Rockabilly-Online

Hoorn Rock ‘n’ Roll, a famed rock and roll party in the centre of the city of Hoorn, The Netherlands. I heard a lot of great things about this party, but i never went, though i had planned to go last year. To my disappointment i missed the party, and with that the Teddy Boy singer Yann the CorrupTED! So when I was asked to go, and one of the organizers  who also writes here one this site, asked me too, I didn’t have a choice 😉 So i got a ride and went there.

Poster from the event

I went with some friends, and we first went to the Spunyboys, of course.  The first set was as energetic and powerful as every time i see them! He had a great arsenal of songs, including songs from Gene Vincent and Eddie Cochran. He even played the great Sandy Ford’s song Oh What A Shame. ‘Especially for Rocky’, Remi(the singer) said, Sandy Ford being from the Teddy Boy band The Flying Saucers. Near the end of the first set we went for a stroll to see which band to go next. On the way I came by a lot of friends from all over the country 😀 We just walked from bar to bar and saw Gotta Go, The Rechords (good band!) and the 2-tones, before walking into El Rio Trio. Always good, the quartet from Amsterdam! Bopper had his new pinstriped bass and wasn’t scared to show it off.  And although the bar was small (all bars were), they played the roof from the joint again!

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It was the last weekend of my vacation, and I just had my last dance lesson on Friday. And i thought that there was nothing to do, nowhere to go for a rockabilly party. But i heard through the grapevine that there was a boppin’ party going on in dB’s in Utrecht. So I looked it up. On the website I read that it was called “Boppin’ The Rock”, which is organized once in a few weeks. 3 Bands were playing that night. This time it was The Buckshots from Belgium, The Slapback Johnny’s from The Netherlands and The Whiskey Daredevils from the USA. And I found out some of my friends were going also, so I decided it was best to go too 😉

The flyer

It was pretty much next to the station, but the door was on the other side. When i walked in I didn’t know where to go, I’ve never been here before. So i walked straight to the bar 😛 After waiting 20 minutes or so, the doors opened to see the band. The Buckshots were first up.  They looked like a country/Rockabillyband, with a lovely female vocalist. After one song, my friends cam dripping in, one by one. They’ve been to dB’s before to see JD Mcpherson.

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“How much emotions can you have in one weekend”. Quote from a friend.

It has been 30 years since a well known group of friends called The Bopcats from Amsterdam decided they needed a Rock’n’Roll bar of their own. Since then the Cruise Inn grew out to be one of the greatest Rock’n’Roll bars of The Netherlands. Rockers from all over the world come here to listen to rockabilly, drink, dance, bop and just have a good rockin’ time. Although i’ve been going to the cruise all my life and a lot of people saw me growing up there, its just the last few years that I have been visiting the Cruise on a regular basis. But even in those few years I made a lot of friends, and every night I have a blast! Most of the nights I stay till they kick me out 😉

The Cruise Inn

So when I heard they would celebrate their 30 year existence big time, I said I be there. I even wanted to film it for 2 days! And when I heard the Foggy Mountain Rockers would play, I went mad! They are one of the best modern day Teddy Boy bands. They started in Germany in 1992, my birth year. With a lot of singles, LP’s and cds on their name, they grew out to be a standard on Teddy Boy concerts!

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Hello Rockabillies/bella’s and Teds,

Lou Cifer

Me and my family went of to Riethoven to see Lou Cifer And The Hellions play along with the Jets, CC Jerome and the Downbeat Meastros. We never thought they would be this good!!!

Bill Zebop and Hal Hellion

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The Silverettes, three rockabellas from Nordrhein-Westfalen in Germany (Europe).
We’ve got a mail from Chad Hawkins from the WyattChristmas Trio (check the interview earlier on Rockabilly-online https://www.karto.nl/?p=3727#more-3727) if we were interested in getting to know these girls from Germany. Sure we do; there aren’t that many female Rockabilly bands in the scene, so we were curious.
The Silverettes are Jules, Sassy and Ira.
Since 2005 they manage to get everyone dancing and swinging to their rockabilly music. Just with a lot of sexappeal, a sharp fifties look and their great live performances.
Whether it are fifties hits, eighties hits of recent hits, they know how to make every song sounds like a Rock ’n Roll classic with their polyphonic singing.
Did you think they are the female version of the Baseballs? Then you’re totally wrong!
Time to get to know these girls. Despite their busy tour schedule, they had time to do an interview with us.

