Various Artists - NME Poll Winners' Concert, Empire Pool, London, Britain, 4-26-1964

NME stands for "New Musical Express," a popular music magazine in Britain. In 2022, I posted a 1965 NME Poll Winners' Concert. Recently, I mentioned I have the 1964 and 1966 concerts as well. That led to a commenter requesting that I post them sooner rather than later. So let's start with this one from 1964.

NME began their yearly music polls, and resulting poll winner's concerts, in 1953. Apparently, the concerts continued until 1971. Since then, the polls and awards have continued, but with more conventional awards ceremonies. Usually, the concerts were broadcast on TV in Britain. However, it seems all the concerts from 1963 and earlier are either lost or otherwise unavailable to the public. (That missing material includes the Beatles performing in the 1963 concert.) Luckily, though, we have versions of the 1964 to 1966 concerts.

In 1964, the Beatles were arguably the biggest stars in the history of popular music. They sold one-fifth of all the music in the world that year, a feat that nobody else has come close to in the years since. So, naturally, they were the big stars of this concert, and were the closing act. By contrast, the Rolling Stones had had a few hits, and were already stars, but they had yet to become superstars. 

This show is basically a "who's who" of the best known British Invasion bands in 1964. Most of these acts would be left behind in a year or two, because musical trends were changing fast back then. But of course a few would thrive and grow even more popular.

I found an account of this concert at the Beatles Bible website. Here's the link:

https://www.beatlesbible.com/1964/04/26/live-nme-poll-winners-all-star-concert-2/

It quotes from a book written by Derek Taylor, who was the main press officer for the Beatles at the time. Here's the quote from Taylor:

"At the end of my first week with NEMS, on the Sunday, I went with [Beatles manager] Brian [Epstein] to Wembley Pool for the New Musical Express Poll-Winners' Award Concert, which comprised two shows. The afternoon show was the main event, with the Beatles topping a bill that included the Rolling Stones, Gerry and the Pacemakers, the Searchers, Billy J. Kramer and the Dakotas, Manfred Mann, Brian Poole and the Tremeloes, Cliff Richard and the Shadows, the Dave Clark Five, the Swinging Blue Jeans, the Hollies, Freddie and the Dreamers, Joe Brown and his Bruvvers, Kathy Kirby, Jet Harris, Big Dee Irwin and the Joe Loss Orchestra. Stars of the evening show – which featured several Epstein acts including Tommy Quickly, the Fourmost, Sounds Incorporated, and (again) Billy J. Kramer – were the Stones. Everyone used Vox amps and it was quite a day out for fans, I'd say. Roger Moore presented awards and so, with a special one for Joe Brown, did Roy Orbison; and afterwards there was a short set from the Merseybeats. Disc jockeys present for the celebrations included David Jacobs, Jimmy Savile and, from WINS Radio New York City, the one and only Murray the K. During the afternoon show, Mick Jagger and Brian Jones visited the Beatle dressing room. ... A huge smile illuminated Jagger's young face and his merry eyes glittered with the delights of success. There was in that dressing-room a glow of liberated young people at large in a beckoning world, their pockets full of fivers, heads full of songs, bodies full of sexuality. Nothing could stop them now."

There are some things we can learn from this quote. One key fact is that the recording presented here isn't the complete show. Other acts who performed included Cliff Richard and the Shadows, the Dave Clark Five, Tommy Quickly, and the Fourmost. I also found mentions elsewhere of others who performed: the Applejacks, Cilla Black, Eden Kane, and Frank Ifield. I'll bet Roy Orbison performed as well, since he was there to accept an award. Elvis Presley, who won "Outstanding Male Singer," sent a recorded message which was played to the audience of about 10,000 people.

Fun fact: the lead vocalist on the second track, "Patsy Girl," is Ross MacManus, the father of Elvis Costello. 

The recording quality is a bit rough. Consider it was probably recorded off a TV in 1964, so lower your standards a little bit. But it's still quite listenable, in my opinion. The lead vocals were usually low in the mix, so I used the MVSEP program to boost them for most of the songs. 

In case you're curious about who won the poll awards this year, there's a list at the NME website, which you can see here:

https://www.nme.com/nme-awards/awards-history/1964-606225  

This album is one hour and 58 minutes long. 

