Fans of sixties sounds will adore this week's theatre attraction, Dreamboats and Miniskirts.
The team responsible for Dreamboats and Petticoats - acclaimed writing partnership Laurence Marks and Maurice Gran - are back with another slice of pop-cool, wrapped up in a cracking story.
This follow-up takes its audience to 1963. The world is changing - Bobby and Laura's hit single Dreamboats and Petticoats hasn't taken off, and Norman and Sue have settled down to non-marital bliss...oh, and a baby too!
Ray and Donna still seem blissfully happy though.
The advent of the Beatles is inspirational, but will it inspire Bobby and Laura to have one more shot at stardom, Norman to find the singing voice he has longed for, and Ray to realise his ambition and manage a top pop act?
Crammed full of 60s rock n roll hits and with Marks and Gran's collective pen responsible for the script, this is a failsafe, fabulous show, and it arrives at MK Theatre for six-day stay from Monday (Oct 6). Call to book on 0844 871 7652.
How better to celebrate the sounds of the era, than with the Laurence and Maurice, who revisited their musical past to share some of their favourite slices of vinyl with Total MK readers...
Laurence's pick of the pops...
You've Lost That Loving Feeling - The Righteous Brothers: Probably the finest pop record ever made. Certainly the most played. I had read somewhere that you just know a record is going to become an enormous hit within the first fifteen seconds, but with this one I knew from the moment Bill Medley sung "You never close your eyes any more when I kiss your lips". It sent shivers down my spine and still does today. Was there ever a better produced record? I hear something different going on in the background every time I listen to this song, thank you Phil Spector. And have there ever been two better white voices than Bill Medley and Bobby Hatfield? If there has then I haven't heard them.
Yeah Yeah - Georgie Fame and the Blue Flames. Whenever I could afford to I would go and see Georgie Fame and the Blue Flames at Soho's Flamingo Club because I simply fallen in love with the sound of this band from the moment I first heard them. The purple hearts may have helped. But for me they were a club band and unlikely to ever have a hit record, let alone a number one. The sophistication of the sound of Yeah Yeah, the Afro-Cuban beat and rhythms had never before been heard on a 6/8d pop single. I could listen to Yeah Yeah all day long back then and it was this record that made me want to learn to play tenor sax (which I did a quarter of a century later). It was said of England footballer of the day, Martin Peters, that he was ten years ahead of his time, well Yeah Yeah was thirty years ahead of its time, and were it to be released today you couldn't help but sit up and take notice.
The Midnight Hour - Wilson Pickett. Having heard and been knocked sideways by Yeah Yeah, I felt I could not again be satisfied with any record by a group with only a drummer, a bass, lead and rhythm guitars, and so I began listening to what was arriving on my radio from Memphis and Detroit. Pickett's voice was my favourite of all the black soul singers and even though he rarely made the best soul records, this one is everything a down home and dirty soul record should be. He was backed by the best backing quartet in the business; the fabulous MGs, Stax Record's resident band and boy, did that always hit the groove! The backbeat on this record defies anyone to remain in their seat when it starts playing. The Memphis Horns (two saxes and a trumpet) sound like a ten piece big band, and the opening line "I'm gonna wait 'til the midnight hour, that's when my love comes tumblin' down" elicits the same emotions in me today as the opening line of You've Lost That Lovin' Feeling. Unforgettable. One of the greatest dance records to ever come out of the Stax Studios, and believe me there were many.
This Old Heart of Mine - the Isley Brothers. Let's travel up from Memphis to Detroit for my next choice. Tamla Motown. Nowhere was there a production line of hits like Hitsville, a small house in a Detroit side street. With this record it is once again the opening line, "this old heart of mine, been broken thousand times", that so accurately described how I felt about a certain girl that was in and out of my life at the time this Motown classic was released. I saw the Isleys perform this song and when I joined my first group in 1965 I tried to persuade my fellow group members that this had to be in our repertoire but nobody would listen to me. They wanted to play "Glad All Over" because it was easy. There was certainly nothing easy about this Isley Brother single; it contained an orchestra, vibraphone, piano...the whole damn lot in a two minute single. Whenever I hear it today I am transported back to my girlfriend's house and my first serious kiss.
Walk On By - Dionne Warwick. Lyrically perfect, musically haunting, but then what do you expect? It's written by Hal David, probably the finest lyricist of the Sixties, coupled with the sophistication of the arrangement, the instruments used, and Burt Bacharach's wonderfully complex music that did it for me, and again I was suckered in by that damn first line: "If you see me walking down the street, and I start to cry each time we meet, walk on by..." Perhaps even then, in 1964, when I was a kid with an interest in romantic poetry, I could detect that this song was something special. I should also add that Dionne Warwick's voice was quite unlike anything I had ever heard at that time. It's interesting when I reflect on my choices that three of my five were songs about breaking up with a lover; perhaps it was the sadness of songs 1, 4, and 5 that made me realise that even at 15 years young I was a romantic at heart.
