Saturday, July 9, 2011

Dave Clark Five (1962-63) + Washington DC's (1964-68)

There was no real connection between the two bands except that they shared the same label (Ember Records) in their early days. After the Dave Clark Five started to hit the charts high Ember Records used them as a lure to promote the Wahington DC's and released the "Dave Clark Five with The Washington DC's" album. It contains only two songs of the DC5 but eight tracks of The Wahington DC's, who had prior to this release a number 1 hit in Turkey with "Kisses Sweeter Than Wine", but failed to make the charts in England. The LP didn't make any impact too and very little was heard of the group over the next two years. They then got a record deal with CBS and reappear on the scene in '66 with the excellent "32nd Floor" 7-inch, followed by the even superior "Seek And Find" single. Again success eluded them and as a consequence the band headed to the continent where they were seemingly better recognized than in their homeland. The end of '68 saw the release of their final 45, the cool Mod/Freakbeat "I've Done It All Wrong/Anytime". Not long after the group finally split.

The CD-only release on Repertoire (Repertoire REP 4314-WY / 1993) contains the first three DC5 singles, white-bread early '60s Pop if you ask me. More interesting is the tracklist of the Washington DC's (17 tracks in total) that contains their whole output plus 2 unreleased songs.

Tracklist:
[Dave Clark Five]
- Chaquita
- In Your Heart
- First Love
- I Walk The Line
- That's What I Said
- I Knew It All The Time

[Washington DC's]
- Seek And Find
- I Love Gerald Chevin The Great
- 32nd Floor
- Whole Lot More
- Any Time
- I've Done It All Wrong
- Kisses Sweeter Than Wine
- Where Did You Go
- Shimmy Shimmy
- Sweet Little Rock'n'roller
- Yakety Yak
- Little One
- Is It Me
- Have You Seen My Baby
- Carol
- Return To Me
- Have You Seen My Baby [alt. take]

Personnel [Washington DC's]:
Pat Curley (lead gtr) [AB]
Barry Fitzgerald (gtr) [ABCD]
Roger Creed (bs) [AB]
Baz (drms) [A]
Glen Duke (drms) [BC]
Roger Saunders (vcls, lead gtr, keyb'ds) [CD]
Berbie Trott (bs) [C]
Gary Lee Illingworth (keyb'ds) [C]
Walt Monaghan (bs, gtr, keyb'ds) [D]
Brian Hillman (drms) [D]


Band origin:
London

Discographie:
Albums:
1. (C) The Dave Clark Five With The Washington DC's
   (Ember FA 2003) 1965

45's:
1. (B) Kisses Sweeter Than Wine/Where Did You Go
   (Ember EMB S 190) 1964
2. (C) 32nd Floor/Whole Lot More (CBS 202226) 1966
3. (C) Seek And Find/I Love Gerald Chevin The Great
   (CBS 202464) 1967
4. (D) I've Done It All Wrong/Anytime (Domain D 9) 1968

Get it here (Artwork included)

Listen to I've Done It All Wrong

5 comments:

mdhjhw said...

Much appreciated!!!

Anonymous said...

Thanks for post. The six DC5 songs are all surprisingly poor, but the WDCs songs are better. I like a
few songs, but on first listen
most of the songs failed to spark
my interest. BTW, the CD is back
in print on the Ember label.

Scitt.

Robert Charbonnier said...

To complete eventually DC5 discography :) Thank you.

Anonymous said...

Thank you! Washington DC was new to me.

sfdoomed said...

You have some real gems on your blog. Your efforts (and musical tastes) are much appreciated!