Interview with Brian Poole, 18^th May 2008

You formed your first band in 1956?

Yes around about 1956 we were all at school together - well, not all Alan Blakley and Alan Howard and me - at Park Modern School in Barking doing GCEs and that’s where the three of us met. I went on after that to Barking Abbey Grammar School which was when the band got together when I was doing A-Levels.

Who was your great inspiration at this time?

Without a shadow of a doubt, Buddy Holly. What we did, we were doing American camps, so we needed a lot of songs, because we had to play for four-hours in two hour sets without a break. It suited, because of the vocal backings, to sing Buddy Holly songs. We wrote to Norman Petty, their manager, who also wrote quite a lot of songs, and asked him to send over some songs, which he did; so we were playing some early Cricket songs at about the same time they were.

Were you influenced by Skiffle, as many of your contemporaries were?

Yes. Our very first influence was Lonnie Donegan. When we were at school about 14 or 15 years old, we used to try to get into the Cellar Jazz Club in Ilford near where we lived. We used to walk up and, as long as we promised to have nothing to do with drink, they let us in. We used to sit under the stairs, which you see though, and watch the jazz sets. We saw Chris Barber, Monty Sunshine and all the bands at that time. What used to happen is that they’d play a jazz set, then Lonnie or Chas McDevitt would play during the interval with guitars, banjos and washboard and sing the old folk songs such as ‘Cumberland Gap’. We used to love it, and realised you didn’t have to play trumpet and trombone to make music, and thought ‘we could have a go at that’.

Which of the British acts at the time did you most admire?

Two or three. For just guitar playing the biggest influence was Bert Weedon. Shortly after he started playing, his books came out which taught anyone looking to play the guitar how to play. Cliff Richard definitely. Billy Fury had a big influence on us at the time. We toured with Billy a number of times. He was very misunderstood. People wrongly assumed because of his health problems that he was on drink or drugs. He was on medication because of the heart defect that nobody knew about apart from Billy himself and his family. He had to be very careful. But he did some great great American songs. We heard a lot of American songs, because we would be singing backing with a lot of acts and one of these became our first big success called ‘Big Big Hits of ‘62’ , which wasn’t a hit in the UK, but was very big in Canada.

At this time you used to play at the intervals in Cinema?

Yes, that was at the Granadas. We were employed to play in the intervals between films which we used to do quite successfully and we gained a lot of fans at that time. It was a good thing to do.

You were invited on Brian Matthews’ Saturday Club before you had a hit record I believe?

Yes, before we had a hit record, because we were one of the top dancehall attractions in England. Later people asked me why didn’t we do the fade out and come back at the end in our version of ‘Do You Love Me?’ like the Contours record did. Well, that was because we were just playing for dancing, if you faded out they would stop dancing.

You turned professional when you went to Butlins, in Ayr, to do a residency?

Yes that’s right. We were kids just out of school. I had just finished my a-levels. I think I was 17 or 18, all of us. We went to Butlins in Ayr, for eighteen weeks at the Calypso Ballroom. I have been back there thousands of time since then.

I believe you met Mike Smith, Decca’s A&R man, through your optician?

That’s right. The only time I didn’t wear glasses was during my time with the Tremeloes. Before that people used to ask me are those glasses plain? Of course, I need them, I started wearing glasses with reading so much doing my A-Levels. I thought if I’m going to wear glasses I’ll wear big ones like Buddy Holly. That’s what I wanted in those days. My optician was also Mike Smith’s and, although we didn’t know it at the time, he lived in our area and was one of the A&R men at Decca. Our optician put the thing together and asked Mike to meet with us which we did at a local coffee bar called the Mocha – good name for a coffee bar! He agreed to audition us, because, of course, we badgered and badgered him. But he said, pointing to me, “the bins have got to go!” That was a joke between the band and me for years and years. They still say it to me “The bins will have to go”. So the bins went. And I just got by and after a while it was like I’d never worn glasses. As I got older I started wearing them again.

It was at that time you started doing session work for Decca?

We were asked to do session work long before we signed for Decca. We worked with Tommy Steel, quite a few of his songs including ‘Butterfly’, and American artists like Gary US Bonds and Johnny Burnett when he came to England we toured and recorded with him. Of course, Jimmy Savile’s one and old record ‘Ahab the Arab’ and the Vernon Girls, one called ‘the Locomotion’. We earned £8 a session from around 1958.

