The American Roadrunner

History and music of Liverpool
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hamilton_square
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The American Roadrunner

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Mr SAXAPPEAL, as a saxophone player around Liverpool in the 1960s, I’ve got a question for you? I know it was long time ago but do you by chance recognise or remember this saxophone playing young lad?

Pic 1:
Roadrunners - 1.JPG
In inserted Pic 1 above he’s the one to the very left of the line-up with both hands resting on his saxophone, I believe it’s a tenor. I don’t know inside or outside what venue or club this photograph was taken but I do know it was sometime between February and August 1964.

Pic 2:
Roadrunners - 2.JPG
And, in inserted Pic 2 above he’s the one again to the very left of photo playing his tenor saxophone on stage at Hamburg’s Star Club during July / August 1964.

To the best of my knowledge, these are the only two photographs in circulation of American-born JOHNNY PHILLIPS lining up with the ROADRUNNERS for a short but memorable spell from February to August 1964.

In Pic 1 the Roadrunners line-up from left to right is Johnny Phillips (Sax / Flute & occasional Trumpet) … Mike Hart (Guitar / Vocals) … Pete Mackey (Bass / Vocals) … Dave Boyce (Drums) … John Peacock (Piano) … Nick Carver aka Nick la Grec (Saxophone)

In Pic 2 and in view live on stage at the Star Club; from left to right are the saxophone pairing of Johnny Phillips and Nick Carver, up front on bass and doing the vocals is Pete Mackey with Mike Hart in the background. Obscured from view are John Peacock at the piano and Dave Boyce behind the drums.

The Roadrunners played two stints at the Star Club, first over Christmas and into the New Year of 1963 / 64 and then again some eight months later during July / August 1964 when Pic 2 was taken. Before February 64 the Roadrunners line-up didn’t feature any instruments that had to be either sucked or blown - that is with the exception of Mike Hart’s occasional harmonica playing. However, while at the Star Club for their first stint, the group co-opted a couple of the Glasgow-based Bobby Patrick Big Six, also playing the at Star Club the same time, to provide a bit of backing for them. While I can’t be 100% sure, I suspect they were trumpet / trombone playing Bobby Patrick himself and saxophonist Alex Young. As a result, I understand Mike Hart in particular was very taken with what could be added to the Roadrunners sound. So, once the group were back in Liverpool he started making the case for a horn section to be added. Enter Johnny Phillips.

Over the years, I have made various enquires, without much success, as to Johnny Phillips antecedents and what happened to him after he left the Roadrunners. Next to nothing is known about him other than the basic of information.

According to founding Roadrunners member and drummer Dave Boyce, Johnny Phillips hailed from South Carolina and was classically taught in playing various reed instruments from an early age. Dave Boyce is quoted as saying “It was the superior musicianship of this seventeen-year old from South Carolina which gave the second incarnation of the Roadrunners its much tighter and more arranged feel. Before I met Johnny Phillips, I didn't know what a syncopated triplet was!”

How exactly a then supposedly 17-year old Johnny Phillips got to Liverpool nobody knows for sure, the myth is that from the other side of the Atlantic he somehow got to hear what was happening on the Liverpool music scene, hopped on a boat and either paid, worked, played or stowawayed his passage across the ‘pond’ to Liverpool’s Pier Head. Seeing as Americans have the reputation of being a generally resourceful and adventurous breed it would be a wonderful story if it were true – but nobody knows for sure if that is indeed what happened. What is known is that sometime during February 1964 Johnny Phillips turned up in Liverpool not knowing a living sole. After asking around he found his way to the Cavern with saxophone case in hand one evening, went down the stairs and descended into the dungeon - and I bet it was a culture shock for him as well.

Playing that night at the Cavern were the Roadrunners. Who, having recently returned from Hamburg, were getting an increasing number of bookings there in light of the Beatles having moved on and shortly to explode all over the US. During an interval the young American approached the group and asked if he could sit in with them for a few numbers. I understand that initially there was a reluctance to let him take the stage but when he began talking at length the group became gradually intrigued with his Southern American accent. One thing led to another until it was eventually agreed to let him have a blow and see what happens. After a couple of numbers they knew he was the goods he said he was.

