Covered: Tony Hatch: 1960-2016

Here's another "Covered" album highlighting a key British pop songwriter from the 1960s: Tony Hatch. He's best known for writing "Downtown" and many other big hits sung by Petula Clark, but his musical legacy goes well beyond that.

Tony Hatch decided he wanted to become a musician at a very young age while growing up in Middlesex, England. After attending choir school in London, he got a job at a music production company when he was only about 15 years old. Starting as a tea boy, he quickly found himself writing songs and producing. His first hit song was "Look for a Star," which was a hit for four different singers in 1960. He wrote that under the alias "Mark Anthony," which he used until 1964. Although he wrote and produced a lot, he didn't have more big successes until 1963, when "Sugar and Spice" was a big hit for the Searchers (under yet another alias) and "Forget Him" was a big hit for Bobby Rydell. (I've included the version of the latter by Gary Lewis and the Playboys, as I like that one better.)

Things drastically changed for Hatch in 1964. He began working with Petula Clark, and had his biggest songwriting success with her straight away with "Downtown." It became one of the biggest hits of the year, hitting Number One in many countries, including the U.S. (though it was kept out of the top spot in Britain due to "I Feel Fine" by the Beatles). Clark was already a veteran hit maker in Britain, having first sung for the BBC in 1942 at the age of seven! But by 1964 she was 32 years old and already starting to seem washed up when "Downtown" broke her in the U.S. and many other countries and totally revitalized her career. Over the next three years, she had nine more Top Twenty hits in the U.S., with most of them written by Hatch.

In fact, Hatch wrote so many hits for Clark that I made an effort to find other versions by other singers, so this didn't end up practically a Petula Clark "best of" album. I found alternate versions for a few, such as "The Other Man's Grass Is Always Greener," "My Love," and "I Couldn't Live without Your Love," but I generally found the Clark versions were the best versions, so I ended up with eight hits sung by Clark.

But Clark was a very busy guy, because writing and producing songs for Clark was just one of his many jobs in the 1960s. He produced singles and albums for many other musical acts, including everything the Searchers recorded from 1963 to 1967, when they were one of the most popular acts in Britain. He also recorded some lounge music style albums on his own, and even did some singing, though he didn't have any hits that way. He also got involved making music for TV shows and movies. His first big success in that domain was writing the theme to the TV show "Crossroads" in 1964. I've also included "Man Alive" from 1965 and "Neighbors" from 1985 as other similar successes. He even briefly was in the Lower Third, a band led by David Bowie in 1965! (They broke up not long after failing a BBC audition.)

Hatch was never romantically connected to Clark (she was married and had children at the time), but Hatch discovered another female singer, Jackie Trent, and they soon were romantically linked. It turned out that Trent had serious songwriting talent as well as being a pretty vocalist. Hatch and Trent co-wrote "Where Are You Now (My Love)" which hit Number One in Britain in 1965. After that, many hits were co-written by them, including: "I Couldn't Live Without Your Love, "Who Am I," "What Would I Be," "Colour My World," "Don't Sleep in the Subway," "You've Got to Be Loved," "Joanna," and "The Two of Us." They got married in 1967 and stayed married until 2002. Their song "The Two of Us" wasn't a hit in Britain, but a duet version they did together was a Number One hit in Australia in 1967.

Hatch's hits petered out around 1970. However, his career as an entertainer kept going strong. He and Trent focused more on writing for musicals, movie soundtracks, and TV shows. In the 1970s, he also became a panelist on the TV show "New Faces," and kept doing that for many years. He and Trent also hosted their own TV shows together, "Words and Music" and "It's a Musical World." 

In 2020, he was appointed Officer of the Order of the British Empire (OBE) for services to music and charity. He is still alive and 85 years old as I write this in 2025.

Here's a Wikipedia article if you want to know more:

Tony Hatch - Wikipedia 

This album is an hour and seven minutes long.

01 Look for a Star (Garry Mills)
02 Sugar and Spice (Searchers)
03 Downtown (Petula Clark)
04 Crossroads (Tony Hatch Orchestra)
05 Forget Him (Gary Lewis & the Playboys)
06 I Know a Place (Petula Clark)
07 Man Alive (Tony Hatch Sound)
08 Round Every Corner (Petula Clark)
09 Where Are You Now [My Love] (Jackie Trent)
10 You're the One (Vogues)
11 A Sign of the Times (Petula Clark)
12 Roundabout (Connie Francis)
13 Heart (Barry & the Remains)
14 Color My World (Petula Clark)
15 Major to Minor (Settlers)
16 Who Am I (Petula Clark)
17 You've Got to Be Loved (Montanas)
18 The Two of Us (Jackie Trent & Tony Hatch)
19 Don't Sleep in the Subway (Petula Clark)
20 Joanna (Scott Walker)
21 The Other Man's Grass Is Always Greener (Vikki Carr)
22 Look at Mine (Petula Clark)
23 My Love (Sonny James)
24 Neighbours Theme (Barry Crocker)
25 I Couldn't Live without Your Love (Mari Wilson)

https://pixeldrain.com/u/S3iEsBeT

alternate:

https://bestfile.io/en/GnrWVOBNq98u4gR/file

The cover photo is from 1974. 

Richard Thompson - BBC Sessions, Volume 3: In Concert, Hammersmith Palais, London, Britain, 11-20-1986

Here's another volume of Richard Thompson performing for the BBC. This time, it's a concert from 1986.

"Volume 2" is a concert from 1985. This concert is pretty similar, except it's shorter. Most likely, it was edited down to fit an hour-long radio slot. That includes getting rid of pretty much any banter between songs. Between the 1985 show and this one, however, Thompson released another studio album, "Daring Adventures." So there are three songs performed from that album here: "Valerie," "Jennie," and "A Bone through Her Nose." Too bad "Al Bowlly's in Heaven" from that album also wasn't included, since I think it's one of his greatest songs. (But a version of that song was included in "Volume 1.")

Six of the songs here made it onto the official box set "Live at the BBC." Those are tracks 2, 3, 7, 8, 9, and 10. The rest are unreleased, from the BBC broadcast. The lead vocals were rather low on some songs, especially the unreleased ones, so I adjusted that using the UVR5 audio editing program.

During this tour, like the 1985, the folk duo of Clive Gregson and Christine Collister were a part of Thompson's band, helping with backing vocals and Gregson guitar. So that's why one song, "Like a Man," has the lead vocals by Gregson. 

This album is 56 minutes long.

01 The Angels Took My Racehorse Away (Richard Thompson)
02 Valerie (Richard Thompson)
03 Jennie (Richard Thompson)
04 A Bone through Her Nose (Richard Thompson)
05 When the Spell Is Broken (Richard Thompson)
06 Like a Man (Richard Thompson with Clive Gregson)
07 You Don't Say (Richard Thompson)
08 Fire in the Engine Room (Richard Thompson)
09 Wall of Death (Richard Thompson)
10 Nearly in Love (Richard Thompson)
11 Tear-Stained Letter (Richard Thompson)

https://pixeldrain.com/u/46MuZAAT

alternate:

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

The cover photo was taken in Los Angeles, California, on March 18, 1985.

Sandie Shaw - BBC Sessions (1965-1970)

Recently, a commenter suggested that I create a BBC album of British singer Sandie Shaw. Turns out I already had one ready to go, so here it is. And by the way, thanks for the suggestion.

Sandie Shaw (real name Sandra Goodrich) was one of the most popular female singers in Britain in the 1960s. Shortly after leaving high school, she was working in a factory when she took part in a local talent show and was spotted by singer Adam Faith, who connected her to his management. She was given a record contract, and also the stage name "Sandie Shaw." Her first single failed to chart. But her second one was a cover of the Bacharach-David song "(There's) Always Something There to Remind Me." It went all the way to Number One in Britain in 1964. Many more hit singles followed, including two more Number Ones, "Long Live Love" in 1965 and "Puppet on a String" in 1967.

However, styles were changing, and her hits petered out towards the end of the 1960s. In the early 1970s, she retired from being a pop singer entirely. Instead, she wrote children's books and acted in plays. At one point, she even became a waitress. However, she revived her music career in the early 1980s, mostly thanks to Morrissey and Johnny Marr of the band the Smiths, who were big fans. She had a Top 40 British hit in 1984 with a Smiths song "Hand in Glove." Later on, she changed careers yet again and became a professional psychotherapist, while still sometimes doing musical things. In 2017, she was given the M.B.E. by the queen for her music career. She is still alive and 78 years old as I write this in 2025.

