Peter Noone sings Tony Hazzard

Peter Noone released a handful of good singles on RAK in the early 70's. After RAK, he made only one single on Phillips before moving on to Casablanca records: 

(I Think I’m Over) Getting Over You / All Sing Together - Phillips 1973. The A-side was written by the great Tony Hazzard. 

Here's what Alan Betrock had to say about this single:

Peter Noone - "(I Think I'm Over) Getting Over You" (Phillips)
By Alan Betrock, Phonograph Record Magazine, January 1974

How could Peter Noone make a comeback if he's never really been away? After Herman's Hermits disappeared from the American charts, they continued to have mild success in their homeland, and Peter, on his own, recorded some wonderful solo singles. One, David Bowie's "Oh You Pretty Things" even dented the British Top 30. Having been a pop star at the tender age of 15, Peter is one up on the Gerry Marsdens, Freddie Garrity's and Billy J. Kramers of the world, who are all at least a third of a century on in years.

Noone's freshness, vitality and appeal stems from this youthfulness. This is his trademark, and his unrestrained versatility makes him a prime choice for guest spots on British variety shows. He can be seen every week on the "telly" - a well rounded vaudevillian much like Davy Jones - who can appeal to the tots, the teens, and the 'mums and dads'.

On this side of the Atlantic, Peter is still quite an unknown entity. His commercial resurgence began with the British Invasion Package Tour which showcased Noone's professionally entertaining and endearing stage act. He took the critics and audiences by storm, gathering raves from most corners. His television appearance on Mike Douglas, Merv Griffin, and Midnight Special have not been so stellar as the nature of the medium tends to cram Peter's one-hour performance into six minutes. But at least these shows help to get Peter's name known again, and his recent Sonny & Cher gig gave him more valuable exposure.

All of this is nice, but Peter will never really be back until he can rid himself of "Mrs. Brown," "A Kind Of Hush" and all the others. If he is pigeon holed as a mere revival act, the novelty will quickly wear off, then it's back yo the pubs again. So Peter has taken a major step in attempting to establish himself as a current performer. He has shelved his old label, hired a new producer, and released a new single.

The result is available on Peter's debut Phillips release. Writer Tony Hazzard (remember "Ha Ha Said The Clown", "Fox On The Run", and "Goodnight Sweet Josephine"?) penned this ditty, and Tony Atkins produced it. It's a good combination of styles, and melodic too, with Peter's double-tracked voice soaring throughout. A steady piano rhythm carries the song which is accented by a nice use of strings. This use of strings is most thankfully tasteful, avoiding the usual pitfall of overdramatic and unneccessary arrangements. "Getting Over You" combines Noone's Bowie phase with middle Bee Gees, and adds a great high falsetto of his own. This is a good start and if Peter keeps putting out strong records, and getting airplay, he just might be back - this time to stay.

Extra: Because You're There, a Graham Gouldman-penned B-side from 1972.

Billy Nicholls - Rock Marketplace article

Who Is… Billy Nicholls?
By Alan Betrock. From The Rock Marketplace no. 10, June 1975

In comparison with our first two Who Is features (Carol Connors, and Tony Rivers and the Castaways), Billy Nicholls career has been much less prolific. In actual fact, Billy only has one single (two if you count a single off an album), and one album to his credit. Yet there's a lot more to his story then released product might indicate, So read on and see why Billy Nicholls should be a TRM household name…

Billy's story begins like so many other British kids. He was from pretty much of a middle-class family, and was a rather active school-kid, Billy recalls how he first got into music: "Everytime we had a school break, I'd go down to the music room---we called them cells---and I found a broken guitar down there one day, I never played guitar before, I bought a set of strings from working in a Wimpy Bar, and started to play, I wrote my first song in about ten minutes…"

Billy's father had played in a band, so there was some obvious family-musical influence, Billy would practice and write songs throughout his years through "what you would call High School". At age 17 or 18 he was accepted at a few Art Colleges, but he wanted to pursue a musical career: "My parents gave me a hell of a lot of freedom, When I was young my father used to knock me around a lot, But when I got older and wasn't bringing any money home---I was just writing songs---he let me alone. Then once I did start earning money I left home…"

Billy then hooked up with Immediate Records: "Soon as I left school, I was already writing seriously. I sent some tapes off to Andrew Oldham, and he liked them.

