(This article was published in two monthly parts by Archant in their Lets Talk magazine (June/July respectively)
Come party time it doesn’t matter if you are standing at the bar, or already on the dance floor, we all know what to shout after hearing the opening line of Gary Puckett & The Union Gap’s 1968 hit Young Girl, and yes, I’ve deliberately left the answer out so you get the fun of saying it to yourself. It’s hard to imagine that this globally recognised song, recorded by a band five and a half thousand miles away in San Diego, USA has any East Anglian connection at all and it should be noted that it was far from a foregone conclusion that it ever would.
It’s a long-forgotten story these days and its roots go back nearly 60 years to the earliest rumblings of the Norwich music scene. No one could envisage the change in music that was to come when Skiffle hit the headlines in 1957, however, this was just the beginning. The question was: how long would it last? The music critics called it a fad; the parents called them drop outs and delinquents and when the teenagers danced and clapped in the aisles of cinemas it was reported as rioting. Teenagers had jobs, spare time, money, a world to rebuild and, thankfully, no wars to fight; passing fad? Not a chance!
Circa 1959, a little-known band by the name of The Nomads was formed at The City of Norwich School (CNS,) after being inspired by watching some of the older students rehearse in the main hall, people such as Tony Sheridan (you may have heard of him). It was a new era, teenagers forming bands, some for fun, and others with the hope of fame and fortune. Equipment at the time was more likely to have come from a hardware store or your mother’s laundry room than a music shop. One member said, “I joined the band because I wanted a girlfriend and people in bands usually got girlfriends.” Motivation aside, The Nomads did command the appreciation of the local teenagers, although one advert for a gig by the band played at The YMCA in St Giles, said ‘Strictly No Dancing’. The group soon changed its name to The Jetblacks. Bass player Shakey Pitt said, “The Beatles weren’t even about when we started; The Shadows were the band we all wanted to be like. We played mostly rock ‘n ’roll, basically if it made them dance, we did it.” Pitt was talking about the embryonic years, what would be next? For The Jetblacks, it was a series of personnel changes, as the band moved into the beat era. Pitt left to do his National Service, selling his bass guitar to his replacement Pat Woods, but the group’s biggest transformation was the introduction of Malcolm Hooper, coming in to replace Tony Clare on vocals. Melly, as he was known, had previously sung with skiffle outfit The Alley Katz, whose beats and rhythms filled the air around its resident spot at The Red Lion Public House in St George’s. He later joined one of the city’s first established pop outfits The Toffs but had in the interim given it all up as he was on the verge of emigrating to America. Those plans fell through and one night he received a call to come and play with the group, and as he always said to me, “The rest is history”. Melly was small in stature but had a versatile voice and plenty of charisma.
Norwich had developed a vibrant music scene by the early sixties and most of you may recall and have danced to bands such as Milton & The Continentals, Ricky Southern & The Cadillacs, Lester Middleton & The Emperors, Garry Freeman & The Contours and many more besides. Steve Grimble, lead singer with another local group The Flintstones, said, “The local scene was like a football league, you had a first and second division. We were definitely second division and always went along to watch the first division bands play, to pick up some tips.” In Steve’s defence, lots of people have said great things about The Flintstones, so I’m sure they were heading for promotion.
By the summer of 1965 Malcolm & The Jetblacks were one of the area’s top bands; they had musical ability, experience and stage presence. Working with the likes of Sounds Incorporated, The Searchers, Freddie & The Dreamers, The Nashville Teens and Long John Baldry’s Steam Packet, they had become an essential fixture on the East Anglian scene and beyond. The group continued to evolve and with each change became more acclaimed. Shortly before his passing in 2005 I asked Melly how come the band managed to get stronger and not fizzle out like so many others. “I’m not sure, I’m surprised myself that the group went for so long. We had players who loved playing and we liked to put on a show, so when someone moved on I think we attracted people of a similar calibre or better.”