[gallery link="file" ids="4937,4936,4935,4934,4933,4932"]
And Maurice's most favoured...
Can't Buy Me love - The Beatles; the Beatles conquered America with America's own sound. They and the other British beat boom groups took the r&b sound of Black America and sold it to white middle class kids. Early on, The Beatles covered lots of other people's songs, but soon they were generating original hit after hit.
I've chosen this because it was the first of their singles to signpost the way from the simple pop of I Want To Hold Your Hand to something more complex and interesting. After all, Can't Buy Me Love was covered by Ella Fitzgerald.
God Only Knows - The Beach Boys; because the Beach Boys were second in my affection only to the Beatles, and because their songs, more than anybody's, fill me with joy. Their harmonies were impeccable, and they quickly moved from surfing songs to more complex and satisfying material.
The Beatles were huge Beach Boys fans too. When they heard the Beach Boys 1966 album Pet Sounds, The Beatles were spurred on to create Sgt Pepper.
The Way You Do The Things You Do - The Temptations: because the Sixties means Motown, or Tamla Motown as the label is still called by we old mods. I could choose any of a hundred Motown classics. I picked this because it is the epitome of smooth soul, because the Temptations were a wonderful vocal group, and because the song was co-written by Smokey Robinson, another Motown great, whom Bob Dylan was said to have called "America's greatest living poet." As it happens that Dylan quote was made up by a Motown PR man - but it's still true as far as I'm concerned.
(You Make Me Feel Like) A Natural Woman - Aretha Franklin; because alongside the Motown sound, I also adored the grittier soul coming up from the South. It's a cliché to call Aretha the Queen of Soul, but cliché is just another word for truth. As with all the other categories, I could have picked any number of Aretha Franklin songs.
Natural Woman has the added bonus that it was written by Gerry Goffin and Carole King, two young white New Yorkers. I could never be Aretha or Otis, but once upon a time when I wanted to be a song writer, I really thought I could become Carole, or at least Gerry.
Nineteenth Nervous Breakdown - The Rolling Stones; again I could have picked the Kinks or The Who or the Spencer Davis Group to represent British mid Sixties rhythm and blues, but I remember that I went out and bought Nineteenth Nervous Breakdown after hearing The Stones play it on TV (I sort of think they were on the Eamon Andrews Saturday night chat show).
At school one was expected to declare for the Beatles or The Stones. The cool kids preferred the Stones. I loved them both, and after The Beatles stopped playing live the Stones led the next British invasion of the USA, so that by the end of the Sixties British bands such as The Stones, Cream and Led Zeppelin dominated the American rock arena scene.
Laurence's pick of the pops...
You've Lost That Loving Feeling - The Righteous Brothers: Probably the finest pop record ever made. Certainly the most played. I had read somewhere that you just know a record is going to become an enormous hit within the first fifteen seconds, but with this one I knew from the moment Bill Medley sung "You never close your eyes any more when I kiss your lips". It sent shivers down my spine and still does today. Was there ever a better produced record? I hear something different going on in the background every time I listen to this song, thank you Phil Spector. And have there ever been two better white voices than Bill Medley and Bobby Hatfield? If there has then I haven't heard them.
Yeah Yeah - Georgie Fame and the Blue Flames. Whenever I could afford to I would go and see Georgie Fame and the Blue Flames at Soho's Flamingo Club because I simply fallen in love with the sound of this band from the moment I first heard them. The purple hearts may have helped. But for me they were a club band and unlikely to ever have a hit record, let alone a number one. The sophistication of the sound of Yeah Yeah, the Afro-Cuban beat and rhythms had never before been heard on a 6/8d pop single. I could listen to Yeah Yeah all day long back then and it was this record that made me want to learn to play tenor sax (which I did a quarter of a century later). It was said of England footballer of the day, Martin Peters, that he was ten years ahead of his time, well Yeah Yeah was thirty years ahead of its time, and were it to be released today you couldn't help but sit up and take notice.
