Released in 1964, Baby Please Don't Go would have been in the tiny library of singles that Big L had aboard the ship from the beginning (see the Cliff Richard story below). In Brian Long's book, The London Sound, Kenny Everett related how the DJs had to play the few available tracks so often that the songs would be going round and round in their heads all night when they tried to sleep! Any new material arriving on the tender would be fallen upon by the jocks like starving men on a crust of bread. During those desperate few weeks, they must been ecstatic to discover that the Them single had a brilliant B-side, in the form of Gloria which they were only too happy to play just as much as the A-side!

Listening to Baby Please Don't Go on Oldies Project, it occurred to the Radio London webmasters that in well over 40 years, neither of them had ever been able to decipher the words Van Morrison was singing. Off they went to look up Muddy Waters' words and found them on the Blues For Peace site. Finally understanding those words led to another search. We now know all about Rolling Forks, in Pope County, Minnesota, a town of folk with predominantly Norwegian ancestry!

By coincidence, a couple of days later we were contacted by Francis K, webmaster of the Irish '60s Showbands & Beat-Groups Archive. It's a great site, giving a fascinating insight into a thriving music scene about which most of us outside of Ireland have remained totally ignorant. There aren't too many Fab Forty artists on Francis's site, but of course there's always Them.

The Irish '60s Showbands & Beat-Groups Archive reveals that the Belfast band's line-up at the time of the recording was Billy Harrison (guitar),  Alan Henderson (bass) and Van Morrison (vocals/harmonica), two other members having left. However, only Van appeared on the single, with Decca's Dick Rowe ousting the other band members in favour of experienced session men like Jimmy Page. The follow-up release Here Comes the Night appeared as Dave Cash's climber six weeks later on March 14th and held the #2 slot for two weeks running. (Sleeve courtesy of Francis)

Sir Cliff, in those days still plain Cliff Richard, has been photographed for the picture sleeve (right) beside a lamp to hammer home the point that I Could Easily Fall is from Aladdin and his Wonderful Lamp. The song had been the first track to be played by Pete Brady on Radio London when transmissions officially started at 0600 on Dec 23rd 1964, so this was its sixth and final week on the station playlist. It was unusual for Cliff to take the title role, as Aladdin, like most pantomime principal boys, is traditionally played by a woman. However, the director adhered to casting tradition when Arthur Askey was given the role of Widow Twankey and the Shadows played comic laundry sidekicks. The show, with Una Stubbs taking the female lead, ran at the London Palladium from December 1964 to April 1965 – an amazingly long stint for a panto!

In March 1965, (while the show was still running) an EP, Cliff's Hits From Aladdin And His Wonderful Lamp, was released, which in addition to I Could Easily Fall, contained the show tracks Havin' Fun, Evening Comes and Friends.

Co-stars and composers of the show's music, The Shadows had already reaped National Top Twenty success with the tongue-in-cheek-titled Genie with the Light Brown Lamp. They too issued an EP of themes from the hit panto. Alongside Genie were tracks Little Princess, Me Oh My and Friends. They went on to pen the tunes for the Palladium's 1965 panto Babes in the Wood, starring Frank Ifield. Christmas 1966 saw Cliff and the Shads back at the Palladium in Cinderella.

I Could Easily Fall is on the 2-CD compilation, Cliff's 40 Golden Greats. For full track listing and clips of selected songs, click on the sleeve photo, right.

Carl Barron and the Cheetahs started their musical career in 1961, first calling themselves as the Echoes. The Birmingham quintet released their first single Only the Beginning, on Columbia in 1964. When lead singer Carl Barron (aka Colin Smith) departed shortly afterwards, Ray Bridger took over as vocalist and the band became simply the Cheetahs. With Nigel Wright on guitar, his brother Rodney Wright on bass and drummer Euan Rose, the band released a further six singles on the Philips label between 1964 and 1966. The first two of these were covers of Mecca (Gene Pitney) and Soldier Boy (The Shirelles). The latter seems rather an odd choice for an all-male band, but this was dealt with by introducing the song as an overheard conversation between a girl and her departing soldier boy.

The Cheetahs returned to the Fab 40 in December 65, with their self-penned Whole Lotta Love.

Ray Bridger's son Nathan has kindly supplied the two scans on the left, including the front page promo for Mecca from the New Musical Express in September 1964. In the bottom photo, Ray is on the left at the back, beside Nigel, with the Wright brothers in front.

Nathan says: "I'm also playing in a band, Grand Harmonic, keeping the old songwriting tradition of our family going. It's going pretty well actually, we were recently heard on BBC Radio Kent. If you are interested have a look at our myspace www.myspace.com/grandharmonic and there's also a section about the Cheetahs.

The late Carl Wayne has been mistakenly linked to the Cheetahs in publications such as the Record Collector Rare Record Price Guide. This is presumably because they came from the Birmingham area and their vocalist was known as Carl.

Left: The height of Brummie fashion, 1964. But at least this later version of the band is wearing Chelsea boots. Carl Barron's Cheetahs were kitted out in animal suits, complete with matching furry paws!