One final note. I mentioned above that I previously posted the 1965 NME concert. At the same time I'm posting this, I made some changes to that one. I didn't change the music, but I switched out the cover photo for a better one, and changed the write-up a bit. Here's the link to that one:

https://albumsthatshouldexist.blogspot.com/2022/01/various-artists-nme-poll-winners.html

01 Opening Theme [Instrumental] (Unknown)
02 Patsy Girl (Ross MacManus & & the Joe Loss Orchestra Band)
03 talk (Hollies)
04 Rockin' Robin (Hollies)
05 Just One Look (Hollies)
06 talk (Rolling Stones)
07 Not Fade Away (Rolling Stones)
08 I Just Want to Make Love to You (Rolling Stones)
09 talk (Rolling Stones)
10 I'm Alright (Rolling Stones)
11 talk (Joe Loss Orchestra Band)
12 Kayote Vender [Instrumental] (Joe Loss Orchestra Band)
13 talk (Swinging Blue Jeans)
14 Shake, Rattle and Roll (Swinging Blue Jeans)
15 talk (Swinging Blue Jeans)
16 Good Golly, Miss Molly (Swinging Blue Jeans)
17 talk (Searchers)
18 Farmer John (Searchers)
19 talk (Searchers)
20 Don't Throw Your Love Away (Searchers)
21 talk (Searchers)
22 What'd I Say (Searchers)
23 talk (Freddie & the Dreamers)
24 Kansas City - Hey, Hey, Hey, Hey (Freddie & the Dreamers)
25 talk (Freddie & the Dreamers)
26 Send Me Some Lovin' (Freddie & the Dreamers)
27 talk (Freddie & the Dreamers)
28 Short Shorts (Freddie & the Dreamers)
29 talk (Tremeloes)
30 Candy Man (Tremeloes)
31 talk (Tremeloes)
32 Do You Love Me (Tremeloes)
33 talk (Manfred Mann)
34 Sticks and Stones (Manfred Mann)
35 Hubble Bubble (Manfred Mann)
36 talk (Jet Harris & Tony Meechan)
37 Diamonds [Instrumental] (Jet Harris & Tony Meechan)
38 talk (Jet Harris & Tony Meechan)
39 Big Bad Bass [Instrumental] (Jet Harris & Tony Meechan)
40 talk (Kathy Kirby)
41 You're the One (Kathy Kirby)
42 Dance On (Kathy Kirby)
43 talk (Billy J. Kramer & the Dakotas)
44 I'll Keep You Satisfied (Billy J. Kramer & the Dakotas)
45 They Remind Me of You (Billy J. Kramer & the Dakotas)
46 talk (Merseybeats)
47 I Think of You (Merseybeats)
48 talk (Merseybeats)
49 Don't Turn Around (Merseybeats)
50 I'm Gonna Sit Right Down and Cry [Over You] (Merseybeats)
51 talk (Diamonds)
52 Happy Being Fat (Diamonds)
53 talk (Joe Brown & His Bruvvers)
54 I'm Henry VIII, I Am (Joe Brown & His Bruvvers)
55 talk (Joe Brown & His Bruvvers)
56 The Seculy Gas [Instrumental] (Joe Brown & His Bruvvers)
57 talk (Joe Brown & His Bruvvers)
58 What a Crazy World (Joe Brown & His Bruvvers)
59 talk (Gerry & the Pacemakers)
60 I Like It (Gerry & the Pacemakers)
61 talk (Gerry & the Pacemakers)
62 I'm the One (Gerry & the Pacemakers)
63 talk (Gerry & the Pacemakers)
64 Don't Let the Sun Catch You Crying (Gerry & the Pacemakers)
65 talk (Roger Moore)
66 talk (Beatles)
67 She Loves You (Beatles)
68 You Can't Do That (Beatles)
69 talk (Beatles)
70 Twist and Shout (Beatles)
71 Long Tall Sally (Beatles)
72 talk (Beatles)
73 Can't Buy Me Love (Beatles)

https://pixeldrain.com/u/RLHMHeFi

alternate:

https://bestfile.io/en/VIOOKmfwfsb8k2S/file

The cover photo of the Rolling Stones is from this exact concert. It shows Brian Jones on the left, and Mick Jagger on the right, hold maracas. Actually, technically, this is a composite of two photos. One of them had a good Jones but Jagger was messed up, and the other one had a good Jagger but Jones was messed up. So I used Photoshop to combine them. They were in the exact same positions in both photos; it was just a matter of using the best parts.