Being ex-students themselves, the Roadrunners soon fixed Johnny Phillips up with cheap student-type accommodation and duly put in some extra rehearsal time. With the arrival of Johnny Phillips founding Roadrunners member and lead guitarist Dave Percy felt it the right time to make his exit and left the group. Shortly thereafter, at a party following some university gig, the group stumbled across another sax player by the name of Nick Carver. After trying him out it was decided to invite Nick Carver to join the group to play alongside Johnny Phillips because while they were more than happy with the contribution of Phillips, it was felt they better have some ‘insurance’ just in case he got homesick and suddenly decided to go back to the States. There was also the matter of Johnny Phillips legal status as a US citizen in Britain without a work permit having originally entered as a visitor.

For some reason only known to himself, Nick Carver liked to be known as Nick la Grec which from the French translates as Nick the Greek. At the time “Nick the Greek” was the derogatory name Prince Phillip, the Greek born husband of Queen Elizabeth II, was colloquially known as following his marriage to then Princess Elizabeth who was still to be Queen. I know this because that’s what my father was want to call Prince Phillip from time to time.

And, so for a brief spell came about what is still considered by many in Liverpool (me included) to be best Roadrunners line-up comprising of Mike Hart, Pete Mackey, John Peacock, Dave Boyce, Nick Carver and Johnny Phillips.

Brief time indeed it was, because come August 1964 the group loaded up and went off to Hamburg for a second stint at the Star Club. Johnny Phillips must have liked what he saw and experienced in Hamburg because he made it known to the rest of the Roadrunners that he would not be returning with them to Liverpool on completion of the engagement. Which when I stop and think about it doesn’t really surprise me. After all, he’d been and seen Liverpool and travelled a great distance to do it. As an American, he didn’t have any family or emotional ties to the city. It was time for him to move on. Also looming large was the question of him re-entering the UK without a work permit – his welcome on British shores may have been wearing a bit thin.

After saying their farewells, Johnny Phillips linked up with another group from Liverpool who were newly playing Hamburg – the Eyes. Featuring Paddy Chambers (Guitar / Vocals) … John Frankland (Guitar) … Lewis Collins (Bass) … and Gibson Kemp (Drums). Unfortunately, the union only lasted for a short duration. John Frankland and Lewis Collins returning to Liverpool while Paddy Chambers and Gibson Kemp recruited Klaus Voorman (having by now learned to play a reasonably competent Stu Sutcliffe bass) and as a trio stayed on in Hamburg for some time as Paddy, Klaus and Gibson.

That’s were Johnny Phillips disappears, some say he was seen playing for a spell in the orchestra of German big-band leader Bert Kaempfert. Which wouldn’t surprise me because he could read a musical score.

However, he did pop up again in of all places Las Vegas, Nevada where for a while (1970 – 1971) he was one of the five sax players in the twenty five-piece hard / brass rock big band that was Jeff Sturges and Universe (featuring Dean Parks on lead guitar). If any name rings a bell, the other four sax players along with Johnny Phillips were Archie Wheeler, Burt Esterman Don Menza and Gary Freyman. I’ve since found out that many of those who made up the Universe – including Jeff Sturges himself – were former graduates of the One O’Clock Lab Band, the premier ensemble of the Jazz Studies Division at the University of North Texas College of Music in Denton, Texas. However, I can find no evidence that Johnny Phillips was one of them.

Jeff Sturges, who did all the musical arranging / conducting, and Universe, who did all the playing, stayed together just long enough to do one album unimaginably called “Jeff Sturges and Universe” recorded live in front of an audience at Caesar’s Palace, Las Vegas.

If anyone out there remembers seeing either Tom Jones or Englebert Humperdinck performing live on stage at Las Vegas during the 70s and 80s then likely it was Jeff Sturges doing the musical arrangements as well as pulling together the ensemble musicians and conducting them for Messrs Jones and Humperdinck’s performances - perhaps Johnny Phillips was one of those musicians, who knows!

