Herman's Hermits 50th Anthology

[gee]

Just as we bemoan the total LACK of any action being taken re The Hollies back catalogue so Bear Family release a 66 track 2CD Anthology re the 50th Anniversary of their fellow Manchester sixties pop colleagues Hermans Hermits - with tracks appearing in true stereo for the first time - compiled by a certain Ron Furmanek !


surely such a project devoted to The Hollies,prelude to a proper long overdue sonic overhaul of The Hollies catalogue might be an idea too...??

IF this 2CD set at least can be done for Herman...well surely a new Hollies such set is an idea ?

my copy arrived today - and while Ron has done a pretty thorough job of work on this project I must say that TWO notable track omissions rather surprised me

first up HH final UK hit single 'Lady Barbara' (which reached No.13 in 1970, also No.7 in New Zealand) is absent from the set...which concludes with 'Bet Yer Life I Do' (that made no.22 in 1970, a hit only in the UK)

- so missing out a BIGGER UK chart hit baffles me - while it's even included in the accompanying CD booklet discography


this is somewhat like me say compiling the DEFINITIVE Hollies Anthology....and omitting 'Gasoline Alley Bred' from it...! 

also an annoying (to me) omission is Graham Gouldman's superb song 'It's Nice To Be Out In The Morning' - which was both in the film and on the soundtrack of 'Mrs Brown You've Got A Lovely Daughter'

this GG gem 'namechecks' places and areas of his native Manchester...it's another of his 'observational' songs (as was 'Look Through Any Window' of course)

Gouldman even salutes Sir Matt Busby's famous Manchester United football team of that mid sixties era...and it's three most famous players - (Sir) Bobby Charlton, Georgie Best, and Denis Law (an Englishman, an Irishman, and a Scotsman - which sounds like the beginning of a joke...) - but was certainly NO joke for the opposing teams and the famous legendary trio are immortalised together in statues facing across to Sir Matt's statue at United's ground 'Old Trafford'

Graham Gouldman's verse dedicated to them is:

'United's ground where the Champions score a hundred goals and the Red stands roar...
Bobby Charlton, Best, and Law...
it's a most fantastic day when they play...'

combined with a nifty guitar hook this 'flowing' song is a delightful piece of social comment re Manchester and the sixties times Gouldman knew so well..


Surely this song, which exists in a true stereo version,  was more worthy of inclusion than the weak comedy cover of the old George Formby 1930's era song; 'Leaning On A Lamp Post' which DOES appear on the 2CD set... 

For strangely missing off those two stronger songs yet including a few lesser ones, I can't really call this a DEFINITIVE HH collection...but otherwise it is a pretty strong effort

[gee]

their final UK hit single 'Lady Barbara' which made no.13 in 1970 (one place better than 'Gasoline Alley Bred' managed that year for The Hollies)

not one of their best singles in my opinion , tho' it has interesting tempo changes which are a bit more involved than many standard pop songs

- as HH final UK chart hit single it surely ought to have been included on any such Anthology set...??

written by Errol Brown, lead vocalist of Hot Chocolate and Tony Wilson,G. Bigazzi, and G. Savio

[baz]

True, "Lady Barbara" should have been represented being the final single they made but frankly, I think its bloody awful! Worth remembering too that it was credited to "Peter Noone and Herman's Hermits" and they split up shortly after.

It is a good 2 CD set and gives a good representation of their work though I find a little goes a long way... some of their hits I like but some were downright awful.

[Mevrouw Bee]

Looked up the track listing out of curiosity:
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Best_of_Herman%27s_Hermits:_The_50th_Anniversary_Anthology

I always thought of them as a band for little girls like me...kind of a pre-Monkees Monkees. Peter was younger than the rest and innocent looking, not scary. So my girlfriends and I were fans. Even of the George Formby song! They were even more popular in Canada than the US with six #1s:

Silhouettes
Mrs. Brown
Wonderful World (three in a row there)
Listen People
Dandy
I Can Take Or Leave Your Loving

Sleepy Joe was a apparently their last Top 10 hit here.

