We were meant for each other, darling i know this is true

Continuing my trip back through the 1963 album charts.

15/09/63 : Billy - Billy Fury


Our first visit with Billy - I know he was very popular (only for a short-ish time?) but apart from that, I can tell you absolutely nothing about him. Interestingly, this album isn't available on Amazon Music but fortunately Spotify came to the rescue.

And it is OK - I imagine it was starting to feel a bit dated by '63 because it's more like late 50's skiffle-ish rock'n'roll but it's got a decent beat and swing, daddy-o. This is the sort of thing that Cliff should have been doing when he was trying to convince us he was Elvis but maybe if he had, he'd had faded into obscurity like Billy did - and we couldn't have that now, could we? I can't say I loved it, but it was nice to finally get round to meeting the lad. 

We're at #15 in the charts this week on his 20th week of a 21 week run, with it having peaked at #6 in its fifth, sixth and tenth weeks. The top five this week were The Beatles, The Searchers (starting an eight week run at #2), The Shadows, Steptoe & Son and Kenny Ball with the highest new entry being Frank Ifield (#12). 

Wikipedia doesn't have an entry for the album but his entry tells us this was his last studio album produced at the height of his popularity, although he also released one of the first UK live albums later this year. The 70s brought both financial and health issues and an attempted comeback in the early 80s didn't exactly catapult him back to fame before he unfortunately died in '83 at the age of 42 (but obviously they released a posthumous album later that year). 

discogs.com tells us you're going to have to spend a fiver to get a copy of this but if you want a mint copy, complete with the original inner sleeve (these things matter to some people) then it's going to cost you £180! This was an interesting rather than enjoyable visit, but it was nice to fill in a blank spot in my musical history.

08/09/23 - We were never going to avoid him
22/09/63 - Surprisingly bearable, for him

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