We are gathered here to consider a matter of grave importance to
the governing of our fair community.
The teenagers of this new town are disrupting its peace, its
serenity, its calm and graceful dignity with the wild, the
furious, the frantic music which they play constantly.
Read that back Miss Hampton. Read that back Miss Hampton.
Miss Hampton. You see what I mean?
Creepy jazzism. We've got to do something about
it. We're going to do something
about it. Any comments?
Meeting adjourned. Follow me.
Hello and welcome to Goon Pod. My name is Tyler Adams, and this
is a podcast where we talk about all things Goon related, goon
adjacent, and this week we are talking about a project helmed
by the Mighty and still with us, Richard Lester.
Richard is probably, I guess it's fair to say, best known to
the most people for his work on 1964's Hard Day's Night film.
But he didn't arrive at that film fully formed without having
to put in the hard yards previously.
And and he developed a unique visual flair and gift for comic
flourishes, having worked with Peter Sellers and Spike Billigan
in the 50s on television and then branching out into short
films such as the Running, Jumping and Standing Still film
with the aforementioned 2 Goons, until he finally got the
opportunity to script and direct an actual feature film in late
1961. And it's that film that we are
discussing today. And I think it's pretty hard to
argue that had Lester never made It's Tri Dad, which is the film
we're talking about, A Hard Day's Night would have been the
poorer for it. Richard Lester was incredibly
visually and conceptually innovative on that earlier film
and in some ways he could rightfully claim to be one of
the fathers of the modern music video, and my guest will enlarge
upon that during our chat. He believes It's Traddad is one
of the most important British music films of all time, not so
much for the acts that it showcased, but for what it
showed could be done. It was, to use that slightly
irritating phrase, a game changer.
And it was also genuinely for all the for all the tunes, it
was genuinely a comedy with some proper funny gags and stuff and
Mario Fabrizzi eating spaghetti and what more could you want?
So my guest is the man behind the The Mighty The All
Conquering, a history of rock music and 500 songs, which in
itself has proven to be a bit of a game changer in terms of
podcasting. His name is Andrew Hickey and we
talked at length about it's Tred Dad and the British musical and
cultural landscape of the time. And this conversation was
recorded in February 2025 and 1st heard on Goon Pod Film Club,
a select club hosted on Patreon where every month the club
members can enjoy chat about classic British comedy films.
Head over to patreon.com/goon Pod For more information and a
free trial. Anyway, hope you enjoy.
Andrew and I having a good old natter about It's Tribe Dad.
We were talking and you said that you would like to talk
about a film which I guess quite a lot of the listeners won't
have heard of, I would imagine, called It's Tribe Dad.
Yeah. Or in America, ring a Ding
rhythm. Yeah, yeah.
And I said to you, because we watched this together, obviously
you've seen it before many times.
We we watched it last week together and with, with a couple
of other friends. And I said to you, why was it
given that different name for the American market?
And you said because tread just wasn't a thing.
Yeah, yeah. The trad movement, the trad jazz
was very much a British thing. There was a sort of American
equivalent, but it was much less well known.
Well known. It certainly wasn't a pop thing.
And they, they were known in America as mouldy figs rather
than trad. And you know, they it's mouldy
figs, pigs or whatever. Wouldn't have been, wouldn't
have been an appropriate title. Yeah, but yeah, also as well,
there's been surprisingly little bit about the production of
this. So I may be or I may be under
false impressions at various points here.
I mean, Richard Lester doesn't even talk about this in the book
of interviews that he did with Steven Soderbergh a few years
back. It it, it just even though it's
his first feature, it just doesn't really appear.
It appears that the the plan was changed at a relatively late
stage to include Rock'n'roll and RB musicians as well, and they
seem to have been put in partly as a selling point for
Americans. So the trap title would work
even less well for the American audience.
So of course, as as we'll get into when we talk about the
plot, the plot is very trap heavy.
Yeah, yeah. Well, yeah.
So to those who haven't seen it, this film, you might, you know,
it might be casually assumed that it's one of those
interchangeable late 50s, early 60s.
Do they call them teensploitation films?
Yes, yeah, yeah. And plot, plot wise, it's it's
absolutely is interchangeable with those.
I mean, the film is written by Milton Subotsky, who I, I should
just mention as well. I, I always get Milton Subotsky,
the the film script writer and producer confused with Milton
Subotnik. They're very similarly named
electronic music composer. At some point during this
conversation, I will undoubtedly say Subotnik when I mean
Subotsky. So if, if people, if people
could bear in mind that that's a a me thing.
Yeah, what a what a duo those two could have made.
Yeah, in some in some field. Subotsky and Subotnik.
Yeah, yes, right. But yeah, Milton Subotsky, who
wrote it, he has a a long list of credits as as a film
screenwriter, but pretty much everything is adaptations.
He he ran Amicus Productions and he is the credited scriptwriter
of most of the Amicus portmanteau films.
I think he was the credited scriptwriter of Doctor Who and
the Daleks as well. But then, but all these things
are adaptations of other people's work.
The only film I'm aware of him having written before, it's
Trapdad, is a truly dire teensploitation film called Rock
Rock Rock starring the DJ Alan Freed.
And to give you an idea of how that is, that's like this seems
to have been intended to be was just an excuse for a bunch of
musical performances. But it was such a threadbare
excuse that there is one scene where literally the protagonist
and her friend sit down in front of the TV for 15 solid minutes
and we just see what they're seeing on TV, which, which is a
bunch of musical, you know, it's, it's that badly, badly
written, some great, some great performances.
People like Chuck Berry and stuff in that film.
But you know, as as a film, it's it's worthless.
And that film also is in the public domain.
So anybody wants to see it, you can find out on its Wikipedia
page. But I really wouldn't recommend
it for. For, for these these, the
handful of films like this that I've seen.
If you like. Yeah.
The common motif, if you like, is that yeah, you you get the
the sort of current flavours of the month and some more
established acts. Yeah.
To to crank out a hit or two and you've got all mostly teenage
extras nodding, swaying or twisting along with varying
degrees of enthusiasm. Yes, the plot is the most by the
numbers version of this plot. It's the man of the small town
where our heroes live is, is an an old man who who thinks that
thinks that this music that the that the teenagers listen to,
it's bad and wrong and must must be banned because it's evil.
So the kids decide to put on a show with all that all their
favorite act you know, to prove to those old squares that the in
fact the the music the teenagers like is is good and makes
everybody happy and everybody has a dance at the end.
Well, you've you've summed it up very neatly.
I I I've actually prepared a summary of what plot there is.
Yeah, yeah. I mean there is there is more
detail and please go ahead with that.
But but that that Oval shape, I have seen at least 50 films with
that, with that basic, basic story, you know, and of them
all, this is by far the best as a film so.
Yeah, so, OK, so look, we're not talking about spoilers here.
No one's going to watch this wanting to watch, you know, a
tightly scripted piece of cinema.
No, no. But we have.
We have Helen and Craig now. So this is Helen Shapiro, who I
believe is 15. Yeah, that's right.
When this was being filmed, she was allowed to finish school
early three weeks before the end of term.
They had an on site, on site tutor well while she was filming
this. So it's Helen Shapiro and Craig
Douglas. Douglas Yeah, I.
Think there's a bit of a gulf in the ages actually, but in this I
believe they're meant to be going steady.
I, I, I think so, although it's, it's not made particularly
clear. And yes, he, he was, he was
about 6-7 years older than her. So yeah, you know, an age gap,
but not, not an, an insurmountable one at the not,
not like it's not like 50 or something, you know?
You know, it's not. It's not acknowledged, but yeah,
but but Hannon and Craig, they regularly gather with their
friends in this suburban coffee shop run by Timothy Bateson, and
the TV and the jukebox compete for their attention.
And as you mentioned before, the the the rather self important
local mayor, played by the actor Felix Felton, who I wasn't
really familiar with. But he he drops in one day for a
cappuccino and is appalled by what he describes through
quivering jowls as creeping jazzism.
And he serves a writ on Mr. Bateson prohibiting him from
playing music on the premises for public enjoyment without a
license. But being enterprising souls,
Helen and Craig hit on the the idea of organising a musical
event which will showcase pop music and try jazz and any luck
win hope for public opinion to the extent that the miserable
old mayor and his councillors are forced to back down and
remove the banning orders. As I look, I appreciate the, you
know, the the plot is fairly difficult to follow.