So Decca were familiar with your work when you auditioned?

Mike Smith certainly was. When it came to a choice he picked us over the Beatles. I spoke to George Martin about this about ten years ago and he said “what you forget Brian is that must record companies in England had turned down the Beatles”. Because they didn’t do the right songs apparently at the audition. They played ‘My Bonnie’ I believe. People say they should have done some of the songs they had written at that time.

According to many books you auditioned on the same day as the Beatles?

Not the same day. I’m pretty sure we didn’t go up on New Years Day and neither did the Beatles. Otherwise we would have met them.

Did you know of the Beatles at this time?

Oh, a long, long time before that. We met the Beatles before either of us had hit records or before any of us had done auditions. We used to play up in Liverpool in some of the places like Litherland Town Hall. At that time they were in Germany. When they started touring we did a tour with them and another band called the Rockin’ Vickers (spelt like the shipyard) and in that band was future Motorhead lead singer Lemmy. The compare was Paul Melba who later became a famous impressionist. We didn’t see a lot of them to be honest, we all turned up at the places ourselves. We also did the Cavern, that’s why when we did world tours later everyone thought we were a Liverpool band. We, of course, were so cockney it was unbelievable.

How did hit records change things?

How it changed – fashion and pop were tied up with each other. When we went on Shows like Ready Steady Go we used to be asked to show the latest clothes. All the fashion houses would come to us and ask us to wear their clothes. We were, of course, the first band on Ready Steady Go. Do you know how they got the format? If you remember the cameras used to go around knocking people out of the way. The reason for this is that we were playing ‘Twist and Shout’. When we rehearsed it they had people sitting at tables like a restaurant, and camera lines in between the tables so no one got in the way. Elkan Allan, the producer, had his son with him and he said ‘why don’t you get the tables out of the way, because when Brian Poole and the Tremeloes came on everyone in the rehearsal was getting up and dancing, and chairs were getting danced on, let people dance’. That’s what they did, but the cameramen still had their camera runs: people were getting pushed out of the way and that became a feature of the show for years.

You toured extensively at this time?

We did four world tours. ‘Twist and Shout’ was No. 1 in 15 different countries and we went to all of those and did a short tour in each one. ‘Do You Love Me?’ was not just No.1 in Britain it reached the top in twenty other countries. We the tours with people like Dusty Springfield and Gene Pitney.

You were known for your dance songs at this time. ‘Someone, Someone’ was therefore a change of pace?

We were looking for a slow song while we were on tour. ‘Someone, Someone’ was a song sent to us by Norman Petty, who wrote that with Edwin Greines Cohen, and his wife I think. We thought this was a great song, and we needed a slow song so we thought lets get into a studio and recorded it. Our manager knew Norman Petty through writing to him, said ‘I’ll get Norman’. So he came over with his wife and played guitar and piano. It was a real great day for us. I think Norman Petty was one of the most misunderstood musicians and innovators of the time, not given his place in history.

Do you still keep in touch with other artists from the sixties?

I talk to Gerry Marsden regularly. I toured with him recently for three years. Ninety gigs a year. Then Dave Dee and Tommy Crane from the Merseybeats came in and that went on for another 3 years, the show called Reelin’n’Rocking. My great mate Dave Berry was also on that show. And of course, Mike Pender, who I’m touring with at the moment and next year as part of a show from May to beginning of July next year with Chris Farlowe, PJ Proby and Vanity Fare which should be interesting. We’re calling this tour ‘Oh Boy it’s the Non Stop Sixties’. I also worked with the Tremeloes in recent years and my own band off and on.

You obviously haven’t lost any of your enthusiasm for the music?

I still enjoy it and will stop doing it when I don’t. The music business has been very good to me and I have two daughters who have done so well. Both Karen and Shelly were in Alisha’s Attic, of course, and are now great songwriters. Karen has written ‘Wow’ and ‘Red Blooded Woman’ for Kylie Minogue and songs for the Sugarbades and the Shapeshifters ‘Lola’s Theme’. They’ve had lots more hits than me.

Have you any plans to write your memoirs?

Trying to do it at the moment. Have so much done and still haven’t reached where we sign. I also have millions of photographs, my wife and I collected, press cuttings and photographs over the years. You know I had a book published on colloquialisms years ago, because I was afraid they would be lost to future generations.

Good luck with the memoirs Brian and best wishes