The original was in black and white. But I colorized it with the use of the Kolorize program. As for the text, I used some promotional material for the album I made for the 1965 NME concert. For this cover, I just copied that over, and changed the dates and musical act names and so forth. 

The Bee Gees & Friends - The Midnight Special, NBC Studios, Burbank, CA, 8-10-1973

Here's a full episode of the "Midnight Special" TV show. It was a rare episode with a theme, with the theme being a focus on British Invasion bands that were big around 1964. The Bee Gees were the hosts, but their role was less than usual, since there also were performances from Herman's Hermits, Gerry & the Pacemakers, Wayne Fontana & the Mindbenders, the Hollies, the Searchers, Billy J. Kramer & the Dakotas.

For some reason, the Midnight Special TV show really liked the Bee Gees in 1973, even though their popularity was near a relative low point around that time. They hosted the show four times that year, and made additional appearances on top of that! I plan on turning that into four albums, with this one being the first to get posted. 

Generally speaking with these Midnight Special albums, I cut them down to just the host act and maybe one more, because I want them to stay musically consistent. But if the show has a musical theme, like this one does, I have no problem posting the whole thing. That's what I did here. However, there still are some cuts. For instance, I removed a section where the musical acts on the next episode are all named. I also did a lot of editing to get rid of the commercial breaks, usually smoothing them over with extra applause. 

This must have been one of the first mass media instances of a British Invasion revival, since it had been less than ten years since the "Invasion" actually happened. Unfortunately, show business is an unforgiving business, and most of the acts on this show were far from the singles charts in 1973. The only exceptions were the Bee Gees, though as mentioned above 1973 was a slow year for them, and the Hollies, who'd had a big hit with "Long Cool Woman (In a Black Dress)" in 1972, and Peter Noone of Herman's Hermits, who had some success with a solo career in the early 1970s. 

By the way, note that "Long Cool Woman" was co-written by Allan Clarke of the Hollies, who also was the lead singer on it. He left the Hollies in 1971, and rejoined in July 1973. But the lead singer seen and heard in this episode is band member Terry Sylvester. So this episode must have been filmed shortly before Clarke rejoined the Hollies. (Unfortunately, for virtually all the Midnight Special episodes, I only know the broadcast date, not the actual recording date, which I always prefer.)

Performing for this show must have been a bit strange for most of the musical acts here. It hadn't been that many years since they had been big stars, and they basically looked and sounded the same as before. But other than rare short appearances like this show, most of them must have been touring supper clubs, on an oldies circuit. But kudos to this show for giving them a national TV platform like this, when their probably wasn't a big call for it.

Musically, I think the highlight has to be a long medley of Beatles songs performed by the Bee Gees in the middle of the show: "If I Fell," "I Need You," "I'll Be Back," "This Boy," and "She Loves You." If you're a Bee Gees fan, it's worth getting this just for that medley. They never put any such medley on an album. 

This album is an hour and two minutes long. 

01 talk by Wolfman Jack (Bee Gees)
02 New York Mining Disaster 1941 (Bee Gees)
03 talk (Bee Gees)
04 I'm Henry the VIII I Am (Herman's Hermits)
05 talk (Bee Gees)
06 How Do You Do It (Gerry & the Pacemakers)
07 I Like It (Gerry & the Pacemakers)
08 talk (Bee Gees)
09 The Game of Love (Wayne Fontana & the Mindbenders)
10 talk (Bee Gees)
11 Long Cool Woman [In a Black Dress] (Hollies)
12 talk (Bee Gees)
13 Needles and Pins (Searchers)
14 talk (Bee Gees)
15 If I Fell - I Need You (Bee Gees)
16 I'll Be Back (Bee Gees)
17 This Boy - She Loves You (Bee Gees)
18 talk (Bee Gees)
19 Little Children (Billy J. Kramer & the Dakotas)
20 Ferry Cross the Mersey (Gerry & the Pacemakers)
21 talk (Bee Gees & Peter Noone)
22 Mrs. Brown, You've Got a Lovely Daughter (Herman's Hermits)
23 A Groovy Kind of Love (Wayne Fontana & the Mindbenders)
24 He Ain't Heavy, He's My Brother (Hollies)
25 Turn of the Century (Bee Gees)
26 Sweets for My Sweet (Searchers)
27 There's a Kind of Hush (Herman's Hermits)
28 Don't Let the Sun Catch You Crying (Gerry & the Pacemakers)
29 I Can't See Nobody (Bee Gees)
30 Love Potion No. 9 (Searchers)
31 talk (Bee Gees)

https://pixeldrain.com/u/rCWB1ARe

alternate:

https://bestfile.io/a5Qh8RSzKdG23Zd/file 

The cover of the Bee Gees is a screenshot taken from this exact concert, during their Beatles medley.

