This article written by Tony Cooper & David Randall. Many thanks to these people for allowing me to publish this story on the blog. Article is copyright © 2009 Tony Cooper & David Randall.
A Brief History of Chaos & Co
(Launceston’s First Recorded Pop Group)
Members:-
Trevor Jones (Vocals/Guitar)
John Jones (Vocals)
John Pearce (Lead Guitar)
Graeme Pearce (Drums)
David Randall (Bass Guitar/Vocals)
Record Releases:-
Seven Golden Daffodils / It Was You (Columbia DO-4718) 08-66
I’ll Remeber Tonight / (One other unnamed track) Unreleased studio tracks
It all started in early 1964, with the formation of the band ‘The Revels’, which comprised John Pearce (Lead Guitar), Steven Groves (Rhythm Guitar) David Randall (Bass Guitar) and Graeme Pearce (Drums). We were a ‘Shadows’-type band, a style which was hugely popular at the time and we performed mainly ‘Shadows’ and ‘Ventures’ instrumental material. It was Barry Bishop, a 7EX disc jockey at the time, who suggested the ‘Revelles’ would be a more striking name and so we adopted the change of spelling. This band carried on for over 12 months until Steven’s father was transferred to Melbourne (Steven was only 15 at the time).
Steven formed a band in Melbourne called ‘The Kinetics’ with John Vallins (who later co-wrote the Johnny Mathis/Deniece Williams hit “Too Much Too Little Too Late” with Nat Kipner, record producer and father of ‘Steve & The Board’ vocalist Steve Kipner). The group broke up in late 1967, after which the two Steves (Groves & Kipner) became a vocal harmony act ‘Steve & Stevie Duo’ and issued a single on Festival Records in 1968 (“Remains To Be Seen/Merry Go Round”). John Vallins then joined them and they became ‘Rombo’s World’. Subsequently joined by Karl Grossman to become ‘Tin Tin’, who issued 9 singles on Polydor, the most successful of course being their 1971 Steve Groves-penned hit “Toast And Marmalade For Tea”.
On Steven’s leaving, we advertised in the local press for a replacement. The Jones brothers answered the advertisement and thinking of the ‘Shirelles’ and other similarly-named groups thought it was probably a female group and would be fun! We were amazed when we first heard them because, in addition to being competent musicians, they were playing a style and with a sound we had not at that stage experienced. John Jones was a fine lead guitarist, but rarely ever played guitar with ‘Chaos & Co’, as John Pearce occupied that position in the group.
The group’s name came from a UK pop magazine the Jones brothers brought with them from England (there was a UK group with the name ‘Chaos & Co’). Incidentally, the Launceston group ‘Set Five’ also got their name from the same magazine (the UK group was called ‘Set Four’, but there were five members in the Tassie group).
Musically, Chaos & Co were influenced by the ‘Moody Blues’ (Denny Lane era) and were at least 2 years ahead of the local competition, as the Jones brothers also brought with them from England an absolute wealth of previously-unheard-of material, some of which was subsequently released in Australia by other bands with some success.
I am not sure where we first performed, but quite early in the piece, we played regularly at the Cavern Club on Windmill Hill. The lady running the Cavern was Sue Hindes (later Garwood), who went on to form the successful chain of fashion stores in Launceston. Sue also arranged for us to spend a weekend in Melbourne, where we played five or six engagements. The Friday and Saturday night were at the Surf Rider venue at Black Rock and other venues were the Tenth Avenue in Bourke Street, Preston Town Hall and a ballroom in Edith Vale. It was on this particular trip that Jim Cox, former radio and television announcer, now politician, drove us around from venue to venue. It was also on this visit we first worked with the ‘Cherokees’ at the Tenth Avenue. They are not to be confused with the UK ‘Cherokees’ who first released “Seven Golden Daffodils”. The Australian ‘Cherokees’ went on under a slightly different line-up to have a few chart hits, including “Oh Monah” and “Minnie the Moocher”.
It was at the Tenth Avenue on another floor that Tony Worsley was performing, along with a band called ‘The Bay City Union’. Phil Manning was playing guitar with the band and we knew him very well from Devonport and Hobart. As you know, Phil went on to become a legend in that fabulous band ‘Chain’. As I said, we knew him very well from Tasmanian gigs and always regarded him very highly, however, he always suffered in Tasmania by not being in very good bands. Glen Wheatley was rhythm guitarist in ‘Bay City Union’, but somehow that day ended up playing bass for the first time. He of course went on to play bass in the ‘Masters Apprentices’, and to subsequently manage John Farnham. That was not the weekend of The Battle of the Sounds.
