moved by the sheer emotion and energy of the moment The first time Juicy Lucy witnessed this event, which was entirely spontaneous, they wrote a letter to the band a few days later, saying how they had dismissed rock ‘n' roll out of hand before this night, but now they would regard it with a new respect and belief- praise indeed from these high priests of the early seventies. The creed ofShakin' Stevens and the Sunsets was to keep music at its most uncomplicated, basic level - a philosophy regurgitated during the awakening of the punk movement. The idea was to experience it first hand, at a gut rather than a cerebral level. In other words you didn't have to think about it - the music didn't give you time. At a gig at Aberystwyth University with Stone the Crows Paul found himself called upon to defend their basic but adequate equipment: the long haired guitar heroes had panicked when their own equipment took a wrong turning off the motorway in the care of some enthusiastically dopey roadie who must have thought Aberystwyth was a kind of beer and that all gigs up the Ml end in Leeds - a common enough error among roadies.

Placing a comforting hand on the shoulder of the road manager who had, somehow, made it to the gig, Paul kindly offered to place the Sunsets equipment at the disposal of Stone the Crows for the night. The blubbering roadie wiped his eyes and then looked across at the Sunsets equipment which had been set up some hours earlier on stage. "We wouldn't even lower ourselves to rehearse on that rubbish," he cried, a snob to the last and with his mind's eye on the articulated lorry load of gadgets which would have dwarfed this meager spread. Paul folded his arms quietly and looked at him - he wasn't bothered if the band played or not. "Maybe you should," he replied.

It's true that the Sunsets equipment wasn't all that much to boast about, but it did the job and that's what mattered to them. It also went complete into their battered old Bedford van leaving enough space for the likes of Legs Barrett to enjoy and after-gig snooze on the way home without causing excessive bruising to the shins of the others. They could also set themselves up in a matter of minutes, an asset for which the social secretary of Portsmouth Polytechnic was to pray to god in, gratitude on the night that the van broke down before the band were due to playa gig at his freshers' ball. Now, for those of us not privileged enough to attend one of England's illustrious establishments of higher learning, a freshers' ball is an event which takes place during the first week of a college year. It's when all the 17 and 18 year old first year female students, straight from school get the once-over from the more experienced second and third year men and promptly get themselves involved in entanglements which take the rest of their college year to unravel; particularly if they have unwittingly involved themselves in the heat of the moment with one of the randier lecturers. The straight from school first year boys, of interest to no one but themselves and off the reins of home for the first time, usually get roaring, reeling, drunk and disgrace themselves in the ladies' lavatories.

on the motorway and ringing him up from a call box (reverse charge) half an hour before they're due to play (sounding drunk) to ask directions to his college- that's asking for heart failure, even for a rugby- playing engineering student.

When the blue, battered and filthy Sunsets van finally careered on two wheels into the Portsmouth Poly car park, nudging the Union Treasurer's brand new Triumph Spitfire into second place outside the stage doors, there were just twenty minutes to go. The social secretary's new green loon pants looked slightly soiled. "Twenty minutes?" said Paul, relaxed as ever. "We've done quite well then. Just find us some beer and leave the rest to us." Clutching some hastily poured pints the guitarists set up their own amps while Paul threw the P A on stage, complete with two open backed speakers (making the need for mQnitors redundant) and a few microphones. The band started their set on time, and needless to say, blew the joint apart. In the Spring of 1971 the band was approached by the press officer of a now defunct record company called B&C, which was by no means a small label for its time and had made quite strident inroads with the Wild Angels, who were "the other" popular rock 'n' roll band of the day largely through the clever hype of their press officer, Max Needham. Although the majority of the establishment music industry found it quite difficult to accept rock 'n' roll as anything but a quaint museum object, Max had just enough pull and lovable eccentricity to raise the Wild Angels to a level where they could at least be tolerated. He mixed with the right types.

In his spare moments he wrote letters to the music press under names like "Bopping Bertie" and "National Assistance Norman". The Wild Angels had an acceptable image, too. They'd come out of a rock 'n' roll joint in London called the Ace cafe in the late sixties and had been cleverly hyped onto the Bill Haley tour of '68 which earned them the kind of credibility that the Sunsets had gained from their brush with the Stones. You needed it, if you played rock 'n' roll then. The Sunsets didn't go a bundle on the brylcream, suspender belts and tattoo image of the Wild Angels, figuring it to be just a little too pat to be real. But they tolerated each other and Paul knew as well that he couldn't argue with the kind of success the Wild Angels were having under Max's guiding hand. Although the band was doing better than ever for live dates, building their price and their reputation with almost alarming speed, Paul was having no luck at all selling them to the record companies. Since the EMI/Rockfield episode of the previous year, doors were firmly closed to them. So when Max called Paul and told him about a proposed B&C compilation album to include them, he jumped at it. Little or no money was involved the band were paid session rates for their time in the studio and as only one track was demanded from them, they hardly covered the expenses of their trip to London to record it.

