2012-04-05

TOMMYKNOCKERS BEAT CLUB VOLUME 11: More uncompiled UK beat & R&B rarities from the sixties again. KNOCKIN' ALL OVER!

Domestic and Continental recordings of rare British 60's beat. Running out of superlatives (no need to mention the kinks, jeff beck, pink floyd, the rolling stones, schildkröte, cozy powell and more celebrities included here et nunc) we beat on wunderbar without further ado:

01 - That's My Story - The Nightshift (Piccadilly,65)

02 - I Don't Need You Anymore - The Kinks (unrel. studio outtake 64)

03 - Lucy Leave - The Abdabs aka Tea-Set (unrel. acetate 65)

04 - Go Home Girl - Stones (unrel. studio outtake 65)

05 - You're The Reason Why - Adam, Mike & Tim (Decca,64)

06 - Speak Up - Opal Butterfly (CBS,68)

07 - You're Gonna Come Home Cryin' - The Roger James Four (Columbia,66)

08 - Talk To Me - The Hobby Shop (Columbia,68)

09 - She'll Know I'm Sorry - The Variations (Immediate,65)

10 - Treat Her Good - Chris Farlowe (Immediate,65)

11 - I Do Know - Steve Darbishire (Decca,66)

12 - I Can't Stop - Dave Dee, Dozy, Beaky, Mick & Tich (Fontana,65)

13 - Beautiful Dreamer - Johnnie Dee & His Dee-Troit Sounds (Swedish-only Sonet,65)

14 - Baby Of The May - The Motives (Dutch-only EP "The World Is A Trapezium", Telstar,68)

15 - What'cha Gonna Do - Lee Curtis & The All Stars (Live on German TV. "Beat Club",67)

16 - How Does She Look - The Shakespeares (Belgian-only RCA,67)

17 - Leaving You - Mike Rabin & The Demons (Columbia,64)

18 - Like I Love You - The Shevelles (Oriole,64)

19 - True To You - Jason Eddy & The Centremen (Parlophone,66)

20 - Don't Take Away Your Love - The London Chimes (US-only Philips, 65)

21 - It's All Over - The Transatlantics (King,66)

22 - Crazy Beatle Boots - Colin Anthony & His Beat Combo (German-only Fontana,64)

23 - I See The Light - The Sonic (German-only LP "English Beat Company". MPS-Center,69)

24 - Hey Bulldog - John Deen & The Trakk (German-only CBS,69)

25 - Matchbox - The Sound Riders (German-only LP "Liverpool Beat", Ariola,64)

26 - Sorrow - The Roadrunners (German-only Paletten,66)

27 - Love Is A Beautiful Thing - The Sorcerers (German-only Paletten,67)

28 - The Blue Way To Go - Kenny & The Cars (German-only GM-Ariola,67)

29 - Jump Back - The Bunch Of Fives (Live on German TV. "Beat Club",66)

30 - For You - The Tremors (German-only LP "Tremors beaten an: Die Knüller", Elite Special,65)

31 - Soulful Dress - The Wild Oats (unrel. studio outtake 65)

32 - Someone Needs You - The Creatures (CBS,66)

33 - It's A Lie - Philip Goodhand-Tait & The Stormsville Shakers (Parlophone,66)

-----UK 45s except where noted------

The Nightshift from London started as The Crescents and had a young Jeff Beck on guitar. He quit before the only 7" was recorded, but according to rumours, he helped his mates in the studio nevertheless. +++

No Kinks cover this time, but the real thing. An unreleased studio outake that doesn't show up on every second Kinks repackaging. +++

Next is Pink Floyd 65 as a five-piece with Bob Klose on lead guitar. The story of The Abdabs (or Screamin' Abdabs or Architectural Abdabs) is a bit complicated, as they seemed to change the name weekly. They also sailed under the flags of Sigma 6 and The Megadeaths, until they found the final line-up, and while "Lucy Leave" usually is credited to The Abdabs, it's more likely that they recorded this acetate as the Tea Set (or T-Set), while I also saw an acetate with "Pink Floyd" scribbled on the blank label. Who cares... a great Syd composition anyway. +++

More celebrities? Unreleased Rolling Stones... Why they decided not to publish "Go Home Girl" is hard to tell. But indeed Dave Berry's version is doing the song a little more justice, and they've already had problems with putting enough soul in "You Better Move On", another song written and recorded in unsurpassable manner by the mighty Arthur Alexander, who also had "Anna", "Soldiers Of Love" and "A Shot Of Rhythm & Blues" up his sleeve, to name a few. +++

Don't know who Adam, Mike & Tim were. But this seemingly is the first ever recording of a composition by future Pink Floyd's Rick Wright, so here you have it. +++

Opal Butterfly from Oxfordshire had former Rockin' Vicar and future MotorHawkWindHead Lemmy in the ranks for half a year, but not on this 45, the first of three. +++

Here's the flip of the second of two singles (a-side on "Purple Pill Eaters") by The Roger James Four from somewhere Greater London, who... +++

...lost one member by the wayside and thus had to change the name. Instead of Roger James Three, they opted for the much hipper Hobby Shop on this last effort in 68. We probably will hear more from this great, but totally overlooked outfit on a future volume. +++

