Carlo Little Night of Honour

Review of the Carlo Little Night of Honour, Sunday 26th March 2006, by Roger Cooper from www.Nashville-Teens.com:

more pictures are available at Roger's excellent web site at http://www.rogerandfran.com/GIGREPORTS.htm

EVERYBODY played at Twickenham to raise money for The South Tyneside Hospital Ward 10 - for terminally ill patients, where Carlo Little died last Autumn. Carlo was one of the most influential drummers of the sixties and seventies, playing originally with The Rolling Stones and eventually being a mainstay of Screaming Lord Sutch's band, The Savages. He is credited with teaching Keith Moon of The Who how to drum - and judging by the fantastic line-up on Sunday night - he had a lot of friends. It was without a doubt THE CARLO LITTLE NIGHT OF HONOUR.

The turnout of musicians was fantastic - they came from all over the World and not all of them got a chance to perform. When I arrived I almost immediately ran into Ray Phillips (The Nashville Teens) and was quickly joined by John Hawken (The Strawbs) and Jack Lynton. Jack was in his element -introducing me to loads of his mates, including the legendary Alan Baratt of The Good Old Boys. At last I had a chance to meet Neil Korner ("Kornflake") who had been bass player with The Nashville Teens in the mid sixties. He now has his own band playing in the Croydon area and we promised to trade gig lists. Among acquaintances renewed were Tom Nolan and Don Craine (Downliners Sect) and Mick Avory (The Kinks). Jack also introduced me to the infamous Wee Willie Harris, who later that evening gave a blindingly good performance. Sadly Jack himself didn't get to perform. The Eel Pie Club put on a fascinating static display in one of the bars, old photographs and press cuttings, plus a short but amazing DVD of the late Long John Baldry backed by Cyril Davis's band with vocal backing from The Marvellettes !

The evenings performance opened with Tom Nolan and the Bluescasters, who set the scene for rock and rhythm and blues, sixties style. Tom had been a mastermind behind the arrangement of this gig, and he and his band are the mainstay of The Eel Pie Club, which sponsored the event. They gradually merged with changing players until they become a mixture of heritage players from The Artwoods including Art Wood himself. The gig was not very professionally structured, with poor sound quality and fairly chaotic stage management (or lack of it) - but it was fun. The next performers were Phil May and Dick Taylor of The Pretty Things - now looking comparatively tame, with Dick playing bottleneck blues on an acoustic guitar. It was an interesting act, but wasn't in line with the rest of the rock/R&B feel of the evening.
Wee Willie Harris hit the stage with his band - his diminutive figure still sporting an enormous "quiff" of hair, strutting his stuff in his red drape jacket with his name written large on the back. This was real Rock and Roll, verging on skiffle at times. A classic performance. He was followed by Vince Eager - an amazing vocalist who's band included his own grand-daughter on bass guitar !

Next up was the auction. This was conducted by three gorgeous girls - well, ladies really. They had been Tiller Girls in the early 1960's and came all dressed up in black bodices, black tights, tophats and sequinned jackets - they must have been in their sixties, but they each looked absolutely stunning. Although there were a lot of sixties characters who managed to attend, the event was also well supported from a distance. Auction items had been provided by many who couldn't be there, including Mark Knopfler, Ronnie Wood, Sir Mick Jagger, Jeff Beck and Chris Farlowe. Jagger had donated two VIP tickets to any Rolling Stones concert in their 2006 UK tour - those tickets alone fetched £1000 for the hospital !

After the auction break we were thoroughly entertained by The Good Old Boys, led by Carlo Little's best mate Alan Baratt. Alan and Jackie Lynton go back a long way and hadn't seen each other for ages. I was with them when they met before the gig and it took seconds rather than minutes for them each to assess that they had both become fanatical Delbert McLinton fans, and Alan went on to demonstrate by performing a couple of Delbert numbers during his set.

The penultimate band was a sort of version of The Nashville Teens. John Hawken (keyboards) Ray Phillips (vocals) and Neil Korner (bass guitar) were originals, supported by Tom Nolan, another guitarist and a drummer, neither of whom I knew - but both of whom I have seen hanging about the Eel Pie Club ! Stage management had been pretty pathetic during the gig so far, and by the time The Teens got on stage the whole event was running almost three quarters of an hour behind schedule ! So they only performed a couple of numbers; Route 66 and Tobacco Road. We had planned for Jack Lynton to join them for a final number (Lawdy Miss Clawdy) but he had sadly had to leave earlier because Vanessa, his wife, has only just come out of hospital and he hadn't planned to stay so late.
Running late on a Sunday night isn't a good thing for those of us who have day jobs, so after the Teens set we did a quick goodbye to all our friends in the artists bar and we left for home just as the final band were starting on stage. Not sure who was doing what, but Mick Avory (The Kinks) had the drums and Tom Nolan was ready to play again.

The full list of artists scheduled to appear was: Eddie Armer, Mick Avory, Alan Baratt, Mike Berry, Rick Biddulph, Simon Bishop, Johnny Casanova, Alex Chanter, Alan Clayson, Doc Cox, Don Craine, Julian Dawson, Vince Eager, Graham Fenton, Mark Freeman, Peter French, Keith Grant, Wee Willie Harris, John Hawken, Richard Hudson, John Idan, Chris Hunt, Jackie Lynton, Phil May, Ali McKenzie, Paul Neon, Tom Nolan, Rick Parfitt, Peter Parkes, Nick Simper, Dick Taylor, Top Topham, Mickey Waller, Geraint Watkins, and Art Wood. I'm sure lots of other people were there, and some of them "appeared" on stage; and I know there were one or two apologies (like Ricky Parfitt who is under doctors orders not to strain his voice, and so took absence to be the better part of valour.)

Overall it was an amazing evening, with avid fans rubbing shoulders with stars of the sixties - and everyone enjoying the blast of live music. Its a shame that this sort of wake only happens when someone has died. At the end Alan Baratt got Carlo's famous hat as a present from Iris Little. A very touching present.