The ROADRUNNERS – Liverpool’s First R&B Group - The Star Club Sessions
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Re: The American Roadrunner

Post by hamilton_square »

Since I wrote the above, I’ve been digging into Hope Hall, the Liverpool venue where the Roadrunners were, at one time, permanent fixtures and I realise I made a factual mistake.
I incorrectly wrote:Before February 64 the Roadrunners line-up didn’t feature any instruments that had to be either sucked or blown - that is with the exception of Mike Hart’s occasional harmonica playing.
Apparently this is wrong, while I can only ever recall seeing Mike Hart playing a guitar and occasional harmonica. I have since seen photographs (like the one below) of him playing a saxophone at a early Roadrunners gig in Hope Hall. Perhaps that’s what endeared Johnny Phillips to him.
Mike Hart and Sax.JPG
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Re: The American Roadrunner

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Peter, I always love it when new historical details emerge that change our view of the way things were. Thanks for the update in this detective hunt as we unearth "band life" as it was in the early days.
Life, as with music, often requires one to let go of the melody and listen to the rhythm

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Re: The American Roadrunner

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Peter, your welcome and thanks for the feedback.

Before the make-over of Hope Hall (referred to in below the Mersey Beat news item of the week 8th – 15th May 1964) whenever we came across - or should I say under - the river, which was usually Fridays and Saturdays, we never went to the ‘old’ Hope Hall. Rightly or wrongly, it had the reputation of being a bit ‘studenty’ and pretentious for our working-class Birkenhead tastes. However, once they did Hope Hall up and out-of-curiosity, I remember we made a few visits to the place. It still had that whiff of we-are-different-from-the-lower-orders smell about the place but, nevertheless it was OK, albeit in small doses for our sensitive cross-river nostrils.
Hope Hall.JPG
This is when for a short while I got to watch the Roadrunners’ two-sax line-up of Phillips and Carver. Prior to 1964 the group really wasn’t on my radar. Yes, for sure I’d heard of them but they didn’t really tick any of my musical boxes at the time. With those two sax’s in the line-up and a set list that featured several numbers that weren’t the usual Liverpool group material of the time, the Roadrunners were something of a different diet than I’d been used to. While I was aware at the time that Johnny Phillips wasn’t a Liverpool lad, I didn’t get to know his story until a great deal later.

Also, in the Mersey Beat clipping there’s an advert for forthcoming gigs at MJs – otherwise know as the Majestic Ballroom, Birkenhead. That was our stamping ground, especially Thursday nights. Seen featured in the advert are the Dennisons and the Undertakers - that was the kind of ‘Mersey Beat’ sound I’d been accustomed to hearing.
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Re: The American Roadrunner

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Out-of-the-blue I got an electronic communication from Dave Boyce (the Roadrunners drummer) that went as follows:

"Hiya, Johnny [Philips] was from SOUTH Carolina, studied at The Berklee College of Music in Massachusetts. The story he told me was that he sold a clarinet, bought a one way ticket to Liverpool (NY or Boston not sure). Showed up at the Cavern because he was obsessed with The Beatles! He was the goods and we had an upcoming season at The Star Club i.e. regular money. He also told us that he had played back up for "Danny and The Juniors". Impressive but who cared when he could blow like that! When he met Nick Carver at an after gig party in Oxford they blew together and the new line up of The Roadrunners was on. Didn't want to lose Dave Percy [lead guitar] but The Star Club would only pay for a six piece. By this time Mike Hart wanted a Big Band a la James Brown, it's why the band fell apart because despite a series of horn players we couldn't afford to keep the band on the road. Mike Hart was his own worst enemy as he kept walking out of management and recording deals. When I left we were under contract to Philips Fontana and were offered session men back up including Jimmy Page on guitar. Mike Hart wouldn't have any of it! Goodbye "The Roadrunners" Sad, Dave Boyce."

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Dave Boyce put me right because I was incorrectly under the impression that Johnny Philips hailed from NORTH Carolina.

Also once across the pond, I wasn’t sure if Johnny Philips had initially docked elsewhere in the UK and then travelled to Liverpool. Dave Boyce seems to imply that Johnny Philips sailed direct from either New York or Boston to Liverpool.

I heard the story that when Johnny Philips landed / arrived in the city he immediately began asking directions how to get to the Cavern because, at the time, that was the only Liverpool club he had ever heard of. Fortunately for him, the Roadrunners were playing there that night and he managed to talk them into letting him sit-in for a couple of numbers.

Didn’t know that Dave Percy was left behind in Liverpool because the Star Club would only pay for a six-piece during the Roadrunners second stint in Hamburg.

Dave Boyce confirms what I’d heard about the increasing disruptive antics of front-man Mike Hart that ultimately led to the Roadrunners calling it day in 1966.
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