The Hollies - In Concert, Cologne, Germany, 1975

Previously, I'd had an album of BBC sessions for the Hollies that ran from 1971 to 1976. Most of that actually wasn't from the BBC, and in fact the biggest part of it came from this concert. I have since radically redone that album. Now, it only deals with the years 1971 and 1972, and all of it is genuine BBC studio sessions, the vast majority of them unreleased and previously unavailable anywhere.

Here's the link to that:

https://albumsthatshouldexist.blogspot.com/2021/03/the-hollies-bbc-sessions-volume-4-1971.html

Since everything I had from after 1972 actually isn't from the BBC, I decided to make a non-BBC live material out of that. The vast majority of it comes from one unreleased concert in 1975. Details about just where and when this concert is from are scanty. You can watch all of it on YouTube, and it's clear the band walks into a stage area with the words "In Concert" on the wall. So it's definitely from a TV show with that name. Most sources say it was a Swiss TV show. But I found one source that seemed more knowledgeable, and claimed the show was actually recorded in Cologne, Germany, and broadcast on both German and Swiss TV. So I'm going with that. I still don't know the exact venue or the date though. If anyone does, please let me know.

The first eight tracks here come from that show. There were a couple of talking sections in the middle I cut out because there was a German translation spoken over virtually everything the band members said. The concert continued, with the band starting to play "Long Cool Woman (In a Black Dress)" as the credits rolled, but the song was cut off near the beginning, so I didn't include that.

I've added three other songs at the end from other TV appearances in that same time period. "Long Dark Road" is from 1973, "Long Cool Woman (In a Black Dress)" is from 1975, and "Draggin' My Heels" is from 1976. Those are all unreleased too.

I had some trouble with the song "Draggin' My Heels." The version I found had many microgaps of total silence in it, often less than a second long. Luckily, I discovered that if I closed those gaps in my audio editing software, no music was lost.

To be honest, the Hollies still did some TV and radio shows after 1976, but my interest in the group rapidly wanes after that. They were hit by the dreaded disco bug in the late 1970s, and generally followed some musical trends that didn't fit well for them

01 talk (Hollies)
02 I Can't Tell the Bottom from the Top (Hollies)
03 Another Night (Hollies)
04 4th of July, Asbury Park [Sandy] (Hollies)
05 Stop, Stop, Stop (Hollies)
06 I'm Down (Hollies)
07 The Air that I Breathe (Hollies)
08 He Ain't Heavy, He's My Brother (Hollies)
09 Long Dark Road (Hollies)
10 Draggin' My Heels [Edit] (Hollies)
11 Long Cool Woman [In a Black Dress] (Hollies)

https://www.upload.ee/files/15123237/THollis_1975_InConcrtCologneGermany__1975_atse.zip.html

The cover photo comes from a TV appearance in Germany in March 1975. But it's different than the main concert here. You can see from the YouTube video that they're wearing different clothes and are on a different stage.

The Hollies - BBC Sessions, Volume 4: 1971-1975

Here's the fourth and final album of the Hollies playing at the BBC.

There's a grand total of one song here that's been officially released: "Too Young to Be Married." That comes from the "Radio Fun" album. That came from a "Top of the Pops" BBC studio session. All of the unreleased tracks also come from "Top of the Pops" sessions, with one of them even from the same session as the released song.

These "Top of the Pops" recordings come from transcription discs sent to overseas radio stations at the time. For those discs that have survived, the sound quality is excellent. For instance, you can't tell the difference between the released song and the others.

My thanks goes to my musical associate Marley for providing me these recordings.

Surprisingly, even as late as 1971 and 1972, there was still a lot of BBC DJ talk over the music. I've noticed that the more poppy a band is, the more likely their songs get talked over. So I did the usual thing of using the X-Minus audio editing program to wipe out the talking and keep the underlying music. Ten out of the 14 songs here have "[Edit]" in their names due to this problem.

After about 1972 or 1973, it became rare to have live performances on the Top of the Pops show, but there were occasional exceptions. We got lucky with one last live performance from 1975, which make up the last two songs here. One of those, "4th of July, Asbury Park (Sandy)," is a cover of a Bruce Springsteen song.