Can you tell us how the band was founded; did you knew each other?
Sassy: Ira, Jules and I met in 2005 and started playing with a band. At that time „The Silverettes“ were founded. After a while other regional bands asked us to join them for projects. We did that, but we also played with our regular band.
Jules: We went on like this until summer 2010, but then we split from our band to do our own stuff. Fortunately, at the same time the producers Adriano Batolba and Pomez di Lorenzo came along and discovered us.
Ira: They supported us and helped us along finding the right musicians. We’ve played with the current lineup since the Spring of 2011.

Do you have a regular band when you’re on tour; can you tell us more
about the musicians?
Ira: Thank God we finally got a regular band!
Jules: Yes, it took a while, but now we are really exited! The guys are super cool!
Sassy: Our drummer Bernie is the one we’ve known the longest ,  because he is a good friend of Adriano. Finding the guy who plays the Double bass was a happy coincidence. Chad just moved from Texas to Cologne, when we caught him;)..
Jules: The guitar part wasn’t easy! First we played with Adriano BaTolba, but after a while he was too busy with his Adriano Batolba Orchestra, so we had to find somebody else. Adriano suggested Ralf, who really rocks your socks off.

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Ben Cooper was a member of the famous British neo rockabilly band Restless, back in the eighties. They have sold many thousands of records and have toured the world. When they announced to fold up the band in the autumn of 1998, there came an end to a great period.
But, as with all good things, we couldn’t let them go, so they came back! The original line-up playing their early material and with a new CD. However in 2007 (Ben already left the band for starting a solo career), it looks like it’s definitely all over again.
Luckily, Ben couldn’t say goodbye to the music business. Alongside an excellent musician (drummer, he played with the bands Frenzy and The Sharks, bass player, guitarist, singer), he´s also a songwriter. Since the eighties he wrote many songs for different bands.
With his own band The Ben Cooper Trio, formed in 2006, he continues the rockabilly revival tradition. On stage he plays (neo)rockabilly with influences from (of course) Restless, The Blue Cats, The Space Cadets, Gene Vincent, Sonny Fisher etc.
I’ve seen Restless as well as the Sharks a couple of times live in action (in my younger years), so it’s an honour for me to interview Ben and I’m looking forward to his gig in May in my hometown in the Netherlands. 

How did you start your musical career; are you home raised with rock ‘n’ roll/rockabilly music?
I started my musical career when I used to sit in on drums with my brothers Rock ’n’ Roll band. This was around 1973/74.
I heard a lot of Rock ’n’ Roll hits as a child but also early Soul, Ska/Reggae, and a lot of different 60’s and 70’s music. I discovered rare Rockabilly and Rock‘n’Roll around 1976.
I used to go to the Lyceum in London UK where the Wild Wax show used to play amazing rare records. Also this is when I first saw bands like Crazy Cavan and Flying Saucers for the first time. 

Can you tell us something about the period when you were playing with Restless?
As the original founding member obviously my time with Restless is very important to me.
We did incredible gigs all over the world and had some amazing times. There was a period when we could’ve got in the mainstream charts, but in the end I guess me and the other band members wanted different things, so that’s why I left.

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Not all good things come from the Usa, right? Well, some things do. Like Modern sounds for instance! And how odd does ‘Joel Paterson and the Modern Sounds’ sound?? From any random teenager you’d ask to listen to these so called ‘Modern Sounds’ you’d get a strange answer..Maybe not so strange.. However, how Joel, Beau and Alex came up with that bandname makes enough sense to any blues, roots, jazz loving Rockabilly who really likes to dig in deep, very deep into music history. They pay hommage to real old music and give it that fresh twist! Joel Paterson is one of the finest players in the field today with a tremendous sound and feel for dynamics. Alex Hall and Beau Sample, drummer and bassplayer are the perfect match for a Class-A guitarpicker as they themselves are true graduates in the music styles they bring to the public. And that’s why Rockabilly-Online tried to get hold of Joel. Let that picker speak!

How did your Modern Sounds bandname come about? Because there will be people that’ll argue with your bandname and your music style as it is far from modern (Thankgod)
Yeah, our band name is kind of torture for us to explain to people. We were having a hard time coming up with a good retro sounding name, so we had the idea of starting a band and a record label that was kind of frozen in time, and were oblivious to all music after about 1963. We say we play music from the “Modern era.” Once you know about us and have our CDs it all make sense, but it is tough when people don’t know us.

