Casey Jones & The Governors

Brian Casser (born 21 March 1936, Newcastle-upon-Tyne, England) is a British singer and guitarist. He led the first notable beat group in Liverpool, Cass & the Cassanovas, who were early rivals of The Beatles in the city. He later led another group, Casey Jones & the Engineers, which was one of Eric Clapton's first bands, and then, as leader of Casey Jones & the Governors, became successful in Germany in the mid-1960s.
Casser lived in Liverpool in the late 1950s, having previously worked in the Merchant Navy. As singer and rhythm guitarist, he formed a trio, Cass & the Cassanovas, in May 1959, with singer and guitarist Adrian Barber (born 13 November 1938, Ilkley, Yorkshire), and drummer and singer Brian J. Hudson (born Brian James Hudson, 21 April 1938, Cleveland, Yorkshire). After a few months, Hudson left and was replaced by Johnny Hutchinson (born 18 July 1940, Malta), known as Johnny Hutch. In need of a bass guitarist, Hutchinson then brought in Johnny Gustafson (born 8 August 1942, Liverpool) in December 1959. At that time Gustafson did not have a proper bass guitar so Barber converted an acoustic for him. The group became popular playing a wide range of music, from Latin American music to rock and roll, in dance halls in the Liverpool area. Casser also started his own music club in Liverpool, the Casanova Club, whose guest groups included one known at the time as the "Silver Beetles"; according to some reports, Casser had suggested that they change their name from the earlier spelling of "Beatals" which Casser found "ridiculous". In May 1960 Cass & the Cassanovas took part in auditions in front of leading manager Larry Parnes who was looking for backing bands for his stable of pop singers. The group secured a place as backing group for singer Duffy Power and toured with him. By this time, Casser had begun using the stage names of "Casey Jones" and "Casey Valence".
In December 1960, Gustafson, Hutchinson and Barber left the band, and formed themselves into a new trio, The Big Three. Casser moved to London around 1962, and managed the Blue Gardenia club in Soho. He also briefly formed a group called the Nightsounds, which featured Albert Lee on guitar. The following year, he won a recording contract with the Columbia label, and recorded a single, "One Way Ticket", using the name Casey Jones. With drummer Ray Stock, he recruited two former members of R&B group the Roosters, guitarist Eric Clapton and bassist Tom McGuinness, and briefly toured as Casey Jones & the Engineers. Clapton and McGuinness left after a few performances, shortly followed by Stock.
Casser then formed a new group with David Coleman (lead guitar), Roger Cook (rhythm guitar), Jim Rodford (bass) and Peter Richards (drums). They played at the Star-Club in Hamburg and became popular in Germany, releasing two singles, "Tall Girl" and "Don't Ha Ha" on the Bellaphon label, before changing their name to Casey Jones & the Governors, Casey Jones and the Governors (1965) and Don't Ha Ha (1966).

apparently in an attempt to stress their British origins. The record label reissued "Don't Ha Ha" – which in fact was a version of the 1958 Huey Smith and the Clowns song "Don't You Just Know It" – under the new band name and it rose to # 2 on the German pop chart. Casey Jones and the Governors continued to tour and record successfully in Germany for a few years, achieving six top 40 singles and releasing two albums on the Gold 12 label,
In the 1970s, Casser, still using the name Casey Jones, worked as a disc jockey in Löhnberg, and recorded a solo album, Casey's Rock 'n' Roll Show. In the 1990s, he formed a new version of Casey Jones and the Governors to play the oldies circuit in Germany, and in 2006 was reported to be living in Unna near Dortmund.
Here is "Don't Ha Ha" From 1966 Enjoy
 

The Trends

The Trends were a relatively minor Liverpool act formed in the early-middle 1960's. Accounts vary, some saying that they started as the Beachcombers, which then became the Beatcombers, before turning into Mike & The Mersey Men, before becoming the Trends-others say that the Beatcombers were merely a band that some of the Trends' personnel had previously worked in. Tony Priestley, the Trends' lead singer, was a good enough vocalist and also smart enough to know that the group couldn't possibly compete with the Beatles on a Lennon-McCartney song. Still, "All My Loving" became their debut single on the Pye Records subsidiary Piccadilly in 1964. They were much better doing Motown material, which they proved with their covers of the Temptations' "The Way You Do The Things You Do" and Marvin Gaye's "You're A Wonderful One, " which got released on Pye proper, produced by Liverpool rock star Billy Fury. Those failed to sell, and their contract was dropped, and the group split up soon after.