This album is 48 minutes long.

UPDATE: On May 15, 2025, updated the mp3 download file. I added two songs I'd previously missed, "Lucy" and "4th of July, Asbury Park (Sandy)." Both are from 1975.

01 Hey Willy [Edit] (Hollies)
02 Survival of the Fittest [Edit] (Hollies)
03 Too Young to Be Married (Hollies)
04 Hold On (Hollies)
05 Look What We've Got [Edit] (Hollies)
06 The Baby [Edit] (Hollies)
07 Oh Grannie [Edit] (Hollies)
08 What a Life I've Led [Edit] (Hollies)
09 Blue in the Morning (Hollies)
10 Magic Woman Touch [Edit] (Hollies)
11 Won't You Feel Good That Morning [Edit] (Hollies)
12 Slow Down (Hollies)
13 Lucy [Edit] (Hollies)
14 4th of July, Asbury Park [Sandy] [Edit] (Hollies)

https://pixeldrain.com/u/CEooJkEP

alternate:

https://bestfile.io/en/IzL1whcU2NLOe9Y/file

The cover art photo shows the band playing on the "Top on the Pops" TV show in 1974.

The Hollies - BBC Sessions, Volume 3: 1969-1970

Here's the third out of four albums of the Hollies at the BBC.

In late 1968, Graham Nash left the Hollies to join Crosby, Stills and Nash. He was a key part of the band's songwriting and singing, and was the "hippest" member of the band when keeping up with the times was extremely important. The band continued having hits just fine without him, although they were increasingly seen as a pop band that was out of step with the increasingly serious and "heavy" music being made. 

During the time frame here, 1969 and 1970, the Hollies continued to perform for the BBC a lot, although that would soon peter out in the early 1970s. The first six songs come from a concert that was broadcast on the BBC in early 1969. I've only included the songs that don't appear elsewhere in this series. One of the songs, "Maybe I'll Settle Down," appears to be an original that never got officially released. 

In 1970, an Australian TV station recorded the Hollies in concert as they toured Australia and made a TV special out of the footage that was shown in 1971, called "Don't Get Sunburnt." Four of the songs here are from that: "Gasoline Alley Bred," "Let It Be," "Woodstock," and "Amazing Grace." The last three are covers that the band never officially released.

The remaining songs come from typical BBC sessions. I had to edit three of those due to the usual problem of BBC DJs talking over the music. I used the X-Minus audio editing program to wipe the talking while keeping the underlying music. One BBC song, "He Ain't Heavy, He's My Brother," is the only officially released performance from this entire album. But the sound quality is nevertheless high, because everything here is either from the BBC or that Australian TV special.

01 Carrie Anne (Hollies)
02 Quit Your Lowdown Ways (Hollies)
03 I'll Be Your Baby Tonight (Hollies)
04 Stop, Stop, Stop (Hollies)
05 The Mighty Quinn [Quinn the Eskimo] (Hollies)
06 Maybe I'll Settle Down (Hollies)
07 Sorry Suzanne (Hollies)
08 He Ain't Heavy, He's My Brother (Hollies)
09 Lady Please [Edit] (Hollies)
10 Gasoline Alley Bred (Hollies)
11 Let It Be (Hollies)
12 Woodstock (Hollies)
13 Amazing Grace (Hollies)
14 Isn't It Nice [Edit] (Hollies)

https://www.upload.ee/files/15124667/THollis_1969-1970_BBSessionsVolume3_atse.zip.html

The cover art photo was taken in January 1969.

The Hollies - BBC Sessions, Volume 2: 1966-1968

A few days ago, when I posted Volume 1 of the Hollies performing at the BBC, I mentioned that I only had three albums to share. I decided that didn't seem right, given how much I've found from similar 1960s groups, so I dug a little deeper and now have four. The first album is still the same. Here's Volume 2.

As I mentioned previously, there is an official BBC album for this band, called "Radio Fun." The vast majority of the songs here come from that. But four of them do not: "I've Been Wrong," "King Midas in Reverse," "Postcard," and "Pegasus." I don't know why those weren't included, because the versions here sound perfectly fine.

Also, similar to Volume 1, six of these songs suffered from the typical problem with these albums whereby BBC DJs talked over the starts and ends to some songs. But I fixed these using the X-Minus audio editing program, wiping the talking while keeping the underlying music.

