British Invasion
29 November 2016
Who knew they were all British?
Time / Life - The British Invasion
One of my cable stations has been showing a half-hour infomercial program for Time-Life's CD release on this topic. It is often called simply the "beat" sound and refers to the "Ferry Cross the Mersey" (Gerry and the Pacemakers) type stuff that we listened to from the mid-60's to early 70's. I was surprised how some of these songs totally escaped my notice and at how many of these British groups I always assumed to be Americans. Of course we did not have the benefit of MTV or the internet in those days so the only visuals were on album covers and 45 picture sleeves.
For example, to the extent that I even thought about it I assumed that "The Spencer Davis Group" was a R&B band out of Detroit that was trying to cash in on the pop music craze; "I'm a Man" and "Gimme Some Lovin" sounding similar but even lamer than a "Sam & Dave" standard like "Hold On, I'm Comin'".
Beat music, British beat, or Merseybeat (after bands from Liverpool and nearby areas beside the River Mersey) is a pop and rock music genre that developed in the United Kingdom in the early 1960s. Beat music is a fusion of rock and roll (mainly Chuck Berry guitar style and the midtempo beat of artists like Buddy Holly), doo-wop, skiffle and R&B. The genre provided many of the bands responsible for the British Invasion of the American pop charts starting in 1964, and provided the model for many important developments in pop and rock music, including the format of the rock group around lead, rhythm and bass guitars with drums.
I guess that "Careful with That Ax, Eugene" does not fit the genre as it is absent from the DVD collection.
Peter Noone is the host of the Time-Life infomercial. He is less than three years older than me but was already a big star when I was still working as a paperboy. For the purpose of this retrospective I will confine the discussion to groups that Noone promotes on the the 8 CD set infomercial.
Getting most of our exposure from AM radio, almost all baby boomers knew that Herman's Hermits (they sang about Henry VIII after-all), The Beatles, The Stones, The Who, Freddie & The Dreamers, Peter & Gordon (easy for someone who was totally into Jane Asher), Gerry and the Pacemakers, Chad & Jeremy (for those who watched "Batman" as "Catwoman" stole their voices in one episode), Marianne Faithful, Lulu, Petula Clark, Tom Jones, and Rod Stewart were British. Later even Deep Purple.
insert "Huge Crush" here
Of course there were cases of the opposite, until recently I assumed that The Dovells' "Bristol Stomp" was about a dance in Bristol UK, I'm not sure I gave any thought to whether the group themselves was a British band.
It turns out that the song was written about teenagers in 1961 who were dancing a new step called "The Stomp" at Good Will Hose Company dances in Bristol Pennsylvania, a blue collar suburb of Philadelphia. Who knew?
"The kids in Bristol are sharp as a pistol
When they do the Bristol Stomp
Really somethin' when the joint is jumpin'
When they do the Bristol Stomp"
Then there were the more attentive group of boomers, those who regularly read music magazines and watched pop music shows on television. They knew that the list of popular British bands included a second tier consisting of groups such as The Animals, Procol Harum, The Moody Blues, The Zombies, The Hollies, The Yardbirds, and later Mott the Hoople. I on the other hand listened to most of these groups for years before being at all aware that they were British. Of course I never saw music videos like this one:
(with lots of young thin 60's women)
I feel compelled to include Billy J. Kramer & The Dakotas in this tier. Lame and obscure, their point of origin was confused by the American Indian reference and the Polka Varieties LP pose. But they have the distinction of being Brian Epstein's other group and John Lennon gave them songs to record. And those baby boomers prowling through issues of Song Hits and Tiger Beat at their favorite record store during the early days of the Beatles, could see that the group was obviously British and was being billed the next big thing (although the invitations were sent out - that party never happened).
A third tier of British Invasion groups on these CD's are those who to this day virtually nobody realizes were British. Small Faces (Itchycoo Park hardly sounds British - But Steve Marriott's fashions if you had known about them were a giveaway), Free (but "All Right Now" is the Stanford Band's stands tune), Traffic (I think I once knew somebody with one of their albums).
"The Mighty Quinn" being the nickname of a guy from junior high school and Manfred being the name of Tom Terrific's dog how would I have even entertained the idea of Manfred Mann being Brits?
Or the Searchers (not to be confused with the John Wayne movie) sounds too much like "The Seekers" who were Australian; and wasn't "Love Potion No. 9" set in New Orleans. Plus we had already heard this done by "The Clovers".
Or anyone professionally known as "Dusty", other than Johnny Mack Brown's sidekick. Who knew that her real name was "Mary Isobel Catherine Bernadette O'Brien"?
The Foundations, with "Baby Now That I've Found You" and "Build Me Up Buttercup" had two toppers on the pop charts, but who knew about their point of origin. These were not songs I ever sought out.
And if Paper Lace was British what were they doing singing about "The Night Chicago Died"?
Finally there is a fourth tier of British Invasion groups who nobody has ever heard of or has long forgotten; with songs on the CD collection with no more purpose than to pad the running length. Hard to be nostalgic about songs you don't recall ever hearing.
Or songs like Wayne Fontana & The Mindbenders "Game of Love" which I only wish I could forget - it is a horribly lame song and hardly what you would expect from someone calling themselves "mindbenders"; more like "mindnumb-ers".
The Silkie is representative of this tier - their version of "You've Got To Hide Your Love Away" sounds like Cat Stevens singing harmony with Elaine Benes. Obviously no Beatles magic happened with them.
Along the same lines is "I Think of You" by the Merseybeats; while they are obviously British I don't recall their song having any role in the Invasion.
The Fortunes (Here Comes that Rainy Day Feeling Again) sounds like a group with a lot of hits but they were not. They also did "You've Got Your Troubles", both songs would cause me to immediately hit another station's button on the car radio.
And then we have Leapy Lee, bet you didn't know that he was British. His song is not included in the CD set but the discussion gives me an opportunity to mention the creepy imagined imagery and the inspired comedy that was "The Little Arrows Club" of Dilgard Auto Parts. Just click on this link:
Dave Dee, Dozy, Beaky, Mick & Tich
Also notably absent from the collection are any of the hits from this strangely named group, a group where Peter Townsend is thought to have almost landed. Perhaps not that strange because they were never especially popular this side of the pond, I probably recall them only because Cleveland radio gave them a lot of play, unlike most the country.