for Sunday 12th June 1966

Aboard the Galaxy this week On June 14th, Bill Hearne (Knees Club member #334) joined Radio London, having been heard first on Radio Luxembourg and more recently, on Caroline South. Bill had been scheduled to join Radlon's proposed new 'sweet music' station UKGM (United Kingdom Good Music) operating from Shivering Sands Fort. He would have been working alongside Duncan Johnson and Keith Skues, but the venture was shelved after the tragic shooting of Reg Calvert, who died only one week after Bill's arrival.

Ashore On Friday, June 17th at Beaconsfield Youth Club, Knees Club Officials permitted Phil Jay from Radio City to sign up as Knees Club member #287, because he told us he was friendly with the Big L jocks. Phil (centre of picture, right, courtesy of Raoul Verolleman) was the only non-Big L offshore jock from the Sixties invited to join the KC till the year 2000, when Bud Ballou (#380) was inducted to become the club's new Vice-President!

On June 18th, a 'top Radio London DJ' – Earl Richmond – appeared at the Uxbridge Blues Festival alongside Manfred Mann, the Action, Long Steam Packet, featuring John Baldry and the Brian Auger Trinity with Julie Driscoll.

Beggars Parade is a cover of a Gaudio/Crew song, the B-side of the Four Seasons' Opus 17 (Don't Worry 'Bout Me), currently high in the US charts.

From Oxford, the Falling Leaves were Rod Stephens, vocals, Neil Stanley, organ, Will Patrick lead (reportedly deceased), Mal West, bass (reportedly deceased) and Larry Reddington, drums. In 1965, they had a single released on Parlophone called She Loves to be Loved, which when posted on Youtube, prompted the comment from keyboard player Neil Stanley, that it was "written purely for the Ready Steady Win! talent show and was not totally representative of the more 'bluesy' style we played." Being obliged to record something unrepresentative of the band's normal style on the insistence of management and record companies, was a fate bemoaned by many musicians of the time.

Webmaster Mary writes:
Beggars' Parade had long proved a source of puzzlement to me, as I was absolutely convinced the song contained the phrase 'flowery bum'! Having been mistaken about song lyrics on many occasions, I simply decided that my ears had been deceiving me again. However, I eventually reached the conclusion that 'flowery bum' was indeed the phrase Falling Leaves are singing, but it did not mean 'florally-enhanced posterior'! As the song is after all, about beggars, the word 'bum' is used here in the American sense of the word, i.e. 'tramp'. My eventual conclusion was that 'flowery bum' described a flower-power hippy drop-out... until I heard from Peter Tomlinson! Peter imparts the invaluable information that, "The phrase is in fact "Bowery bum", a reference of course to New York City's infamous Skid Row of the 1800s up until recently, when it acquired a bit of hip cachet as home to equally infamous punk club CBGB."

37 35 Haywire Bean & Loopy's Lot Parlophone R 5458 Little is known about Bean and Loopy's Lot, but both Haywire and its B-side published by Pall Mall, Stitch In Time, were written by George Bean and fellow 'Loopy' Anthony Catchpole, who was to join the Alan Bown Set the following year. In 1963, as a soloist, George Bean became the first artist other than the Stones to record a Stones' song – two, in fact, on the 'A' and 'B' sides of his second single, Will You Be My Lover Tonight/It Should Be You (Decca F11808), both produced by Andrew Loog Olham. Waxed in 1963, the single was not issued till '64, meaning that Gene Pitney won the race to be first artist to release a Stones' song, with That Girl Belongs To Yesterday. Around 1965, George's band was called George Bean and the Runners, featuring drummer Barry (BJ) Wilson, later of the Paramounts. That version of the band issued one single , Dylan's She Belongs To Me (Decca F12228). which failed to climb the Nationals. George appeared in the 1967 film Privilege starring Paul Jones, singing uptempo versions of the hymns Onward Christian Soldiers and Jerusalem, backed by 'The George Bean Band'. George Bean later formed another band called Trifle but unfortunately, died before their album was issued in the early Seventies.

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40

Mama

B J Thomas

Pye International 7N 25374

In the first week of June, the Association was the successful US act that only ever had one hit in the UK. In week two of June, 12/06/66, B J Thomas is in the same situation. His sole UK chart entry was Raindrops Keep Falling On My Head – the Bacharach/David song featured, somewhat incongruously, in the tremendously-successful film, Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid. Billy Joe Thomas had no less than twenty-five entries in the US Hot Hundred between 1966 and 1978. Mama was #22 in the US chart in June '66, but lost out here to Sheffield's own Dave Berry, who took the song to #5 in the Nationals, #18 in the Fab.

Besides climbers that were played at the time of the broadcast of the Sunday Fab Forty, Alan kept a note of others he heard later in the week and incorporated them into his list.