In the summer of 1966 the group, under the management of Burnell Penhaul - ACE Promotions - entered the burgeoning Melody Maker National Beat Contest. The organisers pointed out to Penhaul that there were already two groups entering under ‘The Jetblacks’ banner, so he convinced the band that the name had run its course. “We were a different band,” said Melly. “So on the eve of the competition we changed our name to The Versions. This turned out to be a good omen as we made it all the way to the final at the London Palladium on 7 August 1966.” “The atmosphere was amazing,” said drummer Chris Bell. “We were up against a lot of good bands,” added bass player Roger Pymer. The story goes that when it was time for the band to take the stage, the compere asked Melly where the band was from, to which he replied, “Norwich”. The compere responded that nobody knew where that was and that he would say they were from King’s Lynn. The band was unplaced on the night and to give the area its due, they were not the only Norfolk group to make the final. The Astrobeats were there as well and they really were from King’s Lynn.
Meanwhile: Across town at the Gurney & Henderson School (later renamed Bowthorpe Secondary Modern), a young band had been formed under the odd name of Organised K-Os. Many of the group had played before, some of you may remember beat groups The Scene Five or The Citroens. This band were protégées of the beat era; inspired not by the skiffle or rock’n’roll greats but by the mop top sound of Liverpool. The K-Os came to the attention of the region when the local paper featured them after they won the school’s Spring Fete talent contest in May 1966. The limelight was brief, Hendrix was coming and things were about to get heavy. The group soon became unhinged over musical direction. Lead singer Pete Reynolds wasn’t a fan of the heavier style, however, a majority of the band were and became Music Hath Charm. Reynolds had the immediate option of joining well-known Norwich group Feel for Soul, who were looking to replace the recently-departed Boz Burrell, who later was to join Bad Company. “I did a couple of rehearsals with them,” said Reynolds. “But I wasn’t convinced, although they were one of Norwich’s best bands at the time!”
The Versions by now were an established semi-pro act, supporting the likes of The Swinging Blue Jeans, The Small Faces, Geno Washington, The Herd and Marmalade, as well as headlining their own shows. By early 1967 the beat era had faded and the UK had gone soul crazy. Inspired by the US, it wasn’t long before the influence could be heard in our home grown bands. Out in America around this time was a struggling group called Gary Puckett & The Remarkables, who were touring the Pacific Northwest and just about making ends meet. Lead vocalist Puckett had dropped out of college early on and had previously sung with a few minor bands and even released two singles with garage beat combo, The Outcasts. A change in line-up saw the band become Gary Puckett & The Union Gap; they took to wearing Union soldier outfits as their gimmick and recorded a demo track, which came to the attention of CBS producer Jerry Fuller.
The shock of May 1967 for The Versions was the announcement of the imminent retirement of their lead singer Malcolm Hooper. “We were getting good gigs and it was always tough for all of us to balance our day jobs with the band but we didn’t see this coming,” said bassist Roger Pymer. The band, now under the management of Phil Beevis at Norwich Artists, was constantly booked up. It looked like they would have to step back for a time and look for a new singer; however, the problem took less than a week to resolve. Pete Reynolds, who had been a contender to replace Boz Burrell in Norwich stalwarts Feel For Soul, heard of the vacancy and took it straight away. “The Versions were a well-established band around Norwich and I knew it was more my style. It was an easy decision,” said Reynolds. Manager and agent Beevis said, “You could tell they were going to be special from their first rehearsals, of which they had very few before Pete was chucked in the deep end.” Beevis was one of Norwich’s music Svengalis. Originally from Long Melford, Suffolk, he was now running Norwich Artists with Geoff Fisher, who ran The Industrial Club/Melody Rooms. Their remit was to bring the best national talent to Norwich and push the best local talent out of the region and around the country. I interviewed Beevis about his music days many times before his passing in 2001; he still had a soft spot for the groups who went through his agency, “I’m not sure people realised at the time how much talent we had with regards to vocalists and musicians in the region. It made my job easy, we had some of the biggest agencies in the country calling us and we had a whole list of acts to recommend.”
Beevis saw The Versions as a sixties-style boy band: young good-looking lads with musical ability. “The name change came about because I genuinely thought there were few bands about with their potential. They really were the precious few, with Pete on vocals they lent themselves to the popular mod/soul style of the day.”
