LEFT to RIGHT: Karl Green, Derek Leckenby, Herman, Barry Whitwam, Keith Hopwood
 THERE is something slightly suspicious about a singer who knows the strength of his own worth and swings on it. Great artists rarely evaluate their appeal - they are too concerned with the immediate job of entertaining their audience to worry about their image. They are too personally involved for self-appraisal. Then again, to be sixteen and know exactly what sells you on stage is an advantage from a commercial point of view. It is Herman Noone's advantage to know it. When he is leading Herman's Hermits on a stage show, the young actor-singer follows this formula: "I make myself look as young as possible and all the girls in the audience go 'aahh, isn't he nice' . . . that's the only thing I work on when we're doing a show. "No, we don't wear sackcloth and that - just nice ordinary stage suits." The Hermits - jumping up the MM pop fifty with "I'm Into Something Good" - are a Manchester group, who have been playing individually for about two years and in their present line-up for three months. The Hermits are all seventeen - Lek Leckenby (lead guitar), Barry Whitwam (drums), Karl Green (bass guitar), and Keith Hopwood (rhythm guitar). Origin of the name? "We all used to watch an American cartoon show called 'Bullwinkle' and there was a character on it - 'Sherman' his name was. He looked like me, so the boys said, and as we thought the name was 'Herman', I became him. |
"'Hermits' was just a follow-on from the first name - it was obvious, really." The group were discovered by invitation. Their manager sent a message to well-known recording manager Mickie Most to go to Manchester and hear them. Impressed, he returned to London, returned the invitation to his studios and "I'm Into Something Good" was the hit-making result. "This weekend we're down again to do a Goffin-King composition - perhaps for the next record," said Herman. "The group's sound is styled on the American surfing sound, which we all like very much, and we intend to do more of the surfing type numbers. "On the stage, we do loads of pop numbers, a bit of rock, some out-of-the-way numbers like Ernie K. Doe's 'Mother-in-law', Tom Courtenay's song, 'Mrs. Brown You've Got A Lovely Daughter', 'The Wedding', which goes down very well, and some R&B sort of stuff." Where did Herman see Britain's pop music scene in the future? "It's just going to go off with a big pop," he answered promptly. "There are more recording managers, more groups and more records than ever. I don't know when it will happen, or how it will happen, but one of these days - it could be tomorrow when you come to think about it - it's all going to slow down. "What'll come next I don't know - I hope it's our sound! One of our ambitions is to be able to say 'we started that craze' - it would be great to be the first in with a new thing." By the way, if you don't know by now, Herman Noone is a face you'll recognise. He was an ItV "Coronation Street" regular as Stan Fairclough, has appeared in other TV shows, and can always return to acting if the music scene goes "pop" as he believes it might. Then you'll have to get used to Herman, alias Stan, changing his names a few more times. |