The Vamps: Australia’s first all-female rock group

 The Vamps, promotional shot, 1968. Collection: Australian War Memorial. 

Left to right (rear): Joy Carrol, Carol Middlemiss, Julie Hibberd, Denise Cooper and Margaret Britt. 

Front: Margaret Britt. Photograph: Parisian Studios, Bondi Junction.

http://cas.awm.gov.au/photograph/P02538.001

Wild Girls for hire

In the December 1965 edition of OZ magazine, Sydney, edited by Richard Neville and Richard Walsh and featuring the art of Martin Sharp, the following brief advertisement appeared on page 4, under the classified ads section:

 

This rather provocative and inviting notice - put together by Richard Neville and Paul Landa - in an equally provocative magazine, laid it out clearly for all to see - the Vamps were an exciting act and, most notably, the first female rock group in Australia. This is a claim which has never been disputed, and it was made a decade before that most famous of female rock groups - The Runaways from the United States - made their mark on the charts and in live performance around the world. Groups such as the Vamps were pioneers in an area of entertainment which was the domain of male musicians, and remains very much so to this day. 

As "wild girls for hire" the Vamps were reflecting the rebellious spirit of the time and the attraction of youth to popular music as a form of self-expression. By 1966 the counter cultural revolutions sweeping through western societies such as the United States, Great Britain and Australia had well and truly hit the up-until-then dour and conservative Sydney. The wild scenes associated with the Beatles Australian tour of 1964 and the Rolling Stones the following year had opened a veritable Pandora's Box amongst the youth of the country. For decades they were constrained by the conservatism and class-based snobbishness inherent in Australia's position as a subservient outpost of the British Empire. Rock and roll music, and its various offshoots, offered them an out.

The Vamps were a reflection of the post-Menzies era as the sexual revolution and psychedelia took over metropolitan centres such as Sydney and Melbourne (the elderly and old-school conservative Robert Menzies resigned as Prime Minister on Australia Day, 26 January 1966, after being in office since 19 December 1949). Local record companies proliferated and released singles by bands such as Reverend Black and the Rocking Vickers and Billy Thorpe and the Aztecs, whilst the Easybeats headed to England seeking fame and fortune. Hippies appeared on the scene, drug use increased, protest against the status quo featured in the daily papers, and OZ magazine - a flagship of the counter-culture in Australia - became even more outrageous, with the editors twice charged with issuing an obscene publication. Such was the opposition to change by authority, including government, the police and the church. Billy Thorpe grew his hair, criticism of the war in Vietnam became more intense and spread across university campuses, and the music scene rapidly evolved from the rebellious rock and roll of the late fifties and early sixties into decidedly more bluesy, rocky and sophisticated forms. The Vamps were definitely not Little Pattie, though in 1965 and 1966 her sweet, saccharine "stompie wompie" pop and the like reigned supreme on pop television shows such as Bandstand and in the Australian charts, even if the youth of the suburbs of Sydney, Melbourne and other capital cities and metropolitan areas were listening to less mainstream music amidst a haze of alcohol and pot. The times were a changing, and something was indeed blowin' in the wind, to use the words of that great messiah of the sixties, Bob Dylan. The Vamps were out there to have a good time and entertain. "Wild girls for hire" was a statement of fact.

Female groups had been around for a long time, though usually in the form of vocal combinations such as the 1940s Andrews Sisters and so-called "girl groups" from the late fifties, including The Shirelles. The earliest female rock group - where the members played all their own instruments - was the American Goldie and the Gingerbreads, formed in 1962 and working through to 1967. They were quickly following by a plethora of similar groups, no doubt inspired by the success of The Beatles. Suzi Quatro and her sisters' The Pleasure Seekers from 1964 were a notable example. By the end of 1965 over forty such groups were performing around the world, according to the All-Female Bands of the 1960s website. These included The Fair Sect from New Zealand and the Vamps. Wikipedia at the beginning of 2014 listed 16 Australian female rock groups, and the Vamps were not included. The band gets a brief mention in Ian McFarlane's 1999 Encyclopedia of Australian Rock and Pop, as one of over 850 entries. They have been cited in a couple of Australian music chat groups (e.g. Midoztouch 9 March 2012; Rock n Roll Scars, 9 April 2013), all of which seek substantive information on the band. A photograph of the 5-piece line-up from 1965 was included in

James Cockington's Mondo Weirdo: Australia in the Sixties though without any detailed information (1992). Because they never released a record in Australia, and no live footage has surfaced to date – though the band made numerous television appearances in Australia and overseas during the 1960s - the Vamps are little known and their history is largely unrecorded. A single gig poster was exhibited in the Real Wild Child exhibition at the Powerhouse Museum, Sydney, in 1994, and a few promotional stills have surfaced on the internet. One undated image shows the Vamps as a 3-piece band, when in fact the drummer has been excised. The following account aims to restore the Vamps to the annals of Australian rock and pop music from the 1960s and 1970s. Apart from being the first all-female rock group, they were also one of the earliest Australian bands to tour extensively outside of the country, spending a substantial period in South East Asia, the Pacific Islands and America. This account is based on limited published and internet sources, and a collection of scrapbooks held by Margaret Britt, along with interviews recorded with Britt and other band members during 2014.

