Wham ! ! Jack Good / ABC TV 1960

[ashleywood]

To compliment the new thread on Boy Meets Girls, here's some info on Jack Good's 3rd and final ABC-TV series.

Wham ! ! A Fistful Of Songs - ABC Television 1960.

April 3rd or 8th and 9th 1960, trial recordings for closed circuit broadcast. These are used as tests for some of the artists and effectively as unbroadcast pilots. Rehearsals for these dummy recordings began on March 21st.
Shows took place at ABC Television Studios in Manchester.

Appearing in every episode - Billy Fury, Joe Brown, Jess Conrad, Little Tony, The Vernons Girls, The Fat Noise (aka Jack Good's Fat Noise).
Compere - Keith Fordyce
Artists played only one song each per show, possibly for the series duration (April 23rd 1960 to June 18th 1960, nine programmes). Shows were broadcast at 18.00 and were just under 30 minutes.

april 23 Johnny Carson, The Four Jays, Dickie Pride

april 30 Richard Allan, Cuddly Dudley, Johnny Kidd and The Pirates, Vince Taylor, Peter Wynne. - for this edition (or possibly his later appearance on June 4th), Kidd wore an eye patch following Jack Good's suggestion. Kidd also took part in one of the dummy trial runs - the eye patch suggestion may have happened then.

may 7 The Flee-Rekkers, Gill Gordon, Dickie Pride, Danny Rivers, Jimmy Saville (not listed in TV Times).

may 14 Michael Cox, Davy Jones, Richard Allen, Sonny Stewart and The Dynamos, The Four Jays.
(NME reported Connie Stevens was due to record for this episode on May 6 - not clear if this happened in the end)

may 21 Michael Cox, Bobby Deacon and The Cruisers, The Four Jays, Davy Jones, Keith Kelly, Red Price, Roy Young

may 28 Tommy Bruce, The Four Jays, Red Price, Dickie Pride, Danny Rivers, Vince Taylor.

june 4 Michael Cox, Alan Fielding, Johnny Kidd and The Pirates, The Four Jays, Red Price, Dave Sampson and The Hunters. (Kidd and The Pirates played Shakin’ All Over)

june 11 Peter Elliott, Cuddly Dudley, The Four Jays, Don Neilson, Red Price, Danny Rivers, Peter Wynne.

june 18 Michael Cox, Karl Denver Trio, The Four Jays, Red Price, Danny Rivers.

No video or even audio is known to survive. The Sound Of Fury LP by Billy Fury features a front cover photograph believed to have been shot on the set of Wham ! ! Fury purchased a gold lame suit specifically for the show. He recorded The Sound Of Fury album just over a week before the series started. It was produced by Jack Good and Joe Brown played guitar and contributed greatly to the session at Decca Studio, London.

[Simon B Kelly]

Within weeks of Boy Meets Girls finishing, Jack Good was making preparations for his final rock'n'roll show for ABC Television, entitled Wham!!

And yes, the correct title is Wham!! with two exclamation marks (I've submitted a correction to the title on IMDb - hopefully it will be updated there soon). Wham!! didn't make it into Ray's Top 100 Lost TV Shows, unlike Oh Boy! and Boy Meets Girls although maybe by discussing it here it will make it into his next list.

It is mentioned in issues 233-241 of TV Times with articles on the show appearing during the first and last week of transmission.

Here is Jack Good's article from TV Times, April 15, 1960:

THE NEW BEAT SHOW

by Jack Good producer of ABC's new Saturday show Wham!! which will feature Joe Brown, Billy Fury, the Vernons Girls and the new band - the Fat Noise. Other programmes in the series will include Little Tony, Dickie Pride, Jess Conrad, Peter Elliott and Michael Cox