So he hired me as a songwriter---with Del Shannon mainly---and a few other people," (As coincidence would have it, TRM also has Del Shannon and Immediate feature stories in this issue, so be sure to read those for more Nicholls tie-ins...). Billy tells about his writing experiences at Immediate: "I was learning how to write songs, and I used to love Del Shannon. We wrote four songs together. It was a good experience to write with someone else, and I'd certainly do it again. I love to write for other people, and I just love commercial songs." As to the Shannon songs themselves, Billy is a bit hazy: "There was one called 'Led Along'---I think it got to #3 in Pitts burgh or somewhere like like…"

Billy was soon called upon to be a singing artist as well as a songwriter. Strangely enough, his debut for Immediate was not written by himself. It was written by someone credited on the label as "Paul" (last name). Billy explains: "Would You Believe' was a demo that someone sent in, and I loved it. I played it to Ronnie Lane and he understood it immediately. It had been around there for years!"

So Nicholls recorded "Would You Believe" with production and arrangement by Small Faces Steve Marriott and Ronnie Lane: "I did it with the Small Faces---it was good, but Andrew overproduced it, He added all sorts of strings and lots more, I actually had expected it to be a hit, until Andrew overproduced it. Someone once called it the best overproduced single of the Sixties" , Actually even with the "overproduction", it is quite brilliant, It pure British-Small Faces pop, circa 1967/8, There's loads of falsettos, strange instruments, powerful drumming and some amazing backup ravings from Steve Marriott, All these over a nice melody with nifty lyrics, Under the circumstances, Billy did enormously well, The flip, "Daytime Girl" (a Nicholls original), is simpler and more of Billy comes through, His voice has always been distinctive, having that uncanny knack for lilting high range lead vocals, and effectively moving harmony falsetto's.

Nicholls then went on to record an album for Immediate---but it was never released, "At 18 I did an album that cost thousands of pounds, but it never came out, I was really quite fond of it. All the great session men were on it--Nicky Hopkins, John Paul Jones etc. Plus everyone around Immediate would help out. That's what kind of organization it was, I played and sung on so many Immediate recordings, There was loads of stuff, I had, and still have, a high voice, so I used to get called upon a lot. I did alot of voices on the early Nice stuff, There's a couple of songs on my album that still turn me on a bit"," Billy continues to talk about Immediate: "Oldham was producing the album, Immediate Records would have, and could have, been amazing---like Stax, but on a different wavelength, There were people like Chris Farlowe, PP Arnold, and The Faces---we all helped each other. Like, I spent a whole summer on Odgens Nut Gone Flake, just overdubbing vocals and other ideas…everyone helped each other on records."


But after this album was not released, and other events occurred in the business, Billy gave up and moved over to the United States. "I was really disillusioned with the whole business, I took a job gravedigging. I did lots of jobs, I got very ill and was recuperating for about a year, I lived in Connecticut for a while, and other places as well from 1969-1973. Then I saved up and got a really good guitar," It was Billy's contact with Meher Baba which really turned his head around: "Baba says that you have something to do in life, and you just gotta go do it. For me it's music, and that's what I'm going to do". With renewed spirit and direction, Billy returned to England and teamed up with friend and mentor Pete Townsend. "Pete was always my idol when I was young. After I had known Pete, I found out that my father and his had played for years in the same band! I said to my father 'don't you know he's my idol???'. I do demos with Pete at his studio, and I had a song called "Hopeless Helpless" which was supposed to be for the Meher Baba album." (It later appeared on Billy's solo album.) Billy did contribute one song to Townsend solo album (Who Came First), a lovely tune called "Forever's No Time At All". Here Billy plays guitar and sings lead in his patently refreshing manner.


Shortly thereafter, Billy began recording his own solo album, "I started by recording and paying for it myself', In late 1973, GM Records heard some rough masters, and became interested, Caleb Quaye came in and we basically did it together, overdubbing etc. The album is a bit schizophrenic, really, because it was done over a period of about a year. "Billy relates his philosophy on album making: "When I make an album it's really got to be fresh."