We have this omnipresent narrator played by played by
Derek Guile and he guides us on the way throughout the film.
And non non British listeners may know Derek Geiler from his
short yet memorable appearance in A Hard Day's Night as the
police station Sergeant who offers Paul's grandfather a cup
of tea. He was in so much stuff that I,
I imagine that people who are listening to this have probably
seen various other things, things he was in, you know, it
was, it was in Sykes and so on, wasn't he?
And I, I imagine the the majority of the listeners here
will have at least seen a few episodes of Sykes because,
because of the goons connection. He is somebody who is very known
to people of our generation and older in Britain, but who is
not, not a known face elsewhere. Yeah.
Once Upon a time, in a small town which will be nameless,
there was a boy, a girl and some assaulted parents.
Now in this town there was a mayor.
One day the mayor decided he'd like a quiet cup of coffee.
I'd like a quiet cup of coffee. But he was a virtuoso on a
particular unusual instrument, wasn't he?
Was he? Yeah, the washboard.
Oh right, I I was actually not aware of that.
Oh, right. You've learned something from
me. No, he was.
He was quite he was quite a celebrated player of the
washboard. OK, so just just to wrap this
up, so, so Helen and and Craig, they, they want to find a disc
jockey who can assist and they eventually enlist the help of
Alan Freeman, Pete Murray, who I believe is still with us and is
going to be 100 this year. That's right.
And David Jacobs, Brian Matthew was due to appear, but he pulled
out. Oh, that's a shame, Yeah.
And they find themselves in an in an ATV television studio,
which has just kind of foreshadows Hard Day's night a
few years later. There there's also they're in a
nightclub cabaret and and the mayor learns of the upcoming
musical Dubbins and is bent upon scuppering it.
And he wants to prevent the bus carrying the performers from
reaching the venue. But the bus manages to evade the
rather ineffective roadblock. And the the bus arrives and and
they put on the show. And even the even the crusty old
mare and his sidekick Arthur Mullard can't resist the
unrepentant rhythms in a scene hoofing it along to the music as
the credits roll. So that's that's a very
simplistic, what's not it's that's the plot.
That's probably more detailed than than actually than Milton
Tboski looked down in his script.
You know well, Richard, Lester said.
You say Lester didn't really go on record about this film much.
I found a little bit of information at the time and and
Lester was interviewed while making the film and he said he
was handed what he assumed to be an 18 page treatment by support.
Yes, yes. But then then he was informed
this was this was actually the shooting script and he said, he
said. So I just turned it around and
made it, yeah, made it send itself up.
That's that's exactly what I had assumed the process was because
having having seen Subotsky's other work had knowing
Subotsky's methods and having seen Lester's other work, it's
very, very clear that this film was not written by the credited
scriptwriter. You know, an 8 an 18 page
treatment is frankly more than more than I expected it to have
been. This is a film that is clever,
that is witty, that is constantly breaking the 4th
wall, that is constantly doing little cinematic tricks.
So you have you have a scene where Howard Shapiro and Craig
Douglas want to get from one place to another and they just
stand in place and the, the the film move side, move sideways.
You see the sprockets and then then there's a different
background, those kind of things.
Or like you're saying that we're talking about the roadblock that
the mayor and Arthur Mullard put put up the the bus bounces off
this rope that they've put up and on the little, the little
model that Arthur Mullard and the mayor are using to to plot
what's happening. The bus bounces back off that it
it it's a very Warner Brothers cartoon influenced thing for a
lot of this. And you get none of that in
anything else Subotsky did. But of course that that kind of
comedy is throughout Lester's work, isn't it?
You know, from running, jumping, standing still film before
before this right through to something like Superman 3.
He has a very, very clear director of your style and a
very, very clear vision. And it's entirely, blatantly
obvious that Richard Richard Lester wrote this script in in
everything but name. He, he was clearly quite a,
quite a decent comedy writer himself, You know, he, he he
wasn't, he wasn't a Spank Milligan or something like that.
But he was clearly more, more than capable of writing this
stuff. Yeah.
I've seen, I've read a lot of reviews from the time of this
film and the the one thing that sort of runs through all these
reviews, you know, they, they, they kind of dismiss the plot
for what it is, but they. But for example, The Hollywood
Reporter said what makes this movie outstanding for at least
for at least 2/3 of the way, is that it's director and producer
have attacked A hackneyed form with style and wit.
The familiar premise for these films has been crossed with
British humour and the French New Wave with delightful
results. Yeah, right.
And the and the Daily Mirror said a bright new director, Dick
Lester, keeps the screen constantly alive with offbeat
ideas and wit. So, yeah, that that's the take
away that most people took from this film.
Now, Richard Lester, do you want to?
I know you've talked about Richard Lester, for Was It the
Hard Day's Night? Yes, 500.
Songs do you do you have just a quick chat about his his sort of
how we got to this point? Now forgive me, I, I, I often
get details a little bit wrong when, when I do this kind of
thing. It's, it's worth pointing out,
I, I have a reputation for getting for getting things
scrupulously right on my podcast.
So, but that's with me having written a script in there, I can
Fact Check things. So, so please, please understand
that that I will probably probably get some of the, some
of the details wrong and misremember things here, you
know. But yeah, he, he had done a
little bit of work in the state. He'd got into TV very, very
young, like in like the very early 50s when he, when he was a
teenager himself. And he'd, I think he'd
originally started out doing music for TV, but he worked his
way up to, to being ATV director basic basically because at, at
the time in the States, nobody was involved in TV really.
And so you, you, you know, like I say, very, very early 50s, it
was just take whatever job's going and and like he he so
yeah, he ends up directing episodes and then he comes
outcomes over to Europe and, and I think for a while he was a
busker. But then then he then he goes
comes to Britain and starts working on what one of those
film shows that that was meant, like half hour shows that was
meant to be made for the export market that they had a lot of at
the at the time, you know. The oh, was it?
Was it? Was it called Mark Sabre?
That's that's the one, yes. And it was one like that, yeah.
So he he starts, he starts direct directing that.
And then Peter Sellers sees a show that that Richard Lester
did Lester did his did his own show where he was.
He was the star as well, as I recall.
And there was only one episode of it went out and it, it, it
was considered like a, a massive failure, but it was a sort of
experimental failure. And Peter Sellers phoned him
that night and sort of, sort of said I, I can't remember the
wording, but it was something. So he said, yeah, he said, he
said, he said either that's the worst television program that
I've ever, ever seen, or I think you're onto something that we
are aspiring to. Yes, exactly.
Yes, yeah. By the way, am I right in saying
that that one episode of the Dick Lester Show also had Alan
Owen? I believe so, yes.
And Alan Owen, of course, starts out as starts out as an actor
and transitions into writing. And Alan Owen also appears in
the a show called Fred, doesn't he, which which is the the the
show that Lester starts to starts doing Peter Sellers.
And of course the story about that is that it was meant to be
a televised version of the Goons.
I'm sure you must have done an episode on a show called Yeah.
But for anybody who has not listened, that was meant to be a
televised version of the Goons. But first, Spike Milligan didn't
want to be involved at all, thinking that you couldn't do
goon style humour on TV. And the story, as Lester tells
it goes, they did. They did the first episode with
like various other of the people from associated London scripts
writing writing bits for it instead.
And then but the the night that the first episode is broadcast,
Milligan phones him up and starts saying, OK, so for the
second episode, I want to do this.
I'm talking talking as if it's his show all along, you know?
Absolutely. We have two very interesting
young men now in the studio just back from Oxford where they've
been studying music for quite some time, Peter and Hugh
Jampton. Good evening, Peter and Hugh.
Very nice to have you in the studio with us and to be
visiting Ying Tong tonight. You've just come down from
Oxford, haven't you? Yes, that's right.
What were you doing there? If I Maybe it's a rude one.
Studying music. Music under Professor WH
Vickers. Oh, WH Vickers?
Yes. Oh, how very nice for you. 29
years. 29 years. Have you Really. 29 years?
Well, that is a long time, isn't it?
And when you think about it, tell me I, I mean, I must make
it quite clear that we know we're in on the joke because,
well, it's not really a joke. But let's tell the world, shall
we? These two young men are just off
on a world tour, isn't that right?
But it's a world tour with a subtle difference, isn't it?