Here's her Wikipedia entry if you want to know more:

Sandie Shaw - Wikipedia 

This album consists entirely of unreleased BBC recordings. But was survived is frustratingly incomplete. She only took part in three BBC sessions for the "Top of the Pops" radio show, twice in 1965, and once in 1970. Those make up tracks 1 through 5 and 20 through 23. I'm sure she did other BBC radio shows, but either they weren't recorded or I don't have access to them. Everything else here is from BBC TV shows. Tracks 6 through 9 are from the "Rolf Harris Show" in 1967. Track 10 is from the "Cilla" show in 1968, starring Cilla Black. Then Shaw had her own BBC show in 1968, called "The Sandie Shaw Supplement." Unfortunately though, most of the show's six episodes appear to be lost. Only all of one episode and part of another survive. So those surviving bits make up tracks 11 through 18. Track 19 is from a 1969 BBC TV special.

Tracks 6 through 10 were performed in front of a cheering studio audience. So I used the MVSEP program to wipe out the crowd noise, helping those tracks fit in with the rest. Also, a few songs have the problem of BBC DJs talking over the music, especially the "Top of the Pops" ones. So I used the UVR5 audio editing program to get rid of the talking, as I usually do, on the songs with "[Edit]" in their names.

Luckily, most of Shaw's biggest hits are here, even if they are out of chronological order a bit. Most notably, "(There's) Always Something There to Remind Me" was a huge hit in 1964, but the version we have here is from 1969. There's also two versions of "Girl Don't Come," one from 1965 and the other from 1968.

A few of the songs here were not officially released by her, mostly the ones from her TV show: "Get Away," "Trains and Boats and Planes," "Do You Know the Way to San Jose," and "Day Tripper - Ticket to Ride." 

This album is an hour long.

01 Girl Don't Come (Sandie Shaw)
02 I'll Stop at Nothing (Sandie Shaw)
03 You Can't Blame Him [Edit] (Sandie Shaw)
04 I've Heard about Him (Sandie Shaw)
05 Long Live Love (Sandie Shaw)
06 I'll Cry Myself to Sleep (Sandie Shaw)
07 Had a Dream Last Night (Sandie Shaw)
08 Puppet on a String (Sandie Shaw)
09 Ask Any Woman (Sandie Shaw)
10 Words (Sandie Shaw)
11 Get Away (Sandie Shaw)
12 Trains and Boats and Planes (Sandie Shaw)
13 [Get Your Kicks On] Route 66 (Sandie Shaw)
14 Do You Know the Way to San Jose (Sandie Shaw)
15 Day Tripper - Ticket to Ride (Sandie Shaw)
16 Homeward Bound (Sandie Shaw & John Walker)
17 Girl Don't Come (Sandie Shaw)
18 One Note Samba (Sandie Shaw)
19 Always Something There to Remind Me [Edit] (Sandie Shaw)
20 Coconut Grove [Edit] (Sandie Shaw)
21 Reviewing the Situation [Edit] (Sandie Shaw)
22 Love Me Do [Edit] (Sandie Shaw)
23 By Tomorrow (Sandie Shaw)

https://pixeldrain.com/u/Sg9J528X

alternate:

https://bestfile.io/en/jugGvkiMUb0ONWH/file

The cover photo is from 1967.

Covered: Tony Macaulay, Volume 2: 1970-1984

I just posted Volume 1 of my "Covered" series albums for British songwriter Tony Macaulay. Here's the second and final volume already.

As I mentioned in Volume 1, Macaulay had a remarkable knack for writing catchy, poppy hits. His winning streak continued well into the 1970s. His biggest hits in this volume were "You Won't Find Another Fool Like Me" by The New Seekers in 1973, "Don't Give Up on Us" by David Soul in 1976, and "Silver Lady," also by David Soul, in 1977. All three of those songs reached Number One in the British charts. He did have a lot of chart success in the U.S., for instance "Don't Give Up on Us" was a Number One there as well, but for some reason he had more success in Britain.

In 1970, he stopped working with his main songwriting partner in Volume 1, John Macleod, when they began working for different publishing companies. But he worked with other professional songwriters, especially Geoff Stephens, Barry Mason, and the team of Roger Cook and Roger Greenaway. But he wrote some songs by himself. For instance, "(Last Night) I Didn't Get to Sleep at All," "Letter to Lucille," "Falling Apart at the Seams," "Don't Give Up on Us."

I'm pretty confident Macaulay could have kept writing hits in the 1980s and beyond. He did have one hits in the 1980s, "Alibis" by Sergio Mendes, that shows him successfully adapting to changing musical styles. But he increasingly lost interest in writing pop songs. Instead, starting in the early 1970s, he turned his attention to film scores and musical theater. He was successful in both, winning nine British Academy Awards. In the 1990s, he then shifted gears again, and turned to writing thriller novels. He was fairly successful at that as well. He's still alive (and eighty-one years old) as I write this in 2025. 

Pretty much all the songs here are the hit versions. For a couple, like "Gasoline Alley Bred" and "Here Comes That Rainy Day Feeling Again," I chose alternate versions since due to posting the other version on other Covered albums. "Bluebird" wasn't a hit, but I liked it so I included it. Normally with these Covered albums, I try to include at least all the big hits. But Macaulay wrote so many that I skipped some I wasn't that keen on, for instance "Play Me Like You Play Your Guitar" by Duane Eddy, "Down on the Beach Tonight," by the Drifters, and "Going in with My Eyes Open," by David Soul, all of which made the Top Ten in Britain.

This album is 50 minutes long.

01 Gasoline Alley Bred (Blue Mink)
02 Something Old, Something New (Fantastics)
03 [Last Night] I Didn't Get to Sleep at All (5th Dimension)
04 You Won't Find Another Fool like Me (New Seekers)
05 Bluebird (Carl Wayne)
06 Letter to Lucille (Tom Jones)
07 I Get a Little Sentimental Over You (New Seekers)
08 Kissin' in the Back Row of the Movies (Drifters)
09 Falling Apart at the Seams (Marmalade)
10 Silver Lady (David Soul)
11 Here Comes That Rainy Day Feeling Again (Connie Cato)
12 Don't Give Up on Us (David Soul)
13 You're More than a Number in My Little Red Book (Drifters)
14 Let's Have a Quiet Night In (David Soul)
15 Alibis (Sergio Mendes)

https://pixeldrain.com/u/7HbNAqA9

alternate:

https://bestfile.io/en/9NoE6XxPOKRpZha/file

I don't know what year the cover photo is from. But I'm guessing on little details that it was taken after the cover photo from Volume 1, which dates to 1972. The original was in black and white, but I colorized it using the Kolorize program. Then I used the Krea AI program on it to improve the detail.

Covered: Tony Macaulay, Volume 1: 1966-1970

I need to post more of these albums from my "Covered" series. I keep finding more and more songwriters that I'd never even heard of before starting on this project. Here's one such example: Tony Macaulay. In the 1960s and 70s, there was a whole stable of professional songwriters in Britain writing lots of hits, and Macaulay was one of the more successful ones, so much so that I found enough for two volumes. 

Macaulay was unabashedly aiming for hit singles with practically every song, so get ready for a poppy sound. But he had hit after hit because he had a knack for writing catchy melodies.

He started working by getting an office job at a record company. That very quickly turned into production and songwriting as his musical talents became evident. For the first few years, he mostly wrote songs with John Macleod, who was two decades older and much more musically experienced. Macleod showed him the ropes of professional-level production and songwriting, allowing him to quickly advance. Within a year of starting this job, at about the age of 20, Macaulay and Macleod not only had a Number One hit in Britain with the song "Baby Now that I've Found You" by the Foundations, it was replaced in the top spot with their song "Let the Heartaches Begin" by Long John Baldry! Having two Number Ones in a row was rare even for the likes of the Beatles, but it showed rare talent. Macaulay would have four more Number Ones in Britain, and about three dozen more Top 40 hits there, plus lots of success in the U.S.

I considered making crediting this to both Macaulay and Macleod, except Macleod left the songwriting team fairly early on. His last co-written hit was in 1970, while Macaulay kept going strong for the rest of the 1970s. Plus, Macleod never had any hits songs co-written with anyone else, while Macaulay had plenty more hits, even during the few years he was working with Macleod. For instance, on this album, "Build Me Up Buttercup" was co-written by him and Mike d'Abo, "Lights of Cincinnati," "Smile a Little Smile for Me," and "Sorry Suzanne" were co-written by him and Geoff Stephens, "Love Grows (Where My Rosemary Goes)" by him and Barry Mason, "Home Lovin' Man" and "(Blame It) On the Pony Express," by him and the team of Roger Cook and Roger Greenaway. Generally speaking, the other songs here were written by Macaulay and Macleod. 

(I've already posted Covered volumes for Cook and Greenaway. I plan on posting volumes for the likes of Geoff Stephens and Barry Mason as well.)