Since your live playing is so incredibly tight i’d like to know when you met each other and how long you’ve been playing as a trio?
We have been playing for a few years or so, we started playing when Beau Sample moved to Chicago. Beau and our drummer Alex are so versatile, we had no problem coming up with a set. Our sound has developed over a lot of gigs played around town. We are good at coming up with arrangements on the spot, and improvising stuff that sounds rehearsed, but really it is pretty loose.

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hope the internet is strong to contain a fight to the finish! What fight you might ask? PUNK VS. ROCKABILLY! Below we have one punk rocker, one greaser, and the madman behind the musical battle. Let’s piece it all together before it breaks the web in half!!

Frank, tell me which band you play in and what you play in it?

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Paul Ansell, do I need to say more? Paul (from London UK) is very well known in the rockabilly scene, he is highly regarded and he has fans worldwide. Paul formed his band Number nine in 1993 and they have already released 11 CDs.

Paul Ansell

Paul’s musical influences are far and wide and his heroes can be heard within his music. The music is fresh, it has a vibe, and it is well played, well thought out but most important, original and distinctive.
Paul has worked over the years with many of rock and roll legends. At the top of his list has to be the great Scotty Moore, Elvis’ guitarist. Along the way, he has had pleasure of recording and play with masters such as Bob Moore, Reggie Young, David Briggs, Jerry Carrigan, Billy Swan, Mac Curtis, Young Jesse, Robert Gordong, Billy Lee Riley, Sonny Burgess, DJ Fontana etc.
Over the years No9 has been made up of top musicians on the rock and roll scene. Now with a brand new line up, No9 is still a swinging little combo of hand picked musicians that form and make the sound gives Paul Ansell his sound. The band members are John Standen (double bass), Paul Atkinson (drums) and James Compton (guitar).
I was so lucky to see a live performance of Paul last year in Paradiso in Amsterdam and I can tell you this: if you weren’t there you’ve missed a lot! What a gig and what a charisma Paul has.
I’m very glad Paul had some time for an interview.

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What does Christmas do for me? That’s what Rockabilly-online’s Dee-ann asked me… Well..Not a terrible lot. Don’t get me wrong, i DO like Christmas trees..In a forrest or in somebode else’s living room. I live alone so where the tree could be standing i have my special place were i put my wood. I love wood. My maple wood, my laquered wood. My tweed covered wood. I could go on and on about my wood. How it vibrates….

And it does vibrate..The wood in my Gretsch does (although some say my Gretsch is made out of cardboard), especially when my doublebass Brother slaps his wood. He seems to need a large piece of wood (about 6 feet high through a 400 watt piece of wood) to get my wood to vibrate. That’s what i’d like to do on Christmas eve; Play… till the sweat runs down my crack..uhh back!

But… since my band doesn’t have gigs on Christmas eve i’ll just listen to my masters of which i’ll give you some listening tips for Christmas: Quiet and peaceful, swingin’ excellence, and total Christmas fun!

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What makes for a great Rockin’ night in the Netherlands? Just take one of the best rootsy rockin’ bands from Holland and let them open for Texas’ Nick Curran & the Lowlifes!

First up, The Rhythm Chiefs. Went to see them quite a lot since i first found out about them. They’ve opened up for the Paladins, Jeff Beck, just to name a few. In my opinion they are the cream of the crop as far as bluesy rootsrock goes. Three piece band which is starting to have quite a loyal fanbase. Dusty Ciggaar, vocalist and guitarplayer always sounds somewhat shy speaking to the public when he talks.. this all fades when he opens up the volume on his Telecaster. No need for a smoke machine on stage there. The Chiefs always take time to honour their own kings. For instance, bluesgiant Freddie King, in this case. Their selfwritten songs from the album ‘Ships of wonder’ have grown on them since they first started playing them live. The title track itself is just an absolute must-hear, this is dynamic playing in it’s purest form. Wow..every, every time, Wow..! ‘I’ll never get out of this world alive’ is their hommage to Hank Williams, one of the forefathers of Rockabilly. Absolutely love that one. Raphael, Danny and Dusty are all around 20 years old, that’s what makes it even greater if you think about the fact that they play a lot of songs from people who have passed away ages ago. They keep it alive and add something of their own to it, with slight differences every time you go to see ’em live. The Rhythm Chiefs are not monkey’s playing their trick, they dare to step out to new, greater hights!

‘On a regular gig’, Dusty said, ‘we would do a Nick Curran song, but now….Well, he must still be at his hotel anyway, so fuck it!’ And they blast off once again. I would have gone to see them if they were the only act of the night. If you don’t know them, go find out about them or you’re missing out.