I mean, actually, you're going to go around the world, walk
around the world backwards on stilts and what else are you
doing playing those, playing sousaphone?
He's he's flashable. Oh, how wonderful.
And all through the heat and everything.
Oh what it could have been bandits and everything.
So yeah, Lester directs a show called Fred, and then he decides
he wants to go into making films, supposedly because you
can. At the time all TV was live and
he wanted to be able to do retakes and so then the next,
the next thing he did of course was the Running, jumping,
standing still film, which everybody will be familiar with.
I think he did another short after that and and then.
But then it's Trad Dad was his first actual feature film.
Well, yeah, just you said there's something else he did
after between running, jumping and It's Trad Dad, he made a
short documentary called Have Jazz Will Travel.
Oh, right. Yes, that's it.
Yes, yes and yes. And, and he said it was and it
was he was collaborating with the cinematographer was Robert
Kraska, right, who did who was on the Third Man.
Yeah. And Lester said he didn't do a
terribly good job of of capturing the music.
He said jazz combos both both modern and traditional,
photographed in smoky places against black just the abstracts
and close-ups of instruments. Yes, yeah, yeah, that's right.
I I believe I've seen this, but it was a while back.
It didn't make, it didn't make a huge impression on me.
I, I should really have checked that and watched it again before
talking about this because I'm sure it would be interesting to,
to contrast that that with it's trad dad.
One of the things about it's trap dad that fascinates me and
that makes me go back to it is the fact that he really does do
an incredible job of capturing the, the musical performances,
even though they're mostly not very good musicians.
You know, a lot of the acts on this, no offence to any of them
are still alive and listening, but a lot of them are not, are
not top tier performers. But in this film, Richard Lester
basically invents the visual vocabulary that that we will use
that we that continues to be used for pop video and stuff to
this day. And you only, you only really
get that if you only really understand that if you compare
this to the films that came before, before it, you watch
even a really good 1950s teens plotation film.
And there were a handful of them.
There was the girl can't help it, which is probably in, in the
film itself, the closest to this that was directed by Frank
Tashan, who was a cartoon director before he went into
before he went into cinema. And so there's a lot of a lot of
similar kind, similar kind of visual gags and 4th world
breaking humor and so on. Very, very similar kind of film.
Much better film, but that's largely because of the music in
it. But you you look at that, or you
look at even something like Jailhouse Rock with it's
elaborate musical sequences, or you look at the only good
British music film prior to this, Espresso Bongo.
And none of the music scenes are shot as anything other than
place a stationary camera to in front of people doing the
performance and film, film the performance pretty much, pretty
much as live. You can have backing dancers,
you can have other stuff going on, but there's no visual
imagination there at all in any of it.
And that that tends to be the case in most film that that is
intended to portray straight musical performances before
this, normally speaking, if if you're watching something
interesting to music, which is done with any kind of visual
style or finesse, it tends to be a a musical.
And the musical performers are are non diegetic.
You, you tends to be people singing and dancing with no real
sound of any of the instrumentalists.
And that that kind of thing you have, you must be Berkeley kind
of kind of stuff or whatever. You have lots of visual
imagination and that kind of thing.
But anything where you've got musicians playing diegetically
in frame, suddenly everybody goes, OK, we're going to we're
going to stand Elvis in the middle of the frame.
We'll have Scotty on the left and Bill on the right and DJ in
the back. OK, play, play the song.
You know, and that's that's about the extent of the visual
imagination and in any of these things.
But Lester is doing is doing things like, you know, you'll,
you'll have almost Citizen Kane like deep focus shots where
where you've got somebody like in, in close up playing, playing
a trombone. And you can you can see another
one of the musicians through the through the trombones tube and
slide and things of things of that nature, split screenshots
and things like this. And literally, as far as I'm
aware, and I've seen a lot of these films, nobody has ever
done this before. Like nobody.
Yeah, and the Temperance 7 sequence.
In the yes, that's the most. Effective, I think.
Yeah, sure. Yeah.
That really, really, really worked very, very well.
And that is clearly what we now think of as a music video, isn't
it? Let's have a dream, A dream away
romance. Cut away from Verizon.
Let's have a dream, a dream away romance.
Get away from the blue. After A Hard Day's Night,
everybody starts copying what Lester does in A Hard Day's
Night visually. And it's because of that that
that becomes the language, you know, that's then used in the
monkeys. And it's the IT it just, it just
becomes the standard way that you that you portray music,
musicians on on screen. But Lester does it, does it all
in, in it's trap Dad before he does it in A Hard Day's Night.
And frankly, were it not for the fact that The Beatles are The
Beatles, it's Trap Dad is the better film in most ways.
You know? Yeah.
It was fighting words. In terms of visual imagination,
in terms of humour, you know, the The Beatles are better
actors than Helen Shapiro and Craig Douglas, and they're
certainly better, better singers and musicians than basically
anybody in It's had that, you know, the musically it's, it's a
million light years away and, you know, The Beatles have
actual characters, which Helen Shapiro and Craig Douglas don't
have in this, you know. There's a door leading straight
into the studio. Oh yes, when the music finishes,
we'll try and sneak past them. Both films are absolutely,
absolutely full of like, little cameos by great, great faces of
British comedy, aren't they? You know there's.
In in this film, sorry, in this in it's triad Dad, you have
Derek Nimmo. Yeah, non speaking role as a as
a waiter. Yeah, of course he turns up in a
non speaking role and credited in Hard Day's night.
Absolutely. Yep.
And Derek Gala in both, Yeah. You've got Mario Fabrizio in
here, who obviously wasn't in Hard Day's Night because of
being dead, you know, But you've got you've got.
Yeah, he absolutely would have been.
There's no question, isn't there?
Who else is in this? Obviously we mentioned Arthur
Mallard, Hugh Lloyd, Frank Thornton.
It's it's just, it's just full of full of all these great
people. Yeah.
Frank Thornton, who's playing a television producer.
Yeah, yeah. And I'm, I'm quite fond of, I'm
sure you are Gonks go beat. Yes.
I mentioned as we were watching this the other night that
because in Gonks Go Beat, Frank Thornton plays Mr. A&R, Whether
Mr. A&R was the same character sort of transformed.
Yeah, I, I, I, I can imagine, I can imagine he is, yes, that,
that's actually, that's funny. I I just clicked on the IMDb
page for this and and the the I I look look to see if there was
a photo of Frank as ATV director because was trying to remember
does he wear these the same sweater that Victor Spinetti
wears in A Hard Day's Night? I think he does, doesn't he?
I. Think so that that that and
visibly hairy jumper. Yeah, the Angola thing I just
noticed that the the top user list for instrad dad is trailers
from Help Presents the Movies That Made Me with Andrew Hickey
Part 2. There you go.
I I, I am. I am clearly, I know.
And it's Trump that person. But they are.
Yes, OK, let's just mention a few of the the acts you see
here, because you said, OK, you said that quite a lot of them
were you didn't say third rate, but you, you, you said that
maybe weren't that weren't that great.
But there's a, there's a few, I mean John Layton of.
Course, yes. Yeah, John, John Layton is he.
He's somebody who is not very well known now, but his single
Johnny Remember Me was was an excellent single, but more for
Joe Meek's production than for Leighton himself.
And the rain is. Falling.
And the wind. Is blowing cold across the moon.
He, he was an I think he's still alive.
He was an actor first and foremost, but he was sort of
started by Robert Stigwood and by Joe Joe Meek, who was who was
the the the producer of Johnny Remember Me and he he made some
fabulous records, but. What was that?
What was that curious sort of was it was it a genre or a mini
genre of the time of, of what would you call it, Death pop?
Yeah, Death discs is the term that's that's generally used.
Yeah, a lot of these came came around.
I think the first one I did, I did a Patreon bonus episode on
this, but it was like 4 or five years ago.
So I I get, I may get on the timeline.
I think the I think the first one was a record called Black
Leather Trousers and Motorcycle Boots, which was written by
Lieberman Stoller. But after after that, there was
a whole run of them for about a decade.
Obviously, Johnny, Remember Me, which we're talking about.
You had things like Terry by Twinkle and you had the the sort
of final culmination was was with the Shangri LA's leader of
the pack. Which?
And since then you've had the odd sort of pastiche of them,
like Richard Thompson's 1952 Vincent Black Lightning, for
example, is a song very much written on this this schemer.