Jeannie And The Big Guys

Formed

Chester, Cheshire, United Kingdom

Members

Rita “Jeannie” Hughes [Cindy Cole] (vocals), Terry Lynch (drums), Peter Johnson (lead guitar), Owen Roberts (bass), Phil Blackman (keyboards), John Pickett (bass), David Jones (lead guitar), Geoff Dawson (rhythm guitar), George Roberts (drums)

Also Known As

The Pacemakers, Four Hits and a Miss

Jeannie and the Big Guys were a Chester quintet, originally called Four Hits & A Miss, the "Miss" being teenaged lead singer Rita Hughes, the daughter of a Chester pub owner, who fronted the group as lead singer for a year or so. As Four Hits and A Miss, their repertory included songs like "Lullaby of Birdland." They became the hottest group in Chester and were signed to Pye in 1963, when Hughes was 17, changing their name to Jeannie and the Big Guys in the process. They cut "Boys" by the Shirelles, which they'd likely heard the Beatles perform, and "Sticks and Stones, " an old Ray Charles number, but saw no chart action. They had a pretty fair Mersey-style r&b sound, but the group broke up when "Jeannie" exited, after a dispute over dressing room decorum, according to the music press of the period, moving over to front Earl Royce and the Olympics, a Liverpool band led by Billy Kally aka Earl Royce (but never recording with them), before going solo-she cut a pair of singles, "A Love Like Yours" and "Lonely City Blue Boy, " under the name Cindy Cole. She later became a successful cabaret artist in her home town, before passing away in 1989.
Here is "Boys" From 1963 Enjoy

The Chants

A five-piece vocal harmony group who proved to be Liverpool’s most popular black vocal act.

The Chants evolved in the Liverpool 8 district of Liverpool, the Toxteth area, which they felt was totally isolated from the rest of Merseyside, part of it being almost a Liverpool equivalent of Harlem, where the black community had their own cultural influences. The music the Chants listened to was reflected in their own cultural heritage as they were brought up on what was to become known as R&B, which was introduced to them by the black GI’s who came to Liverpool 8 from American bases such as Burtonwood. This included doo-wop recordings by outfits such as the Del Vikings, along with the music of artists such as Johnny Otis and Little Richard and the Miracles – this was before these artists became mainstream and their music became the embryonic influence of the Shades, their original name.

Joe and Edmund Ankrah’s father was a church minister who played organ and he taught his sons how to sing in harmony. They enlisted a few of their friends to join them in forming a harmony group and rehearsed in the cellar of the Ankrah’s house, initially practicing harmony with a version of Paul Anka’s ‘Don’t Gamble With Love.’“The Beatles themselves offered to back us when we told them we’d never worked with a band before. We then rehearsed four songs with them and then we ran home to tell all and sundry that we had ‘made it’!”

“When Brian Epstein arrived at the Cavern that night he refused to allow the Beatles to back us, but they collectively persuaded him to change his mind – and when he heard us he invited us to appear on many subsequent appearances with them.”

On that Cavern debut, the Chants, backed by the Beatles, performed ‘Duke Of Earl’, ‘A Thousand Stars’, ‘16 Candles’ and ‘Come Go With Me’ before an enraptured audience, their set lasting approximately 20 minutes.

Local MP Bessie Braddock took an interest in the group as they were from her Liverpool district, the Exchange ward, and she arranged for them to be the only other Liverpool group present at the Beatles’ civic reception at Liverpool Town Hall.

Despite his initial frustration at the Beatles’ agreeing to back the Chants against his wishes, Epstein took over the management of the group early in 1963, but only for a short time, and without any formal signing. The group found him ineffectual as a manager and he agreed to release them. They then signed with Manchester agent Ted Ross, who arranged a recording deal with Pye Records. However, they were later to consider they had committed “professional suicide” by signing with Ross, although they were grateful for what he tried to do for them.

On the special all-Beatles edition of the TV show ‘Juke Box Jury’, the first record played to them was the Chants’ ‘I Could Write A Book’, which they voted a hit – but it became a miss, despite their positive comments.The Chants debut disc, ‘I Don’t Care’, flipside ‘Come Go With Me’, was released on 17 September 1963. Their second, ‘I Could Write A Book’, flipside ‘A Thousand Stars’, was released on 1 January 1964. Their third was ‘She’s Mine’, flipside ‘Then I’ll Be Home’, in June 1964, and their final release for Pye was ‘Sweet Was The Wine’, flipside ‘One Star’ on 11 September 1964.

Eddie Amoo wrote ‘One Star’, credited to Stanley Houseman, as a tribute to Stanley House, where they’d made their first appearance. Stanley House was a social meeting place in the Toxteth area where young met old and black met white to drink, dance and play football, table tennis, snooker and generally mix together.

Commenting on their period with Pye Records, Eddie comments, “They had no idea what to do with a black doo wop group; they just had no idea.”