"You get to know every track really well, There's so few albums like that nowadays, It's like having twelve ideas and using only one---the really good one. I work on one track until it's all finished. When I go the studio, the song is absolutely finished; there's no two ways about it. Anyone else who is there is there for a specific purpose, No mucking about---I have a finished product in mind, I can't stand people who sit around in the studio waiting for a riff to come, We recorded mainly at Olympic and Pete's Eel Pie---also Ronnie Lane's Mobile Unit. 'Kew' was done straight Iive, no overdubs at all."

The finished GM album, Love Songs, was released about a year ago, and it certainly must rank as one of the best of the year; sadly underpromoted and unknown. Billy songs are short and melodic, 'His voice is appealingly distinctive, The musical backing is perfect. My favorites include the opening "Winter Rose", "Kew" (with a rocking Ronnie Wood on guitar), and the soft "Hopeless Helpless". The best one though is "White Lightning", Billy's three part song about a boy with a toothache, Here it all comes together, melody, lyric, vocals, and production, Caleb Quaye's electric guitar is stunning and the song is just perfect. Sadly, as a single, nothing happened.

Billy spent the end of 1974 working on the Tommy film soundtrack: "I worked on that for three weeks straight, It was a fantastic experience, I did all sorts of vocals. I liked 'Stardust' and 'That'll Be The Day", but Tommy is a lot different than that," Billy's current favorites revolve around John Lennon ("he writes amazing tunes, and always sticks to his guns"), and the old Small Faces ("they were really influential around the time of Ogdens, and all their great singles-just writing singles for ingles,"), "Maybe I'm living too much in the Sixties. There was a lot of romanticism in the late sixties---now it's more businesslike I guess, My involvement with Meher Baba straightened everything out for me, and changed my outlook on music.' It helped me get over my disillusion. Now I know I have a job to do, and I just have to go out and do it. Besides that, Pete Townsend is probably my biggest influence."

Billy came to the United states at the end of 1974 to try to get his GM album released here. Some companies were interested, but a final decision seems not to have emerged. He is already well-through a second album, so it seems like his first one will not be issued here. This second album will have an outside producer: "I'm looking towards some sort of a concept album now---songs that I've written fitting together. I love recording, but if I could avoid going out on the road, I would. I may do a British tour soon, though." Billy Nicholls is one of the few British musicians who came through the sixties madness better than ever. Most others changed musically, went stale, or retired. Billy, judging by last years solo album, is more alive than ever, and he'd buzzing with ideas and enthusiasm. I can only urge you to pick up on his old material where possible, and keep your eyes peeled for his new material. It's sincere, and with Billy's great playing-singing-composing talents, I know it's gonna be distinctively appealing. And in this day and age, that's certainly a lot!

Billy Nicholls Discography (1975)

Would You Believe/Daytime Girl
Immediate 063 1/68

White Lightning/Hopeless Helpless
G.M. 018 1974

Love Songs GM 1011: Winter Rose; Gipsy; Travellers Joy; Stay Awhile; Little Lady; Sometimes; Hopeless Helpless; Overnight Train; White Lightning; Kew; (1974).

Wrote & Sings: "Forever's No Time At All" on Peter Townsend's Who Came First LP: US MCA 7-9189
Wrote : "Led Along" and other songs on Del Shannon' s LP & Unreleased Oldham Tapes;
Appears in various capacities: on Tommy Film soundtrack; and Ronnie Lane's A&M LP.

Alan Betrock on The Jook

The Jook "Alright With Me/Do What You Can" RCA 2279 (UK)
The Jook "Shame/City & Suburban Blues" RCA 2344 (UK)
The John's Children saga never dies!!! Here we find The Jook, a new London quintet, being managed and produced by John Hewlett---late of John's Children---. And who is the drummer in this very same Jook? None other than Chris Townsend, the notorious skin-beater for John's Children!!!!!! While John's Children went thru various phases of image-making: the mod look; the short-hair look; the nude look; etc., The Jook seem to be experiencing the same kind of molding. They started out as a "long-hair" band, but now have embraced the short-hair look. Coupled with that is the return to 1967 Mod clothes, combined with the futuristic garb sported by David Bowie. Picture if you will a combination of the mod and rocker aesthetic and enter The Jook. Their first record, "Alright With Me" is a commercial sing-along rocker with some early Slade production bits thrown in---the highlight, tho, is the killer 1967 psychedelic guitar solo ala Pete Townshend!! It probably goes over quite well in concert….

