THE GREATEST SONGS OF THE 1960s THAT NO ONE HAS EVER HEARD
1,165) Ambrose Slade/Slade– “Pity the Mother”
The first song to be written by Slade’s future songwriting team of Noddy Holder and Jim Lea., this “hauntingly folky” (Dave Thompson, https://www.allmusic.com/album/beginnings-mw0000849687) “SAD song [is] about a pitiful lonely single mum, featuring stunningly heart-rending violin by Jim Lea.” (ReverendWerewolf13, https://rateyourmusic.com/release/album/ambrose-slade/beginnings.p/) “Pity” is “Truly exceptional. The interplay of guitar, drums, violin and vocals is sublime.” andrewdolinskiatcarpathian, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O3vmmeiXfhs) Joe Viglione asks us to “l]isten to how musical the Holder/Lee original “Pity the Mother” is to hear how inspired and truly underrated these artists were and still are.” (https://www.allmusic.com/album/ballzy-mw0000840164)
About Slade, Vernon Joynson writes:
The roots of Slade go back to a 1964 Wolverhampton-based band The Vendors who included Dave Hill and Don Powell and cut a four-song demo EP. By 1965 The Vendors had evolved into The In-Be-Tweens. The same year Noddy Holder was guitarist and backing vocalist in another Wolverhampton-based band, Steve Brett and the Mavericks. During 1966 The In-Be-Tweens split into two with only Hill and Powell remaining. They were then joined by Noddy Holder and another Wolverhampton lad Jimmy Lea. In early 1969 the foursome, who were now known as Ambrose Slade and playing Motown, Beatles and ska covers, moved down to London. They were spotted playing at Rasputin’s Club by ex-Animal Chas Chandler who became their manager/producer, got them a record deal with Fontana and fashioned them in boots, braces and close-cut hair to cash-in on the skinhead movement. By the end of the year, he’d also persuaded them to shorten their name to Slade.
The Tapestry of Delights Revisited
Chas Chandler recalled:
I was going to take time out to take stock of things. Then John Gunnell told me about this group in the Philips studio… I went to Rasputins to see them. They were like a breath of fresh eayer… Mon. . . . There was a certain amount of amateurism about them but the main fault was that they didn’t play any of their own material. I liked the arrangements they did of other people’s material and I thought that if they could do that, they must be able to write as well. I made up my mind to manage them that night.
https://sladestory.blogspot.com/1971/02/ambrose-slade.html?m=1
Pay to Play! The Off the Charts Spotify Playlist! + Brace for the Obscure 60s Rock Merchandise
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