We had an association with Bill Lush, who was working as a technician at 7EX and he tried to obtain a record deal for us with W&G Records, however was unsuccessful. A friend of the band was a waitress at the then Matador Restaurant, where some EMI executives were having lunch, and she suggested they should hear us.
The Tasmanian rep for EMI was a Mr Bob Browning, based in Hobart but travelling to Launceston once a week. He was marvellous to us, and certainly looked after our best interests, making sure we took a professional approach to music and projected a professional image. He secured a recording deal for us on the Columbia label. As you know, we then competed in the Tasmanian Final of Hoadleys Battle of the Sounds at Launceston’s Albert Hall and fortunately we won! You may recall that this was the first occasion on which we wore our tartan uniforms. We had a couple of different ones, all based on tartan, the idea being that we could each be different but all in uniform. At this time, we had a very strong relationship with the band ‘Set Five’ (Joe Ratcliffe, Wille Veldhuis, Lawson Ride, Chris Keeling & Robin Jessup) and as most engagements comprised two bands, we chose to book ourselves out as a job lot. We had newspaper advertisements alternate the billing with sometimes their name first and sometimes ours, and also shared equipment. It was an arrangement that worked splendidly for all concerned, and our friendship is strong to this day. When we competed in the National Final of the Battle of the Sounds at Melbourne’s Festival Hall, ‘Set Five’ all flew over to support us.
It was on the abovementioned weekend that “Seven Golden Daffodils” was recorded at Bill Armstrong Studios in South Yarra. We stayed at the Imperial Hotel (I think long since gone). In my memory, all four tracks (“Seven Golden Daffodils”, “It Was You”, “I’ll Remember Tonight” and one other) were recorded in approximately 2 hours! And I recall as final mixing etc., was not completed prior to our departure for Launceston, we left notes as to our wishes. The subsequent release of the record was a huge disappointment to us, as it seemed none of our wishes had been met, nor had anyone really cared about the quality of the finished product. Also, in a very unfortunate (you might say deadly) piece of timing, our record company Columbia/EMI/Parlophone also released on the same day as “Seven Golden Daffodils/It Was You” two other singles, namely The Beatles’ “Penny Lane/Strawberry Fields Forever” and The Twilights’ “Needle In A Haystack”, both of which went to Number 1. With such heavyweight competition as that, it was fairly obvious that Columbia weren’t going to get behind a record by a group from Tasmania! The record charted in Hobart, but received very little airplay in Launceston, due to “problems” with certain people from Radio 7EX. Barry Bishop was the only 7EX announcer ‘big enough’ to ignore what was going on around him and he did play the record when possible. It was very successful in Hobart, as our success was far more demonstrated there. Being from Launceston, and knowing just about everyone, there was no real novelty value in Chaos and Co in Launceston, however in Hobart, we were treated with all the fuss of a mainland band, and on most big shows, eg. The ‘Easybeats’, we would perform one set of approximately 40 minutes immediately prior to the main act.
We played and toured around Tasmania with most of the top bands of the time, and particular favourites of ours were the ‘Twilights’ and the ‘Easybeats’, with whom we got along extremely well. I remember when the ‘Easybeats’ returned from England with their international hit “Friday On My Mind”, that on greeting us at the Albert Hall in Launceston, the first thing they said was we could use all of their equipment (amplifiers and drums), which in those days was virtually unheard of. To hear of the demise of Stevie Wright is just so sad as all of the group were really good to us. The ‘Easybeats’ manager, Mike Vaughn, was very keen to form a partnership with Bob Browning, the plan being that we would go to Sydney, with Bob looking after us and Mike the ‘Easybeats’, but as we were all in employment training, this was never really seriously considered from our point of view. Our appearance in Melbourne at the Battle of the Sounds, did gain us some critical acclaim in the major musical press of the day and I remember two particular articles, one by Maggie MacKeig in “Everybody’s” magazine and the other by 3UZ Dee Jay ‘Stan the Man’ Rofe, both of whom said really nice things about us.
Chaos & Co came to a peaceful conclusion after about two years, and we agreed that our final appearance would be at the Sands in Launceston.
