Big In Birmingham… A Bust In Baltimore (Part 2/2)

Welcome back to part two.

Here we go again with another selection of six acts that you absolutely, positively have never heard of before*

* but might have.

Max was an old school entertainer. Comedian, singer, actor, writer and game show host  – that’s how I first knew him as presenter of Family Fortunes (ok so we stole your Family Feud but gave it a positive spin, rather than suggesting a public airing of grievances and brawling) in the early 80s.

He had two distinct phases to his chart career. The singles phase from 1952 to 1961 which focused on comedy songs and, unusually for the times, even material he wrote himself amongst covers of songs already tried and tested in the US.

He kept making records. But it took until 1972 for the album phase of his chart career to kick off, as he found a winning formula with Sing Along With Max.

Covers of old standards, music hall numbers, anything that would appeal to a more mature audience who weren’t catered to by this new fangled pop and rock. A constant stream of albums, all variations on the same theme followed; Singalongapartysong, Singalongaxmas, Lingalongamax, etc, etc.

His last hurrah was as late as 1989 as two volumes of Singalongawaryears charted, the first making #5. These were full of songs popular during the World Wars. He tapped into a demographic that weren’t record buyers, as evidenced by my Grandma, who probably hadn’t bought a record in at least 30 years, but loved anything that brought back memories of defeating the Nazis.

The most bizarre item in Max’s discography is something that didn’t chart. In 1979 he released Discolongamax. This wasn’t a complete departure from the formula. The songs were still the same timeless classics, but with a disco beat.

I listened to Get Me to the Church On Time in researching this article.

And it is a thing of wonder – hideous but hilarious.

Listening to an entire album’s worth of that may induce dark thoughts. But I applaud the barefaced cheek, eccentricity, and deranged notion of a 57 year old with a Cockney accent having the audacity to do it.

Essential Track:
The word essential is taking a bit of a battering here but his disco version of Get Me To The Church On Time has to be heard to be believed. So here it is. I challenge anyone to keep a straight face when the vocal comes in. 

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While glam rock was taking off in the early 70s and the likes of Roxy Music were looking to the future, there were others looking back. 1972 saw the London Rock and Roll Show at Wembley Stadium, featuring the likes of Chuck Berry, Little Richard, Bo Diddley, Bill Haley – and for some reason, the MC5.

Who to no great surprise, other than perhaps to the booking agent, didn’t go down so well.

Showaddywaddy were rock n’ roll and doo wop revivalists who are unlikely to be remembered in any critical appreciation of the history of music. But they did carve out a successful niche for themselves. Their Debut #2 hit Hey Rock and Roll set out their stall: an original composition that aped the early rock and roll sound, updated with a glam rock stomp.

After that, any originality was set aside. Their biggest hits were covers of the likes of Under the Moon of Love (their only chart topper), Three Steps to Heaven and Heartbeat.

Its not surprising they didn’t cross over to the US. But they did the job at home with a long string of hits from ’74 to ’82: selling nostalgia and escapism to the mainstream for whom the nihilism of punk was a dreadful and unintelligible noise.

As with so many from the era, they never stopped, just downsized. They had a revolving door policy on membership and are still at it now. According to their website they’ve played 2,830 gigs since 1973, and that’s with a big gap from 2000 to 2014 which is ‘awaiting updates’.

Rock and roll will never die it seems – though it might need an administrative pause. 

Essential Track: Hey Rock and Roll

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Blue began as a boyband mixing pop and R&B. An initial incarnation was put together by Simon Cowell but didn’t take off. They split and reformed with a new line up without the evil pop overlord at the helm.

The usual boyband mix of original songs and covers, their first #1 was a version of Too Close by Next and their third was a collaboration with Elton John on his Sorry Seems To Be the Hardest Word. He wasn’t the only high profile collaborator they pulled in: Stevie Wonder and Annie Stone joined their take on Signed, Sealed, Delivered, I’m Yours and even more unlikely, Kool & the Gang and Li’l Kim on Get Down On It. On one hand, it sure looks like they were trying to get noticed in the US.

But there’s a good reason why it never happened.

Controversy magnet Lee Ryan made sure of that. He’s got quite the rap sheet; drink driving, speeding, twitter wars with a drag queen… Just the other month he was arrested for disruptive behaviour on a plane

Early in their chart ascendancy and a month after 9/11 he used an interview to complain that the attacks had been blown out of proportion, culminating in asking; ‘Who gives a f— about New York when elephants are being killed?’ He later apologised saying he wasn’t very good with words. Damage done though: their US representation swiftly dropped them.