As I mentioned above, in the 1960s and 70s, there was a whole stable of professional songwriters in Britain writing hits. It seems Macaulay wrote songs with a great many of them. But he also could write songs on his own, since he usually worked on both the music and lyrics, as opposed to many songwriters who specialize in one or the other. For instance, "Baby Make It Soon" here is credited solely to him. In the 1970s, he'd write many more hits without any co-writers. 

Most of the songs here are the original hit versions. However, I found a few songs he wrote that weren't hits but sounded like hits to my ears, so I added those in: "I Won't Try to Change Your Mind," "Someday," "Heaven Knows I'm Missing Him Now," and "Take Away the Emptiness Too."

Here's his Wikipedia entry if you want to know more:

Tony Macaulay - Wikipedia

This album is 51 minutes long.

01 I Won't Try to Change Your Mind (Sandra Barry)
02 Baby Now that I've Found You (Foundations)
03 Someday (Paper Dolls)
04 Build Me Up Buttercup (Foundations)
05 Let the Heartaches Begin (Long John Baldry)
06 Something Here in My Heart [Keeps A-Tellin' Me No] (Paper Dolls)
07 Heaven Knows I'm Missing Him Now (Sandie Shaw)
08 Smile a Little Smile for Me (Flying Machine)
09 In the Bad, Bad Old Days [Before You Loved Me] (Foundations)
10 Baby Make It Soon (Marmalade)
11 Take Away the Emptiness Too (Tina Tott)
12 Sorry Suzanne (Hollies)
13 Lights of Cincinnati (Scott Walker)
14 That Same Old Feeling (Pickettywitch)
15 Home Lovin' Man (Andy Williams)
16 Love Grows [Where My Rosemary Goes] (Edison Lighthouse)
17 Blame It on the Pony Express (Johnny Johnson & the Bandwagon)

https://pixeldrain.com/u/tGgE5o9s

alternate:

https://bestfile.io/z5hmN1fg5EzatAC/file

The cover photo is from 1972. The original was in black and white, but I converted it to color using the Kolorize program. I also used Krea AI to improve the detail.

B.B. King with Richie Sambora - PBS Soundstage, WTTW Studios, Chicago, IL, 1-29-2009

Here's yet another episode of the "PBS Soundstage" TV show. This time, it's blues legend B.B. King. He's joined by three special guests: Terrence Howard, Solange, and Richie Sambora.

I was reluctant at first to post this, due to B.B. King's advanced age. He was about 83 years old at the time. And if you watch the video, he sat the entire time, and it looks like that's because he had to. However, I gave it a listen and his vocals and guitar playing were still very good, so I'm posting it. He would finally pass in 2015, at the age of 89.

It's pretty remarkable to consider that he did another episode of this show in 1976 (with Bobby 'Blue' Bland), 33 years earlier, and his music career had already been going for four decades prior to that!

The first guest was Terrence Howard. That was a rather strange choice, considering that Howard was famous for being a movie star, not a musician. He only released one album, in 2008. Since that was right before this concert, I guess he was trying to branch out into having a music career too, but gave it up not long thereafter. His singing was good, certainly nothing to be embarrassed about, as is the case with many other movie stars trying to be musicians. 

The second guest was Solange. She's a neo-soul singer (and a sister to Beyonce). At the time of this concert, her music career was just getting started, but she would later have a couple of very critically acclaimed albums. Her singing was very good also.

The third and final guest was Richie Sambora, the long-time lead guitarist for the band Bon Jovi. His appearance was all about jamming on guitar with King. It's a bit unfortunate that both Solange and Sambora wanted to play on King's signature song, "The Thrill Is Gone," so that song appears twice in relatively close proximity.

This album is 53 minutes long.

01 Every Day I Have the Blues (B.B. King)
02 See That My Grave Is Kept Clean (B.B. King)
03 How Many More Years (B.B. King)
04 How Blue Can You Get (B.B. King)
05 I Need You So (B.B. King & Terrence Howard)
06 talk (B.B. King & Terrence Howard)
07 I Got Some Outside Help [I Don't Really Need] (B.B. King & Terrence Howard)
08 talk (B.B. King)
09 The Thrill Is Gone (B.B. King & Solange)
10 talk (B.B. King)
11 Let the Good Times Roll (B.B. King with Richie Sambora)
12 talk (B.B. King with Richie Sambora)
13 The Thrill Is Gone (B.B. King with Richie Sambora)
14 Blues (B.B. King)
15 When the Saints Go Marching In (B.B. King with Solange, Richie Sambora & Terrence Howard)

https://pixeldrain.com/u/gdZFhsi7

alternate:

https://bestfile.io/en/KqvxLt8efGBDDw9/file

The cover photo is a screenshot I took from a YouTube video of this exact concert. That's King, sitting, with Sambora.

The Incredible String Band - BBC Sessions, Volume 2: 1969-1970

Here's a second volume of the Incredible String Band performing for the BBC. Like Volume 1, it consists entirely of studio sessions.

In 1967, the band consisted only of singer-songwriters Robin Williamson and Mike Heron. But by the time of this album, Licorice McKechnie and Rose Simpson joined as well, as you can see from the cover image. They released the albums "Changing Horses" in 1969 and "Looking Up" in 1970.

In 2007, the archival album "Across the Airwaves: BBC Radio Recordings 1969-74" was released. Seven of the songs here come from that, while the rest remain unreleased. Those seven are the first four, plus tracks 9 through 11. It's obvious that that album wasn't meant to be complete, even with sound quality considerations, because the unreleased tracks 12 and 13 are from the exact same BBC session as three that were chosen.

A bunch of the songs on this album had the lead vocals low in the mix. I fixed that for all the songs except the first four, which sounded fine. As usual, I used the UVR5 audio editing program to do that.

This album is an hour and four minutes long.

01 Fine Fingered Hands (Incredible String Band)
02 All Writ Down (Incredible String Band)
03 Dust Be Diamonds (Incredible String Band)
04 Theta (Incredible String Band)
05 The Letter (Incredible String Band)
06 This Moment (Incredible String Band)
07 Gather Round (Incredible String Band)
08 Waiting for You (Incredible String Band)
09 Empty Pocket Blues (Incredible String Band)
10 Beautiful Stranger (Incredible String Band)
11 Won't You Come See Me (Incredible String Band)
12 Flowers of the Forest (Incredible String Band)
13 Dark Eyed Lady (Incredible String Band)

https://pixeldrain.com/u/PEVAtdFC

alternate:

https://bestfile.io/en/SHImL7mI3Tgkrfn/file

All I know about the cover photo is that it's from 1970.

Hot Chocolate - BBC Sessions (1970-1976)

Here's an album of the British R&B band Hot Chocolate performing for the BBC. Everything here is unreleased, and I believe the vast majority of it hasn't been publicly available until now. Once again, I'm getting some great "Top of the Pops" radio show material from an anonymous helper.

In my opinion, Hot Chocolate are very underrated. Today, they're mostly known for a few songs, especially "You Sexy Thing" and "Every 1's a Winner." But they had many other good hits, for a surprisingly long time. In fact, they had at least one hit a year in Britain every year between 1970 and 1984!

Unfortunately, what they did for the BBC is frustratingly incomplete. The vast majority of the songs here are from the Top of the Pops BBC radio show. As I've mentioned in previous posts, live performances just for that show generally died out around 1972 or 1973, although there were some exceptions. That's the case here. Tracks 1 through 12 are all from that show. But after that, the show just played the record versions. This is one exception though, track 14 ("A Child's Prayer"), which was done live on Top of the Pops in 1975, even after that show had started merely playing their records. (In cases like this, I compared the BBC versions with the record versions to see if they were different.)

So that's the bad news. The good news is, at least this gives us a great look at the band's early years. Hot Chocolate was very unusual in that they started having hits in 1970, yet they didn't release a studio album until 1974. Even BBC DJ Brian Matthew, while introducing one of the 1972 songs here, commented how strange it was the band hadn't released an album yet. I'm guessing this is because the band was produced at the time by Mickie Most. Most had an extremely impressive track record of getting bands to have hit songs in the 1960s and 70s, but he was almost exclusively focused on hits. (In fact, I might later post an "album that should exist" of a studio album this band should have released around 1972 or 1973.)

Most of the songs here are versions of the A- and B-sides of singles at the time. But there are exceptions. "Money Don't Make a Man," "Orphan Boy," and "Dance to the Music" were never released by the band in any form. The first two probably are originals that would have been on an early studio album if they'd been allowed to release one. "Dance to the Music" is a cover of the famous hit by Sly and the Family Stone.

