Pop stars

 Hi there

When I was a young teen, in the 1960's, my friends and I decided to try to get the autograph, or at the very least, see every overseas pop singer to visit New Zealand.  I've already mentioned how I climbed about half a dozen stories up a hotel's fire escape to see Cliff Richard.  Well, I did the  limbo (and fell flat on my back) in front of Chubby Checker.  I asked  singer/actor Adam Faith to marry me (it was that day in February when it's allowed for a woman to propose).

I was front row behind the wire netting as The Beatles got off their plane at the airport, but the five hour wait had been worth it because I got a special wave from George Harrison.  Years later I wrote a story entitled "The Day I Saw The Beatles" for The School Journal.  And got paid for it.

I tried unsuccessfully to rip a button off Bobby Rydell's coat during the riot of his arrival at Wellington Airport and, with a friend, got backstage to Helen Shapiro by presenting her with a charm for her bracelet. 

Gerry, from Gerry and The Pacemakers, gave me his autograph earlier in the day, but when he saw me later at the Town Hall stage door, muttered "Not you again".  Gene Pitney kindly spoke into my new mini tape recorder.

The father/manager/uncle of The Beach Boys asked a crowd of fans hovering around his boys to send him future information about NZ record sales. I was the only one who did so, with clippings and reviews. In exchange he sent me autographed photos.  And records. And a lovely letter.

There were many others....

But then lots of flash-in-the-pan singers began coming in a steady stream to New Zealand, here today and gone tomorrow celebs.  Show-biz entrepreneurs, like Harry M. Miller, were grabbing the opportunity to bring such performers to the country while they were hot.  After a time, however, my friends and I got tired of all the strategising, and conniving, and phoning hotels pretending to be reporters to get a star's arrival time.... 

"We're through with all this," we decided.  It wasn't worth the effort any more to run after the soon-to-be-has-beens, the one-hit wonders.

A music group, one of the many so-called British Invasion groups, was coming over from England.  But my friends and I had made the decision to stop the chase ......

...so we never turned out to see The Rolling Stones.

Sixties pop singers

Hi there

When I was  teenager I used to chase after pop singers who visited New Zealand.  Nowadays, of course, fans probably want a lot more than autographs from a star, but we were quite naive in the nineteen-sixties.

Airports, concerts, hotels - my friends and I always managed to find ways to get to the singers.  To meet  Britain's king of rock'n'roll - Cliff Richard, surprised you there, huh? -  we climbed seven stories up the outside fire escape of Wellington's Hotel St George.  We bought a charm for Helen Shapiro's bracelet and that got us in to see her.  By ringing up the local paper and pretending to be who we weren't, we found out plane arrival times.

I won Tom Jones and Herman's Hermits in a contest.  After meeting The Beach Boys, I sent their father information about how the boys were doing on the NZ music charts and he sent me records and autographed photos as a way of thanks.  Gerry Marsden from Gerry and the Pacemakers saw me for about the third time in one day and rudely muttered, "Oh, no, not you again..."

Sadly, the time came when I made the decision that I was too old to hunt down singers.

I vowed to be "finished with all that", that the very next music act that came to New Zealand would not have me chasing after it for autographs.  I was tired of so many flash-in-the-pan groups that within a short time usually  disappeared without trace.

I told my friends, "I'm not going to run after this new group, The Rolling Stones -"

And I didn't.  And I've regretted it ever since...