Alan Field notes: Stay, released on Decca on 17th June '66, was self-penned by Engelbert Humperdinck under his real name of Gerry Dorsey. The song is not to be confused with the identically titled classic by Maurice Williams, The Hollies etc.

Indication Zombies Decca F12426 Zombies stomper Indication was Tony Blackburn's first Big L climber, after joining the station on 7th June. It did well in the Fabs, but sadly not the Nationals. In more recent years the song featured regularly on Colin Blunstone and Rod Argent's set list (whether playing as Blunstone and Argent or as the Zombies). On June 13th '66, Tony (our new Knees Club recruit #274), gave the club one of its many on-air plugs over the Big L airwaves, at 12.45pm. (Thanks to Alan Hardy for this photo and the one of Bill Hearne)

Scrooey Mooey Peels Audio Fidelity AFSP 527 The Peels was a studio band assembled by Tash Howard, consisting of Gail Allan, Bill Spilka and Harvey Davis. The name 'Peels' was picked to tie in with their novelty release Juanita Banana - yes, banana peels. The record scored a minor hit in the Hot Hundred in February 66. The fruit-obsessed Howard also wrote Juanita Banana Part 2 as a follow-up later that year, bearing a b-side called Rosita Tomato! (He could have made it a hattrick with 'Melissa Mango' or 'Clarissa Kiwifruit'...) Juanita Banana seemed to capture the imagination of novelty aficionados internationally. A variety of artists recorded the song ("der grosse US Comic Hit!" proclaims the German picture sleeve, while the UK was possibly the country least impressed by the song. Here, the Peels' recording had divebombed in May, following a similar fate for a cover by our own comedian Terry Scott. The record companies seemed determined to persevere with releasing new versions, but Argentinian Luis Aguile's cover followed the others into the UK dross box in November. The banana theme never ceased and photo sleeves depicted Juanita 'milking' Scrooy Mooey!

Originally from Lincolnshire and called the Tea Time Four, Boz was an outfit named after vocalist, Raymond 'Boz' Burrell. The band appears to have been unable to settle on a name, having been known on occasions as 'The Boz', 'Boz People' and also as 'Boz and The Boz People' and were an occasional backing band for Kenny Lynch. Whatever the title, the little-known London group had an impressive line-up of musicians passing through its ranks

Boz went on to join King Crimson, then Bad Company.

One-time lead guitarist, Ian Whiteman, switched instruments to piano and sax, when he formed Mighty Baby with ex-members of The Action, in '68.

In the period around November 1967 to March 1968 the current version of the group, at that time called simply Boz, contained famous session men of the era, including two Knees Club members. Guitarist, Ritchie Blackmore (#220) and Ian Paice (#311) on drums, accompankneed non-members, Boz, bassist Chas Hodges (later of Chas and Dave) with Jon Lord on keyboards.

Another former Boz keyboard player, Ian McLagan presumably did not perform on any of the singles, as he had left to join the Small Faces in October '65 and was still with them when they evolved into The Faces in '69. He described the style of Boz People as "somewhat jazzy". Ian went on to play with both the Who and the Stones. Sadly, he died in December 2014.

Pinnochio was Boz's third disc to be issued in '66. In all, six singles were released on the Columbia label between '66 and '68, including a cover of the Doors' Light My Fire, but none of them saw any action in the Nationals.

The Pinnochio UK release was backed with Stay As You Are. The follow-up, also from '66, The Baby Song (Columbia DB 7972) had Carry On Screaming as its 'B' side, however, overseas releases had Pinnochio paired with The Baby Song. Written by Myles Rudge and Ted Dick, Carry On Screaming was the title song from the comedy horror film starring Carry On favourites, Fenella Fielding, Kenneth Williams and Jim Dale. The film's credits unhelpfully name the singer as 'Anon', but the theme song was described elsewhere as being sung by "up and coming recording star, Boz". All this anonymity led to false rumours at the time that Boz was Jim Dale, incognito.

The 67/8 Boz line-up containing the two Knees Club members, played on the fifth Boz single, a Dylan cover, I Shall Be Released (Columbia DB 84006) The track appeared on several Ritchie Blackmore (#220) compilations, including Ritchie Blackmore Vol 1.

Brian Long in his book The London Sound records that Boz visited the Galaxy on 17th June, but whether the visitor was Boz Burrell the man, or Boz the group, is unknown!

Webmasters Chris and Mary had the pleasure of seeing Boz Burrell perform with Bad Company in San Diego in 1999. He is also in the film Bad Company Live, released in 2000. He passed away at his home in Spain in September 2006. Read Boz's interview with Sid Smith here.

Bad Company Website: www.badcompany.com