The group never found record success, despite further releases with Fontana, Page One, Decca and RCA and strong singles such as ‘Man Without A Face’.

After they disbanded in 1975, Joey and Edmund Ankrah joined another group and enjoyed a degree of success on the television show ‘New Faces’. Eddie Amoo formed a Liverpool soul group, The Real Thing, with his brother Chris and finally found UK chart success in June 1976 with ‘You To Me Are Everything’ which topped the charts, it also reached No. 5 on its re-release in April 1986.

The Real Thing were still active at the close of 1999 with Eddie commenting “We have seen our flagship song recorded by Philip Bailey of Earth Wind & Fire and Courtney Pine, one of our leading sax players. ‘Can You Feel The Force’ was probably our biggest seller in terms of sales and is still being covered and sampled all over the world. We also have two songs in the all-time top 100 of the Guinness Book of Records.
 Discography

Singles

I Don’t Care/Come Go With Me. Pye 7N 15557. 1963.

I Could Write A Book/A Thousand Stars. Pye 7N 15591. 1964.

She’s Mine/Then I’ll Be Home. Pye 7N 15643. 1964.

Sweet Was The Wine/One Star. Pye 7N 15643. 1964.

Come Back And Get This Loving Baby/Lovelight. Fontana TF 715. 1967.

A Love’s Story/Wearing A Smile. Decca F 12650. 1967.

Ain’t Nobody Home/For You. Page One POF 016. 1967.

A Man Without A Face/Baby I Don’t Need Your Love. RCA RCA 1754. 1968.

I Get The Sweetest Feeling/Candy. RCA RCA 1823. 1969.
Here is "She's Mine" From 1964 Enjoy
 

Goldie And The Gingerbreads

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Goldie & the Gingerbreads was an all-female American rock band from 1962 to 1967, consisting of three musicians and a singer. They were the first all-female rock band signed to a major record label. 

Whereas most female bands were ignored by the big record labels and rarely attracted live audiences, the quartet, consisting of Genya “Goldie” Zelkowitz (later Genya Ravan), Ginger Bianco, Margo Lewis, and Carol MacDonald, was among the first to break into a domain dominated by men. They were signed to Decca in 1963 and to Atlantic in 1964.

In 1962, Genya Zelkowitz (who would eventually change her last name to Ravan–her better-known last name when she was the lead singer of the band Ten Wheel Drive) first met Ginger Panabianco in a New York City club when Zelkowitz was the lead singer of Richard Perry's band The Escorts Panabianco was on stage, performing as the drummer for one of Perry's friends. The discovery of a female drummer inspired in Genya Ravan the idea of an all-female rock band. The name of the would-be band was decided upon rapidly: Goldie was the name by which Ravan's mother chose to call her after their arrival in the United States from post-war Poland, while gingerbread was a play on Ginger's name. 

Richard Perry and the other members of The Escorts were college students. When the summer concert season ended, Genya and Ginger began to look for a pianist and soon recruited Carol O'Grady. Finding a female guitarist turned out to be much harder. Various ad-hoc recruits filled in as and when required, but when they accompanied Chubby Checker on his 1962 concert tour of West Germany and Switzerland, they performed without a guitarist. Organist Margo Lewis, who turned out to be the group's third permanent member, replaced O'Grady and performed with the group on the Chubby Checker tour. The following year, Goldie and the Gingerbreads found guitarist and vocalist Carol MacDonald, who at the time was signed to Atlantic/Atco Records, and she became the fourth permanent band member. 

The group's first release on the Spokane Records label was titled "Skinny Vinnie". Although credited to Zelkowitz and Stan Green, the song was in fact the Bill Haley composition "Skinny Minnie" with slight lyric changes. In 1964, fashion photographer and director Jerry Schatzberg threw a party for the Warhol Superstar Baby Jane Holzer that was later referred to by writer Tom Wolfe as "the Mods and Rockers ball, the party of the year." Goldie and the Gingerbreads were booked to provide the musical entertainment and impressed the assembled attendees with both their music and their inimitable presence. Among the guests at this fashionable and well-attended event were The Rolling Stones and Ahmet Ertegün, the chairman of Atlantic Records

, who promptly signed them to the label.

Later in 1964, the band met Eric Burdon and The Animals, whose manager contracted the Gingerbreads for a tour in England. These standard group tours were arranged by record companies to showcase their roster of talent and the Gingerbreads were one of up to six bands on the tour, performing on the same bill night after night in small towns. In Britain, they toured with The Rolling Stones, The Animals, The Beatles, The Yardbirds, The Hollies and The Kinks, among others. 