The Variations had an early one-off on Immediate produced by Paul Raven and arranged by Denny Gerrard. That's Gary Glitter meets The Warm Sounds. No pun intended. +++

Chris Farlowe's "Treat Her Good" is another 65 release on Immediate, this time produced by Eric Burdon. How they got away with a five-finger discount on this 1:1-copy of Roy Head's "Treat Her Right" by changing one word and releasing it under the phantom writer's credit of "Dighton"? Dunno. Time-barred anyway. +++

Steve Darbishire again. (see vol. 4). Still no idea where the guy came from. This is his second release, co-written with Pete Dello, the later mastermind of Honeybus. +++

Dave Dee & Co were formed in Salisbury as Dave Dee & The Bostons. "I Can't Stop" is the flip of their first UK minor hit "You Make it Move", (which was downgraded to b-side status on the Continent.) In Germany, were they got extremely popular with the next 45 "Hold Tight", the number wasn't released at all, as it just was a minor hit for The Honeycombs here. (The Honeycombs' version had no 7" release in the UK.) +++

Johnnie Dee is no other than John Christian Dee, the dazzling character who wrote "Don't Bring Me Down" for The Pretties and "Get Yourself Home" for The Fairies, and had some 45s under his own name, before he settled down in Germany where he was one half of our Sonny & Cher clones Adam & Eve. Inbetween he had to stay away from England for a while, where he was charged with procuration. Later on, he stabbed his girlfriend in Germany and broke out of jail in the late 70s without leaving an address. He also produced beat groups in Germany and Bulldog Breed's album in England. Prolific little bastard. He even found time for an attempt at starting a parallel career in Sweden, where he had two singles on Sonet. Stephen Foster's "Beautiful Dreamer" already was a hundred years old, when it became a Liverpool stage favourite in versions by The Beatles, The Searchers, Rory Storm and Cliff Bennett. Johnnie Dee's rendition with the Brian Jones-quote is somethin' else... +++

We've already had two of the songs from The Motives's EP on Prae-Kraut Pandaemonium vols. 17 and 18 here on this blog. The members were servicemen of the British Rhine Army in Wildenrath, Germany (or Tommies, as they were called by the natives). To record this rare artefact, they just crossed the bridge to Holland, which led to some misbelief among collectors, but they definitely were not a Dutch group. Tom Winter stayed active in this part of Europe for another decade and released records with German and Dutch musicians.+++

After three singles on Decca (the fourth on Philips was a Star Club licence) Lee Curtis from Liverpool centered his life around Hamburg, where he recorded two LPs and a couple of 45s for Star Club. While most of these records sound a bit bloodless, he was an amazing stage act with his All Stars. By the time of this TV performance for the famous "Beat Club" in Bremen, he had a German drummer and keyboarder, the latter being Franz "Piggy" Jarnach, the guy you can watch each sunday on German TV as Schildkröte (= turtle) in the comedy show "Dittsche" with the sentence "Halt die Klappe, ich hab Feierabend", which translates as "Shut up, I'm kocking off!" +++

The story of The Shakespeares, originally from Rhodesia, can be found on vol. 5 under Shake Spears, as they used to spell the name in 65. Please excuse the borderline sound quality on this tough to find rarity. +++

Some say Manchester, but I guess London is the better bet: Mike Rabin & The Demons only recorded this 7", a second single a year later credited to Mike Rabin & His Music seemingly hasn't got much to do with The Demons. The a-side "Head Over Heels" showed up on three essential compitations. Here's the flip. Terry Stamp on bass later joined progsters Harsh Reality and left-wing agit-proppers Third World War. +++

Not quite sure whether this Shevelles are the same who later recorded as Shevells and Mike Stevens & The Shevells. If so, they'd be a Welsh band with six singles from 63 to 68, and you should also check vols. 2 & 9. +++

Merseybeat again: Jason Eddy's (or Eddie's) real name was Albert Wycherley, and he was the younger brother of Billy Fury until he died last year. The Joe Meek produced "True To You" was the flip of "Singing The Blues", one of two 45s on Parlophone with The Centremen, confusingly one credited to Jason Eddie, the other to Jason Eddy. He had a last attempt with a solo single - as Eddie again - for the small Tangerine label in 69, which I haven't heard yet. +++

Read about The (London) Chimes and their short, but very international recording career on vol. 6. Here's the a-side of the 7", recorded by a British band in Germany, but only released (as a single) in the USA. +++

More of The Transatlantics on vols. 3 & 7. Here's the third of five 45s, and there's still some in the can. +++

The mysterious Colin Anthony toured Germany in 64 and managed not only to record this single here, but a whole album, which was released as "Colin Is Fab". (See Prae-Kraut 16). He and his Beat Combo definitely were British, but no-one seems to know more about them. +++

The Sonic, who already had released two singles in Germany as The Sonics, were two Scots and two Englishmen resident in Kassel, Hessia, if memory serves. Before they left Teutonia they recorded this hard to find LP for Center, the budget label of Musikproduktion Schwarzwald, the famous MPS label, known for its unique jazz productions. (See also Prae-Kraut 19.) +++

