Greyhound

The roots of Greyhound can be traced back to the 1960s when drummer, Danny Bowen Smith formed the first incarnation of the band that featured singer Alfred Peters aka Freddie Notes, keyboard player Sonny Binns, Errol Denvers on lead guitar and bassist Trevor Ardley White. 

By the close of the sixties, the group were regularly recording for a number of British-based Jamaican music specialist record companies, most notably Pama, Melodisc and Trojan, working either incognito or as the featured act for a variety of London-based producers, whose number included Joe Mansano, Graeme Goodall,Robert Thompson (aka Dandy) and Joe Sinclair.

Significant singles from this period include ‘Blues’, ‘Guns Of Navarone’, ‘Chicken Inn’, ‘The Bull’, ‘Down On The Farm’, ‘Babylon’ and a version of Creedence Clearwater Revival’s‘It Came Out Of the Sky’, although it was theircover of Bobby Bloom’s hit, ‘Montego Bay’ that brought them to the attention to the record buying public at large, with the disc spending two weeks in October 1970 at the lower end of the UK Top 50.

During this time, Freddie Notes & the Rudies’ also saw the release of two Trojan albums dedicated to their works, ‘Unity’ (TBL 109) and ‘Montego Bay’ (TBL 152), but by the close of 1970, Freddie had decided to go solo, leaving the group in need of a new front man.

Carl Douglas, now best known for his international hit, ‘Kung Fu Fighting’, provided a temporary replacement, joining them on a fine version of Clarence Carter‘s ‘Patches’, but soon after he returned to session work for Pye, as well as working with fledgling British funk group, Gonzales.

In May, the Rudies’ were hired to play at the wedding reception of Mick Jagger and Bianca Perez Marena De Macia in St Tropez, as later related in Rolling Stone magazine:

‘At the slightly seedy Cafe des Arts, where the reception was held, a local band opened the show and flopped. Next came the Rudies, a thumping reggae group big in their own scene in Britain. They lifted up plenty of souls ready for a set by Terry Reid and band‘.  

By now, Glenroy Oakley had joined the group, who decided to mark the new line-up with a change of name, initially opting for the Tillermen before settling upon the more familiar Greyhound.

Soon after, the newly titled outfit began working with Trojan plugger-turned-producer, Dave Bloxham and promptly hit the big time. In June 1971, Greyhound scored a Top 10 hit with ‘Black And White’, a clarion call for and end to bigotry that peaked at number six in the UK pop chart.

Unfortunately, the follow-up, ‘Follow The Leader’ failed to crossover, but convinced of their hit-making potential, Trojan released a blank pre-release a 4-track E.P. comprising ‘High And Dry’, ‘Love Is Blue/I Can Sing A Rainbow’, ‘Peace And Love’ and a version of the Henry Mancini-penned ‘Moon River’, which was distributed to the movers and shakers in the music business.

The ‘in crowd’ favoured ‘Moon River’, their feedback resulting in the release of a maxi single that featured the recording alongside ‘I’ve Been Trying’ and a foretaste of roots and culture with ‘The Pressure Is Coming On’. The group also embarked on a UK tour to promote their debut album, suitably entitled ‘Black And White’ (TRL 27) and in January 1972, saw ‘Moon River’ enter the UK Top 20, where it peaked at number 12.

Greyhound’s final pop hit, ‘I Am What I Am’, was a plea for recognition in a white dominated society, which made it to 20 in March of ’72. This was followed by a cover of Paul Simon’s‘Mother And Child Reunion’, followed by an equally noteworthy version of William Bell’s‘Lonely For Your Love’, with both discs combining the group’s talents with label-mates, the Pioneers ‘ a union briefly known as the Uniques.

Around this time, Trojan also issued Greyhound‘s ‘Floating’ b/w ‘I Troubles’, a single that sadly failed and marked the end of their relationship with the company.

It didn’t take long for the group’s manager and producer Dave Bloxham to secured a deal with Island Records, which towards the close of 1972 issued the excellent, if ultimately unsuccessful version of Bobby Darin‘s ‘Dream Lover’ c/w ‘Wappadusa’ on the company’s Blue Mountain subsidiary.

Early the following year, Greyhounds’s second Blue Mountain 7″ single saw issue, but after ‘Only Love Can Win’ c/w ‘Jamaica Rum’ also failed to illicit much interest, they briefly moved on to Derek Lawrence‘s indie label, Retreat, which in August released their next 45, ‘Wily’ c/w ‘The Circle’.

By the following year, it was all over for the group. Sonny Binns joined the Cimarons, while the remaining members re-emerged in the line-up of Dansak, a seven-piece band that performed to critical acclaim across the UK in 1974 as part of the Jimmy Cliff Extravaganza Tour , which also featured Dave Barker. This was followed by studio sessions, having notably accompanied the late lamented Freddie McKay on his Trojan release, ‘Help Me’.

In 1975 their erstwhile colleague, Sonny Binns, enrolled the group to play on his productions released through Trojan’s Horse subsidiary, with the sessions resulting in two notable singles:  ‘Sounds Of A Good Song’ and ‘How Could You Do This’, performed by Clinton Taylor and Nora Dean, respectively.

That same year, Transatlantic Records issued ‘Mango Rock’, a compilation of Dave Bloxham-produced Greyhound sides that had been cut two years earlier during the group’s sojourn with Island. With the group members long since having gone their separate ways, unsurprisingly, the LP failed to sell and little was heard of the group individually or collectively until 1999, when Trojan reissued ‘Black And White’ (CDTRL 419), with bonus tracks from their sessions for the company.

The re-release inspired the producers of the BBC TV series, ‘Never Mind The Buzzcocks’ to invite Glenroy Oakley to appear in a ‘spot the celebrity line-up’, his appearance leading to the singer re-forming the group as Glenroy Oakley & the Greyhound, which promptly began touring on the revival circuit.

Stephen Nye