But it was good to see the album, which was first released under the somewhat misleading title of "Battle of the Bands" (bearing in mind today's heavy metal connotations of that phrase), carrying tracks from the likes of Gene Vincent, TJte Wild Angels, the Houseshakers, the Hellraisers all the major rock In' roll names of the time, coupled with their own. And it introduced them to the man who was to lead them into the next phase of their so far luckless recording career - Donny Marchand. Donny (short for Donald) was an expatriate American who had decided to make a home for himself in Great Britain after an emotional experience with WEA in the States, when he had been excorted from their New York offices and asked never to darken their door again during a period when stress and overwork caused him to behave somewhat eccentrically - even for a New York record company. He was now making a name for himself within the narrow field of rock ‘n' roll in England as a producer, and Shakin' Stevens and the Sunsets met up with him when he handled the B&C compilation. He had had some success producing the Wild Angels but in the end the Sunsets were not very happy with the work he did on their one track, "All By Myself", but they knew he had clout in record company circles.

Marchand was fairly confident that if they only left all the negotiating to him, he could swing them a recording deal with none other than CBS Records - a company who had only recently passed on the band. Paul shrugged his shoulders and told Donny to "go right ahead and try" - he figured if anyone could get a deal for them now, it must be Donny - he had friends in high places at CBS plus just enough sheer cheek to fool the A&R men into signing them as next year's big thing. It worked. The band was signed almost on the spot to record an album - with Donny as producer - to be released in the autumn. It was during this period that a few line-up changes occurred within the Sunsets.

Trevor the Hawk, the Wild Piano player who had been with them from the early days at the Northcote Arms, made a vital mistake when he moved from his native London down to Cardiff to be near the band while they rehearsed. Things seemed to be going so well for them that he must have thought it was worth the upheaval for both himself and his girlfriend and the band had been booked to support Chuck Berry over a summer tour, which would have capped even the Stones date for them. But just after Trevor had put up his poster of John Wayne, and plugged in his gas ring in his small Grangetown bedsitter, chuck Berry canceled. It was blamed on the World Cup which was taking place at the same time and was collecting all the media attention that belonged to Chuck - whatever the reason, tickets just weren't selling well enough to warrant him even climbing aboard an aeroplane with his guitar.

So Trevor was left a bit high and dry with no major tour, no regular income and his roots torn from under him. Eventually he went home, leaving the Sunsets without a piano player. But only temporarily - the band at the time were connected to a Bristol Agency called Tower who got them the occasional gig and were generally quite riendly and helpful to them. It was one of the agents at Tower - an ex-army mercenary called Bud Godfrey - who put Paul on to Ace Skudder. Ace was a black Bristolian who talked with a strong West Country accent and who could boogie woogie like nothing you ever heard. Paul invited him to come and play at a gig just outside Swansea - the Langham Bay Hotel, and he agreed. They must have looked an odd sight as they met on Swansea Station for the first time - two rockers, one tall and thin with a crew-cut and the other short and stocky with a head like a basket ball resting on a massive pair of shoulders and with a grin which stretched almost from ear to ear across his jet black features. Ace played the gig that night and was immediately accepted into the band.

They had a new bass player, too, George Chick who had replaced Stephen Percy after the whisky smashing episode, who lived in Barry and had been playing in bands around Cardiff for some years. Paul found George at a period of fairly low activity for him with the local bands, so he was pleased to move into the Sunsets, and what for him must have looked like the big league. George was a good rock In' roll bass player, he introduced a wild element into the set which pleased Paul, the wilder the players, the wilder Shaky would go in his efforts to keep his front-man hold, and the better the show. And so the band set out on yet another shoe-string budget album, the second of many more to come in their career, with: Shakin' Stevens on vocals, Rockin' Louie on drums, Carl Petersen on guitar, George Chick on bass and Ace Skudder on piano. It looked like a good team when recording began. But Paul knew that trouble was brewing with Carl Petersen. Carl "The curse" had found a new interest in life, the hippie ethos and all its attendant vices, he was already beginning to wonder if it wasn't time he left the rock 'n' roll scene and caught up with the seventies.

too much finesse for their approach, but he was good, and he stepped in just when they needed him most. Mickey played a few gigs with the Sunsets after the recording finished but you have to be a special kind of person to withstand life on the road with Shakin' Stevens and the Sunsets for long. They really were slobs. It didn't take long for the cigarette smoke, inevitably No.6, and the empty beer cans and the excessive life-style to finish him off completely - he split. Its strange to think that it's to Mickey that Shakin' Stevens now owes much of his success, he arranges his songs, plays on all his hit records and is very much a driving force in the success story of the present day Shaky. He is a highly talented musician, one of the best in this field. To replace Mickey, Paul brought in Willie Blackmore, who came in just in time to be included on the album cover of "I'm No JD", ( short for juvenile delinquent) which was released in the autumn with all the passaz that CBS could muster, including a rock 'n' roll launch party with all the record company staff togged out in rock 'n' roll fancy dress. The band hadn't seen any kind of advance from the album, although it's the usual practice that record advances go to the artist, with an agreed cut to the manager and/or the man who negotiated the deal, of something around ten percent. Donny seemed to have added a nought somewhere. To date neither Paul nor any of the Sunsets have seen a penny in royalties from the "I'm No JD" LP. It has, however, sold something in the region of 300,000 copies. This wasn't the last they were to hear or see of Marchand however. Early in 1972 they were approached by a small record company called Contour, a subsidiary ofPolydor headed by Lionel Blurge that employed Donny Marchand as an independent producer. They wanted a quickie from Shakin' Stevens and the Sunsets, and Paul refused at first, naturally. But they persisted with their talk.