John Deen and The Trakk were a Scottish group who often visited Germany since the days they still were known as John Deen & The Deacons. (One 7" on Hit House.) As the Trakk they recorded two 45s for the German branch of CBS and an LP for Europa. No homeland recordings though... +++

The same is true for The Sound Riders, a British group captured live on stage in the famous Kaskade Beat-Club in Cologne, and pressed in plastic by Ariola, who did the same with the German-only live LP by The Swinging Blue Jeans, and with The Boomerangs on the budget label Baccarola. By the way: "Matchbox" usually is credited to Carl Perkins, but indeed it was first recorded by Blind Lemon Jefferson in the late 20s. +++ The Roadrunners in question are not Mike Hart's Liverpool band, who did most of their recordings in Germany for Ariola and Star Club. Maybe the good people at Paletten Schallplatten thought that they could cash in in 66 with this established name of a band that no longer existed. Recorded in England, released in Germany, but we'll never know who really plays on this amazing - superior in my book - version of The Merseys' greatest hit. +++

Birmingham's Sorcerers were Ken Aston, Pete Ball, Roy Black (no, not the man from Augsburg), Chris Moore and Cozy Powell. Their discography consists of three 45s, all recorded and released in Germany. The first and best on the Saba label (pictured here) was part of Prae-Kraut vol. 4, the second on Kerston was an attempt to create some German schlagers in Teutonic tongue, and isn't really worth our attention. Here's the third on Paletten, a pretty decent cover of a Young Rascals hit. Dubbed from a near mint copy, but the sound is as muddy as on many German small label releases, when the engineer had to handle some full blast group effort with soul leanings. Back in England they changed name to Youngblood, and Cozy plus the Ball brothers Dave and Denny (Pete seemingly stepped out somewhere along the line) became The Ace Kefford Stand, who, after the departure of Ace, were known as Big Bertha. +++

Kenny MacGaskill came from Glasgow to Germany with his group The Fleets and settled down in Kassel for some years when the others went back home. He recorded here for Metronome and GM-Ariola, backed by The Sonics (see track 24) and The Cars, a half German, half British band. More of him on Electrick Loosers vol.4 here on this blog. +++ With Viv Prince, Dave Stewart and Mick Wayne, the short-lived Bunch Of Fives had some illustrious members in the line-up. They only released one 7", but were active on the club scene for half a year. They even appeared on German TV, but they were last of the bill, and faded out before they had played the last chords of Rufus Thomas' "Jump Back". But this is all we've got. Here 'tis, take it or leave it. And - bad news for all Pretties aficionados - the drummer on this video doesn't look much like Vivian. Don't know who he is, but definitely no Prince. In 67 they were known as The Tickle, and recorded the superb "Subway" for Regal Zonophone. +++

For the story of The Tremors check the last volume. This is a track from their rare, but for the most part disappointing German LP. +++

And another unreleased track from Leiston's Wild Oats (See vols. 2 & 7). No, it's not on the Oak Story and not on 10th Planet's live LP. +++

The Creatures again. Read more about this Irish band from Dublin on vols. 1, 2 and 8. This is the b-side of the third single they recorded in the States, and the last that had a UK release. +++

We've already had Philip Goodhand-Tait's Stormsville Shakers, who came to London from Surrey, with a foreign EP on vol. 3 (where I misspelled them as Stormeville Shakers. Ashes on my head...) Here is the flip of the UK debut. Stay tuned.

(The Lolly Pope and van daale, the engineer)


TOMMYKNOCKERS 11
(154 mb / mp3 256 kbps / all scans and liners included / direct download)


9 comments:

Anonymous said...

Ha, da habt Ihr aber mal mein Easter gerettet, DANKE !

Btw, Colin Anthony ist doch gar nicht soo mysteriös:
http://www.colinanthony.co.uk/index.htm

I stay turned on...
J.

Anonymous said...

Thanks for sharing from Portugalete

Gummo said...

Always happy to see a new Tommyknockers, thanks!

Gyro1966 said...

Thanks so much for another superb volume! Here's a fully tagged version via mediafire:

http://www.mediafire.com/?o31cfj33898h13b

michael vee said...

.. wunderbar as can be! my fave tracks are by The Nightshift, The Roger James Four, Steve Darbishire (again), DDDBM&T (my first concert!),Bunch Of Fives, The Sorcerers, The Wild Oates, Creatures, Philip Goodhand Tait... just what I needed brother .... and here's the booklet:
http://www.mediafire.com/view/?u33dic2y29mejcx

Gyro1966 said...

Here's a fully tagged version, with the booklet as well:

https://rapidshare.com/files/3548764994/tommyknockers12.zip

Thanks again for this great compilation!

Anonymous said...

Thanks for what's obviously a labor of love, and thanks to Gyro for his contribution!

Anonymous said...

What can i say more than thank you for all you've been sharing , one the best blog.

JK from T.O

Anonymous said...

This is history of the modern age. You are doing a tremendous work.
Thanxalot for your effort
Kostas (Athens, GR)