I picked this photo and blurb up this AM from Soul Source. I hadn't seen this before and thought I'd share:Otis promoting one of the venues on the 1967 Stax/Volt tour - Billy Walker's Upper Cut club in East London.The tour took in the U.K./France and Scandinavia and brought most of those artists over here for the first time.Pretty much all the venues were on the theatre circuit - I guess this that this was the only performance in a club environment.
Anyone who was around at the time will remember Billy Walker as one of the iconic British boxers of the 1960's. A good looking guy - they called him the Blond Bomber. He was on the fringes of the Swinging 60's/Mod scene along with other sports stars like George Best and Bobby Moore. The pinnacle of his boxing career was fighting Henry Cooper for the British heavyweight title - but he was beaten on a TKO.
Where exactly was The Uppercut?
ReplyDeleteI played there with booker t and the m gs and with hedrix in a group called the avalons would lov to find a poster of that ,,my wife danced up in the cage hanging from the cieling
ReplyDeleteThe Uppercut was in a cul-de-sac just off the Woodgrange Road - turn right if coming from the direction of Forest Gate Station just before Percy Ingels Bakery (which is still there!) Tried to get in the club once when I was 14 and got told to F**k off Boy! We used to go to the Ilford Palais on Saturdays and listen to Blue Beat, Ska, early Reggay and Soul (and meet girls!) A few years later we used to go to the Lotus club above the furniture store on the other side of Woodgrange Road opposite the cul-de-sac. I have loads of other memories of East End pubs & clubs but far too many to go into here, perhaps I should write my memoirs.
ReplyDeleteP.S. My Nan used to own the smallest pub in the East End called The Hope (now the Chevy Chaise) opposite Maryland Station and then the Railway Tavern off Stratford Broadway.