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Counterbeats


RichardB

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Don't know much about

The Counterbeats

LINK BROKEN - REMOVED.

Heard them described as a Sheffield band on "Sounds of the Sixties" on Radio 2.

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Guest damagevoncrap

I do know that Karen was replaced by Anthony Fitzgerald, who later changed his name to Tony Christie.

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Richard,

Although the links in your previous posts are both less than 2 years old both of them now seem to link to something different to what you intended.

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Thank you for the update, they were good when posted. Now I've entered LINK BROKEN - REMOVED.

Cheers Dave.

Richard,

Although the links in your previous posts are both less than 2 years old both of them now seem to link to something different to what you intended.

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Here's a quote from Tony Christie

“And so I basically carried on doing that until I was offered a part in a band called The Counterbeats”, he continues, now in full flow: “Basically they’d had a girl singer - Karen Young - who’d left them because she’d recorded a song called ‘Nobody’s Child’ that had gone to Number One in the charts! So, after she left and their manager heard me sing, he was like ‘Do you fancy turning full-time pro and touring with the band?’… So I said yes, left my office job - and went full-time with The Counterbeats, who were mainly a cabaret-type band... Because even back then I’d already started harbouring ambitions of becoming the sort of English Sammy Davis Jr. or English Tony Bennett!”

From an Article on bluesandsoul.com

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Here's a quote from Tony Christie

“And so I basically carried on doing that until I was offered a part in a band called The Counterbeats”, he continues, now in full flow: “Basically they’d had a girl singer - Karen Young - who’d left them because she’d recorded a song called ‘Nobody’s Child’ that had gone to Number One in the charts! So, after she left and their manager heard me sing, he was like ‘Do you fancy turning full-time pro and touring with the band?’… So I said yes, left my office job - and went full-time with The Counterbeats, who were mainly a cabaret-type band... Because even back then I’d already started harbouring ambitions of becoming the sort of English Sammy Davis Jr. or English Tony Bennett!”

From an Article on bluesandsoul.com

<object width="420" height="315"><param name="movie" value="<a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gczR_Q18YPA?version=3&amp;hl=en_GB"></param><param">http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gczR_Q18YPA?version=3&amp;hl=en_GB"></param><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"></param><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"></param><embed src="http://www.youtube.c...=3&hl=en_GB" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" width="420" height="315" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true"></embed></object>

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Hi does anyone here have any information about the counterbeats. I'm just curious as my father was the bass player in the group and he has passed now and I would like to know more about his time in the counterbeats, are there any recorded songs I can hear anywhere? 

 

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Unable to find any recordings, but here's the first newspaper mentions of the Counterbeats I can find:

414525154_Counterbeats1960.png.0aa5e52dfa53d637922b99b193480a10.png

234955815_Counterbeats1960_2.png.15d707845d25389125edc8ae5f8b6f26.png

If you have plenty of time, you could browse through some early '60s music magazines, but they aren't searchable. Maybe concentrate around any key dates? Here:

Music Magazines

586880434_MusicMagazines.png.1f98e308de33c42c97a6e50f2bbb2ac1.png

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On 28/06/2022 at 21:12, Amanda said:

Hi does anyone here have any information about the counterbeats. I'm just curious as my father was the bass player in the group and he has passed now and I would like to know more about his time in the counterbeats, are there any recorded songs I can hear anywhere? 

 

You could try Mike Lawton through the My Kind Of Town magazine, he’s quite an authority on the Sheffield music scene in the sixties.

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Here's the former Plaza Cinema, Wombwell, scene of the group's "terrific success" and now the Wombwell Snooker Club.

Wombwell Club.jpg

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They were very popular in Leicester, there was a fan club based there.

Karen left the group in 1965, she had a couple of minor hits and retired from the business in 1974 at the age of 28.

For three years in the early 1960's the singer was a teenage girl from Staines called Jean Hayle.

They had a guitarist called Val Talbot who formed his own trio in 1968.

The comedy/rock group The Staggerlees were managed in 1966 by Bill Turner ( ex Counterbeats)

An article about Tony Christie says The Counterbeats later became known as The Tony Christie Show...Christie was 21 when he joined the group.

It seems to me your best chance for information might be to contact Tony Christie...he is on Twitter.

 

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