Sunday, July 03, 2011

The Liverbirds: Peanut Butter



Nothing to do with Carla Lane, thank God, this week's video is a sort of companion piece to The Monks. Both are sixties bands I discovered through Youtube and both were successes in Germany but not at home.

You might think that an all-girl Merseybeat band would get a small but honourable mention when pop history is written, but The Liverbirds seem to have been forgotten. A description of them that is all over the web - I have no idea where it orginates but Old Melodies is a good example - says:
They were startling to look at in an era when girl singers were supposed to be pretty on-stage, four tough-looking northern girls dressed in black and playing their instruments with attitude -- they cut a savage version of Bo Diddley's "Mona" and could rip through most any rock & roll standard, but when their record company had them throw on a soft Everly Brothers-type ballad or two, it sounded more like a joke; these girls couldn't harmonize to save their lives, but they rocked their asses off.
Listen to other track by them and you will find that is only a little unfair. But Peanut Butter rocks.

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