The Midnight Hour - Wilson Pickett. Having heard and been knocked sideways by Yeah Yeah, I felt I could not again be satisfied with any record by a group with only a drummer, a bass, lead and rhythm guitars, and so I began listening to what was arriving on my radio from Memphis and Detroit. Pickett's voice was my favourite of all the black soul singers and even though he rarely made the best soul records, this one is everything a down home and dirty soul record should be. He was backed by the best backing quartet in the business; the fabulous MGs, Stax Record's resident band and boy, did that always hit the groove! The backbeat on this record defies anyone to remain in their seat when it starts playing. The Memphis Horns (two saxes and a trumpet) sound like a ten piece big band, and the opening line "I'm gonna wait 'til the midnight hour, that's when my love comes tumblin' down" elicits the same emotions in me today as the opening line of You've Lost That Lovin' Feeling. Unforgettable. One of the greatest dance records to ever come out of the Stax Studios, and believe me there were many.
This Old Heart of Mine - the Isley Brothers. Let's travel up from Memphis to Detroit for my next choice. Tamla Motown. Nowhere was there a production line of hits like Hitsville, a small house in a Detroit side street. With this record it is once again the opening line, "this old heart of mine, been broken thousand times", that so accurately described how I felt about a certain girl that was in and out of my life at the time this Motown classic was released. I saw the Isleys perform this song and when I joined my first group in 1965 I tried to persuade my fellow group members that this had to be in our repertoire but nobody would listen to me. They wanted to play "Glad All Over" because it was easy. There was certainly nothing easy about this Isley Brother single; it contained an orchestra, vibraphone, piano...the whole damn lot in a two minute single. Whenever I hear it today I am transported back to my girlfriend's house and my first serious kiss.
Walk On By - Dionne Warwick. Lyrically perfect, musically haunting, but then what do you expect? It's written by Hal David, probably the finest lyricist of the Sixties, coupled with the sophistication of the arrangement, the instruments used, and Burt Bacharach's wonderfully complex music that did it for me, and again I was suckered in by that damn first line: "If you see me walking down the street, and I start to cry each time we meet, walk on by..." Perhaps even then, in 1964, when I was a kid with an interest in romantic poetry, I could detect that this song was something special. I should also add that Dionne Warwick's voice was quite unlike anything I had ever heard at that time. It's interesting when I reflect on my choices that three of my five were songs about breaking up with a lover; perhaps it was the sadness of songs 1, 4, and 5 that made me realise that even at 15 years young I was a romantic at heart.
[gallery link="file" ids="4937,4936,4935,4934,4933,4932"]
And Maurice's most favoured...
Can't Buy Me love - The Beatles; the Beatles conquered America with America's own sound. They and the other British beat boom groups took the r&b sound of Black America and sold it to white middle class kids. Early on, The Beatles covered lots of other people's songs, but soon they were generating original hit after hit.
I've chosen this because it was the first of their singles to signpost the way from the simple pop of I Want To Hold Your Hand to something more complex and interesting. After all, Can't Buy Me Love was covered by Ella Fitzgerald.
God Only Knows - The Beach Boys; because the Beach Boys were second in my affection only to the Beatles, and because their songs, more than anybody's, fill me with joy. Their harmonies were impeccable, and they quickly moved from surfing songs to more complex and satisfying material.
The Beatles were huge Beach Boys fans too. When they heard the Beach Boys 1966 album Pet Sounds, The Beatles were spurred on to create Sgt Pepper.
The Way You Do The Things You Do - The Temptations: because the Sixties means Motown, or Tamla Motown as the label is still called by we old mods. I could choose any of a hundred Motown classics. I picked this because it is the epitome of smooth soul, because the Temptations were a wonderful vocal group, and because the song was co-written by Smokey Robinson, another Motown great, whom Bob Dylan was said to have called "America's greatest living poet." As it happens that Dylan quote was made up by a Motown PR man - but it's still true as far as I'm concerned.
(You Make Me Feel Like) A Natural Woman - Aretha Franklin; because alongside the Motown sound, I also adored the grittier soul coming up from the South. It's a cliché to call Aretha the Queen of Soul, but cliché is just another word for truth. As with all the other categories, I could have picked any number of Aretha Franklin songs.
Natural Woman has the added bonus that it was written by Gerry Goffin and Carole King, two young white New Yorkers. I could never be Aretha or Otis, but once upon a time when I wanted to be a song writer, I really thought I could become Carole, or at least Gerry.
Nineteenth Nervous Breakdown - The Rolling Stones; again I could have picked the Kinks or The Who or the Spencer Davis Group to represent British mid Sixties rhythm and blues, but I remember that I went out and bought Nineteenth Nervous Breakdown after hearing The Stones play it on TV (I sort of think they were on the Eamon Andrews Saturday night chat show).
At school one was expected to declare for the Beatles or The Stones. The cool kids preferred the Stones. I loved them both, and after The Beatles stopped playing live the Stones led the next British invasion of the USA, so that by the end of the Sixties British bands such as The Stones, Cream and Led Zeppelin dominated the American rock arena scene.