It was, it was always the exact same story, which is the
rebellious, misunderstood teenager whose girlfriend loves
him, but everybody tells her to keep away from keep away from
him because he's rebellious and dark and brooding and handsome
and he's from the wrong side of the tracks and he's only going
to have bad things happen to him.
And eventually she decides to break up with him.
And then he he goes off and immediately dies in a fatal
crash. And some, some sometimes the the
the singer is visited by his ghost or similar.
Now, in the case of Johnny Remember Me, which was John
Leighton's big one, the roles are sort of reversed because
it's a man singing, you know, but it's, it's still the same,
the same kind of thing. The other the other main example
of a song in in this style that's not quite like that is
The Beach Boys. Don't worry baby, where again,
because it's the man singing, he doesn't end up dying at the end,
but it sort of implied that he might do and that that one
you've got. She told me, baby, when you race
today, take along my love for you and if you knew how much I
love you, nothing could go wrong with you.
But I mean, there was also a Dead Man's Curve by Jan and
Dean, which was another Brian Wilson song.
So there were there were loads and loads and loads of these
things for about a nine year period.
But yeah, so John Layton, he's quite prominent in this film.
But you've got people like Chubby Checker.
Yeah, yeah, Vincent. Yeah, Gene Vincent, of course
was wonderful, but but he at this point was in a weird
position in his career when he'd had no hits at all in the
States. Bibo Palula was a one hit wonder
thing in the States, but over here, because he was one of the
fewer Americans who'd actually come over here to perform at all
because he couldn't get gigs in America.
Over here, he was the big American rock star and he'd, and
he'd been very, very big on British TV in the late 50s,
early 60s, but was on the downturn of his career in
Britain at this point after the car accident he'd been in with
Eddie Cochran, where Eddie Cochran had died.
He'd, he'd already been an alcoholic and he'd already been
in lots of chronic pain. But, but both of them got worse
and he became a very heavy drug user.
He was dead within like 6-7 years of this, you know, so and
I don't, I, I think it'd already been, he gave us since his since
his last hit over here. But in Britain he was a
rock'n'roll star in a way that he just wasn't in the States.
But yeah. That that, that car crash, am I
right? Am I right in remembering that
either you or or our friend Tilt mentioned it that wasn't one of
the policemen on the scene? Dave Dee.
Yes, Dave, Dave Dee. Later of Dozy Beaky, Mick and
Titch fame, yeah. Yeah, yes, Dave, Dave Dee was,
was one of the policemen on the scene there.
Yeah. And just just one of those
little weird coincidences, or in another weird coincidence, the
driver of the car was called George Martin.
That's right. That's right, just on George
Martin. It's a It's a That's a handy
little Segway, a good excuse just to talk briefly about the
musical director for this film. Yeah.
He was a a bitter rival. Yes, Ken Thorne, Yeah.
Oh, Nori Paramore. Oh, you're talking.
You're talking about the one who recorded the Ken Thorne, did the
incidental music for the film, and he was also apparently a bit
of a rival with George Martin. Yeah.
Or at least there was apparently some disgruntlement between them
after Ken Thorne got chosen to do the music for help rather
than George Martin. I can't, I can't remember the
details, but that was. But yes, of course.
Yeah. Nori Nori Paramore produced most
of most of the music for this, although not not every track.
For example, the John later one, Lonely City is a is a Joe Meek
production. And I believe, I believe that
the Temperate 7 tracks will be produced by George Martin 'cause
he was there, he was their producer, Yeah.
But yeah, I think, I think most, most of the rest of it is
produced by Nabi Paramore. Yes, Yeah.
And do you just just sorry, keep going all over the place?
No, no, no. You mentioned the temperate 7
again. Yeah.
And and how we I think we both agree that their sequence in the
film was the most visually arresting.
Absolutely. Yes.
Was Do you think that's because of the nature of, of the, you
know, because they were slightly eccentric and they were.
I, I, I suspect they, they, they must, they must both, both more
eccentric performers and they were more arty, you know, I, I,
I think, I think they were the ones who were most, most eager
to go along with it with Richard Lester.
For those those who don't know, well, we haven't really
explained even what Trad is at this point, have we?
Trad was a, a musical movement in the 50s in Britain where
people were trying to slavishly recreate 1920s New Orleans jazz.
That was the, that was the original idea of it.
And people like Humphrey Littleton and Chris Barber,
these, these kind of people were making records that were just
note for note recreations of the of music was made before about
1927 in New Orleans was, was their aim.
So some of them would would get very, very, very dogmatic about
this. And like, yeah, we, we, we can't
have anything from Chicago in the 1920s.
So we can't have anything from after 1927.
You know, once, once Louis Armstrong formed his Hot 5,
that's, that's what, that's when music, music went downhill.
It'll never be the same again. You know, there were, there were
bands that split up because somebody suggested doing a Duke
Ellington tune, you know, that, that, that kind of thing.
But but that that was that was trad as it was in the 50s and it
the, the trad music actually spawn things like the skiffle
craze and so on the the track bands would have breakout
sessions where they play skiffle music as well.
And that's that's where, you know, Rock Island Line by Lonnie
Donegan was recorded during a session for a Chris Barber tried
album. Oh.
Yeah, because you, because you, you mentioned about Chris Barber
going to to a Humphrey Littleton.
That's that's right, yeah, Chris.
Chris Barber is largely responsible for the British
Blues boom and for the existence of the Marquee Club in London,
for the existence of the Reading Festival.
And basically you don't get British rock music without him
because he brought over all the the Blues musicians who inspired
people like The Rolling Stones and the Animals and all those
kind of bands. And he only became a musician
because he went to a Humphrey Littleton gig and sat in the
front row. And halfway through the gig, the
trombone player leaned over and said, said to Chris Barber, who
was like 15 at the time, kid, do you want to buy a trombone?
And Chris Barber said, how much? And he said, I, I think the
number was £5.10 shillings. But it was some, some amount of
money. Yeah.
And Chris Barber checked his pocket, and he happened to have
exactly £5.10 shillings in his pocket.
So he said, all right, and bought the trombone.
And that's why he became a trombonist.
And and did this trombonist immediately get fired by
Humphrey Littleton for not being able to play as trombone
anymore? Have a spare one?
History doesn't relate. I I, I presume they sort of made
the exchange at the end of the gig or something like that.
But but. Not halfway through.
But that's, yeah, that that's that's how Chris Barber, who who
became one of the biggest musicians in Britain in the 50s,
it became a trad musician. The camera swing from Kenny
Balls, Jasmine will swing with Chris Barber and Yellow Dog
Blues. But by this point this is like 8
to 10 years after the peak of trad as a musical subculture.
There'd been this sort of watered down commercialised
version of it that it had a lot of minor chart successors.
People like people like Akebilk and so on were, were having hits
with what was often not far, not far from just being Muzak at
this point. It certainly wasn't this sort of
rigorous trying to be authentic to to, you know, it was, it was
far more commercial and you can make arguments as to, you know,
whether that's better or worse. And frankly, I, I am not a huge
fan of a lot of this music in in either capacity.
But though some of the some of the stuff that Chris Bob and
hopefully a little to do in the 50s is actually very good.
But but in general, it wasn't a musical subculture that made any
anything of any great lasting worth.
But by by this point, it's gone into a far more sort of poppy
style. But that's also meant that a
group of art students who created the Temperate 7, it's
almost a sort of concept, conceptual art thing.
And they they were performing recreations of old 20s novelty
songs, sort of. Before the Bonzos, yes, sort of
like like the the Alberts. Yes, they were, they were very,
they were very influential on both the Bonzos and the Alberts.
And I can't remember exactly, but I believe that there was at
least one member of the Temperance Seven who went on to
be in the Alberts or something like that.
There was, there was certainly some sort of fluidity between
those two, but they were, they were, they were very obviously a
huge influence on the Bonzos as well, who came along like 3-4
years after this. But the the temp, the temperate
Seven were a novelty act, but a novelty act that had space
created for them by the existence of the the trap, the
trap movement. And they'd had a number one hit
the year earlier that George Martin had actually produced for
them. And I, I, I believe that they'd
also had a hit in the States. But yeah, they're they're most
of you're driving me crazy was yeah, certainly was number one
over here. And they had another few top ten
hits and that was that was, I believe, George Martin's first
number one record for anybody. Also they they did people
listeners to this will quite probably know the version of the
ukulele lady that Peter Sellers did a couple of years before
this. And that's them them backing him
on that. Oh, that's.
