I have a clear memory of listening to this in a booth on the first floor of the electrical shop in Beckenham with friends after school. I can’t quite remember the name of the shop – it was something like Robertson’s but not quite. We got the assistant to play several records then I chose this one. It was 6s 8d. It was released in May 1963 and I was 15 the following month.
It was written by Jerry Lordan who also wrote the Shadows’ Apache and Wonderful Land. It got to No 2 in Britain. I doubt if it was released in America.
The group’s line-up by then was Hank Marvin (lead guitar), Bruce Welch (rhythm guitar), Brian ‘Licorice’ Locking (bass guitar) and Brian Bennett (drums).
Here they perform it in 2016.
Superb. I just about remember those record-listening booths in electrical shops.
Hank Marvin is from a lost era when even the pop stars were decent and gentlemanly. A few years ago he was a guest on one of Jonathan Ross’s chat shows. Ross asked Hank various smutty questions, trying to make him look square, much to the amusement of the audience. Hank was having none of it and wouldn’t play along.