Margaret Britt and pre-Vamps

Margaret Britt, lead guitarist and founder of the Vamps, had been performing since the age of 3, but not as a musician. Her parents trained horses and she grew up travelling the agricultural show circuit from her home base of Orange, in western New South Wales. Margaret won prizes at events such as the Sydney Royal Easter Show and horses remain one of her passions. The other passion is music.

In 1956 Margaret Britt heard Bill Hayley’s Rock Around The Clock and from that moment on felt she was on a mission to play and perform. Initially Margaret and her brother shared a guitar, but eventually she secured her own and began to pick up tunes by ear. In 1959 she started playing in hotels around Orange, despite being under age at the time of these first forays into the professional music scene. However her talent was prodigious and she quickly acquired the ability to perform instrumentals on the guitar. These she performed in local hotels and later on the show circuit with her first bands.

Her playing was assisted by the purchased in 1962 of a white Gibson Les Paul solid body guitar from Dave Bridge, former lead guitarist of early Australian rock and roll band Col Joy and the Joy Boys, and later of the Dave Bridge Quartet (1961-64). The cover the magazine Teenagers' Weekly for 29 November 1961 features a picture of Bridge holding the guitar. It was used by Britt during her time with the Vamps up until 1969 when it was exchanged for a Fender. She eventually returned to a Gibson and plays one to this day.

Dave Bridge Quartet, Teenagers' Weekly, 29 November 1961. 

In 1963 Britt went on the showground circuit with that guitar. Her band comprised Rodney "Rude" Keft (vocals, guitar), Gus and a drummer who later married the Bee Gees sister, Lesley. They toured during 1963/4 throughout northern New South Wales ("the northern run" as Britt called it). Upon Showgrounds offering her a tour of New Zealand, Britt took up the opportunity and quickly followed it with two additional tours. Early in 1965, whilst in New Zealand, she decided to form the first Australian all-girl rock group. She called them the Vamps and played under that name, or variants, through to 1977 when, upon the advice of a local record producer, Vamps was dropped and replaced by Peaches.

The Vamps

The Vamps were put together by Margaret Britt in Sydney around April 1965. The initial 4-piece incarnation included Margaret Britt (lead guitar), Kaye Gazzard (drums), Judy Owen (rhythm) and Wendy Walton (bass). Gazzard had been with Britt in her previous band and was on one of her three New Zealand tours. She transferred from vocals to the drums for the Vamps.

Following their formation the band rehearsed for 6 weeks prior to an inaugural concert at the AMOCO Community Centre, Orange, in June 1965. It was a sellout, with a crowd of 2,030 in attendance - a record for the venue. Britt noted that, whilst "musically it left a lot to the imagination", in all other respects it was a great success. The venue regularly held concerts under the banner Stomp City, with all the major Australian rock and pop acts of the sixties performing there. On the night the Vamps performed instrumentals, and Gazzard has noted the amazement of the audience at the time that women could play rock and roll.

Following the Stomp City gig the band returned to Sydney to perform at Miller’s Hotel Blacktown and at a number of venues around town. For this they got on board a young, blonde 16 year old singer whose stage name was Babs King. Around this time the band also performed Twist and Shout - a song made famous by the Beatles - on the Don Lane television show. This was the first of many such television appearances by the Vamps.

At one stage Richard Neville of OZ magazine fame considered managing the band and got the band a gig at Maroubra. In the December 1965 OZ magazine advertisement, the band contacts were given as Marsha Rowe, then working as secretary at OZ, and Paul Landa, who may have been the Sydney solicitor of that name who subsequently became a politician and minister in the New South Wales Labor government (1973-1984). A contract was drawn up but never followed through and Neville left Australia the following February.

The Vamps, 1965. Reproduced in Mondo Weirdo (1992), p.120. Left to right: Babs King, Judy Owen, Kaye Gazzard, Wendy Walton and Margaret Britt.

According to Britt, "Originally, when the very first Vamps came out, that was in the days of the Shadows and the instrumentals. We did so many instrumentals. I pushed everyone else I could to the microphone. And little Babs came in and sang all the vocals – she was blonde and looked a bit like Little Pattie. She only stayed for a little while and we were on the Millers circuit. Babs had to leave the band because she was under age and someone reported us."

