IT'S not often the title of a record you've made comes back and, as it were, stares you in the face and says, "You see? I'm not just a collection of words. I'm what's happening now!"
     I mean, when we made No Milk Today we didn't give up drinking milk. The very reverse as far as I was concerned. I was drinking it like mad - in my perpetual effort to put on weight (of which, as they say, more later).
     But with A Kind of Hush it's different. This title really has been working out for me. And it's been great
     Because immediately after our last trip across (when we had a ball working with tremendous people like DEAN MARTIN on his show, and JIMMY DURANTE and ROCHESTER and NOEL HARRISON and all that great crowd on The Go Show) there was a kind of hush. Because I'd nothing important to do until the start of Mrs. Brown You've Got A Lovely Daughter (our new picture) in May.
     So what did I do? Got right away from it all for a bit. Off to the wilds of Ireland. To Galway Bay, in fact. Of which they wrote that song. Remember? 'If you ever go across the sea to Ireland....'
     Well, that's what I did - though I hardly saw the sea, we were so high up in the place. Not until I got to Galway Bay on the Atlantic coast and thought, 'What a contrast! One minute the mad rush of New York TV; the next, miles and miles of wild countryside that's looked exactly the same for thousands of years. And not an aerial in sight!
     A couple of weeks horse-riding and drinking the native brew - draught Guinness (not the bottled kind, but the stuff that comes straight from the barrel in the marvelous little off-beat Irish pubs they call shebeens). In my everlasting ambition to put on weight.
     And I have! About a stone (14 lbs.) since probably the last time you glimpsed me. And given up cigarettes too! What about that? But the only snag is - I'm all the time ravenously hungry. And now they're telling me next thing I know, I'll be trying to lose weight! Ah well; maybe it's true what they say. You can't win!
     Anyway, back from Ireland and home to my new house in the south of England while they sorted out shooting schedules for the new picture. And here again I've been living like a true Hermit (but with my father and mother!) Just watching the flowers come out and the squirrels romping up and down the trees - and trying to persuade the moles to stop building castles on the lawn!
     Then in the evenings, down to what we call over here "the local" - the local pub - to chat and play darts with the farmers and the blacksmith and other nice "normal" people - as opposed to us lot!
     I told you I'd been made a member of the local's darts team, didn't I? Well, we had a championship match the other night - and we lost! There are ten of us in the team and we each have to play three games against a member of the other team. Whoever wins two of them is (you've guessed!) the winner.
     Well, I managed to win my game. But not so my mates. So I had the pleasure (?) of presenting the Cup to our rivals.
     Actually, our rivals were from the local hospital, so I didn't really feel so bad about it. And - come to think of it - maybe the boys on my side half wanted the hospital to win! Could be. . .
     But now the "simple life" is over. It's goodbye to Peter Noone, the darts player, man of leisure, and hello again to Herman. Because we're now caught up in the throes of filming. And here's a laugh. Guess the parts we've got to play!
     We're just a group appearing as a group, but what they call "just normal everyday people"! I'm playing a fellow who works in an advertising agency, KARL GREEN is a road digger. BARRY WHITWAM is in a steel foundry. KEITH HOPWOOD is a telephone engineer. And LEK LECKENBY works in a jelly factory.
     Try and work out the plot from that! Because I'm certainly not going to spoil it all by telling you in advance!
     Music? Well, a lot of different writers are working on that still. Including young GRAHAM GOULDMAN. He's the one who wrote our very successful Listen People as well as No Milk Today - which was inspired by seeing a note on a friend's doorstep saying just that!
     And just to show how "with it" everybody concerned with the picture is, the guy writing the script is the same guy who wrote our song, Mrs. Brown You've Got A Lovely Daughter, Trevor Peacock. He's done a lot of pop music television shows.
     So that's all right. But I'm still meaning to ask him how come he took a look at HERMAN'S HERMITS and saw us as a collection of road diggers and advertising agents and jelly makers. . .
     Oh, hello Trevor! Have you got a minute. . .?

Herman with his famous friends. Left to right: Paul Revere, Desi, Billy, Herman and Dino

"It's always been my ambition to put on weight. And guess what? I've put on over fourteen pounds."

"And I've given up smoking cigarettes too.
What about that!"

"The only snag now is that all the time, I'm ravenously hungry."

"Now they're telling me I'm getting too fat!"

"They think I ought to go on a diet.
Really, you just can't win!"