Billy Nicholls (Official Thread)

[CP/M User]

Wiki Link

I found out about Billy Nicholls from a few songs he wrote in which Del Shannon performed around 1967 and produced by Andrew Loog Oldham. The Del Shannon Album was meant to have been called Home and Away, but for some unknown reason (well unknown to me) the album was shelved and finally emerged sometime in the 70s - 1974 or 1978 as "And The Music Plays On" with a couple of other songs thrown in ("And The Music Plays On" being one of them!).

But in the process of learning more about Billy Nicholls I found he too had an album in 1968 with "Would You Believe" and to my knowledge the album was also Produced by Andrew Loog Oldham as well. Only one of the songs which Del Shannon performed so well is included on this album - the Del Shannon song simply called "Cut and Come Again", it's been called "Come Again" by Billy Nicholls, though is esentually the same great song, sounds a little different, but still worth listening to!

 

[CP/M User]

Re: Billy Nicholls









And here's a link to this Would You Believe Album on Wikipedia! As you can see it's a 60s album, but it too shared simular fate to Del Shannon's Home and Away album before comming out properly in the 90s!

 

[Nai Noswad]

... You don't hear songs like this anymore.... unless you're keeping the dream alive...
I've got this on mauve Immediate label... Small Faces influence can be heard. Shame the Loog ripped all these bands off - he made Allen Klein look like the tooth fairy!

Would You Believe.

 

[CP/M User]

Yeah the Small Faces are prominent though the album along with other musicians Big Jim Sullivan (electric and acoustic guitar), Caleb Quaye (piano), Jerry Shirley (drums), Nicky Hopkins (Keyboards), John Paul Jones (bass), Joe More (electric guitar).

Billy Nichols wrote the majority of the songs except for Would you Believe, which was written by Jeremy Paul.

The Del Shannon album which Andrew Loog Oldham produced was recorded earlier between 23-26 Feb 1967 includes 2 Billy Nicholls not included on Would You Believe worth checking out with "Led Along" & "Friendly With You" and "Cut & Come Again" I think is a stunning track though perhaps sadly discarded and forgotten, Billy Nicholls performs it elegantly as "Come Again" on his "Would You Believe" album, though I guess it just goes to show how a song can change with Producers get involved.

I merely only picked up this album thanks to finding out about Billy Nicholls through Del Shannon, if I hadn't, then it would have being a whole different matter. After finding out about Billy Nicholls, I would of being using the Internet to search his stuff and developing an appreciation for it in the same way the Internet kept my other interests alive.