Despite his ongoing attempts at career sabotage they’ve kept him onboard. They split up in 2004. But after the familiar tale of solo careers offering diminishing returns, they reformed in 2011 to take part in Eurovision. (Finishing eleventh – which at the time was pretty credible for the UK. They are still plugging away with a new album due in October.

Essential Track: All Rise

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From Eurovision resurrecting a career, to: making a career. Bucks Fizz were Bobby, Cheryl, Mike and Jay; a two girl / two boy line up in the Abba mould, if you ignore that they didn’t play instruments or write their own material. The song Making Your Mind Up was already written, ready to be put forward as the UK entry for Eurovision 1981. It just needed an act to sing it.

The four were duly assembled and went onto win. A large part of its success has been credited to the live performance where on singing the line ‘if you want to see some more’ the boys whipped off the girls long skirts to reveal…..shorter skirts. Europe had never seen anything like it.

It sold four million copies charting all over the world…

Except in the US.

Whether it was that the miniskirt routine was too daring or not daring enough, only you guys can tell me.

Despite having been put together for a one off event, the momentum was too good not to follow up on. They spent much of the early 80s in the charts across Europe.

All that ended in December ’84 when their tour bus crashed, leaving band and crew members severely injured. The worst being Mike who spent three days in a coma on life support before pulling through. Just as they started back on the promotional trail in 1985, Jay left. And while they scored one more top 10 hit the following year, that was their last top 40 entry. Their recording career was over before the end of 80s. Eventually only Bobby remained, continuing as a live act with a revolving cast of members.

The story doesn’t end there though, as the other three original members got back together. Calling themselves The Fizz, they’ve had had two more top 30 albums since 2017, with another due imminently. Still no Billboard entry though. Maybe next time.

Essential Track: Making Your Mind Up

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I guess the name didn’t help for a start. What could be more fitting for a glam rock band than Mud? They released their first single, Flower Power in 1967 – again, nothing says peace and love like Mud. It took until 1973 to get their break as writer/producer team Nicky Chinn and Mike Chapman took control. After years of struggle it all came together with a run of success from 1973 to ’76.

At their best, songs like Tiger Feet and Dyna-Mite were an intense burst of catchy bubblegum rock and pop. Singer Les Gray could do a passable Elvis impression which was put to use on singles, including their Christmas #1; Lonely This Christmas.

While differing variations of Mud carried on far from the charts, lead guitarist Rob Davis had a seemingly implausible re-emergence in the 90s as a songwriter on club and dance tracks and was co-writer of Kylie’s Can’t Get You Out Of My Head and Spiller & Sophie Ellis Bextor’s Groovejet.

Essential track: Tiger Feet

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Saving the biggest for last.

I’ve slightly cheated.

The Shadows did actually make it onto the Billboard charts four times… but all as Cliff Richard’s backing band. On their own they’re conspicuous by their absence.

Originally calling themselves The Drifters, they changed their name to The Shadows for obvious reasons, and struck out on their own while still joining up with Cliff every now and then. Even without their work with Cliff, the home chart stats I’ve quoted are immense.

It shouldn’t really have worked. They survived the early 60s beat boom that did it for many of the contemporaries. Their output was purely instrumentals, led by the twanging guitar of bespectacled Hank Marvin.

Sidenote: like Ruby Murray: they have gifted another piece of well known rhyming slang to the idiom. If one is Hank Marvin, this can definitely be alleviated by going for a Ruby Murray

They gave their singles names that gave them a sheen of adventure and the glamour of America, unlike the staid matching suits they sported. There was FBI, Kontiki, Geronimo and Apache. They might not have hit the US charts but Apache had an afterlife of its own as a staple sample in hip hop. 

Their top 40 singles lifespan went from 1960 to 1980 and albums wise all the way up to 2020. Changes in fashion and popular taste didn’t affect them. They just kept going regardless. And people kept lapping it up.

Their album discography is littered with Greatest Hits collections. I’ve no idea who buys them, but they keep releasing them. And they keep charting: three of them being #1s and numerous others in the top 10. So many that it feels like every home should have one. My parents certainly did. 

Essential Track: Apache – wait for just before two minutes in for the perfectly synchronised ‘dance’ steps, heady stuff. 

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Hope you enjoyed the selections.

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