I tried to augment this album with some later TV performances, but I was mostly frustrated. It turns out that the vast majority of TV performances were lip-synced. I even found a short concert done for TV in East Germany in 1978, and the entire thing was lip-synced. But I did find two songs that were done for TV shows in 1974 and 1976 respectively and were actually live: "Cheri Babe" and "You Sexy Thing." Those show the band was more than capable of playing these songs very well for TV shows. It's a shame that so many shows at the time favored lip-syncing.

This album is 47 minutes long.

01 Love Is Life [Edit] (Hot Chocolate)
02 Money Don't Make a Man [Edit] (Hot Chocolate)
03 You Could've Been a Lady (Hot Chocolate)
04 Everybody's Laughing [Edit] (Hot Chocolate)
05 Orphan Boy [Edit] (Hot Chocolate)
06 I Believe [In Love] [Edit] (Hot Chocolate)
07 Caveman Billy [Edit] (Hot Chocolate)
08 Dance to the Music (Hot Chocolate)
09 Give Them a Hand (Hot Chocolate)
10 Mary Anne [Edit] (Hot Chocolate)
11 You'll Always Be a Friend [Edit] (Hot Chocolate)
12 Go-Go Girl [Edit] (Hot Chocolate)
13 Cheri Babe (Hot Chocolate)
14 A Child's Prayer [Edit] (Hot Chocolate)
15 You Sexy Thing (Hot Chocolate)

https://pixeldrain.com/u/1hGSGtXw

alternate:

https://bestfile.io/RP68nfJDtnfgb8h/file

The cover photo shows the band in 1972.

Peter Gabriel - BBC Sessions, Volume 4: In Concert, Mermaid Theatre, London, Britain, 10-19-2011

Here's the fourth and final album of Peter Gabriel performing for the BBC. (At least the fourth so far.) It's different from most Peter Gabriel concerts in that he is backed by a full orchestra.

Earlier in the month of October 2011, Gabriel released a new studio album, "New Blood." It consisted of orchestral re-recordings of songs from earlier in his music career. This concert is basically a live version of that album. But one key difference is he talked a lot between songs to explain their meanings. 

There also is a live album from this tour, called "Live Blood." But it's quite different, with a much longer run time. 

Note that a 2004 concert in Milan, Italy, was also broadcast by the BBC. But this was later released as the live album "Growing Up Live," which is widely available, so I didn't see the need to post that here.

This unreleased album is an hour and 16 minutes long.

01 talk (Peter Gabriel)
02 Heroes (Peter Gabriel)
03 talk (Peter Gabriel)
04 Wallflower (Peter Gabriel)
05 Intruder (Peter Gabriel)
06 talk (Peter Gabriel)
07 San Jacinto (Peter Gabriel)
08 Signal to Noise (Peter Gabriel)
09 talk (Peter Gabriel)
10 Downside Up (Peter Gabriel)
11 Mercy Street (Peter Gabriel)
12 talk (Peter Gabriel)
13 The Rhythm of the Heat (Peter Gabriel)
14 talk (Peter Gabriel)
15 Father, Son (Peter Gabriel)
16 Red Rain (Peter Gabriel)
17 Solsbury Hill (Peter Gabriel)
18 talk (Peter Gabriel)
19 Don't Give Up (Peter Gabriel)
20 talk (Peter Gabriel)

https://pixeldrain.com/u/R1SWwpCb 

alternate:

https://bestfile.io/en/Qxd4hZDKlaWbVeo/file

The cover image is from this exact concert.

Gilbert O'Sullivan - BBC Sessions, Volume 3: Sight and Sound, Golders Green Hippodrome, London, Britain, 1-28-1978

This is the third and last album I have of singer-songwriter Gilbert O'Sullivan performing for the BBC. Like Volume 2, it's a short concert.

Gilbert O'Sullivan had a lot of hit songs and popular albums from 1970 to 1975. After that, his popularity dropped considerably. He did have one last hit single in 1980 with "What's in a Kiss?" But at the time of this concert, his popularity was at an all-time low for him. His most recent album, "Southpaw," released in late 1977, didn't even make the album charts anywhere. New musical styles like disco, punk, and new wave were all the rage. It didn't help that he was having trouble with his record company. He discovered they were ripping him off. After years of legal trouble, in 1978, he won about 45 million dollars (adjusted to its 2025 value). But presumably the record company retaliated by failing to promote him. He later said the legal battle effectively put his music career on hold for years. 

So kudos to the BBC for giving him this prominent platform in 1978 anyway. "Sight and Sound" was a BBC TV show (thus the "sight" as well as the "sound"). It showed O'Sullivan rocking more than in the past, and still a very capable songwriter and performer.

I don't think this has been shared as an audio bootleg before. I found a video of the concert on YouTube, converted it to audio, and broke it into mp3s. Despite that, the sound quality is excellent.

This album is 35 minutes long.

01 talk (Gilbert O'Sullivan)
02 If I Can't Have You All to Myself (Gilbert O'Sullivan)
03 Things that Go Bump in the Night (Gilbert O'Sullivan)
04 talk (Gilbert O'Sullivan)
05 For What It's Worth (Gilbert O'Sullivan)
06 talk (Gilbert O'Sullivan)
07 Nothing Rhymed (Gilbert O'Sullivan)
08 talk (Gilbert O'Sullivan)
09 Miss My Love Today (Gilbert O'Sullivan)
10 talk (Gilbert O'Sullivan)
11 The Best Fun I Ever Had (Gilbert O'Sullivan)
12 talk (Gilbert O'Sullivan)
13 That's Where I Belong (Gilbert O'Sullivan)
14 talk (Gilbert O'Sullivan)
15 Forever Wondering (Gilbert O'Sullivan)
16 Get Down (Gilbert O'Sullivan)

https://pixeldrain.com/u/4xWfkQ77

alternate:

https://bestfile.io/en/5raLW9vkL5qBFUr/file

The cover image is a screenshot I took from this exact concert. I used the Krea AI to boost the low-res image quality somewhat.

Gary Walker and the Rain - Album No. 1 - Alternate Version (1968)

A commenter recently posted on this blog that singer-songwriter Joey Molland died two months ago, on March 1, 2025, and suggested I should post something in his memory. (Molland is one of a few key singer-songwriters in the early 1970s band Badfinger.) I thought that was a good idea, so I'm posting this.

This album has a curious history, especially because it's credited mainly to Gary Walker, who is mainly just the drummer in the band. Walker, whose real name is Gary Leeds, was one of the three members of the 1960s American band the Walker Brothers. None of the band's three members were related to each other, though at least the lead singer, Scott Walker, really had "Walker" in his name. In 1965, the band moved to Britain and found massive success there, including two Number One singles hits. But in early 1968, while still at the peak of their popularity, the band broke up.

Gary Walker was just the drummer in the Walker Brothers. He hadn't done any singing or songwriting at all. But he realized he could take advantage of his "Walker" name and connection. This was especially true in Japan. The Walker Brothers toured Japan shortly before breaking up, and were treated like the Beatles there, with screaming fans following them everywhere. So Walker resolved to quickly form a new group made up of British musicians, since he was still living in Britain. For the band's main lead singer, he picked Charlie Crane. Crane had been the lead singer to the Cryin' Shames, which had a minor hit single in 1966 before breaking up. He also picked Joey Molland as lead guitarist. This would prove crucial. Molland had been in a couple of bands up until this point, but none of them had done much. It turned out not only was Molland a talented lead guitarist, but he also could sing well and write songs. Rounding out the band was John Lawson on bass, who had previously been in the band Plastic Penny. It consisted mostly of songs by Molland, plus a few covers, though Crane also contributed a couple. Walker was credited as co-writer with Molland on three songs, though I wonder how much he contributed considering his lack of songwriting credits before or after this album.

The album was surprisingly good, especially considering the way it was quickly put together to take advantage of Walker's involvement in the Walker Brothers while the public still had that in mind. I like it quite a lot. One can definitely see the connection with Molland's songs and involvement in Badfinger.

The band put out a single in Britain, and performed a short tour there. However, the single didn't make the charts. The band didn't have enough credibility for the album to even get released there, or in the U.S. But it did get released in Japan. So they went there to tour and promote it. That's when Gary Walker's Walker Brothers connection paid off. They were met at the airport by thousands of screaming girls, with Walker being treated like a big star. Molland later commented that it was like being in a band with Elvis Presley. But when they returned to Britain, they were basically nobodies again. Their record company released another single, which also flopped. Walker decided the game was up, so he broke up the band and moved back to the U.S.

What I'm posting here is an alternate version of the band's sole album. In my opinion, this is a case where less is more. The official album has 13 songs on it. There was a later edition that added three bonus tracks from singles. I cut that down to ten songs from the album, plus one of the bonus tracks. A few of the songs just aren't that good. 