Right. Yes.
It's not about that. Yeah, yeah.
So that's the that's the kind of
thing they they were doing. They were in this intersection
of music and comedy, but far closer to the music side than
the comedy side. Pastiches of nine and
recreations of 1920s novelty music put with with a slightly
raised eyebrow about it. Yes, yeah, you mentioned Chris
Barber and Humphrey Littleton. I'm I'm a big fan, always have
been. Of I'm sorry I haven't a clue.
Of course, yes. And regularly during during
humps pomp in that as chairman he was regularly getting gently
ribbed, usually by Barry Cryer. Gently ribbed that he wasn't as
good as Chris Barber or Kelly Ball and both of whom appear in
this. Yes, but Humph doesn't.
I mean, Humph would have been perfect for this film.
Absolutely. I I assume, I assume it was, I
don't know what label he mean. He he recorded free MI, didn't
he? Because of course, George Martin
produced his bad penny bad thing.
Yeah, Bad penny Blues. Yeah.
Bad Finger Blues was The Beatles track that became, yeah, his bad
penny Blues. George Martin produced that.
And Joe Meek, who engineered, who produced the John Leighton
track in this, engineered that, you know, so he was clearly
working. He was clearly an EMI at least a
few years earlier than this. I'm quite surprised that he
didn't get picked up for this as well.
I mean, maybe maybe he was asked and said no.
Maybe there was a scheduling conflict.
You know it, but it it, it is surprising because he is, he is
the one big name from that, from that genre that that isn't here.
And you know, by this point, quite a quite a few of the the
smaller names of him as well. You know, people like the the
Dukes of Dixieland and stuff like that.
And Bob Wallace at his Storyville Jazz Man.
Yes, yeah, it's very. Lightfoot to this New Orleans
jazz band. Yeah.
And then And then you said about the fact that there was.
So Lester went to the States to film.
Yes. The likes of Chubby Chequer.
Yeah, basically towards the end of the film, again, getting
details on the making of this is difficult.
So I may be telling anecdotes that have been sort of polished
and but aren't actually what's actually happened, you know, But
towards the end of filming the the trad boom was not doing all
that well in Britain at this time.
And Lester had some contacts in the the American entertainment
industry, as did Subotsky. And it was basically agreed that
Richard Lester would go over to the go over to the States and
for one day film as many American acts as he could,
miming miming to to their latest records.
And they would stick, stick that in, in.
There's a there's a nightclub scene here, which we mentioned
earlier, the one, the one where you've got Mario Fabrizio and
Derek Nimmo. And basically in that scene, you
keep cutting back and forth between performers supposedly on
the stage and comic business going on in the audience.
And all the performers supposedly on the stage were
filmed in one day in the States. And you had the Paris sisters
who were sort of one hit wonders who Phil Spector had produced
some stuff for. But I don't think, I don't think
he produced the track of theirs that's on this.
But don't quote me. You've got Jim McDaniels, you've
got Gary U.S. Bonds, Dell Shannon and Chubby
Checker. But there's there's like a, a
stretch of like 5 or six performances where you where you
notice that there's never any interaction between the
performers, the audience and they're shot much less
imaginatively than the rest. Yeah, yeah.
And that's because it's the he's gone over for one day found as
many American pop stars as he as he as he could persuade to be in
it and sort of done the Plunk 1 camera in front of the mind, the
single in front of a black background and get them off, get
the next one on kind of thing. But even there, you know, that
is very much the equivalent of that of that scene, as I
mentioned in rock, rock rock, the Alan Freed one that that
Milton Zapotsky wrote where they they they punk somebody down in
front of ATV for 15 minutes. But even there you have him into
cutting between that and comic business between Mario for
Brittany and Derek Nimmo, you know, which is in in inherently
better than Tuesday world sat on sat on the sofa, you know, and
that's that seems to have been a very, very much a last minute
decision. And that's the the bulk of the
non trad music that's that's in this is is in that one scene,
not all of it because because you've got John Layton and Gene
Vincent. Gene Vincent wasn't American,
but oh, but he was firmly based in the UK at this point.
And you've got Helen Shapiro and Craig buglers doing their own
hits at the end. But all all the other pop or
rock music comes from comes from that sequence in the middle.
And it's mostly people doing like the hit that's like two
hits after their last big hit. It's all people who It's all
people who were a little bit past their commercial peak.
Yeah. Like the chubby, chubby check is
doing the Luzia inhibitions twist.
He's not. He's not doing the twist Or
let's twist again. You know, Del Del Shannon's
doing. You never talked about me.
He's not. He's not doing the runaway.
Yeah, that that kind of thing. They're all a little bit past
past the peak. Chubby Chequer.
I'm no expert whatsoever on Chubby Chequer.
All his songs. Did they have an element of the
twist? They all had, they all had, they
all had the twist or some other, some other dance.
He he, he, he tried various various other dance crazes and
some, some of them he had some of them he had fairly big hits
with. He had like 7 or 7 or 8 big hits
in sixty 6162. You know, he, he, he wasn't just
a one hit wonder by any means, but he, he was definitely on the
down downside of his career by by this point, you know, he only
had that sort of two year window where he was doing anything.
Yeah, yeah, yeah. I'm just looking as well.
I just want to touch on Helen Shapiro and Craig Douglas
because because yeah, we, we, we've barely spoken about them,
but she was, she was huge at this time.
Yeah, again, she was somebody who had a very, very big hit.
I mean, a bunch of very, very big hits.
I mean, the thing that's always striking about this is that both
Helen Shapiro and Craig Douglas headlined over The Beatles after
The Beatles had their first hits the the The Beatles.
The Beatles were their support act in in 1963, you know, after
the after to this point. These were these were not small
stars at all. But in both cases, their career
more or less ended in 63, you know.
Interestingly, Helen Shapiro went on to sing with Humphrey
Littleton in the 80s as a regular part of his band.
Well, she, she was. No, she's no actress, was she?
Although she did appear as a regular character in Albion
Market in the 80s, I discovered. I didn't didn't.
Know that I don't know what level of acting chop she needed
to be in but but but her voice is so distinctive.
It's so. Yeah, yeah, it's, it's weird.
What what what does tilt say about it?
If if you need Lulu and Paul Robeson to be the same person,
that is phrasing something like that.
Yeah, yeah, Walking back to happiness I guess was her
biggest hit maybe or. So, yeah, yeah, I think, I think
so, yeah. She she had she had a couple,
but that's that's the only one that sort of that's that's the
only one that anybody sort of remembers these days.
The the one that the one she does here.
The the the first hit was don't treat me like a child, which
played up the fact that she was only 14 when she had her first
hit, as she was when she's walking back to happiness, I
think. But at this point she's 16.
The the the song she sings here, Let's talk about love is like
one of her last two or three hits.
It was like a top thirty hit. But again, like with many of
these people, this is really capturing.
It's it's it's a snapshot of an era that was slightly before
even the era when it was made. You know, we we talk about how
The Beatles completely overturned popular music in
Britain. And they've they really, really
did. But yeah, Helen Shapiro's and
Craig Douglass's were always already slightly on the downturn
when this came out. This, this is a film that was
striking slightly too. It's after the iron had already
started to cool down a little bit, which again, I think is why
Richard Lester wanted to put these American stars in.
Because even though they were also fading stars in America,
that was at least a little bit of extra glamour to be to beef
the film up a bit. Back at the town centre, unaware
of the plans of the police. Come on, Ellie.
What about a number? Come on, come on.
Let's talk. Why don't you drive?
Let's talk. Let's talk, Let's talk, let's
talk, let's talk, let's talk about love.
If you've got time to spare, I've got a heart to share
anytime or anywhere. Let's talk, Let's talk, let's
talk about love. Some folks say love is blind.
So this film wrapped film filming wrapped in December 61
and it's it's released 30th of March 1962 in the UK.
A day rich with musical significance.
Andrew, because it was also the day MC Hammer was born.
Well, there you go, the stars aligned.
Yeah, but what was it? So October 62 was Love Me do,
wasn't it so? October the 5th, 1962 was Love
Me Do. I always say that October the
5th, 1962 was the day that the 60s really started because that
that was the day that Love Me Do was released.