Glad they included Sea Cruise on the anthology. That b-side to Just A Little Bit Better is still pretty good to my ears!

[gee]

'Lady Barbara' reaching no.13 in the UK chart of course made it a bigger UK hit than either;

'Gasoline Alley Bred', 'Hey Willy', 'Long Cool Woman', 'The Baby' and 'Curly Billy'(!) - so regardless of whether some deem it to be 'bloody awful' (maybe that's a bit harsh, while I am not that keen on it either  it's not as bad as some hits I've heard) the fact is many UK singles purchasers obviously DID rate it

while the fact that it was credited to 'Peter Noone & Hermits Hermits' - probably due to them knowing Peter was to go solo thereafter (tho' the rest of the group never split up then) - doesn't really matter either (the final single IS included on a few UK HH compilations) as 'Lady Barbara' was released on Mickie Most's RAK Records label for EMI so was readily available for inclusion...

HH managed some 21 UK chart singles over 1964 to 1970 - only one less than The Beatles, Hollies, Dave Clark Five with 22 chart singles each...and of course enjoyed a few years of strong American chart success besides other countries notably Canada as Bee advises above...

we may dismiss them as merely a simplistic pop group but they did some deeper recordings too such as the class distinction of 'The Man With The Cigar', the social comment of 'Gaslight Street', plus covered songs by Ray Davies, Donovan and Bruce Woodley of The Seekers (whose song 'Rattler' was a gem both by HH and by The Seekers) and of course cut some great Graham Gouldman songs - he tailored songs for HH, and gave them a few more than he did to both The Hollies and The Yardbirds, so Gouldman certainly rated the group

I have read that HH enjoying the brief 'Hermania' actually outsold The Beatles in the USA in 1966 (probably when Lennon's 'Bigger than Jesus' remark was going down like a lead balloon...) 

Like the DC5 after their USA heyday ended - when a number of music writers casually just dismiss HH as 'finished' - the actual UK chart details contradict that as they then scored more decent hit singles back home enjoying quite a strong run of Top Twenty UK hits over 1967 to 1970 with;

'There's A Kind of Hush' (no.7), 'I Can Take Or Leave Your Loving' (no.11,) 'Sleepy Joe' (no.12),'Sunshine Girl' (no.8),'Something Is Happening' (no.6), 'My Sentimental Friend' (no.2), 'Years May Come, Years May Go' (no.7)....plus a few lesser chart singles in that period before 'Bet Yer Life I Do' and 'Lady Barbara' scoring a total of some eleven UK chart singles overall between 1967 and 1970 

so even if one might loathe the group the chart facts prove that many other people back then did NOT share that view...



HH were essentially kept as a pop group overall of course, and some singles were stronger than others - their better singles and 'B' sides, album tracks were fine examples of sixties pop music

Fil of 'Wings of Pegasus' here does an interesting observation of Hermans Hermits proving they were playing live in 1966 - he notes how guitarist Derek Leckenby makes an error but then expertly covers it (!) 

Fil also himself here makes a small error in that he does mix up lead guitarist Derek Leckenby and rhythm guitarist Keith Hopwood's names

- note here the lead guitarist who was not a vocalist stands back from their front line as Karl Green on bass guitar and Keith Hopwood on rhythm guitar were the harmony and backing vocalists

[dirtyfaz]

I guess Rick Nelson summed it up best in Garden Party "You see, you can’t please everyone, so you got to please yourself.” Ron did HH's a big service by getting the 50th Anniversary set out. I would suggest that just about all compilation ie best of or greatest hits are missing something so the compiler pleases themselves first while trying the please everyone. They can't win.

[knut]

I have compared it to the EMI 2008 4CD compilation, and the overlap is almost complete. However, the EMI box also covers the PN & HH singles plus some PN solo singles.