A NEW programme tailor-made for a new style in beat music — that’s Wham!! With Six Five Special we heralded in the first onslaught of the blue-jeans and guitar craze. Oh Boy! outdated the old Six-Five and set the hit Parade rocking to the new noise of the rough-riding saxophones that put the hoots into "Hoots Mon."
Boy Meets Girls caused a stir when it glided in with the violins, but pretty soon the new sound was recognised as The New Sound, with Adam Faith and many others showing up in the Top Ten backed by strings-with-a-beat. The violin now shares a place with the guitar and the saxophone as part of the accepted equipment belonging to rock'n'roll.
Now it's Wham!! — a bold, brassy title for a new, bold, brassy sound ... with pictures to match. It is fair to say that rock'n'roll is still the liveliest influence in show business, because life means change and development, and rock is still changing and developing at a fantastic rate.
Our new noise is a fat noise — the band the Fat Noise. Its line-up includes trumpets, trombones, a tuba and a French horn. The whole thing is a 20-piece, rock'n'roll brass band — the biggest resident rock'n'roll band ever to be formed.
But if the sound is brassy, the music is getting more and more melodic.
Tunes - happy tunes at that — are taking over from the sullen, sexy stuff we used to hear, when the twang and the off-beat were all-important.
It is not surprising then that nowadays old tunes like Way Down Yonder in New Orleans and Slow Boat to China are cropping up in new guises.
Wham!! will not only have a new sound. It will have new faces — faces we believe will shortly be some of the best-known in show business. For, contrary to the once generally accepted theory that teenage idols are strictly for teenagers, the stars who are born with silver discs in their mouths are among the biggest attractions in the country for all age groups.
Tommy Steele used to be thought the exception to the rule that rock'n'rollers were nine-day wonders.
Elvis Presley, Cliff Richard and Marty Wilde have since then broken the "sound" barrier as well. Rock'n'roll shows have replaced variety as the training ground of the stars. This may or may not be regrettable, but it is a fact. So programmes like Wham!! have a tremendous responsibility. A responsibility to find and shape new talent.
We shall be taking this task very seriously, and no edition will go by without presenting at least one new face. The problem of finding talent in the beat field is not as difficult as it was.
The standard of performance is noticeably higher these days because competition is greater, and I think you're going to be pleasantly surprised by some of the newcomers you’ll see.
Some of the newcomers we featured in Boy Meets Girls the public have already taken firmly to their hearts, and these will be appearing regularly on Wham!!
Joe Brown, the blond, teddy-bear, Cockney guitarist, for one. Billy Fury, the latest teenage rage, for another. Stalwarts from Oh Boy! tenor sax star Red Price and the Vernons Girls are happily still with us.
Others who will be appearing during our series are Little Tony, Dickie Pride. Jess Conrad, Peter Elliott, Michael Cox and many, many more ... never fewer than eight individual artists in each show. Guest vocal and instrumental groups will also be featured.
New faces ... new sound ... and a new look, too. I can’t tell you very much about that aspect of the show. It’s not something you can really explain. You’ll just have to see it.
It’s enough to say that it’s a big show visually, with a distinctive perspective.
I hope at any rate that, however it strikes you, it strikes you forcibly.
In fact, Wham!!

Contributors to the show, as mentioned in the TV Times listings, are as follows:

Musical direction by Syd Dale
Dance direction by Leslie Cooper
Script by Trevor Peacock
Directed by Ben Churchill
Produced by Jack Good

[ashleywood]

Thanks for that Simon....Wham ! ! was no.97 in the missing 100.
I have to say that the April 30th episode would be my pick of the bunch - live performances by Billy Fury, Vince Taylor and Johnny Kidd and The Pirates.

[Simon B Kelly]

May 15, 2018 7:27:15 GMT ashleywood said:

Wham ! ! was no.97 in the missing 100

Yes, Wham!! is listed in William's A-Z of completely missing Top 100 Pop Shows, but not in Kaleidoscope's Most Wanted Top 100 Lost TV Shows compiled by Ray Langstone.