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Elvis had to join military service and became a moviestar, buddy holly died, ritchie valens died, eddie cochran died, johnny cash gave his soul to the lord, aswell as to amphetamine pills. Roy Orbison broke down because he lost his family in a fire…

And so, where did it all go? Well numerous places. Back in the rockabilly days parents had worries about their daughters passing out at Elvis gigs. “Shoot him from the waist down”.. A lot of people thought it was the devils music and had to be brought to a halt. But did it? Hell no, popular music just went through a new fase. The Beatles and Rolling Stones were both heavily influenced by the wildmen of the fifties. But how did rockabilly survive? Many people think it didn’t.. But a lot of famous musicians in the sixties and seventies never forgot about it. Led Zeppelin were big Cochran fans and like to let people know where they got it from (as long as they didn’t have to pay royalties…) Creedence Clearwater Revival, also one of the supergroups who liked to play straight up rock ‘n roll. In the early seventies even Stevie Ray Vaughan had sideburns and played Rock ‘n roll. Even punk musicians reported to have been influenced by those who really showed their wildness to the public. Psychobilly?

The eighties? Music was sort of took over by synthesizers and Mtv! Finally, a music channel on tv! Shame that a lot of the ‘musicians’ shown those days on Mtv didn’t even record their hits themselves. For me, those early Mtv days were where i was first introduced to The Stray Cats (aswell as to Stevie Ray Vaughan btw). Stray Cats where wild, rock solid and basic. AND the Usa didn’t want them so they left for England to play in bars to audiences who where appreciative. With a record deal they went to create what some may call ‘Neo Rockabilly’. One could say that punk influences could be heard; Full circle? I don’t know really. What i do know is that Brians Gretsch and Lee’s doublebass sure gave me something to remember!

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How much more basic can a 3 piece rockabilly trio get? Just a doublebass, electric and acoustic rhythm guitar. Felix Potier is the one playing twang guitar (very well spoken there, boys!), Tyron Shaw is mr Bullfiddle and Leo Francis handles shakin’ rhythm guitar and lead vocals. Rechords is what they’ve called themselves and the album is ‘On the wagon’. The album has a total of 15 tracks covering all substyles within a basic Rockabilly format. Now this is first class Australian Rockabilly and i can imagine they’ll even get a dingo to shake it’s paws! But, is it all that basic as one thinks by looking at the album cover? Let’s find out…!

‘Hocus Pocus’ has a boogie woogie piano and some multiple backing vocals. Nicely performed, a classic like this always goes down well with rockabillies and bella’s. On a number of tracks the doublebass reminds me of Wayne Hancock’s bassplayer which is a good thing because i love tight bassplaying to get a good song going!
‘It won’t be long’ is a sad (but good) sounding ballad with a fiddle to give the song some extra weight. Good one! An up and coming western movie could do with ‘Bordertown’
Harmonica is used to get to a little something extra with a pianola kinda’ solo on ‘It’s been a while’

These Aussie boys sure do know their stuff and they’re creative enough! They’ve incorporated different instruments (and players) to spice things up, that’s a good thing for sure. Every track sounds very well balanced, nice and sparkly. However, since i’ve said that they know their stuff i very much wonder how things would sound if they had used a swinging drummer on a couple of songs. But anyway Rechords, very good effort, i sure would enjoy seeing you guys live! And as my bassfiddle brother put it to me very nicely; “If you’d said that these recordings were made in the fifties i’d have believed you!”

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For our special section: What artists say about other artists… I asked Viva van Story to take a look at Miss Missy Photography’s work.

Miss Viva Van Story

Viva: Miss Missy and I have known each other since my beginning only via web but I hope to meet her one day and give her a big hug. She’s always been very supportive to me so I’d love the opportunity to share my thoughts of her. I’m really watching this gal grow as a photographer. She has passion about her work and really cares about getting better. I see her working very hard with her work and style. She’s very much like myself .. It’s her life and her hard work will pay off in her upcoming years. I’m excited to see her work in a couple more years.

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Little Kim and the Alley Apple 3

We have a special item in our magazine: What artist say about other artists.

I’m asking Belgian singer Little Kim, of the Alley Apple 3, to take a quick peek at Dutch singer Sue Moreno’s profile: http://www.myspace.com/suemoreno

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Today we start a new series: What artists say about other artists.
I asked our glamourous Dutch singer Sue Moreno about the also glamourous American Marti Brom.

Sue Moreno - Photo by Marco C. Buschman

Marti Brom - Photo by Ricardo Acevedo

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