Ironically, two of the songs I cut are the two that the record company decided to release as singles in Britain. One was a cover of "Spooky." It had just been a big hit and there was nothing special about the cover. The other was "Come In You'll Get Pneumonia," a song by the Easybeats. I love the Easybeats, but that was one of their weakest songs. So it's no wonder those singles failed. I also didn't include "I Can't Stand to Lose You" (a song co-written by Walker and Crane), "I Promise to Love You" (another Crane song), and "Gary's Theme" (a cover of an instrumental).

In retrospect, I wonder if the record company deliberately sabotaged the band by selecting those songs for singles, or if it was just the usual stupidity. I could see how they would have been unimpressed by a band led by a drummer with no known singing or songwriting skills, and wanting just to have them go away. The fact the band happened to contain a serious talent in the form of Joey Molland was basically a lucky fluke, especially since Walker hired him after only speaking to him for a few minutes, without any proof of his singing or songwriting abilities. 

But the bottom line is we're left with this quality album. Especially if you're a Badfinger fan and had never heard of this album, you really should give it a listen.

This album is 38 minutes long.

01 Magazine Woman (Gary Walker & the Rain)
02 The Sun Shines (Gary Walker & the Rain)
03 Doctor Doctor (Gary Walker & the Rain)
04 Market Tavern (Gary Walker & the Rain)
05 Take a Look (Gary Walker & the Rain)
06 The View (Gary Walker & the Rain)
07 If You Don't Come Back (Gary Walker & the Rain)
08 Thoughts of an Old Man (Gary Walker & the Rain)
09 Francis (Gary Walker & the Rain)
10 Whatever Happened to Happy (Gary Walker & the Rain)
11 Cutie Morning Moon (Gary Walker & the Rain)

https://pixeldrain.com/u/omNaWNJz

alternate:

https://bestfile.io/q9Xwp6JqPr40x4w/file

The cover is the same as the original cover. However, I noticed there are slightly different versions, for instance with record company logos and boasts of "stereo" sound and so forth. I combined parts from a couple of versions to create the cleanest version.

Covered: Jesse Stone: 1942-1985

Until a few days ago (writing this in May 2025), I had never heard of Jesse Stone. But I found out about him while research possible additional subjects for my Covered series on well-covered songwriters. What really caught my eye was that he was the one who wrote the song "Shake, Rattle and Roll." That was one of the most pivotal songs that launched the popularity of rock and roll music. Rolling Stone Magazine has rated it as 127 on their list of the 500 greatest songs of all time.

But while Stone is best known for that song, he wasn't a songwriting one-hit wonder. Ahmet Ertegun, the head of Atlantic Records, the most important R&B record company in that era, once stated that "Jesse Stone did more to develop the basic rock and roll sound than anybody else."

Stone's music career went way back. He actually came from a family who put on minstrel shows, and began performing at the age of four! His first big success as a songwriter came with the song "Idaho," which sold over a million copies in 1942. That's not really a style of song I like, but I've included it since it was a pivotal song in his career. Things got more interesting as the rock and rock era dawned in the early 1950s. Another big success for him was "Money Honey" by the Drifters, which Rolling Stone Magazine also put on their list of the top 500 greatest songs of all time. "Flip, Flop and Fly" by Big Joe Turner and "Don't Let Go" by Roy Hamilton were also especially big hits.

Stone had his own career as a singer, as well as a producer and arranger. He had a fine voice, but never had any hits of his own. He certainly stood out for being a successful Black songwriter in the 1950s when there were very few others. (Although Otis Blackwell comes to mind as another key exception.) His success as a songwriter petered out in the early 1960s as musical styles change. Most of these songs are the original versions, except for the last three, which came significantly later. He died in 1999 at the age of 97.

Here's the Wikipedia entry on him:

Jesse Stone (musician) - Wikipedia

This album is 47 minutes long. 

01 Idaho (Benny Goodman with Dick Haymes)
02 Cole Slaw [Sorghum Switch] (Louis Jordan)
03 Losing Hand (Ray Charles)
04 Money Honey (Drifters)
05 Shake, Rattle and Roll (Bill Haley & His Comets)
06 As Long as I'm Moving (Ruth Brown)
07 Razzle-Dazzle (Bill Haley & His Comets)
08 Flip, Flop and Fly (Big Joe Turner)
09 Crazy, Crazy Party (Cues)
10 Don't Let Go (Roy Hamilton)
11 Love Is A-Breakin' Out (Roberta Sherwood)
12 Red Hot Love (Billy Williams)
13 Private Eye (Buddy Wilkins)
14 Like a Baby (Elvis Presley)
15 Smack Dab in the Middle (Ray Charles)
16 Your Cash Ain't Nothing but Trash (Steve Miller Band)
17 Liptstick, Powder and Paint (Shakin' Stevens)

https://pixeldrain.com/u/AhbgKxJs

alternate:

https://bestfile.io/en/BtYyaOvcEyjyV9q/file

I don't know much about the cover photo except that it looks to be a promotional photo from the 1950s. It was originally in black and white, but I colorized it using the Krea AI program.

Ronald Isley with Burt Bacharach - PBS Soundstage, WTTW Studios, Chicago, IL, 11-2003

Here's another episode of that great TV show, "PBS Soundstage." This time, it stars Ronald Isley, who sings exclusively from the catalog of classic songs written by Burt Bacharach and Hal David. He's assisted by Bacharach playing piano on all the songs, though Bacharach doesn't sing, or talk much.

Ronald Isley is the long-time lead singer of the American R&B group the Isley Brothers. He founded the group in 1957 with two of his brothers. The Isley Brothers had hits from the 1950s to the 2000s, and they are still going as I write this in 2025. Ronald Isley didn't release a solo album until 2003, called "Here I Am: Ron Isley Meets Burt Bacharach." No doubt he put it out as a solo album because it was so different from the usual R&B danceable, funky style of the Isley Brothers. It turns out there was an ballad crooner inside Ronald Isley waiting to get out.

Not only was this concert part of the tour to support that 2003 album mentioned above, apparently it was the very first concert of the tour, so these were all performed live by Isley for the first time. Generally speaking, all of the songs are classics from the 1960s and 1970s, most of them associated with Dionne Warwick. However, the first version of "Love's [Still] The Answer" was from just a year earlier.

I don't believe this has even been shared as an audio bootleg before. I found a video of the episode and converted it to mp3s. However, the sound quality is still excellent.

This unreleased album is 54 minutes long.

01 talk (Ronald Isley & Burt Bacharach)
02 The Look of Love (Ronald Isley & Burt Bacharach)
03 This Guy's in Love with You (Ronald Isley & Burt Bacharach)
04 Anyone Who Had a Heart (Ronald Isley & Burt Bacharach)
05 Love's [Still] The Answer (Ronald Isley & Burt Bacharach)
06 Here I Am (Ronald Isley & Burt Bacharach)
07 talk (Ronald Isley & Burt Bacharach)
08 Windows of the World (Ronald Isley & Burt Bacharach)
09 Alfie (Ronald Isley & Burt Bacharach)
10 In Between the Heartaches (Ronald Isley & Burt Bacharach)
11 [They Long to Be] Close to You (Ronald Isley & Burt Bacharach)
12 Raindrops Keep Falling on My Head (Ronald Isley & Burt Bacharach)
13 talk (Ronald Isley & Burt Bacharach)
14 A House Is Not a Home (Ronald Isley & Burt Bacharach)

https://pixeldrain.com/u/rZ1TTXsa

alternate:

https://bestfile.io/en/TknRRIFjVuk7Udj/file

The cover image is a screenshot I took from a YouTube video of this exact concert. I used the Krea AI program to improve the image quality.

The Swinging Blue Jeans - BBC Sessions (1963-1970)

I'm prioritizing the posting of rare BBC sessions from the 1960s and 70s lately, especially the ones that are completely unreleased. Here's another case, the Swinging Blue Jeans.

The Swinging Blue Jeans were one of the many British bands that rode the wave of the British Invasion sound in the early 1960s. They started in 1957, and after some personnel changes, they found themselves honing their concert abilities at the Star Club in Hamburg, Germany, at the same time as the Beatles. In late 1963, a cover of the song "Hippy Hippy Shake" reached Number Two in the British singles charts, and suddenly they were stars. They had two more hits in Britain in 1964: "Good Golly, Miss Molly" and "You're No Good," and another in 1966, "Don't Make Me Over."

But all their hits were covers. Unfortunately, the band didn't have big success writing their own songs, although they did put some on their albums and B-sides. Like many bands of their time, they were unable to keep up with changing trends when psychedelic music became all the rage in 1967. So it's not surprising that their BBC sessions petered out that year. However, they never really quit. They made one last BBC appearance in 1970 under a new name, "Music Motor," but their latest single failed to make the charts and they disappeared again. The band is still touring as I write this in 2025, though they no longer have any original members.