The Hollies had a very important personnel change at the end of 1968, when Graham Nash left to group to join Crosby, Stills and Nash. I'm glad to say I managed to arrange things so the end of this album marks the end of the Nash-era BBC recordings. 

UPDATE: On November 27, 2021, I updated the mp3 download file. I added a song I'd previously missed, "Don't Even Think About Changing."

01 I Can't Let Go (Hollies)
02 To You My Love [Edit] (Hollies)
03 Little Bitty Pretty One (Hollies)
04 I Take What I Want (Hollies)
05 That's How Strong My Love Is (Hollies)
06 I've Been Wrong (Hollies)
07 Hard Hard Year [Edit] (Hollies)
08 Bus Stop (Hollies)
09 Shake (Hollies)
10 Don't Even Think About Changing [Edit] (Hollies)
11 King Midas in Reverse (Hollies)
12 Away, Away, Away (Hollies)
13 Charlie and Fred (Hollies)
14 The Games We Play [Edit] (Hollies)
15 Postcard (Hollies)
16 Jennifer Eccles (Hollies)
17 Step Inside (Hollies)
18 Wings (Hollies)
19 Pegasus [Edit] (Hollies)
20 Wishyouawish [Edit] (Hollies)

https://www.upload.ee/files/15122400/THollis_1966-1968_BBSessionsVolume2_atse.zip.html

The album cover shows the band on the "Ready, Steady, Go" TV show in 1966.

The Hollies - BBC Sessions, Volume 1: 1964-1965

Next up for BBC material is the Hollies. I don't know why, but it seems like the Hollies got unlucky when it comes to surviving BBC recordings. I found a list of at least 40 sessions the band did for the BBC. Since each session usually meant two or three songs played, that would be well over 100 songs. But it seems the majority of that either was lost or is sitting in a vault somewhere. Only one single album of their BBC material has been officially released, an album called "Radio Fun." That album is woefully inadequate, since I've been able to find three album's worth of material. Here's the first one.

For this album, most of the songs come from that "Radio Fun" album I mentioned. But four of the songs remain officially unreleased. Their sound quality is pretty much the same as the others though. There are some more recordings out there that survive but with really poor sound quality, so I'm not even including those as bonus tracks.

I did include one bonus track here though, "Yes I Will." I considered that one close to being worthy of inclusion, but it fell just short.

The usual problem with BBC recordings is how BBC DJs tended to frequently talk over the starts and ends of songs. For the officially released BBC versions, the songs were faded in and out to remove such talking. Those were the versions I used when I first posted this album. But when I updated it in November 2021, I was able to find unreleased versions that sound just as good, and had the DJ talking. Then I used the audio editing program X-Minus to wipe that talking while keeping the underlying music. The ones I edited like that have "[Edit]" in their titles.

Most of the songs here that have survived are different performances of songs the band put on record. But occasionally they did some exclusive material for the BBC. The only song here I'm sure they didn't put out on record is "Ride Your Pony," but there could be others. If anyone knows, please let me know and I'll update this text.

This album is 51 minutes long.

UPDATE: On November 27, 2021, I updated the mp3 download file. In addition to fixing the BBC DJ talking problem mentioned above, I added "Mickey's Monkey," which I'd somehow previously missed.  I also found a much better sounding version of "Yes I Will," so I was able to remove that as a bonus track and add it with the other songs. Finally, I found a different version of "You Must Believe Me," so I added that as a bonus track. It sounds as good as the others, but I just dislike having two versions of the same song on the same album.

01 Here I Go Again (Hollies)
02 Set Me Free [Edit] (Hollies)
03 Something's Got a Hold of Me (Hollies)
04 We're Through [Edit] (Hollies)
05 Nobody (Hollies)
06 She Said Yeah (Hollies)
07 Yes I Will (Hollies)
08 You Must Believe Me [Edit] (Hollies)
09 Mickey's Monkey [Edit] (Hollies)
10 I'm Alive (Hollies)
11 You Know He Did [Edit] (Hollies)
12 Stay (Hollies)
13 Lawdy Miss Clawdy (Hollies)
14 Look through Any Window (Hollies)
15 Put Yourself in My Place (Hollies)
16 Ride Your Pony (Hollies)
17 Too Many People (Hollies)
18 So Lonely [Edit] (Hollies)
19 If I Needed Someone (Hollies)
20 I've Got a Way of My Own (Hollies)
21 A Taste of Honey (Hollies)

You Must Believe Me (Hollies)

https://www.upload.ee/files/15122402/THollis_1964-1965_BBSessionsVolume1_atse.zip.html

The promo photo used for the cover art is from 1964.