The band liked Beevis’s idea and in May 1967 became Precious Few. They were an instant success on the local scene and a female fan, who wanted to remain unnamed, said, “I would get to the gigs early and stand at the front, I thought the band was great but Pete was my favourite.”
Meanwhile, back in the US, ex-musician, performer-turned-producer and songwriter Jerry Fuller had heard some demos by Gary Puckett & the Union Gap and got the band to record his track Woman Woman for the label. The single turned out to be the group’s first chart success, reaching number #4 in the American Billboard charts and #6 in the Australian charts in November 1967. However, it remained outside the top 50 in the UK.
I hope you’re not getting seasick with all this to-ing and fro-ing across the Atlantic, as back in Norwich, Beevis needed the Few to record a track that would showcase their potential. He wanted to avoid the obvious stuff. It’s not known who suggested the track but the group did a version of Sam & Dave’s Blame Me, Don’t Blame My Heart and when I interviewed them back in 2014, Reynolds said, “It wasn’t one of our main numbers but it did highlight the fact that the whole band could sing; a great song and a bit of a showpiece.” The band travelled to Regent Sound Studios in London in early 1968 and laid down the track. “The song was perfect,” said Beevis. “Now I just needed to get the right people to hear it.” On 7 March 1968 Beevis arranged a day in London and booked up to see the A&R departments of all the major labels. “Luckily I knew many of those I was going to see, or at least had worked with the agents pushing their bands. That was my advantage, but I got very little out of the Majors. They all liked the track but were non-committal now the beat boom had ended. Some didn’t keep their appointments, which really did annoy me, you need to be professional and I always aimed to be that.” By the end of the day Beevis had received a lot of compliments on the group but no proposals. “My last call of the day was to Pye Records in Marble Arch.” Head of A&R at Pye at the time was ex-BBC Band Leader Cyril Stapleton (1914-1974). “At first the receptionist said Cyril was running late, which wasn’t a problem although I could feel a possible cancellation coming on. I’m happy to wait as long as it takes I said, which was code for I’m not leaving until I’ve seen him,” laughed Beevis. “Less than an hour later I was listening to the demo with him in his office. Cyril loved the track and its vocal strength.”
Now, to keep things running smoothly, back up a few weeks and return to America; Columbia* were keen to follow up on the success of The Union Gap’s first single Woman Woman and recorded Fuller’s track Young Girl, which was subsequently released in the US on 13 February 1968 and was steadily crawling up their Billboard chart.
Back in the offices at Marble Arch, Cyril had been pondering putting out the track Young Girl by a British band, in the hope of getting a chart hit for the label. A little conjecture could be that because the band’s first record had fallen flat with the British public, a more reserved UK version might do the trick. ‘Pond-Hopping’ a hit was nothing new, many companies did it before the days of imports. In case of point our very own Norwich band Peter Jay & The Jaywalkers attempted to impact the UK chart with The Supremes’ Where Did Our Love Go back in August 1964. And if you’re looking for a famous example there is Doo Wah Diddy Diddy by Manfred Mann: the list is endless.
Stapleton asked Beevis if he could get the band into the studio that weekend (Sat 9 March 1968). Without confirming it, Beevis agreed. The story from here is taken up by the band, “It was a Thursday I think that we got the call, that they wanted us in on the Saturday,” said bassist Roger Pymer. “I remember it being quite frantic,” said drummer Chris Bell. “We had to get everything down to London by train.” “Were you excited?” I asked the band. “I’m not sure we had time to think about it,” said vocalist Reynolds. “It didn’t really hit us until we were in the studio,” said Bell. “They played us the record and we had the morning to learn the chords and they’d booked the afternoon to record it,” Pymer pointed out.
The group recall being asked by producer Jack Dorsey if they had a track for the B side. “We didn’t have anything of our own,” said Reynolds. “He said don’t worry, me and Ross (Parker) will write one during your lunch break and they did. They added keyboard parts during the session and I had to learn these for when we played live later on,” said Reynolds.
