You want Vernon's, we got them. You don't want Vernon's, we got them anyway.
"I'm At The Crossroads" - Vernon Garrett
"Hazard County Saturday Night" - Vernon Oxford
"You Know What I Mean" - The Vernons Girls
Two musical pioneers passed away earlier this week. I dare say there are plenty of clips of Jack Ely of the Kingsmen belatedly kicking off the 1960s in the USA with "Louie Louie", so I have gone for the other one. His sidekick wished he could fly right up to the sky, but he's the one whose done it. RIP Keith Harris.
A while back the BBC's Arena show did a programme which featured Vernon Oxford doing an incredible version of "Power In The Blood" at a church on the Shankhill Road, Belfast in 1989. You can watch the 3 minute live clip of the song here:
ReplyDeletehttp://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p00jqjlt
You've got to hand it to Keith - a man who made a living by sticking his hand up a duck's jacksie!
ReplyDeleteJoe Ely may have been the more obvious (and therefore discarded) choice but the first time I heard Louie Louie escape from my crackly transistor was just as much an episodic moment in my musical education as when Alley Oop by the Hollywood Argyles escaped from a Norfolk coast jukebox when I was still a kid.
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