Listen: Are You Ready To Rock / Wizzard
Are You Ready To Rock / Wizzard

My guess is when you can play every instrument under the sun, most get boring. Combine that with the option your competitors don’t have: the ability to pull a real musical curveball out of your hat, and you’ve unexpectedly just described Roy Wood.

Not totally mind you. Don’t forget that Roy Wood could write hooks and choruses seemingly in his sleep, and decorate the whole thing with an over the top visual to match the over the top audio.

So was the case with his band Wizzard. Not content with having masterminded The Move in ’66, then The Electric Light Orchestra in ’70, Roy Wood outglammed glam via Wizzard in ’72.

Yes, the rainbow haired frontman whipped up a rockabilly meets Beach Boys/Neil Sedaka pop stomp recipe with every Wizzard single. I couldn’t for the life of me understand why the US hadn’t come to their senses and jumped on this train back in ’73 and ’74, when ‘Are You Ready To Rock’ continued a by then, British chart Top Ten onslaught, this one peaking at #8. Really tried convincing every last person in earshot pay attention to this UK national treasure but to no avail.

In hindsight, I understand. The American consumer’s musical tastes were sterilized by lazy, laid back radio programmers, all leaning to southern boogie noodle doodle or California soft rock to fill their playlists, and the future WalMart shoppers were no brighter then than now, hence limping along behind like injured lemmings.

A true multi decade damaging setback for our country. They were not ready to rock, and certainly not to bagpipes.

Listen: Alright, Alright, Alright / Mungo Jerry
Alright, Alright, Alright / Mungo Jerry

Like McGuinness Flint before them, or Ronnie Lane’s Slim Chance just after, Mungo Jerry existed in the own sonic universe while current. A kind of rag tag gypsy dance folk, or even the skiffle side of glam, whatever…it was warm weather music and a fun slop.

‘Alright, Alright, Alright’ found it’s place on Radio 1 summer ’73. Like others I’ve mentioned here, the single was an ever present soundtrack of Soho’s market stalls that season.

Only The Beach Boys can rival them in the ‘forever summer’ category.

Listen: Just a Little Misunderstanding / The Contours 06 Just A Little Misunderstanding.mp3

Most times the really successful acts are great, but after they’re pounded into your brain relentlessly, you can go off them a bit. The Beach Boys come to mind and their biggest hits at that. I love ‘California Girls’ but never need to hear it again. Likewise ‘Hey Jude’ or ‘You Can’t Hurry Love’.

So yeah, we all loved The Supremes and The Four Tops too, but those lesser known Motown acts were just as great. Some had the occasional smash, Like Mary Wells or The Marvelettes, yet some just never got near their fair share. Like The Contours.

It’s in hindsight I’ve come to appreciated them. Northern Soul has given a lot of great singles an unexpected success story, if not in big sales at least in big appreciation. ‘Just A Little Misunderstanding’ is one. I heard this on a few of those truly great Northern comps like THE IN CROWD – THE STORY OF NORTHERN SOUL and it’s accompanying must-read book.