The Hollies - Live - Konserthuset, Stockholm, Sweden, 12-12-1966

The Hollies don't get much respect. True, they were embarrassingly square, but they consistently made great pop music for many years.

One aspect of them not getting respect is that their live performances are very poorly documented. They didn't release a live album of any kind until the mid-1975, by which time they were well past their peak. They do have some officially released live music from 1968, as part of a box set, which I turned into an album, here:

https://albumsthatshouldexist.blogspot.com/2018/05/the-hollies-live-1968.html

But it would be nice to have more than that, especially from something even earlier, when they were arguably at their commercial and creative peak around 1966 and 1967. There are virtually no Hollies bootlegs, at least not from the 1960s. But luckily, it turns out there are just enough high quality live recordings to make up an album, though it's a short one.

The bulk of this album comes from a concert the Hollies did at the Konserthuset in Stockholm, Sweden, in late 1966. I've recently posted a Traffic concert recorded at the Konserhuset, and noted a lot of bands have excellent sounding recordings from there during this time period. It turns out that's because shows there were regularly recorded for a Swedish radio show.

I could only find seven songs the Hollies did at that concert. Three of them have been officially released as bonus tracks, and the other four are from a bootleg. But the sound is nearly as good for all seven. In addition to playing their expected hits, they do covers of "You Don't Know like I Know" and "Reach Out, I'll Be There," which they never officially recorded.

To flesh out the album a little more, I found two more songs performed around the same time for a German TV show called "Beat Club," and two other songs played for a different German TV show, "Beat Beat Beat." As luck would have it, there are no repeats between any of the songs played in Sweden or on the two German shows. (And all of these performances are definitely live and not mimed.)

The album is only 31 minutes long, but this is a case of quality over quantity. All the songs here sound just as good as the lucky three that got chosen for official release as bonus tracks. The Hollies were as square as a cardboard box, but they were a very tight group when they played live, and the proof can be heard here.

UPDATE: On March 14, 2023, I updated the mp3 download file. A commenter sent me a version of the Stockholm that had one song that I'd missed, "What's Wrong with the Way I Live." It also had some banter between songs I didn't have. However, my version had slightly better sound quality. So I combined the best versions from both.

01 I Can't Let Go (Hollies)
02 You Don't Know like I Know (Hollies)
03 talk (Hollies)
04 The Times They Are A-Changin' (Hollies)
05 talk (Hollies)
06 What's Wrong with the Way I Live (Hollies)
07 talk (Hollies)
08 Reach Out, I'll Be There (Hollies)
09 Too Much Monkey Business (Hollies)
10 talk (Hollies)
11 Stop, Stop, Stop (Hollies)
12 Look through Any Window (Hollies)
13 Very Last Day (Hollies)
14 Bus Stop (Hollies)
15 On a Carousel (Hollies)

https://www.upload.ee/files/15122398/THollis_1966_KonserthustStockholmSweden__12-12-1966_atse.zip.html

For the cover art, I found a photo of the Hollies playing at Wembley Studios in London in 1966, performing for some kind of TV show.

The Hollies - Wings - Non-Album Tracks (1968)

In the 1960s, the Hollies typically released at least one album of new studio material every year. They didn't release one in 1968, probably because key band member Graham Nash left the group at the end of that year to find bigger fame and fortune as part of Crosby, Stills and Nash (CSN). But they really should have, since they've released just enough material for such an album. Here's my version of it.

Most of the songs here are A- and B-sides, including two hit songs "Jennifer Eccles" and "Listen to Me." Another handful come from various rarities compilations. All of the songs are from when Nash was still in the band. One of the songs, "Blowin' in the Wind," would later appear in the 1969 album "Hollies Play Dylan," but ins an alternate version recorded with Nash.

I have some especially interesting and unreleased songs to end this album. One is a version of "Louisiana Rain" done with Bobbie Gentry for her BBC TV show. The song is written by Gentry and appears on one of her albums, but for this version, in my opinion, the Hollies actually do more of the singing.

