Few people know that rock appeared in the UK even before the Beatles. In the 1960s, the British would teach Americans how to play American music, but in the 1950s they taught themselves. First, Lonnie Donegan showed teenagers with holes in their pockets how to play skiffle, an island version of country music with a discount on the possibilities of bare feet: a clothesline instead of strings on an improvised bass, any hollow container as a drum, a washing board and any improvised harmonic instrument, be it a guitar or a banjo. Kettles and irons were welcome as ovens. And in the capital, “Blue Suede Shoes” were already in full swing, and London was slowly starting to swing.
Tommy Steele
Tom Hicks joined the Merchant Marine at the age of 15 in 1952. That’s where they taught him bad manners: to yell like Hank Williams in delirium tremens, accompanying himself on a six-stringed paddle. Tommy recalled that he picked up his love of rock and roll in Norfolk, Virginia, USA, when he attended a Buddy Holly concert. What kind of nonsense a sailor does not pour into himself. It is quite possible that Hicks confused Buddy Holly with Bo Diddley, Buddy could not have been there, all his concerts were recorded by devoted biographers. After finally leaving the ship, Tom headed to the most notorious area of London, Soho, where he met with future accomplices and accompanists Lionel Bart and Mike Pratt. Calling themselves The Caveman, the trio tried to play “Heartbreak Hotel” there, but impresario Larry Parnes appeared, combining the talents of eel and ghoul, called the whole mess Tommy Steele & His Steelmen. The witty “Rock With The Caveman”, decorated with the brutal saxophone part of the famous Ronnie Scott, became the first British rockabilly song to jump into the charts in November 1956, taking the iconic 13th place. The press hastened to christen Tommy Steele the “British Elvis,” unaware that a succession of British Elvises would soon be born. The second single, “Doomsday Rock”, failed due to the obvious apocalyptic theme. However, the third single carried the A-side of the artistically whistled hit “Singin’ The Blues”, recently sung on the other side of the Atlantic by Marty Robbins.
Steele’s version reached number one on the UK Singles Chart, where it lasted a week in January 1957. Blouses, shoes and toy guitars in the style of Steele went on sale. The epic film “The Story Of Tommy Steele” was immediately concocted, featuring the production of the song “A Handy Of Songs”, a kind of “clip” that would be played two decades later by some of The Stray Cats (see “Stray Cat Strut”).
This movie was even brought to the USSR in 1959, when a private screening took place in the Kremlin. It didn’t go any further than the Kremlin, although Tommy still played three concerts in Moscow, making the Soviet dudes happy. In 1958, Steele recorded the song “Come On, Let’s Go” by Richie Vallance and was hospitalized with a bitten hand and pulled out clumps of hair: in anticipation of Beatlemania, crazy girls trained on little Tommy.
In the following decade, Tommy Steele switched to musicals, playing, in particular, the leprechaun in Coppola’s second film Finian’s Rainbow. In his spare time, he took up sculpture. He gave way to young punks.
Cliff Richard
Harry Webb was born in British India in 1940, wearing a pith helmet, a tiny damn colonizer. The Webb family moved to their native island only after the loss of British empire status and the declaration of independence of India, that is, in the late 1940s. In English school, Harry played skiffle a lot and with a group of like-minded people created the vocal and instrumental ensemble The Drifters. Very soon after receiving the contract, Harry received an offer to take on a stage name. The name was the word “cliff”, synonymous with the word “rock”, and the sonorous Richard was taken as a surname, in honor of Little Richard. The first single was “Schoolboy Crush”, a little-known song by American Bobby Helms, but the real breakthrough was “Move It”, recorded on the second side of the record.
The song was written by The Drifters’ guitarist Ian Samwell, and it was given a special dark magic by the absence of a bass player in the band, which made the rhythm guitar sound lower, dragging the vocals behind it and creating a sense of invisible but growing threat. Even John Lennon defined “Move It” as the first British rock, ignoring Tommy Steele’s achievements. In the late fall of 1958, “Move It” appeared in the USA, this time side A, on the back was a slightly less beautiful “High Class Baby”, but who did they want to surprise in the States? Elvis had an absolute voice for a pop singer, and his musicians would have played the same thing much more elegantly and swingingly. Wait a minute, Yankees, it won’t be a decade… But the American Drifters were outraged, they did not need namesakes.
By this time, Hank Marvin had already joined Cliff Richard‘s band. He brought the name The Shadows, suggested by a colleague and a friend at another club party. The Shadows quickly transformed from an accompanying group into an independent creative unit, without leaving Cliff, however. Before getting bogged down in molasses for housewives (the daughters immediately switched to other performers), Richard managed to record such uncompromising themes as “No Turning Back” and “Don’t Bug Me Baby”. His further work is too mawkish to be considered seriously.
To be continued… Chapter 2. Billy Fury.