Here's a Wikipedia link:

The Swinging Blue Jeans - Wikipedia 

The vast majority of the songs here are from the "Top of the Pops" BBC radio show. None of those have been officially released, although I found a grey market collection of them while searching the Internet. Unfortunately though, those BBC sessions don't include their two biggest hits, "Hippy Hippy Shake" and "Good Golly, Miss Molly." The problem is the Top of the Pops show only started making records of each weekly show and sending them to overseas stations in mid-1964, which is how the recordings survive, and those two songs were hits before that. I would guess it's highly likely they were performed on the BBC, but those versions were lost. 

So I dug deeper, trying to find other versions I could include. I found an unreleased live performance of "Good Golly, Miss Molly" along with "Shake, Rattle and Roll" for the 1964 N.M.E. Poll Winners concert. So I included those. I also stumbled across a 1963 BBC performance, "It's Too Late Now." It survived because it was done for the short-lived BBC radio show "Pop Go the Beatles." All of those shows survived due to the intense interest in the Beatles. But I still couldn't find a good version of "Hippy Hippy Shake" version anywhere. Finally, I discovered that one best of collection included an alternate version recorded in the studio. There was a lot of dead air before the song started, but I left in a bit of the studio chatter to show it indeed is different.

While the Swinging Blue Jeans were never going to rival better known British Invasion bands, they were better than many, and their music is full of that elusive 1960s vibe, which I really like.

This album is 58 minutes long.

01 It's Too Late Now (Swinging Blue Jeans)
02 Hippy Hippy Shake [Alternate Version] (Swinging Blue Jeans)
03 Shake, Rattle and Roll (Swinging Blue Jeans)
04 Good Golly, Miss Molly (Swinging Blue Jeans)
05 It's So Right [Edit] (Swinging Blue Jeans)
06 You're No Good (Swinging Blue Jeans)
07 Johnny B. Goode [Edit] (Swinging Blue Jeans)
08 I'm Gonna Sit Right Down and Cry Over You (Swinging Blue Jeans)
09 It Isn't There (Swinging Blue Jeans)
10 One of These Days (Swinging Blue Jeans)
11 Ol' Man Mose (Swinging Blue Jeans)
12 So Much in Love [Edit] (Swinging Blue Jeans)
13 Good Lovin' [Edit] (Swinging Blue Jeans)
14 Crazy 'bout My Baby (Swinging Blue Jeans)
15 Lovey Dovey [Edit] (Swinging Blue Jeans)
16 You Don’t Love Me (Swinging Blue Jeans)
17 I've Got a Girl [Edit] (Swinging Blue Jeans)
18 Don't Make Me Over (Swinging Blue Jeans)
19 What Can I Do Today [Edit] (Swinging Blue Jeans)
20 Tremblin' [Edit] (Swinging Blue Jeans)
21 Bye Bye Baby [Edit] (Swinging Blue Jeans)
22 Don't Go Out into the Rain (Swinging Blue Jeans)
23 It's Alright [Edit] (Swinging Blue Jeans)
24 Open Up Your Heart [Edit] (Swinging Blue Jeans [Music Motor])
25 Happy [Edit] (Swinging Blue Jeans [Music Motor])

https://pixeldrain.com/u/UBh2ic3L

alternate:

https://bestfile.io/en/UDrhoNB7xu3hTVb/file

I don't know anything about the cover photo except that it's from around 1965.

The Sweet - BBC Sessions, Volume 2: 1972-1974

I originally posted just one album of all the BBC sessions from the British glam band the Sweet. However, in May 2025, I found some more songs, enough to split that one album into two. This is the second volume. 

There are lots of changes and improvements to the first volume. Not only are there new songs, but I found better versions of most of the songs. So if you'll want this one, you should want that one too. Here's the link:

https://albumsthatshouldexist.blogspot.com/2024/02/the-sweet-bbc-sessions-1969-1974.html

Volume 1 thoroughly covers the best songs from the time period of that album (1969 to 1971). Volume 2 is more problematic. Most of the songs here come from the Top of the Pops radio show (although some were first broadcast on other BBC shows and then rebroadcast on Top of the Pops, with the Top of the Pops broadcasts being the ones that survived). But around 1972, many acts stopped performing live in the studio for that show or other shows, and the BBC simply played the album versions instead.

That's what happened with this band. In fact, I found one case where two of their songs were broadcast on the same date, and one of them was done live in the studio and the other one was just the record version. That's probably because that song had sound effects that couldn't be done as effectively live. But in any case, the usable BBC sessions run out at the end of 1972, while the band actually had many big hits after that. 

For instance, nowadays, it seems this band is mainly remembered for two big hits: "Ballroom Blitz" and "Fox on the Run." (Those two have ten times more views than any other Sweet songs on Spotify.) Unfortunately, neither of them are here. They were such big hits that they were performed on the British TV show "Top of the Pops" (different from the radio show of the same name), but like most performances on that show, they were lip-synced. I also couldn't find six other songs that made the Top Five in Britain. But some songs are better than none.

I tried to fill in the missing songs with other versions performed on British TV shows. Unfortunately, usually when the band was shown on TV, they merely lip-synced. I found a few other performances from British TV shows that weren't lip-synced, though. "Teenage Rampage" is from a show called "Crackerjack." Tracks 21 and 22 are from the show "45." Tracks 23 and 24 are from the show "The Geordie Show." 

In 2017, a box set was released called "Sensational Sweet." That included most of their BBC recordings. However, when the BBC DJ talked over the beginnings and/or ends of the songs, those parts of the songs were simply cut out. So I usually had to resort to using unreleased versions. I used the UVR5 program to wipe the DJ talking while keeping the music. Those are usually marked with "[Edit]" in their titles. Only two of the songs here are officially released and unchanged (tracks 5 and 7). Also, "The Six Teens" is from a TV show, but the emcee talked over the beginning of it, so I removed the talking for that one too too.

This album is 41 minutes long. 

01 Chop Chop [Edit] (Sweet)
02 Poppa Joe [Edit] (Sweet)
03 Little Willie (Sweet)
04 Man from Mecca (Sweet)
05 Lucille - Great Balls of Fire (Sweet)
06 Wig Wam Bam [Edit] (Sweet)
07 Need a Lot of Lovin' (Sweet)
08 Teenage Rampage (Sweet)
09 You're Not Wrong for Loving Me - Lady Starlight (Sweet)
10 The Six Teens [Edit] (Sweet)
11 Solid Gold Brass (Sweet)
12 Turn It Down (Sweet)

https://pixeldrain.com/u/DxJ3376z 

alternate:

https://bestfile.io/en/2MveUwDqEhNdbaf/file

The cover photo was taken from a TV appearance in September 1972. But I don't know the details. The band's drummer didn't make the picture.

Covered: Bob Crewe & Bob Gaudio, Volume 2: 1974-2024

Here's the second of two "Covered" volumes highlighting the songwriting of Bob Crewe and Bob Gaudio.

In Volume 1, the vast majority of the songs were written by Crewe and Gaudio together. In this volume, all or nearly all of the new songs (meaning new at the time) were written by either Crewe with others or Gaudio with others. However, as far as I can tell, it doesn't seem that they had a falling out, or even stopped writing songs together. For instance, as late as 1983 they co-wrote a couple of minor hit songs for the duo of Roberta Flack and Peabo Bryson. It's just that it seemed both of them had better success with other songwriters when it came to big hits in this era.

As I mentioned in my write-up for Volume 1, by the start of 1974, it seemed as if the songwriting success of both Crewe and Gaudio had petered out. Also around 1971, Gaudio phased himself out of being a member of Franki Valli and the Four Seasons, apparently due to stage fright and introversion. However, he retained a key financial stake, and continued to write songs for the group. So their musical futures were looking bleak. But both of them had a series of stunning songwriting successes, especially in 1974 and 1975.

For instance, I consider the first song here, "Lady Marmalade" by Labelle, one of the greatest dance songs of all time. It was a Number One hit in the U.S. in 1974, and then a cover of it was an even bigger Number One hit by Christina Aguiliera, Pink, and others in 2001. It was co-written by Bob Crewe and Kenny Nolan, another professional songwriter Crewe started working with around this time. Crewe also wrote "My Eyes Adored You" and "Get Dancin'" with Nolan, as well as "Swearin' to God" with another songwriter.

Crewe's "My Eyes Adored You" totally turned out the fortunes of Franki Valli and the Four Seasons, as it was a Number One hit in the U.S. in early 1975. (As with Volume 1, I've tried to avoid having lots of songs by that act, so I chose a duet version by Isaac Hayes and Dionne Warwick instead.) But then Gaudio also rose to the occasion in 1975, writing "Who Loves You" and "December, 1963 (Oh, What a Night)" with Judy Parker, who would later become his wife. "December, 1963 (Oh, What a Night)" in particular was a massive hit, not only reaching Number One in both the U.S. and Britain, but was the fourth best selling song of the year. (Again not wanting to include too many Franki Valli and the Four Seasons performances, I chose an interesting mostly acappella version from 2024.)

