Cream of The Crate: Album Review #123 - The Shadows: The Shadows Greatest Hits

This review was originally posted on the first Toorak Times web site where publications ceased on that site in March 2017. The old site will be permanently closed in 2020 and these reviews are being re-published in order to preserve them on the current Toorak Times/Tagg site.

“The Shadows aren’t hard to defend – the spark and clean modernity of singles such as Apache and FBI defined and inspired a generation of guitarists.“ – (The Guardian – 2009) . . . “Thousands learned to play guitar by imitating the Shadows’ hits.“ – (The Birth of Rock & Roll: Music in the 1950’s Through the 1960’s)

This is album retro-review number 123 in the series of retro-reviews of both vinyl and Cd albums in my collection.

The series is called “Cream of The Crate” and each review represents an album that I believe is of significant musical value, either because of it’s rarity, because it represents the best of a style or styles of music or because there is something unique about the group or the music.

The first fifty reviews were vinyl only, and the second fifty reviews were CD’s only. Links to these reviews can be found at the bottom of this page. From review 101 onward I have mixed vinyl and CD albums and, try and present an Australian album every fifth review!

This vinyl album sits comfortably and proudly in my crate, and I would struggle to explain why it hasn’t been featured earlier.

The group is one of the all time greatest instrumental groups, The Shadows and the album is titled, The Shadows Greatest Hits. It’s a vinyl album and it was released on the Columbia label in 1963, its code is 33SX 1522.

It was pressed and released in Britain and contains fifteen tracks recorded between 1960 and 1962. As it is not a re-release it presents the tracks as originally recorded in mono.

A four piece outfit easily the most recognisable member would be Hank B. Marvin, whose heavy almost horn-rimmed glasses, certainly in the early days of their existence, made him look like a most unlikely candidate for a star.

However, the man could really play and play consistently with a brilliant edge to his skill.

The group was formed from members of various skiffle bands and the resultant line-up that was formed in 1958 was called the Drifters, but to stop confusion with the American singing group by the same name, they took up the name – The Shadows.

It consisted of Hank Marvin on guitar, Jet Harris on bass, who was replaced shortly after by Tony Meahan, Bruce Bennett on drums and Bruce Welsh on guitar.

The group started recording and performing with Cliff Richard and released two singles in their own right in 1959 (“Feelin’ Fine”/”Don’t Be A Fool With Love”) and (“Jet Black”/”Driftin‘”).

The first two tracks were vocals and the second pair instrumental. Neither charted.

A further vocal, “Saturday Dance”/”Lonesome Fella“, also failed. According to Norrie Paramor, their first producer, The Shadows’ first studio album was dogged by clashes within the band.

Harris and Meehan eventually recorded under their own names for Decca Records after first Meehan and then Harris left following clashes.

Meehan was replaced by ex-Krew Kats drummer Brian Bennett, Harris by bassist Brian Locking and he was later replaced by John Rostill.

It was the line up with Rostill that is generally considered the best and longest surviving lineup.

The groups work with Cliff Richard is widely known and was one of the most successful combinations of its time. Even with the British Beat scene exploding into the market around 1963, The Shadows remained popular and hard working.

Over the years many fine musicians have played with them including Australian John Farrar, one time guitarist with the well known Australian group – the Strangers, who loosely based themselves on the Shadows.

Over the years the group membership has been –

Hank Marvin
Bruce Welch
Brian Bennett
[The core members]

and
Jet Harris
Tony Meehan
Brian Locking
John Rostill
Alan Hawkshaw
John Farrar
Ken Pavey
Norman Mitham
Ian Samwell
Terry Smart

So by the time this album was produced (1963), The Shadows had already had many hits and tracks that were favourites of fans.

It has some of the Shadows absolute classic tracks on it, and others are very noteworthy.

Choosing four tracks is both easy, as there are so many good tracks, but also hard, because it was difficult to choose from so many good tracks.

