Malcolm Lenny

I was Born in Shepton Mallett, Somerset 30th April 1942. Rock’n’Roll kinda started in Britain during my last year at school in Clapham, South London I’d been playing in my school’s “Trad Band” consisting of Accordion, Trumpet, Washboard, Tea-chest Bass and me on Banjo. It must’ve been pretty awful. Anyway, I graduated to a Skiffle Group called The Skyliners and played at the legendary “Two II’s Coffee Bar” in Old Compton Street. We didn’t get discovered by Larry Parnes or anyone else, but 2 other geezers (Hank Marvin & Bruce Welch) did. So on the strength of their success I formed a Rock’n’Roll group called The Jokers. We did all right locally but I wanted more. I was serving a 2 year apprenticeship with GPO Telephones when I answered an advert in The Melody Maker for a Lead Guitarist “willing to Record, Rehearse & Travel”. That was The PACKABEATS. who made records with Joe Meek, the first independent record producer in the U.K. and became a legendary instrumental group. Reached No.49 with “Gypsy Beat”. I had a lot of fun with that band, we did loads of top line gigs. BBC Saturday Club, Juke Box Jury etc. (voted a Miss. What did they know?). They were all “crumblies” on that show anyway. We recorded 2 instro singles and 1 vocal with our singer Tony Holland with the legendary Joe Meek and got to No.38 in The Record Mirror Chart with “Evening in Paris” before the pressing plant went on strike for 3 weeks and killed off our chances. We’d sold 13,000 in 3 weeks. That would get you in the top ten these days. But when the Liverpool bands appeared and undercut all the existing London bands the gigs started to dry up. I joined The Hi-Fi’s after a two and a half year stint with them I got a call from Ted Harvey (who was in the PACKABEATS with me but had left after 18 months) to come and join the band he was in, The Hi-Fi’s. Then we backed Jess Conrad. Don’t laugh! He was great fun. The record sold quite well but didn’t make the charts, so we went back into the studio to record Lennon/ McCartney’s “Baby’s in Black”. Lots of groups were covering Beatles songs and getting hits but we got a song in 6/8 tempo! Great song but not danceable. The Hi-Fi’s did quite a bit of radio [BBC Saturday Club] and television [BBC Kathy Kirby Shows, 5 O’clock Club etc.] The Hi-Fi’s played on the BBC TV “Kathy Kirby Show twice. The first time was when Kathy was singing the song for Europe called “I Belong”. It was recorded “as live” and transmitted the next day. What they didn’t tell us was that it had an audience of 13 million! I think I might have wet myself if I’d known beforehand. After a 1965 summer season on La Duchesse Du-Normandy (a boat that travelled from Jersey to France), the work suddenly dried up and Ted Harvey the bass player/vocalist left. I phoned Gary Unwin who had replaced him in The PACKABEATS. Gary said,” OK I’ll come and join you but only if I can bring my friend Mickey Douglas”. So he did and that was the start of another chapter in the life of The Hi-Fi’s and some great friendships. The HI-Fi’s became:- Brian Bennett – Organ/ Electric Piano/Vocals Mal Wright – Drums Malcolm Lenny – Lead Guitar/Vocals Mickey Douglas – Rhythm Guitar/Vocals Gary Unwin – Bass/vocals We went almost straight away into the Philips/Fontana studio in London to record “I’m not Ready for you Yet”/ “Heaven Knows”. Both great songs. We took a 6 week gig in Konstanz, Germany, which was excellent but when we came home to England, they wouldn’t release the single because we didn’t have much work. So we went back to Germany. We played a few monthly bookings in Monchengladbach, Wuppertahl, Krefeld for example. We also began playing at The British army Headquarters in the various officers mess’s. All pretty good money for the time. We’d also been offered a nice little earner in Duisburg, in The Rheinland. The club was called “Tante Olga’s” literally translated as “Auntie Olga’s”. Now Tante Olga was a formidable lady who scared the pants of us on first impression, but she grew to love us as we did her. Well she would because we were packing ‘em in every night at the club. This was happening mainly because, as Mickey would say, we used to loon about and make the kids laugh. They never knew what we were going to do next, but then neither did we half of the time! The first gig I played with The Hi-Fi’s was in a big seafront house for a private party. (in Littlestone at the house of Brian Bennett’s girl friend) Straight away I thought," These guys are seriously good musicians!" That was Brian Bennett (organ), Mel Wright (drums), Ted Harvey (bass). Soon after, we were on a package show with Big Dee Irwin, who sang “Swingin’ on a Star” with Little Eva. After that, we went into the IBC Studios in London to record “I Keep Forgettin’ ” with Glyn Johns as the engineer, before he became famous as a Beatles & Stones producer. That came out on release, to co-inside with a 3 week tour with The Hollies topping the bill. Touring on the package show with The Hollies/Heinz/The Tornados/Jess Conrad etc, was just excellent! Everyone on that tour got on so well. I remember being out for a coffee with Alan Clarke and Heinz, when we were spotted by some fans. I say ‘we’ but I was a nobody. We had to leg it back to the theatre or we’d have all been torn to bits, me included. I also remember opening the second half of the show in Douglas, Isle of Man. I sang the Frankie Valli lead part for “Rag Doll”. I had a really good falsetto in those days. I’ll never forget the screams from that audience, it was electrifying.