The Invaders line up when Graham joined in 1961 was Graham Betchley rhythm guitar/vocals, Frank Bright piano, Carl Nolan lead guitar, Stuart Brading bass, Brian Kersley rhythm, Pete Taylor drums.
Frank Bright then dropped out, Mike King (now in London) replaced Stuart Brading on bass and Dave Pressey replaced Brian Kersley on rhythm, "On the odd occasion he wasn't playing snooker" as Graham put it. Graham had replaced Ian Sherfield.
"I remember at an early rehearsal Frank Bright played like a cartoon keyboard on Del Shannon's Runaway. We played at the Waverley Caravan Park in East Cowes and St. Andrew's Mission Hall in Cowes. We always ran our own gigs. Everything that went over the door was the bands.Joining The CherokeesWith the Invaders we did a lot of odd American stuff, 'Don't You Worry My Little Pet', college stuff. I can only assume I got it from a friend in the Navy who used to bring the records back." Graham was also a Buddy Holly fan.
"Carl Nolan, being the good businessman that he is, invested in good equipment. Pete Taylor had the best drums, Carl had a good guitar. When I joined the Cherokees the equipment was appalling. When I took the equipment that I had from the Invaders it was the real stuff."
"Lodge had to go away. They came along and asked me to sit in on a couple of gigs. We hit it off like we had always been together. They offered me this enormous sum to join them. Little did they know I was earning twice as much with the Invaders . . ."
The Cherokees 'Hymn sheets'
Graham: "The Winter Gardens was good because of the crowds. We played for four and a quarter hours regularly. The acoustics were diabolical. 1964 was a good year for material. It was the first year that all the bands, Beatles, Stones, Hollies, were producing good material.Cherokees run the Seagull Ballroom, Ryde Pier, 1965The Cherokees always retained a lot of American material. I found my 'hymn sheets' for the Winter Gardens recently. There were three hundred songs on this list, phenomenal. All current material being used during the course of six weeks.
Equipment was becoming of some quality by then, guitar amps coming over from the States were on the market. We certainly would learn four new songs every week. When the Beatles came on the scene it explored vocals to the depth that had never been done before. High harmonies for example. It got rid of all that American college stuff."
"We formed a limited company, London Enterprises. We were in the bar all day. Wives, girlfriends, everybody came to help us get it ready."The Cherokees in the StudiosGwen Betchley: "I can remember going on the bus from Cowes with a paint brush."
Graham: "If the fire authorities had come in on one of those nights I don't know what would have happened. It was so busy you could see the sea through the floorboards."
Gwen: "Wonderful beehive hair dos. It took hours to get them right with all this lacquer. You would spend all day getting your hair right and then walk up the Pier which ruined it. On a Saturday night the Ladies toilet used to be packed for the first hour."
"The EP was done during the day in the old Olympic studio which I think was in Bond Street. The Beatles had just finished recording Revolver and we were the next band in, singing Stewball . . . I remember an acetate of Good Vibrations by Brian Wilson. It was all him, he had done it to show the Beach Boys what he wanted. We suddenly heard it in Olympic. It made me wonder did Lennon hear it and influence him on Sergeant Pepper?The days of the 69 ClubA couple of things that Brian and I wrote, I Feel Good and Deep Blue Feeling were done later on in Lansdowne Studios in Notting Hill, and released in Sweden. Also recorded in the Polydor Studios were two Marvin Gaye songs, Ain't That Peculiar was one, which were never released. It's not surprising, they were diabolical.
We didn't do well in the studios. I'm not a recording person. We didn't really have any firm direction, we were inexperienced. We were much more transient, on the night stuff.
"We used to play at Portsmouth Art College and some pubs in Pompey. We must have played their half a dozen times, end of seasons and fundraisers. We played with Skip Bifferty at Portsmouth Guildhall. When we were booked, to play at Portsmouth Guildhall, in our naviety we took our normal gear expecting to fill the place."
We lost direction for a while. The last period that I really enjoyed was at the Oasis with the Joe Cocker/Leon Russell stuff. After that it was about the only change we could make over the ten years. Bass patterns, drum patterns had changed. It was fine at the beginning, we were all reasonably natural.
I was in a band called Grey's Elegy for a few months with Brian Sharpe, Martin Ford and Mick Newberry. It ran alongside Wilfred. Brian and I needed a change of direction. It didn't last long. Then Brian and I did the duo for twenty years (Sharpe and Betchley).
Blue Moon
"To a degree we're in a time warp on the Island. The same people were still going out. The material is so strong. It's not exactly my favourite material but it's so strong. It was a bit of a pushover."Final question:
Vic King: How did you remember all those words?
"If you're in training of rit you can do it. For thirty years I had to focus on learning words. You develop the part of the brain that remembers. A great deal of the time you almost know what the words are going to be. We went through a phase in the Cherokees, mainly egged on by Crann, of changing words to make them as obscene as possible . . ." - Graham Betchley