Track Listing:

SIDE 1
1. Apache
2. Man Of Mystery
3. The Stranger
4. F.B.I
5. Midnight
6. The Frightened City (From Film “The Frightened City”)
7. Kon-Tiki

SIDE 2
1. 36-24-36
2. The Savage (From The A.B.P.C. Film “The Young Ones”)
3. Peace Pipe
4. Wonderful Land
5. Stars Fell On Stockton
6. Guitar Tango
7. The Boys
8. Dance On!

Caveat~ This album has been in my collection for a very long time, and has had many plays and as a result the surface is not in good condition. I could have simply downloaded recent re-digitised tracks which would have had no surface noise, but, they would not be the same as the original mono recordings.

I have reprocessed my album to remove the “snap, crackle and pop’s”, but some scratches were too deep. So accept them as battle scars on a well loved album!

It would be a major mistake to move past track 1 on side 1. Apache was the biggest number 1 ever for the Shadows.

Yet amazingly it was the hit they probably may never have had but for someone outside the group.

The year was 1960 and while on tour with singer-writer Jerry Lordan, the Shadows asked him if he could write a number for them. Now it is often cited that he wrote this track especially for them, but in fact he had it up his sleeve so to speak.
The fact is he had English guitarist Bert Weedon record it, but he really disliked the interpretation Weedon put on it, so he “gave” it to the Shadows.

Ironically Cliff Richard sat in on the recording session and played bongo’s, and when the track was released it shot to number 1 in a staggering seven countries, including Britain and Australia, and charted well in many other countries.

The irony comes in because in Britain Apache knocked Cliff’s “Please Don’t Tease” off its number 1 position.

The group at this stage consisted of Marvin, Welch, Harris and Meehan and as a result of the tracks success, including being awarded a Gold record in August 1961, they then played their first major concert as the featured act, without Cliff.

There is something that audiences found fascinating about the track. Certainly the composition was a primary reason for its success, but it was also the interpretation by the Shadows, in fact an interpretation that went a long way to establishing what was called the “Shadows Sound“.

From the initial tom-tom beat, the strum of the Am & D chords and Hank Marvins clean lead sound, the track then takes us on a journey through the magic of the instrumental.

It’s an utter classic piece of clean, un-fancy, brilliant playing.

Now Hank was and still is well known for using Fender Stratocaster’s, and in those early days he used a Strat – Fiesta red, rosewood fingerboard with chrome hardware and, in those early days, he used Vox amps.

Yet interestingly, for this track he actually used Cliff Richards’ Gibson J200 and a Meazzi Echomatic tape.

Almost every young guitarist who wanted to graduate from playing Peter Gunn, then moved to Apache.

Apache

Track four on side 1 is F.B.I.

For many years this was one of the groups most requested live performance tracks. Recorded and released in 1961, once again it features that distinctive “twangy” sound of the Shadows with Hank using his Fender Strat on this track.

There is some uncertainty even today as to who wrote it. According to this album the composer was their manager – Peter Gormley.

I have found a few references to the fact that it was a Marvin/Welch/Harris composition, as indeed the other side of the single of F.B.I – that track being Midnight, is credited as Marvin/Welch.

There is a reference in Wikipedia to the fact that it is credited to Gormley who then re-directed all the money back to the three players from the Shadows.

We need to remember that very few groups wrote their own music either in the years leading up to the early 1960’s, or indeed at this time. The Shadows were among the first.

The track once again is pure delight to listen to with the rhythm, bass and drums setting an oh so smooth backing for Marvin to play some most excellent lead lines.

It is pure unadulterated early 1960’s music and while the radio stations in Australia were predominantly devoting themselves to the USA “emasculated” pop of this era, the Shadows were foretelling a change of direction of music development, one that would come out of Britain within 18 months of this track was released.

There is no doubt about it, the Shadows were not just entertaining, they were more with tracks like F.B.I were setting up music in the future.

In his book “Words and Music” (2003), author Paul Morley says of this track and Hank Marvin’s playing in particular, in part, ” (Hank Marvin)….whose middle eight in particular predicates the work of Status Quo“.