Unfortunately, the revived successes of Crewe and Gaudio didn't last that long. Gaudio co-wrote "Silver Star," which was a big hit in 1976. But after that, the new hits for both of them became smaller and fewer, and petered out altogether in the early 1980s. However, they still had more big successes with earlier songs that eventually became hits with cover versions. For instance, "Bye Bye Baby," a minor Franki Valli and the Four Seasons hit in the 1960s, was a Number One hit in Britain for the Bay City Rollers in 1975. 

Some songs kept coming around again and again. For instance, "Let's Hang On," a Four Seasons hit in 1965, was a big hit by the Darts in Britain in 1980, then again by Barry Manilow in 1981. And "Can't Take My Eyes Off You," a hit first for Franki Valli in 1967, has been hits by other musical acts so many times that it's hard to keep track, including making Number Four in Britain in 1982 by the Boys Town Gang.

Crewe, who was 13 years older than Gaudio, died in 2014 at the age of 84. Gaudio is still alive at the age of 82 years old as I write this in 2025.

As I said in Volume 1, I think these two are very underrated songwriters. I could have included many more hits, enough for another volume or two, but I wanted to give this a stronger appeal by including only their biggest hits. It seems some of their songs are going to be hits forever, periodically revived with new cover versions. For instance, "Beggin'," a minor hit when first released by Franki Valli and the Four Seasons in 1967, is another one that keeps getting covered to big success, with Madcon having a Number Five hit in Britain with it in 2008, and then Maneskin having a Number Six hit with it there in 2020.

This album is 54 minutes long.

01 Lady Marmalade (Labelle)
02 Get Dancin' (Disco Tex & the Sex-O-Lettes)
03 Swearin' to God (Frankie Valli)
04 Sherry (Adrian Baker)
05 Bye Bye Baby [Baby Goodbye] (Bay City Rollers)
06 My Eyes Adored You (Isaac Hayes & Dionne Warwick)
07 Silver Star (Frankie Valli & the Four Seasons)
08 Rag Doll (Steeleye Span)
09 Buzz Buzz a Diddle It (Matchbox)
10 The Night (Lene Lovich)
11 Let's Hang On (Barry Manilow)
12 Walk like a Man (Mary Jane Girls)
13 Barbarella (Wondermints)
14 Who Loves You (Murray Head)
15 December, 1963 [Oh, What a Night] (Jared Halle)

https://pixeldrain.com/u/8irSCEPX

alternate:

https://bestfile.io/en/Ia2z6pVWw86bXGm/file

As with Volume 1, I couldn't find good photos of the two of them together. So I found individual photos and put them on the cover. The Bob Crewe one (with red hair) is from 1976. I don't know the date of the Bob Gaudio one, but I'd guess it's from the 1970s. Both were in black and white, but I colorized them using the Kolorize program. Then I improved the quality with the Krea AI program.

Covered: Bob Crewe & Bob Gaudio, Volume 1: 1957-1974

The songwriting team of Bob Crewe and Bob Gaudio is another one that doesn't get as much respect as it deserves. So they're a good subject for this next installment in my "Covered" series. They were responsible for writing most of the big hits by Franki Valli and the Four Seasons. But they had many songwriting successes for other musical acts as well.

Note that since many of the songs here were first hits by Franki Valli and the Four Seasons, I wanted to avoid turning this into mostly a "best of" by the band. So I tried hard to select versions of those songs by other musical acts. I've made two volumes, and many of the hit songs in this time period (1957 to 1974) aren't included until cover versions that happened in the time of the second volume. Examples that were 1960s hits but don't show up until later covers include "Sherry," "Rag Doll," "Walk like a Man," "Bye Bye Baby," and "Barbarella." Also keep in mind that these two wrote most Franki Valli and the Four Seasons hits, but not all of them.

Bob Crewe was thirteen years older than Bob Gaudio, so his music career started first. In 1953, he partnered with another songwriter, Frank Slay, Jr. Four years later, in 1957, they had their first hit with "Silhouettes" by the Rays. I haven't included that, because I chose another version of the song by Herman's Hermits, which was a big hit in 1965. The B-side was another song they wrote together, "Daddy Cool." The Diamonds had a hit with it in 1957, so I included that version here. They also had a big hit in 1957 with "Tallahassee Lassie" for Freddy Cannon in 1959.

Meanwhile, Bob Gaudio was starting his music career. In 1958, at only the age of 15 years old, he wrote the hit "Short Shorts" for the band he was in at the time, the Royal Teens. Not long after that, he came across a band led by Franki Valli, and joined them as a piano player and songwriter. They soon were renamed "Franki Valli and the Four Seasons." From the very start, they were produced by Bob Crewe, which is how Crewe and Gaudio met each other. It probably helped that both of them were from New Jersey.

The very first hit by the Four Seasons in 1962, "Sherry," was written by Gaudio alone. But soon, Crewe and Gaudio were generally writing the hits together. From 1962 to about 1968, they wrote dozens of hits together, just for the Four Seasons. 

Meanwhile, with Gaudio busy a lot of the time as a member of the Four Seasons, Crewe had a whole other career going on as a producer, which often also included more songwriting with others. He even formed his own record label, Dyno Voice Records, and had over 20 hits with artists on that label other than the Four Seasons. One hit was actually in his own name - the "Bob Crewe Generation" - an instrumental called "Music to Watch Girls By," in 1967. However, that's not here because although he produced it and performed it, he didn't write it. In 1968, his group the Bob Crewe Generation wrote and performed all the songs for the soundtrack to the hit movie "Barbarella." I put a cover of the theme song on Volume 2.

So the 1960s were an extremely successful time for both Bobs. Generally speaking, songs Gaudio helped write ended up first being performed by the Four Seasons, though sometimes other groups ultimately had the big hit. For instance, the Four Seasons version of "The Sun Ain't Gonna Shine (Anymore)" didn't even make the Top 100 singles chart in 1965. But the Walker Brothers did a version in 1966 using the same arrangement and hit Number One in the singles chart in Britain with it. Meanwhile, Crewe had his fingers in other pies, and sometimes wrote songs with other songwriters.

However, in the late 1960s, the style of music favored by the Four Seasons fell out of favor, with musical trends changing rapidly and drastically. Gaudio teamed up with another songwriter, Jake Holmes (best known for writing "Dazed and Confused"), and made the 1969 Four Seasons album "The Genuine Imitation Life Gazette." It was their attempt to stay relevant with a quasi-psychedelic album. (Crewe wasn't involved with the songwriting, but he produced the album.) It was too strange to sell well, but it's reputation has grown over time, and it's actually a pretty good, interesting album, in my opinion. John Lennon reportedly considered it one of his favorite albums.

Overall though, the time from 1968 to 1973 was rough for both Crewe and Gaudio. It looked like both of their music careers were petering out. However, both would have great successes starting in 1974. But that will be saved for Volume 2. (The one song here from 1974, "You're Ready Now," is actually a cover of a song they first wrote and released in 1966.)

Here's links to their Wikipedia pages:

Bob Crewe - Wikipedia

Bob Gaudio - Wikipedia

This album is 49 minutes long.

01 Daddy Cool (Diamonds)
02 Short Shorts (Royal Teens)
03 Tallahassee Lassie (Freddy Cannon)
04 Big Girls Don't Cry (Orlons)
05 Navy Blue (Diane Renay)
06 Big Man in Town (Frankie Valli & the Four Seasons)
07 Silhouettes (Herman's Hermits)
08 The Sun Ain't Gonna Shine [Anymore] (Walker Brothers)
09 Dawn [Go Away] (Rockin' Berries)
10 I'm Going Out [The Same Way I Came In] (Kiki Dee)
11 Sock It to Me Baby (Mitch Ryder & the Detroit Wheels)
12 Silence Is Golden (Tremeloes)
13 [You're Gonna] Hurt Yourself (Bystanders)
14 Beggin' (Timebox)
15 Can't Take My Eyes Off You (Nancy Wilson)
16 Mrs. Stately's Garden (Four Seasons)
17 Stone Liberty (Diana Ross)
18 You're Ready Now (Guy Darrell)

https://pixeldrain.com/u/do5dtFze

alternate:

https://bestfile.io/en/6uSrZKGp9dqYhGe/file

There are very, very few photos of Crewe and Gaudio together, and those didn't show their faces well. So I found individual photos and put them together for the cover. The one of Gaudio (with black hair) is from 1966 while the one of Crewe (with reddish hair) is from 1959.