The other unreleased song is the Hollie's version of Marrakesh Express. Nash would have a big hit with it with CSN in 1969, but he actually wrote it while he was still with the Hollies. The Hollies recorded a backing track for it, which has been bootlegged, but apparently never got around to adding vocals to it. Someone named "HolliesRareandUnreleased" has created a mash-up version using this Hollies backing track version with the vocals from an acoustic demo Nash made in 1968 that was released on the "Over the Years" archival collection in 2018.

The vocals and music match very well in my opinion, and it's mixed well. The only problems are that the drummer seems unsure about the best approach to take, so the rhythm isn't that great, and the usual Hollies backing vocals never got added. Still, it's pretty interesting to hear how the Hollies approached this song, which is fairly different from the CSN version.

By the way, squabbling over this song is one of the reasons Nash left the group, since the song has a hppie vibe to it (vacations to Morocco were very popular with hippie types back in those days) and Hollies were still square. Although they did wear hippie-style clothes sometimes, their hearts weren't in it and they still played cabarets in matching suits in 1968.

True, the Hollies were square and behind the times in 1968, but they still made great pop music, as this album shows.

This album is 41 minutes long.

UPDATE: On April 26, 2023, I updated the mp3 download file. I found a demo Graham Nash did in 1965 of a song the Hollies wrote for a different British band called the Mirage. This demo was recorded in 1965 to help the band learn the song. It actually was released on an archival Mirage album called "The World Goes On Around You." It doesn't fit in that well with the rest of this album chronologically, but I didn't have a better album to put it in.

I also added "Survival of the Fittest." This dates from a 1970 Hollies album of the same name, and it was recorded without Nash. But it's known there was a 1968 version done with Nash, but it's never been made publicly available. Surely song likely would have been included if the band released a 1968, so adding it here gives an idea what that might have sounded like.

01 Jennifer Eccles (Hollies)
02 Open Up Your Eyes (Hollies)
03 Listen to Me (Hollies)
04 Do the Best You Can (Hollies)
05 Blowin' in the Wind [Nash Version] (Hollies)
06 Like Every Time Before (Hollies)
07 Wings (Hollies)
08 Relax (Hollies)
09 Tomorrow When It Comes (Hollies)
10 Man with No Expression [Horses in a Rainstorm] (Hollies)
11 A Taste of Honey [Nash Version] (Hollies)
12 Louisiana Man (Bobbie Gentry & the Hollies)
13 Marrakesh Express [Edit] (Hollies)
14 Survival of the Fittest (Hollies)
15 Go Away [Demo] (Graham Nash)

https://www.upload.ee/files/15175575/THollis_1968_Wngs_atse.zip.html

I made the album cover from a publicity photo of the band dating to 1968.

The Hollies - Live 1968

The Hollies don't get much respect. True, they were more of a singles band than an album band, but they created lots of classic songs, a majority of which they wrote themselves. For me, their best era was when they had Graham Nash in the band (from their start through most of 1968). He tried to pull the group in a more progressive direction before leaving, but once he left, they got stuck in a very square mode that was at odds with most of the great music happening at the time.

There isn't a lot of quality recording of the Hollies playing live. Luckily, there is a show from 1968 (the Lewisham Odeon Theatre, London, in May), done not long before Nash left, which was included as part of a box set on the years Nash was in the band. This is a short recording, only 24 minutes.

Luckily, I was able to find another show, also from 1968 and from before Nash left (Split, Yugoslavia, in August). I took the songs from that show that they didn't play in the other show and added them to the end. That makes it a 36 minute long album, a more satisfying length.

The Hollies didn't attempt to impress with instrumental soloing in their live shows. However, they were a tight band and certainly brought all their vocal harmonizing skills.

01 Stop, Stop, Stop (Hollies)
02 Look through Any Window (Hollies)
03 The Times They Are A-Changin' (Hollies)
04 On a Carousel (Hollies)
05 King Midas in Reverse (Hollies)
06 Butterfly (Hollies)
07 Jennifer Eccles (Hollies)
08 Carrie Anne (Hollies)
09 Dang Me (Hollies)
10 The Very Last Day (Hollies)
11 A Taste of Honey (Hollies)
12 Do the Best You Can (Hollies)

https://www.upload.ee/files/15122424/THollis_1968_LewishmOdeonTheatreLondonBritain__5-24-1968_atse.zip.html

Originallyl, I used the cover art of a photo of the band playing in Split, Yugoslavia. It was a screenshot from a YouTube video. But it was low-res and blurry. Over a year later, I replaced it with a much clearer photo of the band performing for the BBC in 1968.