It was The Beach Boys first single, but in Britain was
released. It'd been released a month or
two earlier in the States. James Brown was doing his life.
The Apollo show shows over the first couple of weeks of 19 of
October 1962 and the the the first Bond film Doctor No came
out on October the 5th 1962. So that's like the official
start date of the 60s as far as I'm concerned.
So yeah, it's your birthday as. Well, wasn't it?
But not, not, not 62. Yeah, October the 5th, 1978.
But that's what that's why I remember the the October the 5th
specific, but that that is the date that all those things were
happening simultaneously. And you have the cubic missile
crisis kicking off in October 62 as well.
So this is in that weird liminal period between, between the end
of the 50s and the start of the start of the 60s, you know, in
between the end of the chat, the band and The Beatles first LP as
Larkin talked about, you know? Yes, just to put this in the
context of Beatles context as well.
So this comes out end of March 6210.
Days later, Stuart Sutcliffe died.
Yeah. And then, little more than what
six months later, Love Me Do comes out.
Yeah, yeah. And some changes it begins to.
I, I can't remember the exact dates, but sometime around the
time this came out will have been when Gene Vincent was
playing at playing the star club with The Beatles as well.
Oh, OK, yeah, yeah, there's, there's quite a quite a lot of
sort of little Beatles connections in here.
Like, like I said, Jim, Jim Vinson played this, played the
star club with them in late 61, early 62.
I can't can't remember the exact dates, but I, I think I think it
was around then. And of course, I can say Helen
Shapiro and Craig Douglas toured, toured with The Beatles
as as did Del Shannon, also also toured with them in early 63.
You know this, this is all all people who would be around in
those early stages of The Beatles career.
It's. Just put a pin in Gene Vincent
for a moment because I was looking at some acts or
performers that were due to appear, asked to appear perhaps,
but didn't end up in the film The Shadows, apparently.
That makes sense. Makes sense both that they'd be
asked and that they they would turn it down because of course,
they they were the big stars at the time.
Yeah. There's people don't don't
understand just how big Cliff and the Shadows were before The
Beatles came along. I'm.
I'm just going to read out the list.
This is the list of official number ones from 1960.
From 1963. Yeah, first of first of January,
Cliff Richard and the Shadows. The next time that stays on the
stays at #1 for three weeks, it's replaced by dance song by
The Shadows, which which is, which is replaced a week later
by Diamonds by Jet Harris and Tony Beehan, the former bass
player and drummer of the Shadows who who'd quit the band.
That's at #1 for three weeks. Then you have Frank Ifield with
The Way We'd Win for three weeks, then Cliff in the Shadows
with Summer Holiday, then the Shadows with Foot Tapper, then
Cliff in the Shadows with Summer Holiday again.
And then you have how do you do it by Jerry and the Pacemakers
and from me to you by The Beatles.
But that's, that's how big, that's how big both Cliff and
the shadows were at this at this point.
Now after that, they wouldn't have another hit, the number one
hit again for like 2 years because it suddenly becomes all
mercy beat all the time. And the rest of 63, it's like
Billy J Kramer, the search of The Beatles, Jerry and the
pacemakers. You know, there's this total
Wipeout, but you know, and the shadows were appearing in all
the Cliff Richard films and stuff like that, you know, so
there was it. It makes perfect sense that
they, they, they were, they were too big for a low budget thing
like this, you know, they, they, they were the major megastars of
the time, you know? Also not in this film, The Mick
Mulligan Band. Right.
Yes. Clinton Ford.
Right. George Malley.
Yeah, that, that it, it makes sense again, both that he would
be asked and both that he would turn it down.
Mellie. Mellie was very much a driver of
the early trad movement, but he was I, I, I believe I might say
he didn't like the term trad. He he preferred to call himself
a revivalist, you know. So this, this is already, you
know, he performed with a lot of, a lot of the people who
became the early trad people in the in the very early 50s.
But he, he was, he had ideological differences with
with the people who became who became the trad movement and
didn't really want to be associated with them.
And he was far too far too much a serious performer, even though
at the same time he was also far more eccentric than most of them
and far more. He would have fitted in very
well with people like the Temp and Seven actually, but.
A very flamboyant. Yes, yes.
But I think it's a shame he wasn't involved.
I think he I think he would probably have actually
appreciated the finished film. But I can I can easily see why
he why he would turn down appearing in it to start with.
Yeah, The Highwaymen. Right.
And I'll say this delicately, but yeah, also a rising young.
I think he he'd originally been with Decker, but recently signed
to Polyphone. Paul Raven who?
OK. And so I said, stick a pin in
Jean Vincent. Doing my research here.
In 1968, in a hotel in Germany, Jean Vincent tried to shoot Paul
Raven. Yeah, he fired several shots but
missed, and a frightened Raven left the country the next day,
apparently. I to be to be fair, Gene Vincent
tried to shoot almost everybody, but in this case it was probably
more justifiable than most, you know?
Yes, it was for the uninitiated. Paul Raven went on to infamy, or
fame and infamy as Gary Glitter. Yeah, but we'll move on from
that. Craig.
Craig Douglas. His big hit was only 16.
That's right, yeah, the first of the Sam Cooke song, yeah, that,
that was his only #1 and that that had been like 2-3 years
earlier at this point. He, he, he was one of one of
those British teen idols who made their careers by doing
sound alike cover versions of hits from the States before the
hits had managed to get over here and not very good ones in
general. So he he was already a little
bit past it at this point, but he he was still popular enough
that that he could Co headline this kind of thing, you know.
Well, I think he's still with us.
I believe so, yes. Yeah.
And he, and certainly up until about 10 years ago, he was still
recording music. Yeah, because apparently he
recorded a a cover version of Creep by Radiohead.
Right, OK. You can imagine such a thing.
Yeah, you know, good, good, good.
The same keeping keeping vaguely modern, you know.
Just wanted to touch on a few of the other the the more sort of
comic personalities that you see turning up in this film, only in
very small roles. You've got Hugh Lloyd as the TV
Centre commissioner. I didn't know we'd have so much
trouble just getting a disc jogging.
We better get the next one. He's our last one.
Hello. See those doors?
They're closed and they're going to stay closed by anyone who
doesn't have a ticket. But how can we get tickets?
What? For this show?
You'll be lucky. They're handed out by the
performers themselves. Fan clubs.
We don't belong to any fan clubs.
Then you don't get in. Who's on next week's show?
Mr. Akabilk. Akabilk.
A friend Tilt keep bringing him up, don't we?
But he he likes to tell the story about Sophie Loren, who's
working in the in Britain in the early 60s and her favorite
television show was, as she called it, huge and I, which,
which was Hugh Lloyd's sitcom Hugh and I with Terry Scott.
So he had an unlikely admirer. And Sophia Loren, you got Ronnie
Stevens as a as ATV director. Yeah.
Freddie Mane as as waiter. But we didn't see Freddie Mane,
did we, In actual film? As listed, I didn't notice him,
but as as as the wait did, did he?
Did he do the I? I thought they did the cutting
of the spaghetti, didn't they? Yeah.
But maybe Ferdi, Maine was sort of looking on.
Yeah, possibly. Flowering at Nimmo yeah
whatever. And I just want to mention Bruce
Lacey getting back to the Albert's and of course he was.
So Bruce Lacey turns up in the the beginning of this film in
the coffee shop. The guy he's he's down as
Gardner and he's like trimming the the the plant life in the
coffee shop. Now, I haven't seen help for a
while, but he also turns up and help as the as the gardener or
lawn mower and and and of course he was in the running, jumping
and standing still film. Yeah.
He was in the mouse on the moon as well, wasn't he?
And in the neck. So he, he, he was sort of like a
regular Richard Lester player in, in the sort of first half,
first half of the 60s. I don't know.
I don't know why he sort of disappeared from Lester's films
later on. But but he, he, you know, always
in sort of tiny little bowls. But yeah, he, he was, he was all
over, all over them. Yeah.
But yeah, I mean, there's, there's, there's some decent
comedy moments in the film, but it's fair to say that I'd
suppose what 4/5 of the of the film is, is music.
