Graham Reid | | 2 min read
Imagination, by Clayton Squares
Many years ago an interesting but hardly essential compilation What About Us? pulled together material by Liverpool bands (the Chants, Koobas, Johnny Sandon etc) and also-rans like Tommy Quickly in the years of Beatle-led Merseybeat.
It was a bit of fun but few of the songs leaped to attention as lost classics from the era.
A more recent collection compiled Bob Stanley of St Etienne picks up where What About Us? left off, the artists from Liverpool who remained in the city after the Beatles and others set themselves up in London and the wave of aspiring managers and record company people felt that particular Merseybeat mine had been tapped out.
What is apparent from the collection – subtitled The City After Merseybeat 1964-1969 – is that there were some inventive artists who were were racing to keep up with the changes, new sounds and directions pop was going.
So here is Stones-like fuzz guitar on the Kirkby's garageland raver It's A Crime and something approaching dramatic R'n'B prog from the Koobas on Constantly Changing.
It's A Crime, by The Kirkbys
There is Donovan-influenced psychedelic folk on Michelangelo by The 23rd Turnoff which was the Kirkby band under another name, again cruelly overlooked.
Michaelangelo, by The 23rd Turnoff
So small echoes of the Zombies, Spencer Davis soul (Imagination by Clayton Squares, Come on Back by Paul and Ritchie) and an early hint of dream pop by Focal Point with Girl on the Corner.
There are certainly ambitious bands here, notably Wimple Witch with Atmospheres which is fuzzbox and soul with shimmering avant-psychedelia.
Atmospheres, by Wimple Witch
Among the better known names are the Swinging Blue Jeans (who'd had hits with Hippy Hippy Shake, Good Golly Miss Molly) who go the soft-pop route on Summer Comes Sunday, Billy J Kramer and the Dakotas getting a bit pop-soul of the serviceable We're Doing Fine . . . and Cilla Black with the peculiar Abyssinian Secret (what is behind that locked door?).
Abyssinian Secrets, by Cilla Black
But none of these bands or artists had much relevant longevity (aside from Cilla), for the familiar reason that few – other then the Kirkbys/23rd Turnoff – had in-house writers.
And the focus had shifted from Liverpool to London, then back to America with Bob Dylan, the Byrds and the psychedelic sounds coming out of the West Coast.
It would be a decade – during which the Beatles' star fell in the public imagination – before Liverpool would re-emerge as a contender with bands like Teardrop Explodes, Echo and the Bunnymen, Wah! Heat and others.
But Liverpool Sunset offers a postcard from home.
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This exact album isn't out there digitally at the time of writing but on Spotify someone has posted a version which is worth finding. See here.
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