At the turn of the 70s, songwriters like Tony Macaulay (‘Love Grows Where My Rosemary Goes’), Cook and Greenaway (‘Something's Gotten Hold Of My Heart’), Lynsey De Paul and Barry Blue (‘Storm In A Teacup’) and John Carter (‘Beach Baby’) were bossing the singles charts and Radio 1 while more serious acts like Led Zeppelin and Pink Floyd concentrated on album sales.
“Chip Shop Pop” is a stellar collection of super-melodic, expertly crafted songs; it gathers two dozen of the songs that got away, all potential hits written by these Denmark Street-schooled songwriters. You might have only heard these records once or twice before, coming out of a passing kid's transistor radio, or in the background in a cafe, or a chippie, and then they disappeared into the ether never to be heard again - until now.
Aside from the Fortunes, Marty Wilde and Candlewick Green, very few of these names will be at all familiar but the harmonies, the string and brass arrangements and top session musician playing will all be familiar to anyone who loves the sound of ‘My Baby Loves Lovin'’, ‘Silver Lady’ or ‘(If Paradise Is) Half As Nice’. They are all incredibly catchy.
Compiled by Bob Stanley from his sizeable collection of 70s 7" singles, ”Chip Shop Pop” revives records on Bell, UK, Young Blood and Bradley's, labels that were home to these unabashed radio-friendly sounds that would disappear when first disco, then punk, came along later in the 70s.
Dormant for decades, many unavailable for more than fifty years, here is a perfect collection of sunshine-friendly pop with a capital P.