Yes, yes, yeah. Now, I was looking at, as I
said, the top of the show, looking at some of the reviews
from the time and some of them are so PO faced, or at least,
yeah, maybe not PO faced, but just, I mean, look, there's a
there's a review in the Tatler by the the writer Elspeth Grant.
She said. I'm not going to read the whole
review, but She Said, this raucous film in which Miss Helen
Shapiro, the 15 year old prima Donna of pop, makes her screen
debut. Proudly described by its
promoters as the hottest musical ever seen in this country, it is
certainly the loudest ever heard.
I tottered away from it, half stunned, holding my throbbing
head and moaning pathetically. It's the noise, boys.
Note to editor. I deserve danger money, honey.
The The film is specifically designed for the young and will
doubtless afford them endless joy as their hip contemporaries
are seen to score splendidly of stuffy old squares like me.
So that gives you that gives you a taste of the toad.
The review there, the data Express said there are moments
of imaginative photography, as we said, and some good jazz.
Otherwise, it's straight, loud and strictly not for squares.
And the the, the, the, the, the that that well respected organ
the Thanet Times Andrew in in reviewing the film, but it also
attempted to educate its older readers on on some of the the
rather puzzling teenage slang that was that was in the film or
the the the you know. So here's here's a few sort of
definitions that the Thanet Times gives.
So to feel groovy is to feel very down to earth.
A cat is the usual word for any kind of jazz musician.
Crazy can be a eulogistic superlative of almost any
connotation. Dad is a rather endearing or
cajoling form of address. A gig is a one night job,
usually with rather meagre compensation.
Jack in England is the equivalent of Mac or bud of
American slang. A mouldy fig is what an ardent
modernist calls a zealous disciple of early jazz.
And to send somebody is to sharply stimulate another
person, musically or otherwise, just, you know, and all that
would be swept away a mere about 18 months, two years later, as
the cultural landscape of the country just turned on its head,
isn't it? Yeah.
Absolutely. Absolutely.
Yeah. But this, this is absolutely the
best example of certainly of this kind of thing made in
Britain. And it's it's it's a wonderful
time capsule in that way. I don't think anybody watching
it is going to get much out of the musical performances now,
unfortunately, from a musical point of view, because even as
somebody who likes and appreciates music from this era,
most of it is not the best stuff.
You know, it's rather feeble even given that this this is not
the most not the most innovative of times for British, British
music. But as as a capsule of a world
that was lost so quickly, it's one of the few that that does it
artistically. Like I said, the only other
British music film that that is worth actually worth watching
from before A Hard Day's Night is the Cliff film Espresso
Bongo, which which is a fantastic film and it is so
right but. And Lawrence Harvey in that.
I, I believe so. It's been a couple of years
since I've watched it. I think, I think he's, I think
he's one of the major roles, yes.
I tend not to remember casts all that well from films, but it's
it's a wonderful, wonderful satire of Soho life.
And far it it it's, it's not what you'd expect from a Cliff
Richard film, put it that way. But most, most of most of this
kind of film at this point is diabolically bad.
You know, even the the Cliff ones, other than Espresso Bongo,
they used to get run every bank holiday.
They're not actually, they're not actually good or even like
really watchable films. You know, they they, they had a
much higher budget than this. But they're they're not, they're
not good. Yeah, and things like, you know,
the Tommy Steele films, I mean, they're they're they're just
just poor. But this is a it's a genuinely
imaginative, funny, well made film.
It's it's let down by the music. But you know, people, there was
the phrase that was used about hard days like the Citizen Kane
of jukebox musical jukebox movies.
Wasn't there that in many ways that that is better applied here
in that it I I've I've just been be watching Citizen Kane
yesterday actually, and Lester has clearly watched Citizen Kane
for a a lot of the the visual look of this film, which sounds
which sounds bizarre, but it's a lot of the same kind of deep
focus shots a lot a lot of the same use of black and white
cinematography. Now just the one person we
haven't mentioned of course, is Gilbert Taylor.
Yes, cinematographer. And he was.
He worked with Leicester on Hard Days night as well, didn't he?
He did, yes. And he, he worked on all sorts
of stuff. I, I I.
Strangelove. Yeah, exactly.
Yeah, he he he was like the pre eminent, particularly black and
white cinematographer in in Britain at that point.
He he he he did did quite a few of the early Bond films.
I think he he did Star Wars, he did The Omen, he was the DP on
basically every major film made it made in Britain.
And also also did a lot, a lot of good, good TV work as well.
A lot of things like Vandal and Hopkirk and The Avengers and
stuff. He he worked at those as well.
Yeah. But yeah, I mean of of interest
to the people, the people listening to this he he made
this more or less between the the rebel and the Punch and Judy
man and then went on to do Doctor Strangelove, you know,
yeah, like I say, he went went on to do hard disk.
He also did fabric cross the Mercy, the Jerry and the
Pacemakers film. But he, he was a really properly
good cinematographer. He deserves a lot of, a lot of
credit for this film. I don't know how much is him and
how much is how much is Leicester because obviously he
worked on a lot of Leicester's early stuff.
And so you never know who, you never know who did what.
But he, he is clearly, you know, I mean, and anybody who's seen
Doctor Strangelove, which I again, I assume everybody
listened to this has it, it. There was a lot, a lot of the
similar look to that film about, about this.
And again, I, I was, I was thinking Citizen Kane because
I've just re watched that. But again, the the same stark,
noirish black, black and white shots.
There's there's again, the same deep focus where you can see
multiple things on multiple different levels in in focus and
it's it's a stunning looking film and you know, it's it's
made on a budget of top and take the if that, but it still looks
extraordinary. Any, anybody who's interested in
the history of visual representation of music on the
screen needs to watch this, you know, and will be more
entertained by it than I suspect they would, they would imagine
big because it's it's, it's got a fairly funny script from
Leicester. It's got some, you know, it's as
we talked about, it's packed, packed full of faces who are all
in small parts. But all can always be be relied
on to be good in everything. You know, you put Hugh Lloyd or
Derek Nemo in the kind of old 7, they're going, they're going to
do the job. They know they know how to do
the job. You know, it it, it looks
stunning and it is so visually imaginative for most of most of
the musical sequences, like I said, particularly the temperate
7/1 and to a lesser extent some of the other ones in the TV
studio. Well, earlier and again, anybody
who's watched the Hard Days night, the the TV studio
sequences very, very visually similar to Hard Days night, he,
he was lifting for himself, which makes sense because no,
nobody watched this thing. You know, it, it, it, it, it was
not any kind of a hit. So it it's, it's an
extraordinary piece of history in multiple different ways.
But it's it's more entertaining than than you would expect going
in, despite having two charisma voids, to be, to be frank, as
lead actors, you know, and despite despite having a plot
that was written on written on the back of a napkin and despite
the music, which is meant to be the centre of it, not being very
good, they did still, Despite that, it's still an an
entertaining film. And you have you have to give
Lester and Taylor and the the various bit parts performers an
immense anti credit for that. But no, you don't have to give
somebody to get any credit at all for it.
You know, he he, he deserves no credit.
He got more, more credit than he deserves, you know.
Fair enough. He thought that this would be
the shot in the arm for for trad jazz, he he said.
He said he thought it would take off in the States as a result of
the film, he said. He said it has the ingredients
for success in America. After all, it's American Music
anyway, with your own special British flavour added.
If a trad dad can be found among the DJs in the States, I think
the the youngsters there will take to it.
It was not to be. We watched the, we watched the
really nice copy of it or transfer of it.
I haven't checked to see. I'm sure it's probably on
YouTube in some shape or form. And I'm sure you can probably
listen to the soundtrack album on Spotify.
I know, I know, I know the soundtrack album was digitally
available for like a quid because it, because it's, it's
public domain. So if nothing, if nothing else,
you can literally go go and buy an MP3 copy of the soundtrack
album for like, I think, I think I bought it for 2 lbs when I
wanted, when I wanted to accept some of it for my podcast.
So, you know, it's, it's the, the soundtrack album is very,
very easily available. But frankly, frankly, don't
watch, watch, watch the film. Yeah, unless, unless you are a
mega fan of the Dukes of Dixieland or something like
that, you know, you, you, you don't, you don't need the
soundtrack album. There are a handful, there are a
handful of decent, decent musical performances in it.
But even there, it's, it's not, it's not usually the best thing
that, that those particular artists have done.
You know, it's always 2 tracks past their last big hit.