The Incredible String Band - BBC Sessions, Volume 1: 1967-1968

In the poll I conducted in February of new musical acts you'd like to see BBC albums from, the Incredible String Band tied for third place. So here's the start of a series of BBC albums by them. I found enough for seven albums.

Personally, I've never really gotten into the Incredible String Band. I know they were talented, and their style of psychedelic folk was unique and interesting, but their songs generally don't grab me. Still, the voters have spoken, so here you go.

The heart of the band were the singer-songwriters Robin Williamson and Mike Heron, with the two roughly doing about the same number of songs. In fact, for some of the time period of this album, they were the only two members of the band. However, in 1968, their girlfriends at the time, Licorice McKechnie and Rose Simpson, were also made band members. Happily, they were talented singers and musicians.

This band arguably peaked early, around the time period of this album. If you look at the crowd-sourced ratings of their albums on rateyourmusic.com, their 1967 album "The 5000 Spirits or the Layers of the Onion" and their two 1968 albums "The Hangman's Beautiful Daughter" and "Wee Tam and The Big Huge" are their highest rated ones. 

All the performances here are unreleased. The first four songs are from a 1967 appearance on the "Top Gear" radio show, hosted by John Peel. The rest all date from early 1968. Tracks 5 through 7 are from "Once More with Felix," a BBC TV show hosted by Julie Felix. Tracks 8 through 12 are from the "Night Ride" radio show, which was also hosted by Peel. The last two songs are from another appearance on "Once More with Felix."

Unfortunately, one song is repeated, "Painting Box." It's both the first song and the last song. And two of the songs have "[Edit]" in their titles because Peel spoke over the music a little bit. That was pretty unusual for him. I did the usual, using the UVR5 program to wipe the DJ vocals while keeping the music.

This album is 52 minutes long.

01 Painting Box [Edit] (Incredible String Band)
02 Mercy I Cry City (Incredible String Band)
03 Chinese White [Edit] (Incredible String Band)
04 Nightfall (Incredible String Band)
05 Three Is a Green Crown (Incredible String Band)
06 Geordie (Incredible String Band)
07 See All the People (Incredible String Band)
08 You Get Brighter (Incredible String Band)
09 All Too Much for Me (Incredible String Band)
10 Ducks on a Pond (Incredible String Band)
11 I Bid You Goodnight (Incredible String Band)
12 Won't You Come See Me (Incredible String Band)
13 The Half-Remarkable Question (Incredible String Band)
14 Painting Box (Incredible String Band)

https://pixeldrain.com/u/kfLHempX

alternate:

https://bestfile.io/en/UmFrpOKn2L0yyJM/file

The cover image is from around 1967, when the band was only a duo. That's Robin Williamson with blonde hair and a beard and Mike Heron with dark brown hair.

Richard Thompson - BBC Sessions, Volume 1: 1984-1987

Just two weeks ago (as I write this in mid-May 2025), I posted what I thought was Volume 1 for a long series of BBC albums from British singer-songwriter Richard Thompson, a concert from 1985. I was wrong. As I was getting ready to post this album, I stumbled across a song I wanted to include from 1984. That predates the 1985 concert. So this is the new Volume 1. That other album is now Volume 2.

You can get the revised version here with new cover art and mp3 tags and so forth:

https://albumsthatshouldexist.blogspot.com/2025/04/richard-thompson-bbc-sessions-volume-1.html

This album is a collection of studio sessions, plus a live performance that was too short to make its own album. The first song is from the "Old Grey Whistle Test" BBC TV show in 1984. The next three are from a BBC session in 1985. Then the majority of the album, tracks 5 through 13, are a live performance recorded for the BBC radio show "Folk on Two." It took place at the Bloomsbury Theatre in London on May 20, 1987. Finally, the last song is a live performance from the Cambridge Folk Festival in 1987.

Tracks 2, 3, 4, and 14 have been officially released. The first three are from the album "Live at the BBC," and that last one is from the "Life and Music Of" box set. Everything else is unreleased.

I plan on posting many more Richard Thompson BBC albums. However, there are four BBC concerts that I know exist and I can't find. Here they are. If you have any of them, please let me know:

BBC In Concert, The Venue, New Cross, London, 11-10-1983
Celtic Connections Festival, Royal Concert Hall, Glasgow, 1-17-1998
Cambridge Folk Festival, Cherry Hinton Park, Cambridge, 7-28-2001
Cambridge Folk Festival, Cherry Hinton Park, Cambridge, 7-28-2006

Note that if someone finds that first one, I'll have to make that Volume 1 and rename everything after. So hopefully that can happen sooner rather than later, before I post more albums.

Also note that this album contains two versions of "She Twists the Knife Again." That's kind of unfortunate, but at least one was done in the studio while the other one was in concert.

This album is 49 minutes long.

01 Tear-Stained Letter (Richard Thompson)
02 You Don't Say (Richard Thompson)
03 She Twists the Knife Again (Richard Thompson)
04 When the Spell Is Broken (Richard Thompson)
05 Genesis Hall (Richard Thompson)
06 Wall of Death (Richard Thompson)
07 Valerie (Richard Thompson)
08 talk (Richard Thompson)
09 Air for Morris Ogg - Mrs. MacLeod's Reel [Instrumental] (Richard Thompson)
10 She Twists the Knife Again (Richard Thompson)
11 talk (Richard Thompson)
12 Al Bowlly's in Heaven (Richard Thompson)
13 I Want to See the Bright Lights Tonight (Richard Thompson)
14 Drowned Dog Black Night (Richard Thompson)

https://pixeldrain.com/u/XiP7fHGZ

alternate:

https://bestfile.io/en/spi6lxgAF64k1An/file

The cover photo was taken at at Wolfgang's in San Francisco, California on October 7, 1983.

Julie Driscoll, Brian Auger & the Trinity - BBC Sessions, Volume 2: 1968-1969

I had previously posted an album of BBC sessions by Julie Driscoll, Brian Auger and the Trinity. Recently, I found a bunch of BBC performances that I'd previously missed. There were enough for me to split that album into two parts. The existing album has been renamed "Volume 1." This new album is "Volume 2." But both volumes contain a mix of previously posted songs with newly discovered ones. 

If you like this one, you surely will want to download the renamed and revised Volume 1 as well. Here's the link to that:

https://albumsthatshouldexist.blogspot.com/2021/05/julie-driscoll-brian-auger-trinity-bbc.html

Volume 1 is a mix of actual BBC studio sessions and other some TV show appearances. But luckily Volume 2 is all BBC studio sessions, with everything officially unreleased. The vast majority are from the "Top of the Pops" radio show. However, tracks 3 through 6 are from the "Top Gear" show, hosted by John Peel. 

As is typical for Top of the Pops recordings from this time period, the sound quality is excellent. The only snag is the usual problem of BBC DJ Brian Matthew talking over the beginnings and ends of songs. I did my usual thing, using the UVR5 audio editing program to wipe his voice while keeping the underlying music, for all the songs with " [Edit]" in their titles. 

Note that a few songs here (tracks 7, 12, 13, and 14) are without Julie Driscoll and are labeled as such in the credits.

This album is 45 minutes long.

01 After Loving You [Edit] (Julie Driscoll, Brian Auger & the Trinity)
02 I'm Going Back Home [Edit] (Julie Driscoll, Brian Auger & the Trinity)
03 The Road to Cairo (Julie Driscoll, Brian Auger & the Trinity)
04 I'm Not Talkin' (Julie Driscoll, Brian Auger & the Trinity)
05 Old Jim Crow (Julie Driscoll, Brian Auger & the Trinity)
06 I Am a Lonesome Hobo (Julie Driscoll, Brian Auger & the Trinity)
07 Tiger [Edit] (Brian Auger & the Trinity)
08 Light My Fire (Julie Driscoll, Brian Auger & the Trinity)
09 Take Me to the Water [Edit] (Julie Driscoll, Brian Auger & the Trinity)
10 Indian Rope Man (Julie Driscoll, Brian Auger & the Trinity)
11 The Flesh Failures - Let the Sunshine In [Edit] (Julie Driscoll, Brian Auger & the Trinity)
12 I Finally Found You Out [Edit] (Brian Auger & the Trinity)
13 I Just Got Some [Edit] (Brian Auger & the Trinity)
14 I Want to Take You Higher [Edit] (Brian Auger & the Trinity) 

https://pixeldrain.com/u/292xc2vy

alternate:

https://bestfile.io/en/nJzzHx0aK7Phm8w/file

It's hard to find good photos of the entire band, so this time I had to resort to just a photo of lead singer Julie Driscoll. This one is from an appearance on the "Frost on Sunday" TV show in 1968.