The second Jook release "Shame" doesn't live up to the promise indicated by their premier effort. An updating of the Willie Dixon song doesn't really get anywhere, and lacks power & punch---however, there is another "My Generation" guitar break which almost make the whole thing worth having…
By Alan Betrock The Rock Marketplace no.2 July 1973

The Jook "Oo Oo Rudi/The Jook's On You" RCA 2368 (UK)
Undeterred by their lack of record-selling success The Jook return with "Oo Oo Rudi" which is clearly their most commercial release to date. An anthem-like guitar riff weaves its way throughout, conjuring up visions of the Jook marching thru the streets followed by their legions of space-mod fans. The melody line is too simplistic and a bit overbearing, but the lyrics continue in the 1967 Mod-rebellion style: "All we hear and all we see/And everything we learn from/Is planned by the older Generation"….."If they knew/If only they knew/What we're all about/Maybe then they'd understand that their way won't last…." And yes, they do treat us to some more killer guitar breaks.
By Alan Betrock The Rock Marketplace no.3 October 1973

Also coming next issue: …our friends the Jook keep on coming with two newies! Speaking of the Jook, they've just been signed to backup the British Sweet tour, so perhaps they will finally burst onto the charts. Their next single is rumored to be a 1974 mod classic---the working title of which is: "Bish, Bash, Bosh". Not exactly as original as Creation's "Biff, Bang, Pow", but a great move nonetheless…
By Alan Betrock The Rock Marketplace no.5 April 1974

The Jook "King Capp/Rumble" RCA 2431 (UK)
The Jook "Bish Bash Bosh/Crazy Kids" RCA 5024 (UK)
The Jook have issued two new singles since we last checked in with them. The first "King Capp" was a rather plain rocker which saw little action. Perhaps that's why they switched producers to John Burgess for "Bish Bash Bosh". This is one of the groups most commercial singles to date, a driving rocker with an upfront vocal and backing vocal chorus. The drums are especially well recorded, and if it wasn't so repetitive, it might have been a big hit. The flip is one "B" side that the group took seriously, and I really like it more than the "A" side. It shows that the group finally are developing a sound of their own, as well as a confidence and lack of imitative pretense which marred much of their earlier work. The lyrics are fine, the beat is strong, and the hook chorus is their most commercial and memorable one to date. It's too bad that the group broke up after this single was released because they showed signs of finally breaking thru. But there are rumors that they may reform with some new members. Let's just hope they pick up from where they left off.
By Alan Betrock The Rock Marketplace no.6 July 1974

Then came The Jook, whose story has been recounted in these pages over the last few issues. Basically Chris Townsen formed the group, and John Hewlett managed and produced them. Whether consciously or not, the group image-wise and music-wise was a 1970's version of John's Children---short hair; matching mod clothes; driving guitar-drums music; and teenage rebellion lyrics. But the Jook, like John's Children, never caught on in a big way (although they did release 5 singles within a year, just like John's Children) and in May of this year, after recording their acclaimed new single "Bish Bash Bosh", the Jook split up. Two Jook-ers joined Sparks, but now after a few weeks in limbo, the Jook have reformed anew and the personnel seems to have been finalized. It is: Chris Townsen (ex-John's Children-drums); Martin Gordon (ex-Sparks-bass); David O'List (ex-Nice-guitar); and yes, folks, Andy Ellison (ex-John's Children) on lead vocals!!! If this band can stay together and get some money behind them, the musical results are endlessly fascinating. With a slew of new bands, (Cockney Rebel, Sparks, Arrows, etc) making serious and important inroads in the British music scene, the new Jook stands and excellent chance of making it. The talent, creativity, and experience are all there, that's for sure…

