THE TREMELOES
Silence is Golden
You had to give The Tremeloes credit for their triumph, however accidental, over a certain coastal U.K. band that would one day leave them and every other homegrown musician in the dust once the obsession with British acts took hold around the world. But in January 1962 it was every man for himself as skiffle and trad jazz preferences were on the verge of giving way to rock and roll; on New Year's day, both Tremeloes and Beatles auditioned for Decca Records producer Mike Smith, who signed Brian Poole's band due mainly to their close proximity in Dagenham, while the Beatles were at the opposite end of the map in Liverpool and thereby less accessible. Smith took a lot of heat throughout the rest of his life simply for being unable to foresee a rather spectacular future.
But the guys who obtained a recording deal five months before the future Fab Four were talented and marketable in their own right. Formed in 1958 by Poole, a rabid fan of Buddy Holly and his Crickets right down to briefly sporting a pair of horn-rimmed glasses and playing a Fender guitar in imitation of his idol, he was joined by tenor saxophonist and later bass player Alan Howard, guitarist Graham Scott and drummer Alan Blakley. They called themselves the Tremilos (or at other times the Tremelos, never using the correct spelling, tremolo) and with high school behind them all by 1961, the band landed a sweet gig as a featured act on BBC radio's Saturday Club. At that point, Dave Munden had taken over the drumkit and Blakley moved to rhythm guitar; also, Scott had left and was replaced by lead guitarist Rick Westwood. The fateful New Years' signing didn't yield any kind of instant success; initial projects placed them in the studio backing radio and TV personality Jimmy Savile on his cover of Ray Stevens' U.S. hit "Ahab, the Arab" and The Vernons Girls (from Liverpool, at odds with the notion that acts from that location were "too far away") on their version of Little Eva's "The Loco-Motion."
The spelling of the name settled on Tremeloes and an April 1962 session of their own, with Smith producing, yielded "Twist Little Sister," written by outside composers, a formula that persisted for two more singles. The fourth effort, "Keep on Dancing," was a Poole-Blakley original performed by the group in the '63 film Just For Fun. Smith, whose usual pattern was to have his acts cover American hits, nixed any further originals. The Beatles scored a deal with Parlophone during this time and in hindsight were surely relieved to be able to work with producer George Martin, who gave them plenty of opportunities to sink or swim with their own material, as opposed to Poole and the gang's burden of having to hop on existing trends by recording across-the-pond knockoffs.
In a weird twist of fate, "Twist and Shout," which had been a hit for The Isley Brothers the previous summer, was recorded by Poole and the Tremeloes in a style much closer to the Beatles, who'd included a version on their debut album, Please Please Me (never intending it to be released as a single, a plan foiled several months later in a foreign land). The Tremeloes' take went top five on the U.K. chart in July '63, placing them in league but not quite on par with Liverpudlians Gerry and the Pacemakers (two number one hits thus far) and the Beatles (one number one with a second coming shortly). Then...success! By Smith's standards, anyway. "Do You Love Me" (a stateside smash for Motown quintet The Contours) reached the top of the U.K. singles chart in October (this in spite of the song's embarrassing quarter-minute opening).
Hit versions of other composers' works took them through another year, highlights being a top ten showing for "Candy Man" (Roy Orbison did it first) and The Crickets' 1959 post-Buddy Holly ballad "Someone, Someone," a number two Brit hit in the summer of '64 that also showed up briefly on the U.S. charts a few months later (on the Monument label, briefly making them a labelmate of Orbison), the only Poole-era single to gain a spot among the early Invaders. Their run of eight U.K. chart entries ended in 1965 with a late-summer cover of The Strangeloves' "I Want Candy." Brian split from the rest and began an ill-fated solo career in 1966; both acts were signed separately to CBS Records (Epic in the U.S.) that summer. Howard also quit, taking what had been a quintet back down to four; Len "Chip" Hawkes took over as lead singer and bassist. Both the reconfigured band and Poole flopped with their first separate efforts. But the group quickly bounced back.
The first hit by the post-Poole Tremeloes was "Here Comes My Baby," penned by a teenaged Cat Stevens (born Yusuf Islam in London, he'd broken through as a singer just a few months prior with his hit "I Love My Dog"). An upbeat, live-party-vibe studio recording that belied its sad lyrics ('...here she comes now...and it comes as no surprise to me, with another guy...'), the song went top ten in England soon after release in February 1967, followed some weeks later in America, where it reached the top 20. Next came "Silence is Golden" ('...but my eyes still see'); penned by Bob Gaudio and Bob Crewe, the sorrowful ballad had first come to life as a 4 Seasons flip side side in '64. Listener reaction was strong; in May, the single made it to number one in the U.K., 44 months after that first fateful chart-topper with Poole. In the U.S., it went top ten on the Cash Box charts while just missing the mark on Billboard, becoming the band's biggest hit on either side of the Atlantic.
The raucus live sound returned with the band's next hit, "Even the Bad Times Are Good," written by Mitch Murray (who'd handed Gerry and the Pacemakers a pair of their biggest hits) and a songwriter he'd just forged a lengthy and successful collaboration with, Peter Callander; it was a top ten U.K. and top 40 U.S. hit. Callander adapted "Suddenly You Love Me" from an Italian song ("Uno Tranquillo" by singer Riccardo Del Turco), another British top ten that was the last Tremeloes tune to have a notable chart run in America in early 1968. Meaning 12 months of U.S. success and that was it. "Helule Helule," a happy singalong-type song based on a Swahili melody by Kenyan Daudi Kabaka, fared well in the group's homeland, as did "My Little Lady" (another Italian tune from the same previous source), Bob Dylan's "I Shall Be Released," Liverpool tunesmith Tony Hazzard's "Hello World" and several more popular U.K. songs between 1969 and '71 including Blakley-Hawkes originals "(Call Me) Number One" and "Me and My Life." Poole, meanwhile, fronted a group called The Seychelles but had little luck.
The band continued recording and touring well into the 1980s. Later, they formed in various combinations as an "oldies" band; all the main group members, including Brian Poole, put in time. Family members were inspired by their famous fathers to become musicians: Brian's daughters Karen and Shelly Poole formed Alisha's Attic and landed nine hit singles on Britain's charts between 1996 and 2001; both have since embarked on lucrative careers as songwriters, supplying material for many of the top recording acts of recent years. Chip Hawkes' son Chesney Hawkes has had a successful solo career ("The One and Only" was a number one U.K. and top ten U.S. hit in 1991). He's also toured with The Tremeloes, taking his dad's place on occasion as lead singer.