As someone else once told me, sadly I cannot recall who, it is a piece of music that maybe should not have worked.

The backing melody is in a minor chord (A minor actually), but Hank plays the lead line over it in a major scale – E A D G B E. It works and works brilliantly!

F.B.I

Turning the album over it stopped at track number 4 – Wonderful Land.

Now the piece was produced by Norrie Paramour a well known British record producer, composer, arranger and orchestral conductor.

He is actually best known for his work with Cliff Richard and the Shadows, having steered their early career into success. Taking the clean and bright sounds of the Shadows, he added strings and horns to the piece, written by well known composer Jerry Lordan, who was also the composer of Apache).

The track was released early in 1961, but for reasons I was unable to track down, was actually recorded almost 12 months earlier and why there was a 12 month break is uncertain. It was another hit for the group and stayed in the number one position for 8 weeks.

It was the first track by the Shadows that features other artists in a backing role, and Bruce Welch said in paying homage to both Paramour’s production skills and Lordan’s arrangement skills, “Norrie Paramour was a great help to us, a father-figure if you like, an older man but a trained musician.

Jerry Lordan had given us ‘Wonderful Land’ and we recorded it knowing there was something missing. What we’d done wasn’t enough.

We had it in the can for 9 months and while we were on tour, Norrie added French horns, strings and a little vocal bit. Then it was a classic record and we were so excited about it. It was the first time that a rock group had used an orchestra….“

Wonderful Land

The final track could easily have been track 2 – The Savage, or track 6 – Guitar Tango, but I have gone for track 8, the final track – Dance On.

This was the first Shadows track my first band – The Sound ever played back in 1963/64.

We learned a number of instrumentals because we often opened the nights up at the bigger dances, while we were cutting our teeth, and the instructions were, you only get to play instrumentals as the crowds come in.

In fact so infectious was the track, Dance On soon became a vocal based track in the UK thanks to an up and coming British female vocalist – Kathy Kirby.

The track was actually released as a vocal track earlier by the US group – The Avons. it was sent to Bruce Welch who thought it would make a great instrumental, and it was recorded by the Shadows in 1962 and released January 1963.

In September 1963 Kathy Kirby released to it and it reached number 11 in Britain. If there was ever a foot-tapping track released by the Shadows (well maybe other than their track Foot Tapper), this was it!

A nice uptempo track, easy going, inviting the listener to “dance on”, the track was another number 1 for the group. From the opening bent note and the heavy beat of the drums the track is all class!

Dance On

It is utterly impossible to consider the guitar based music of the 1960’s without putting The Shadows toward the top.

Their music was classy, tight and thoroughly entertaining. Driven by the masterful playing of Hank B. Marvin, changes in styles and likes over the past six decades has seen them fall in and out of favour – but they always return to rise to the top.

In the last edition of Guinness’ British Hit Singles & Albums book, the Shadows are referred to as “Britain’s most influential and imitated act before The Beatles.

It’s impossible to know how many hopeful teenager guitarists paraded before their bedroom mirror trying to copy Marvin’s lines and do the Shadows Walk – a routine incidentally borrowed from American R&B act the Treniers.

This influence also went as far as affecting the Beatles, who used to play Apache and other Shadows instrumentals during their early Hamburg club dates, a debt they acknowledged in the title of the instrumental “Cry for a Shadow.“

Like Buddy Holly, Hank Marvin made glasses cool. As for Hank, well he was actually born Brian Rankin – somehow it just would never have been the same if he hadn’t become Hank B. Marvin.

The group in its final form played and toured throughout this decade, finally calling it quits in 2010.

Oh, did you know that except for one small instance, the group never used the name Shadows on the kick drum skin – which certainly was the done thing particularly in the earlier years.

It was either blank or had the name of the drummer.

That one exception? The logo was used once on the front artwork of the 1975 original studio album, Specs Appeal.

As of 2009, the logo still remains non trademarked and un-copyrighted.