Here's another article from TV Times, June 10, 1960, where Joe Brown talks about the boots that Johnny Cash sent him (see the Boy Meets Girls thread for more info):

Two jokers in the Wham!! pack

Take a rock'n'roll guitarist with a haircut like a woolly mop and a singer with the sultry looks and vibrant personality of an Elvis Presley, and what have you got?
Not only Joe Brown and Billy Fury, stars of ABC’s big-beat show Wham!!, but also two accomplished practical jokers.
Seeing the two off-stage, no one would ever guess they could have so much in common. While Joe is always clowning, Billy seems shy and retiring.
But when they get together, the fun flows. For Billy and Joe have a friendly feud that started when they were on a variety tour after meeting for the first time in Boy Meets Girls, the show that preceded Wham!!
Neither will confess to playing the first joke, but since then the contest has developed so that the whole cast of Wham!! is wondering what they will get up to next.
Joe claims that Billy started the ball rolling when he sawed through the legs of Joe’s bed so that it collapsed when he climbed in.
But Billy says: "The first move came from Joe. He filled my bed with shaving cream one night."
Whoever started it, the pranks the two play on each other have become more frequent and involved.
"I’ve reached the stage now where I always have to look at the top of the door when I enter a room." says Billy, "because the chances are that Joe has planted a bucket of water, or a bag of soot and flour, there for me."
If anything, Joe has a slight edge on Billy in the contest. But then, he has had a lot more practice.
Before his swinging guitar and his cheeky Cockney grin made him a TV favourite a few months ago, he had dozens of jobs — from selling winkles off a barrow in London to being an engine-cleaner with British Railways.
"I’m afraid some of my bosses didn't seem to appreciate my type of jokes," he says.
Billy, on the other hand, had a regular job on a Mersey tug in his native Liverpool before his success with his exciting singing of numbers like Maybe Tomorrow and Collette, both of which wrote himself.
But Billy has caught Joe napping several times. "He is getting a little too good for my liking." says Joe. "I think he’s got his eye on my boots. I always have a good look in them before each show. Knowing Billy, I wouldn't be surprised to find frogs and kippers in them."
The boots are Joe’s pride and joy. They are cowboy boots, of black, cerise, red, green and yellow leather, sent to Joe by American singer Johnny Cash when he returned to America after appearing in Boy Meets Girls. Billy, on the other hand, has to watch his clothes. "I have a suit of gold lamé which I bought especially for the show," he says. "Joe has seen the suit, and I’m pretty certain he has something in mind for it."
But the two remain good friends, and Billy has a London flat in the block where Joe lives with his parents.
W. O. Court

[williammcgregor]

[williammcgregor]

It says this album was recorded on 14 April 1960, is it possible that Billy and The Four Jays sang some of these
on Wham!! which began 23 April 1960


Billy Fury With The Four Jays ‎– The Sound Of Fury LP (1960)
allmusic-wingsofdream.blogspot.com/2019/11/billy-fury-with-four-jays-sound-of-fury.html


14/11/2019 · The album was recorded in Decca Studio 3, West Hampstead, London, on 14 April 1960. It featured Joe Brown on guitar, Reg Guest on piano, and bassists Bill Stark or Alan Weighell. Andy White, later to notably appear on The Beatles' first single "Love Me Do", is the drummer on the album. Providing backing vocals were the Four Jays.

The Four Jays (Four crazy boys with a beat)

[ashleywood]

Dec 9, 2019 7:20:09 GMT williammcgregor said:

It says this album was recorded on 14 April 1960, is it possible that Billy and The Four Jays sang some of these
on Wham!! which began 23 April 1960


Billy Fury With The Four Jays ‎– The Sound Of Fury LP (1960)
allmusic-wingsofdream.blogspot.com/2019/11/billy-fury-with-four-jays-sound-of-fury.html


14/11/2019 · The album was recorded in Decca Studio 3, West Hampstead, London, on 14 April 1960. It featured Joe Brown on guitar, Reg Guest on piano, and bassists Bill Stark or Alan Weighell. Andy White, later to notably appear on The Beatles' first single "Love Me Do", is the drummer on the album. Providing backing vocals were the Four Jays.

The Four Jays (Four crazy boys with a beat)

Certainly possible and indeed, given the involvement of the Four Jays and Joe Brown, probable. A running order exists for one show, May 7th but Billy sings Young and Beautiful rather than a Sound Of Fury number.
I have read elsewhere that for Wham, each act performed one song only and this was certainly the case on May 7th. The only other song info I'm sure of is that Johnny Kidd and The Pirates played Shakin' All Over on the June 4th edition.
I've still yet to find any further hard info on songs performed and no audio of any kind has turned up to my knowledge. Still looking though !