggling. The latter skill came courtesy of her juggling husband who was soon
juggling husband duties with managerial ones for Caterina. Knowing of this list of Valente’s achievements, you may not be surprised to learn that she was inducted into the Guinness Book of Records. In 1986. Caterina Valente was Europe’s most prolific female singer having released over 1350 tunes (now risen to more than 1500) in 12 languages. One of which was ‘Vive le Rock and Roll’ a duet with Bill Haley, in fact, the only record that has Haley partnered by a female artist.
Italian songstress, Valente, appears on three WORLD OF LPs, one of which is her own. The other two are THE WORLD OF PHASE 4 STEREO (SPA 32) and THE PHASE 4 WORLD OF LATIN FIRE (SPA 408) on both of which she partners Edmundo Ros on ‘La Bamba’ and ‘Maria Elena’ respectively. These versions of both songs feature on THE WORLD OF CATERINA VALENTE (SPA 192). Her first major successes were with ‘Malagueña’ and ‘The Breeze and I’, this latter tune was her only hit in the UK, getting to no. 5 in 1955. These two songs get the two sides of the record off to a fine start. Malegueña is splendidly dramatic and effortlessly delivered. In fact, listening to the LP, the over-riding aspect is the easy professionalism with which Valente handles all songs regardless of type and genre.
From the drama of the first track to the ballad ‘The Fool on the Hill’; the easy harmonic latin alongside Edmundo on ‘Marie Elena’ to the pop of Mexican folk song, ‘La Bamba’; the Spanish waltz of the copla ‘Cielito Lindo’ to the bossa nova of ‘The Girl from Ipanema’. All this and PEANUUUUTS! too (that is, ‘The Peanut Vendor’). So, who was the girl from Ipanema? Well, I have been to the trouble of finding out so that you don’t have to. This song is about seventeen year old (in 1962) Brazilian Helo Pinheiro who attracted the attention of composer Antonio Carlos Jobim whilst attracting the eye of each and every other male on the beach in Rio. LOS MACHUCAMBOS Costa Rican singer Julia Cortes formed Los Machucambos with Rafaêl Gayoso and Milton Zapata, a Spaniard and Peruvian respectively. A largely South American flavour
then, except that it was in Paris that they came together and to break the mood even further, the splendidly named Zapata was replaced soon after by someone called Romano Zanotti, who appears on our record cover, and was Italian! Ah well, sometimes it just feels like things are not as they really should be but, don’t worry, THE PHASE 4 WORLD OF LOS MACHUCAMBOS (SPA 144) will bring things right back to the mood inspired by the band name and Latin looks of the personnel on the LP cover. The first track, for goodness sake, is ‘La Cucaracha’! a slightly lazy delivery but it sets the ambience for the next 40 minutes or so and listen out for the guinea pig impersonation a few seconds into the next tune ‘El Rancho Grande’, the guinea pig being a very important creature in the
South Americas … true, it is as a food source but, you know … the ambience … Also here, for your listening pleasure, are ‘El Cumbanchero’, ‘La Bamba’ and ‘The Girl from Ipanema’. This is a fine record, of its type. The band also have a song on THE WORLD OF HAPPY SOUNDS AND MELODIES (SPA 338) and two more tunes on THE PHASE 4 WORLD OF LATIN FIRE (SPA 408). Oh, and the name, Los Machucambos, means ‘armadillo’ to South American Indians and these little fellows are also important creatures in South America … true, their horny shells are used to make the lute-type mandolin called a charango that the group use … Oh, don’t worry, the armadillos are killed first … Ooh! You know … that ambience? … Forget it!
GIUSEPPE DI STEFANO
Italian operatic tenor, Giuseppe (Pippo) Di Stefano, born 14 years before Luciano Pavarotti, was the latter’s idol but things could have turned out differently. Giuseppe was headed for a life in the priesthood early on but after a spell in the Italian army, decided on a career in singing, falling out of love with Mussolini and deserting to
Switzerland in 1943, two years before the end of the Second World War. He made his inaugural professional performance at age 25 and would go on to rack up an impressive portfolio of recordings including a dozen or so with soprano Maria Callas. Di Stefano’s voice has always been praised for its emotional immersion into, for example, heartbreak, melancholy and, to quote David Salazar in his notes on The Glorious Dramatic Art of Tenor Giuseppe Di Stefano3, ‘disillusion and nostalgia’. Though known as an opera singer, he sings a fine ballad too and the bulk of THE WORLD OF NEOPOLITAN SONG: GIUSEPPE DI STEFANO (SPA 313) is comprised of just this type of song and begins with a song that Elvis fans will recognise even if unable to sing along with. This particularly Neopolitan ballad, ‘Torna a Surriento’ was arranged to produce one of Presley 21 UK No. 1s, ‘Surrender’. Giuseppi Di Stefano’s career took a battering after years of dragging his tiring voice through many operas and other performances, when he took on a concert tour with Maria Callas, whose voice was also suffering. Both singers recognised the end of tremendous careers, winding down by taking minor roles.
THE MEXICANS
All of the tunes on THE WORLD OF TIJUANA: THE MEXICANS (SPA 95) can be found
on albums by Tijuana brass giant, Herb Alpert except ‘Comin’ in the Back Door’. The song arrangements are largely similar to Alpert’s versions but the sound here is a little thinner. There is very little information on the band so how's about we talk a little about Tijuana itself. This from The Lonely Planet, '... sleazy red-light district … gritty … plenty of violent crime …'4. Hmmmm, Cornwall again this year, then.
PACO PEÑA
Pure flamenco, a symbol of Spain, is Paco Peña’s bag. Not that he’s inflexible. He has, after all, been on the same card as Jimi Hendrix! Still, when you think that he had eight siblings and seven of those were sisters, I guess flexibility was a virtue. As a
young lad, after being inspired by his guitar-playing brother, Peña was encouraged to follow a dream after hearing such as Elvis Presley and Paul Anka. Flamenco puro was still a little way in the future, then. Paco is a self-taught musician, absorbing techniques from his brother and friends but he really began to pick up the craft of performance art when he was chosen to join a government program at the age of 12 aimed at promoting Spanish culture. Whilst playing with this group of performers, he was invited to tour with a flamenco troupe – he was still at school juggling his responsibilities which got even more complicated when he was obliged to leave school in order to help out his impoverished family, taking on two jobs whilst continuing to play. It was his intolerance of less disciplined members of the group that helped determine him to become a solo performer. So, Paco Peña and his music is very very Spanish but he actually resides in London. The music on THE FLAMENCO WORLD OF PACO PEÑA (SPA 534) is mainly traditional though Peña wrote two of the 13 tunes; ‘Patio de Arcos’ and ‘El Templo’.
Please do read the rest of the Lonely Planet's account on Tijuana. Mexico, including the town of Tijuana, sounds like a fantastic place to visit.
Other references available on request
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