Troubles with British working visa requirements led to the band performing dates in West Germany (where many UK and US troops were then stationed as part of the NATO defences) at venues including the Star-Club in Hamburg while they waited for their British work permits to come through. 

A subsequent appearance in Paris at the Olympia earned Goldie & The Gingerbreads a favourable introduction to the French music scene, despite technical difficulties that arose during the performance.

Throughout the early 1960s, when Goldie and the Gingerbreads toured extensively throughout North America. Club and venue promoters were not so much interested in their music as in the excitement that an all-female musical group caused. 

Goldie and the Gingerbreads did have one single, "Can't You Hear My Heartbeat", that reached No. 25 on the UK Singles Chart in 1965 Although the single was also released in the United States, a recording of the same song by the heavily promoted Herman's Hermits was released with great fanfare just two weeks prior to the Gingerbreads' release, thus fatally undermining the Gingerbreads' chances for their first hit single in the U.S.Over the course of 1967 and 1968, Goldie and the Gingerbreads gradually broke up. They returned to the United States in an attempt to garner success, but failed. Genya Ravan's strong personality and forceful leadership of the band has been cited as a major factor in the band's split

Frustration due to making little profit from their record releases may also have been an issue.

Genya Ravan went on to form Ten Wheel Drive. She now hosts two radio shows in Little Stevens Underground Garage Siriux/XM Goldies Garage and Chicks and Broads. Ravan's memoirs, entitled Lollipop Lounge: Memoirs of a Rock and Roll Refugee, were published in 2004 by Billboard Books. 

Carol MacDonald and Ginger Bianco later formed the nucleus of jazz-fusion band Isis. 

Margo Lewis joined her ex-bandmates in 1974. Along with being an accomplished musician, Lewis is owner and president of Talent Consultants International, Ltd., a talent booking agency in New York, and is partner in Talent Source, Ltd, which manages the estate of Bo Diddley. Lewis toured with Diddley not only as his personal manager, but also as his keyboard player for the last 10 years of Diddley's life.

In 2011, Goldie and The Gingerbreads were recognized by the Rock and Roll Hall Of Fame

Here is "Can't You Hear My Heartbeat" From  1965 Enjoy

The Applejacks

The Applejacks were an English pop and beat group of the 1960s. They were the first "Brumbeat" group (that is, from the West Midlands conurbation-Birmingham area) to reach the Top 10 of the UK Singles Chart, and were unusual for having a female bass guitarist, Megan Davies.

All of the Applejacks (except Jackson) were members of the same scout troop as children. Baggott, Cash and Freeman began playing together in a skiffle group named the Crestas in 1961, occasionally performing at a local youth club. Davies joined the group in 1961, Gould the following year. Lacking a vocalist, they were strictly an instrumental band until the addition of singer Al Jackson in 1963; they began playing rock and roll songs and secured a residency at Solihull Civic Hall. During that time, they changed their name to the Jaguars before finally becoming the Applejacks in July 1962.

Signed to Decca Records late in 1963, their success was largely due to the strength of their first single, "Tell Me When". Written by Les Reed and Geoff Stephens, "Tell Me When" was released in February 1964 and shot to No. 7 in the UK. After the group met the Beatles during rehearsals for a television appearance, John Lennon and Paul McCartney provided the Applejacks with a song which was to be their second single: "Like Dreamers Do". However, the record only reached number 20 in the UK chart, whilst their final hit, "Three Little Words (I Love You)" (also in 1964), made it to No. 23. 

The group quarrelled with Decca over their next single. Decca wanted them to record "Chim Chim Chiree", but the group disliked the song. Although the single had been announced (and is therefore listed in most discographies), it was never released. According to Megan Davies, the group did not even record "Chim Chim Chiree". Thanks to this quarrel, their next single, "Bye Bye Girl", was released half a year after "Three Little Words".

Although Decca continued to issue Applejacks recordings during 1965 (including the first released version of Ray Davies's "I Go to Sleep"), they met with little response from the public, leading to a rapid return to playing local gigs. After 1966, the group became an act on some of the world's cruise liners, working for Cunard until the end of the decade and frequently aboard the RMS Queen Mary, RMS Queen Elizabeth and RMS Queen Elizabeth 2. 

Freeman and Davies were married in September 1964, with the other band members serving as groomsmen. Davies eventually retired from music to become a nurse and hospital administrator for the National Health Service.

They were once described as the "Solihull Sound", and Chris May and Tim Phillips compared their music to the bijou doorbells popular in Solihull at the time.

On 11 December 2010, the band came together once more to perform a one-off concert at St Mary's Church, Solihull, in which church the Applejacks practised in the early days. The concert was meant to raise funds for the church.

Here is "Tell Me When" From 1964 Enjoy