How about a picture of Tiny Tim meeting Princess Margaret in 1969 while David Bowie looks on?
Tim is flanked by Dusty Springfield and Lou Christie.
The Tiptoe Through The Tulips hitmaker routinely carried his ukes in a plastic carrier bag and on this occasion he went for a patriotic theme.
I assume it was some kind of charity gala Royal Variety-type event.
I found this on Danny Baker’s Twitter feed yesterday.
http://i.imgur.com/lQhOGWC.png
Now read on….
Bowie’s head doesn’t look quite right, like it’s been photoshopped in.
I thought that too, but there are several other pictures from the same event and he’s in all of them.
Tiny Tim recorded the first version of the Biff Rose song Fill Your Heart which Bowie covered on Hunky Dory it seems.
I love Tiny Tim (of course) yet do not own any of his records. It’s all MP3s & YouTube wotsits these days. Where do you suggest I start dear JC?
This is the place to start (and end) Beany old fruit. It’s Tim’s debut LP containing not only Tiptoe Through The Tulips but Fill Your Heart.
Hard to believe now, but Tim was very much part of the rock scene in the late 60s. George Harrison was a fan and brought Tim onto one of the final Beatles’ Xmas records doing Nowhere Man in his own distinctive style.
I saw him at the Isle Of Wight festival in 1970 doing They’ll Always Be An England.
We made our own entertainment in those days.
http://i.imgur.com/kCSTYiw.jpg
Tim’s hooter makes Zappa’s look like a little button nose:
http://i.imgur.com/BYWFj67.jpg
There’ll Always Be An England, sorry.
Marvellous. The song has always been a Hunky Dory favourite of mine.
Released in 3 days. Tiny Tim: The Complete Singles Collection: 1966-1970
How many singles did he have?
There are 22 tracks on the CD. There may be liberties being taken by Cherry Red. Further research is required.
I always thought the Tiny Tim appearance on the Beatles Christmas flexi in question (’69, was it?) was a joke and it was actually George Harrison impersonating him.
It was the 1968 Xmas Flexi and it really was Tim:
From Wiki:
Also notable is a rendition of “Nowhere Man” by the ukulele-playing Tiny Tim. Also included is a sped-up snippet of the Beatles’ own “Helter Skelter” and a brief snippet of Perrey & Kingsley’s “Baroque Hoedown” which was used three years later in Disneyland’s Main Street Electrical Parade. “Ob-La-Di, Ob-La-Da,” “Yer Blues,” and “Birthday” are also heard in the background for part of the message. The dialogue and songs for the flexi-disc were organised and edited together by DJ and friend of the Beatles, Kenny Everett.
Dylan was also a huge fan of Tiny, who’d been a fixture in Greenwich Village for years. I believe he introduced George to the delights of the ‘human jukebox’. IIRC, Tiny had a repertoire of about 20K songs.
His version of ‘Tiny Bubbles’ is magnificent.
The clip of Tiny uniting about 100,000 Yetis at the IOW in singing ‘There’ll always be an England’ is hilarious.
Let’s watch that famous clip right now.
And if you’ve ever wondered where Oasis got the title of Fuckin’ In The Bushes the instrumental lead track of their Standing on the Shoulder of Giants album, look no further.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MV0O2Y9xto4
See the Baroness on that clip? That’s Russell Brand’s whole act that is.
“The Baroness” is great. Those bosoms don’t seem terribly convincing, though.
I also like “The Commodore” the pipe-chewing miserable old git who pours cold water on the entire event. I think we’ll all turn into him eventually.
Well, Biff did a version too. Actually, TT’s is the best of the 3
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ce2cFyVPjo0
Yes he did, but Tiny Tim got his version out first as the B-Side of Tiptoe Through The Tulips
Did you know that Biff Rose was primarily a comedian who also wrote songs? No, me neither.
Yes, it’s a good version. You can see that Bowie lifted the arrangement and even his vocal approach straight from Biff’s version
Re Biff Rose? Only as of earlier this week as research for a Hunky Dory covers article. For his acknowledged apparently accorded best album, Hunkdory certainly has its share of tracks well skipped. Cpvers of Eight Line Poem and Song for Bob Dylan are scarcely 2 a penny
Sorry retro, you’ve lost me there with, well, just about all of that.
HRH seems to exchanging a few words with Tiny. What can they be talking about? And what’s that in his hand? It looks like a shopping list.
Dusty had just done her best album…..and so had Bowie.
OOAA.
An even more unlikely duo involving Margret Windsor, Joe Boyd’s White Bicycles mentions a New Year’s Eve party where she danced the night away to Satisfaction with Mike Williamson of The ISB.
Robin?
Heron?
SORRY: SENIOR MOMENT. Robin W. it was
Here’s a better picture proving it’s not photo shopped.
The date is November 1969. Tiny Tim is not in shot here, but I do believe that’s Radio One DJ Dave Cash far left next to Bowie. And could that be Eddie Grant second right with bleached hair?
But who is the Engelbert type far right?
http://i.imgur.com/BNRxOXv.png
Of course it’s Lightnin’ Strikes hitmaker Lou Christie who I identified in the OP. Doh!
And just one more:
http://i.imgur.com/gZagJJG.jpg
The slightly odd-looking Bowie in the first pic is entirely due to the lighting. The interior looks big and dark, and the flashes pretty powerful. Bowie is probably being lit by another flash, to the OP photographer’s left – the two chaps on Dave’s left being partially shadowed by Princess M.
Can you draw a diagram of that, please?
Bowie’s being shot from the grassy knoll.
Yes, that is Eddy Grant – presumably Baby Come Back had been number one by then.
Viva Bobby Joe was the Equals’ only big hit in 1969
According to my mum, The Equals were due to play a small local dance (Aldeburgh Jubilee Hall, I think) booked well before Baby Come Back charted. When it hit the top spot they kept the booking, much to the excitement of the Suffolk Coastal Teen Massive.
That would have been 1968 when Baby Come Back Back reached number one.
Yes. My band, Eyes of Blond, were the support group at what we have listed as “Aldeborough (sic) Public Hall Saturday, April 13, 1968”
I’ll change it on our website. PW
Wow! I’ll see if my mum remembers your band. Do you have a link to your website? Thanks PW.
Here’s something. I’m well impressed.
http://www.eyesofblond.co.uk/history.html
I asked my mum about the dance PW, and she said the entire evening was unbelievably good, including the support band. Specifics were a bit hazy; it seems her abiding memory is of dancing a lot with a medical student named Raymond, in order to make her ex-boyfriend jealous, since he’d broken up with her a couple of weeks before the dance. It must have worked, as not long afterwards the ex wrote her a beautiful letter, asking her to take him back, which she eventually did. You might have guessed by now that the silly young man was in fact my dad; they married the following year and celebrate their 47th anniversary this summer. And she still has the letter.
Lovely story MB
She also saw Bowie in the Riot Squad in 1967, at the Framlingham Assembly Rooms, but has no memory of it at all. She only knows because her friend told her! This is her pal talking about the night: http://www.eadt.co.uk/news/when_david_bowie_rocked_suffolk_in_framlingham_1_4374577