The label signed the band after the session on a two single deal and pushed for their version of the song to be released at the earliest opportunity. However, unbeknown to Pye, CBS UK, who were also looking for a hit, released The Union Gap version in the UK on the very same day, 29 March 1968. It’s not known if this was a calculated move but it did mean the fight was on. The first round went to Precious Few, who saw their local supporters out in force and their version shot into the local chart at #7. Good airplay on Radio Luxembourg’s 208 Show and Tom Edwards’ new BBC VHF show Happy Weekend Everybody, saw them climb to #2 in the local charts before The Gap entered at #5. However, nationally The Gap had stated to pick up speed. The Few’s version bubbled around in the breakers list (records outside the top 50 chart) for a couple of weeks until 13 April 1968, peaking during that time at #3. The band even did a promotional video performing Young Girl on Mousehold Heath, which was shown on Anglia TV on 5 April 1968. However, the race was all over once The Gap broke into the top 30 and from there they steadily rose until hitting number one on the 22 May 1968. It was a valiant effort but not to be for the young Norwich band.
A lot has been written about the track. Early statements on social media said that Precious Few wrote the track and sold it to The Union Gap for £200! Another claim was that The Gap had heard their version and then released their own. The content of the song has also been discussed, with some of it quite disparaging towards composer Jerry Fuller; the song was inspired during Fuller’s touring days when underage girls desperate to see their idols, would make themselves up and dress to look much older, just to get into the gigs.
Despite no national chart success, the Few received many offers of work and their performances within East Anglia had reached fever pitch. In September 1968 the local Mercury featured a two-page pictorial pull-out of one of the group’s 200-mile round trips to RAF Stanbridge. That same month over 2000 people watched the band play at the Industrial Club, which was filmed with excerpts broadcast on Anglia TV on 19 September 1968. “There was a lot a pressure on us to turn professional,” said Bell. “We received offers of £10,000 or more, I know, it’s nothing compared to the deals handed out today but back then it was a lot of money.” To turn or not to turn professional is the age-old question that has split more bands than it has ever united. The group’s second single The Pleasure Of You, also composed by Fuller, and featuring Harry Stoneham on keyboards and the Ladybirds vocal trio as backing singers, was merely an obligation to the label and the swan song of the band when released on 1 November 1968, as they split one month later. Was it all in vain? “We had a great time,” said Reynolds. “We are all still good friends and yes, it would have been nice to have made it but it wasn’t to be.” Bell said, “I continued playing semi-professionally and I’d do it all again tomorrow.” Pymer added, “Not many bands will get to do what we did.” So how far did Young Girl by Precious Few Go? Well, the track was chosen to appear on the Marble Arch Records’* compilation More Stars Of 1968, an album that included Val Doonican, The Status Quo, The Foundations and The Kinks. This album was released worldwide, so not a bad legacy.
*Early Union Gap records were labelled The Union Gap featuring Gary Puckett and went out on the Columbia label, which was the parent label of CBS. However, UK releases by the band were on CBS, UK. It is also believed that many of the session musicians on the Union Gap’s records were the famous Wrecking Crew.
*Dates for the studio recordings are unconfirmed but between Phil and the band, I believe they are correct.
*Marble Arch Records was the budget-price label of Pye Records
*There was a band from the USA called The Precious Few, who as servicemen oddly found themselves stationed over in the UK at USAAF Wethersfield in 1967. It did cause a little confusion during the rise of the Norwich band but it’s believed the US band went out as Tommy G & The Precious Few and soon returned to the States after their tour.
Kingsley Harris founded the East Anglian Music Archive in 1982. The Archive collects information on influential groups that are connected to Norfolk, Suffolk, Cambridgeshire and its border areas. The Archive collects: records, cassettes, reel to reel tapes, CDs, posters, photographs, paper cuttings, flyers, tickets, badges, old diaries, listings magazines, music and fan club newsletters and much more. Appeal from the Archive, “Every year we hear stories of someone throwing these things away because they don’t know who is interested in them. Please remember us on these occasions and allow us the chance to preserve or simply borrow, scan and digitise these items.”