The royalties from "I'm No JD" would be sorted out soon, they insisted, and this album was something not to be missed, it was to be one of those budget LP's guaranteed a showing in every supermarket and petrol station throughout the country. Finally Paul agreed, he didn't have too many cards left to play record-wise, and he knew it, and even a budget record is better than nothing. Early in 1972 they went into Majestic Studios in London to do the fastest recording in the history of the band, thirteen tracks were laid down in one long session. One of the tracks was the famous "At the Hop:, laid down on the first session as just the bare bones of itself. At the end of the day, Paul approached Donny and said, "We're still going, we'll do the overdubs now if you like." "Overdubs?" queried the producer, "Sorry, no time for those. This is it." That's why the album, "Rockin' and Shakin' " on Contour Records is memorable as being the only cut of" At the Hop" with a chorus of" At the hop silence...at the hop..." without any of the familiar "bop bops" which usually punctuate that song.

Listen closely to Shaky on "Tallahassie Lassie" and you'll hear the kind of monumental cock-up usually avoided on slightly more serious projects, when he sings "Tally Assie Lassie" and puts a whole new meaning into the lyric. Soon after the disastrous day in Majestic Studios, Shakin' Stevens and the Sunsets were booked to appear during the afternoon at the "Disc" Awards at Hatchetts Club, in Mayfair. The band played, watched by their old friend John Peel with Lindisfarne who looked decidedly uncomfortable to see them there. Later on, armed with alcoholic courage, Paul and Louie went to the Conduit Street offices of Contour Records and burst in on Lionel Burge as he was preparing to go home for the evening. "We want our royalties from this album to come direct to us instead of to Donny," they demanded, leaning menacingly over his desk, although in hindsight their demand was totally justified. Lionel Burge was unmoved, however. "OK, if you guys won't play it my way, I'll re-do the whole thing with the Hellraisers," he said calmly. Paul looked at Rockin' Louie, knowing that his bluff had been called. He shook his head. "What can we do?" he asked him. Burge had them over a barrel. The band never received any royalties from the "Rockin' and Shakin'" album either.

One of the resident support acts at the club was a singing duo, composed of two personable young men with rhythm guitars, cavalry twill flares and clean white shirts who nightly sang sweet pop songs to match. One of these guys was called Lenny. He was one of the club fixtures soon to become known to the band during the many post-gig drinking sessions which took place under the encouragement of Brian and Ken. Another character who frequented the club under the guise of occasional compere was Vince.  An incident surrounding Vince worthy of note for the way it illustrates how the club was run, was the night he was accused of stealing five pounds and sacked. Vince emotionally declared himself to be entirely innocent of this crime and went on stage to do his compering, but during the course of the night it became apparent to all that his emotion was getting the better of him: each announcement that he made was slightly more slurred than the last, until finally at the end of the night he collapsed, falling forward with his arms outstretched across the stage and his eyes rolled upwards towards the heavens. Ken was in the kitchen at the time, but when Brian came and told him about it, he roared with laughter and reflected that maybe Vince wasn't so bad after all! He was duly reinstated, but his pride was sufficiently damaged for him not to show his face too often after that. So, another compere was needed to take his place.

Lenny seemed the ideal answer. He was a fresh-faced, personable young man- white teeth, clear eyed, just the hint of a tan, shiny black hair and immaculately clothed. He eagerly accepted his new role, along with the offer of accommodation in one of the rooms up- stairs which went with it. Over the next few months, the band didn't have too much occasion to go to the club- their date sheet was loaded with gigs elsewhere, and recording sessions. When they next saw Lenny, however, they received something of a shock. Gone was the clear-eyed complexion and the ready smile. Lenny had become definitely dog-eared. His eyes were bloodshot, and he didn't shave as closely as he did at one time. He sagged. After a few visits, Paul became quite worried about him and approached him at the bar.

He gazed at the tall rocker with a kind of sad, or was it tired, desperation. "I've got to get away from this place, Paul, I've got to think of some way to escape," he said, with a quick glance over his left shoulder at an imaginary eavesdropper. He hadn't, it was revealed after some probing, seen the light of day for six months. His routine was set: he'd compere at the club until the early hours and then drink at the bar until the even earlier hours. Then he'd go to bed with one of the barmaids in his room upstairs and be forced to prove his masculinity before sleep overtook both of them and he would lie in a kind of whirling blackness until the late afternoon, when he would stagger downstairs for a meal, a pick-you-up drink and the whole cycle would begin again. A few months later Shakin' Stevens and the Sunsets went to the Watersplash to discover that Lenny had, in fact, managed to escape. Late one night, it seemed, he had climbed out of a window clutching his belongings and a few bottles of scotch, and was never seen again. That was Lenny.