By Alan Betrock from John's Children Article in The Rock Marketplace no.6 July 1974

Song on MGM

Song: "Like We Were Before"/"Sugar Lady"; MGM 14157

And speaking of Curt Boettcher, how could we let a Discoveries column go by without the mention of another Boettcher effort? This time it's Song on MGM, a group that featured Mickey Rooney's son. These two sides were produced by Curt and Keith Olsen, and are quite delightful. "Like We Were Before" is the real standout sounding like Badfinger, the Nazz and Merry-Go-Round all rolled into one. Strong melody, excellent vocals and fine instrumentation throughout. "Sugar Lady" is a bit heavier, without any real melody to hook you, but there still are a couple of nice touches. Look for the review of the Song Lp in these pages next issue!
- Alan Betrock, The Rock Marketplace no.4 December 1973

"Like We Were Before" is a perfect song and a perfect record - a mix of heavy guitars and melody with tremendous phased drumming. Just like the Nazz, Song was a band of Anglophile Americans playing powerpop before there was such a thing. That makes "Like We Were Before" both behind the times and ahead of the times.

I don't think Alan Betrock ever got around to reviewing the Song Lp in TRM. I had the single for a year or so before I found the Lp. The first time I brought it home, I had such high expectations, hoping for an album's worth of "Like We Were Before". What I found was closer to an album's worth of "Sugar Lady" - not horrible, but much too wanky. Apparently, this is one of the productions that Curt Boettcher did under duress. He was under contract as a producer, and was doing this album to pay the rent. The good news is that "Like We Were Before" is on it. But so is "Sugar Lady". I shelved the album, thinking Song was only good for one song on one side of one single. Mickey Rooney Jr. was the main songwriter and singer as well as rhythm guitar player. I don't know if this was a vanity project for a Hollywood brat or what.

I came back to the album a year later, though. I found a really cool song called "Eat Fruit" that sounds like an early John Lennon solo track, kind of like one of those Hudson Brothers songs where they sound more like Lennon than he did at the time. There's also a track called "Whenever I Think Of You" that is really catchy and melodic - a mellow Merseybeat sound for the 70's, again like what the Hudson Brothers, the Wackers, Badfinger and Rockin' Horse were doing. The tracks I thought were awful before aren't that bad after all. "Banana High Moon" is really melodic and has great harmonies inbetween frantic bongo-handclap breaks. "10 x 10" is sort of a husky Creedence boogie with some nice jangly Badfinger guitar. On a whole, the first side is great.

Some overly husky vocals on "I'm Not Home", which has a bit of an English Isles folk sound like Fairport Convention. "Wife" is a beautifully understated ballad, like Bread or Paul McCartney's "Mother Nature's Son". "Sugar Lady" and "Meatgrinder" are unexceptional midtempo rockers and "Medicine Man" is a progressive jazz-rock jam complete with a drum solo. So that make's 3 great tracks, 3 good ones and 4 duds. I've read that Mickey Rooney Jr. made some solo records later on. Has anyone out there heard 'em?


Song - Album Lp - MGM SE-4714

Clark Garman: Lead Guitar
Mickey Rooney Jr.: Rhythm Guitar
Rob Lewine: Bass
Shelly Silverman: Drums

Side One
10 x 10 2:28
(Garman - McDonald)
Like We Were Before 2:05
(Rooney Jr. - Covington)
Eat Fruit 2:28
(Garman - McDonald)
Whenever I Think Of You 2:06
(Rooney Jr. - Blanchard)
Banana High Noon 6:00
(Garman - Rooney Jr.)

Side Two
I'm Not Home 3:42
(Rooney Jr. - Sardo)
Wife 1:42
(Rooney Jr.)
Sugar Lady 2:45
(Garman - Rooney Jr. - McDonald)
Meatgrinder 2:58
(Garman - Rooney Jr. - McDonald)
Medicine Man 7:19
(Garman)

Produced by Curt Boettcher &
Keith Olsen for Portofino Productions

A&R Coordinator: Michael Lloyd
Recorded at Sound City