Yeah, Jean Vince is doing spaceship to spaceship to Mars
rather rather than doing it. And you know, Bieba Palula or
Blue Jean Bopp or any, any of his classics.
You know, the, the, the Paris sisters doing what am I to do
rather than I love how you love me and the the the couple of
like good tracks that are properly good.
The temperate 7 doing everybody loves my baby and John Leighton
doing lonely city. Anybody who's interested in
those kinds of music has probably already got those, you
know, So it's it's not it's not worth seeking out for the for
the music. Not that not that the music is
mostly bad. It's it's, you know.
It's a nothing. It's a bland.
Yeah, it's, it's a mixture of people who are actually quite
good at what they do, like Chris Barber but not do not at their
best, and people who never really had the best to be but
doing adequately. You know, there is, there is
nothing unlistenable in in in the soundtrack, but there's
nothing that's even like, I say I, I have far more taste for the
music of this period than pretty much anybody I know.
But even I would not like, say there's anything, there's
anything here you really want to be listening to, you know?
Yeah. If you if you want to watch a
really good Richard Lester film with with good songs in it, then
Hard Day's Night. Absolutely, yeah.
What do we do now? He's bound to have an idea.
Otherwise there's no picture. I know, but we'll have to get
some disc jockeys to help us. Disc jockeys?
Help us? Do what?
Well, to bring a show to this town, but just so here.
Yeah, but to do it, we'll have to go to the city.
How? Well, what do you mean?
Can you help us? Me.
I'm just a simple narrator, all right?
Hey. Crazy.
Wow. OK.
OK, well, and you normally when I thank you, you know, thank you
so much, of course, for coming on to talk about this.
Now when I have guests on who also have podcasts, I always ask
them to, you know, to to plug the podcast.
I don't think you really need to really history of rock music of
500 songs. You've got enough listeners
surely anymore. You can always do do with a few
extra. I have a podcast called The
History of Rock Music and 500 songs.
It's ridiculously popular. I mean that I, it's far more
popular than I ever expected it to be.
But but I, I think it's, I think it's quite, quite good.
Not not so much at the moment, but when I was covering stuff,
particularly in the late 50s and early 60s, there's quite, quite
a bit of overlap there with thing things that people, people
listening to goon part might, might find interesting.
The episode on A Hard Day's Night, as we've said, covers a
lot of stuff about Richard Lester.
There's, there's some stuff, I can't remember which episode.
The episode of Johnny Kidd and the Pirates talks about talks
about associated London scripts quite a bit because their, their
manager was scruffy Dale from, from ALS.
Yeah, So the, the, the, if if you look at anything, any, any
of the episodes about British music from 1957 through 1964
that I've got, I've got in there.
The, the tend, there tends to be a lot of, a lot of coverage of
British light entertainment stuff, lot of lot of overlap
with the, the, the material covered here.
Those episodes. If if you don't know, if you
don't know my podcast and you're not particularly interested in
the music side of things, those still might have some interest
to people anyway. But yeah, I'm I'm currently in
the middle of doing a a long four part story about about The
Beach Boys who D LED Belly Ledbetter and Charles Manson.
So not not so much overlap there, but you know, but I tilt
mentioning him again, but he actually had he actually edits
the the podcast and he he's he says that it's also a secret
history of Granada TV. So you know that.
And it's gone from being because the early, early episodes were
relatively short, I suppose. But it's now it's it's well up
to 4 hours so. Yeah, yeah, I, I started out
trying to keep episodes to half an hour, but that was that was
why I was covering music from like the late 30s, early 40s.
And most of my listeners didn't have a clue about any of that
stuff. But after, after you get into
the late 50s, early 60s, people start saying, why didn't you
cover this thing? Why didn't you talk about, why
don't you talk about that? Why don't you talk about that?
And there's just more material, you know, if you're doing an
episode on Gina Eunice, you know, or I think my episode on
Vince Taylor, who I mentioned earlier, I think I literally did
the longest thing in the English language about Vince Taylor and
it still only came out for about 40 minutes.
But there's, there's biographies of him, but they're in French.
He was, he was big in France for a while.
But yeah, I think, I think my 40 minute episode on him is more
more information about him than there is otherwise in the
English language. I might, I might be wrong.
I might. But if it's close to it, you
know, but but then when you, when you talk about The Beatles,
you, you do a four hour episode on The Beatles in 1968 like I
did last year. And there is still more
information out there, there's still more stuff out there that
doesn't get covered, and that's just the way it is.
But also I've got a bit more experimental in the storytelling
and stuff as a result. So even those longer episodes do
I think hold people's attention. I certainly get told they do so
you know. And you're gonna have enough
work for the next decade or more.
More than yes. You're going up to 2000.
Yeah, it's up to 2000. It finishes with a song from
very late 1999, which I'm not gonna say it is.
You've told me, Yeah, you've told me which one?
That. Is yeah, I've told a handful of
people and many more people. Want to know and I'm going to
find out. It's not actually meant to be
some sort of big secret, but people started treating it as
one so I'm now treating it as one as well.
But yeah, originally I planned to make it last only 10 years
cuz I was doing an episode a week, but it's a lot easier to
do a half hour episode a week with no bonus material for the
Patreon backers than it is now where I'm doing.
You know, an average episode comes in an hour and a half and
some of the, some of the bigger episodes are like 4 hours or so.
So now it tends to be more like an, an episode every two weeks
or an episode a month. But my Patreon backers also get
another episode and they're often an hour long as well.
So, you know, it's, I, I get people all the time asking me
what, how, why is it taking so long between episodes?
And you know, I'm, I'm doing, turning out like 40,000 words of
script a month. So, you know, so yes, it's,
it's, it's going to keep me going.
Assuming, assuming I live long enough, I, I, the current rate,
I'll get to song 500 sometime in the middle of the next decade.
Hopefully I'll be able to get the get the the episodes shorter
and more frequent again, because I'm now past the sort of peak
boomer classic rock singularity where everybody has a very, very
fixed idea about what they want to hear about.
And you know, if you don't cover this detail or that detail or
the other detail of The Beatles or the Stones, then some,
somebody's going to get very, very, very mad at you because
there is a portion of the audience that assumes that
everybody cares about the same music.
Once you, once you get into the early 70s, you know, people know
that not everybody, like, not everybody who like Black Sabbath
also like James Taylor or whatever.
So, so they, so they, they would be more understanding and
accepting of the fact that I have to explain to people I have
to give, give a higher level overview and don't go down into
the detail quite so much. So I'm hoping to get back to
doing like hour long episodes or something as as the norm by the
time I hit the early 1970s. So I'm hoping I'm hoping to get
get the series completed by maybe 2035 S.
Maybe by the time your your journey ends, maybe Mark Lewison
will have released the third volume.
Who knows? Well.
Then some, in some ways I hope he doesn't.
I hope he leaves it until after I've completed my work so that I
don't have to go back and redo everything.
It's to say sorry I was wrong. Thanks again to Andrew.
So yeah, thank you for listening.
Just just one quick point. Obviously this is a show first
heard on Goon Pod Film Club. The reason that it is out this
week on Goon Pod is due to the fact that it is, it is my 25th
wedding anniversary and I'm away on holiday.
But I thought that this was an appropriate subject and
obviously a fantastic guest to showcase to the the the wider
listening public. And so hence I decided to put it
out this week as part of Goon Pod.
So I hope you enjoyed it and I will be back next week with
another show. I'm trying to think what show it
will be. I think it is listeners
questions next week where the Great and the Good and the ugly
who listen to this podcast have sent me a bunch of questions,
queries, comments and such forth which I will be tackling.
So that will be next week on Goonpod.
End of this week on Goonpod Film club, there's a brand new show
dropping, which is myself and Chris and Rob from still any
good podcast. They will be joining me to talk
about the Mighty Without a Clue, the the the the Sherlock Holmes
comedy starring Michael Caine and Sir Ben Kingsley.
So look out for that. That should be out a few days
after this comes out. There only remains for me to say
thank you for listening. Any new listeners, please do
rate and review in the usual places and also look back at the
back catalog. We've got 200 plus shows in the
Goon Pod depository, including back in when was it March?
We did an entire show on the running, jumping and standing
still film. So lots more less the chat in
that one. Anywho, thank you again as I say
for listening, take care of yourselves and I will see you
next time. The.