This line-up of the Vamps played through to the beginning of 1966 at which point various members left. In February 1966 Britt put together a new line-up that included Jan Little (drums), Merlene Ryder (rhythm guitar and saxophone, cousin of Margaret Britt), Lisa-Kay James (bass guitar and organ, cousin of Margaret Britt), Margaret Britt (lead guitar, bass guitar, organ, harmonica) and

Elaine Nielsen (organ, vocals). This band undertook an extensive tour of the show circuit in Queensland and, at the end of the year, played a number of weeks in Brisbane. Nielsen left in September and was replaced on vocals by Denise Cooper. Whilst in Brisbane the Vamps performed at Cloudland, The Cave, Storey Bridge Hotel and the Lands Office Hotel, to name a few. They also appeared on the IN television show, performing House of the Rising Sun and Hanky Panky. At the end of the year they returned to Sydney and played through to January of 1967 when they undertook a residency at the Sound Lounge in St. Kilda. A number of members decided to leave at this stage so Britt got together a new line-up. According to the Amoeblog website listing of All-Female Bands of the 1960s, band members at the time included: Margaret Britt (lead guitar), Linda Cable (vocals, bass guitar), ex Grown Up Wrong and later The Pussycats, Terri Scott (rhythm guitar and vocals), also later of The Pussycats with Linda Cable, and Marilyn Ockwell (drums), also later of The Pussycats. Marilyn Ockwell is not included in the photograph on the Amoeblog website, and all the guitars shown were owned by Margaret Britt. This version of the Vamps did a number of gigs and television shows in Melbourne before heading off to Sydney where they performed on the Millers circuit, under Showgroup management.

In July Britt decided to change the band line-up and placed an advertisement in the Sydney Herald newspaper for new band members. She quickly secured three replacements, and they gelled musically from the time of the first rehearsal. The new Vamps started the following Monday night after Cable and the others left. Band members included in this July 1967 incarnation of the Vamps included Margaret Britt (lead guitar, harmonica, bass, vocals), Julie Hibberd (keyboards and vocals), Valerie Fallon (rhythm guitar, bass and vocals), Carol Middlemiss (drums, vocals) and Denise Cooper (vocals).

Millers at Parramatta was a rough pub. During an early Vamps gig a fight broke out amongst the audience and one of those involved bit the ear off another man. As he spat it out, the bloodied ear landed on Julie Hibberd's keyboard. Needless to say she was horrified and nearly fainted. On such occasions Britt would tell the band members to "keep on playing, but faster". This episode brings to mind that famous Rawhide scene out of the Blues Brothers movie, where Jake and Elwood face an initially hostile crowd, before eventually winning them over. In regards to the type of music they played at the time, the gig poster included in the Real Wild Child Australian Rock and Roll Exhibition at the Powerhouse Museum, Sydney, in 1994, according to one report, "made them look like a rebellious beat / garage combo."

Vietnam

In September 1967 the Vamps left Sydney for Vietnam, stopping off on the way at Noumea, New Caledonia for a residency. They arrived in the war zone the following month and stayed through to March 1968, performing at American, Australian, Korean and South Vietnamese bases. In an episode reminiscent of something straight out of Francis Ford Capolla's epic film Apocalypse Now, at the time of the Tet Offensive in January-February 1968 the band members were feared missing while on tour in Vietnam. They were safe and well at the time, though they had encountered dangers prior to this. For example, in November 1967, whilst on stage entertaining United States troops at the front line Landing Zone Ross base north of Da Nang, they came under a mortar attached from the Vietcong who were located just 200 yards away. Quickly hurried into the safety of bunkers, the band members were eventually evacuated from L.Z Ross by chopper. In January 1968 the Vamps were awarded a plaque by the US forces citing their bravery and performance, and noting they were the first band to perform on the front line. Later that month they were caught up in the Tet Offensive which began on 31 January. Their whereabouts had caused some anxiety back home in Australia

until it was announced in the newspapers that they were located safe and well. The Canberra Times of 6 February 1968 reported the incident as follows, referring to both the Vamps and The Pussycats:

Australian girls safe

SYDNEY, Monday. — The parents of two groups of Australian girl entertainers who have been touring Vietnam have been told that their daughters are safe. The British Embassy in Saigon has announced that the five members of the Vamps touring team have been located after it was reported that they were missing following Vietcong actions in the city.

Father flies to Vietnam

The father of one of the girls flew to Vietnam yesterday to seek his daughter. He is Captain Stewart Middlemiss, father of the Vamps' drummer, Carol, 19. In Melbourne, it was reported that the four girl members of the Pussycats group are safe and well in Saigon. The girls, Terri Scott, 22, of South Caulfield, Marilyn Ockwell, 19, of Frankston, Linda Cable, 19, of Glen Waverley, and Suzanne Lutge, 19, of Cremorne, Sydney, were supposed to arrive in Sydney last Thursday. They have been in Vietnam for the past three months entertaining American troops. In Canberra, a Department of External Affairs spokesman said that although little was known of Australian civilians stranded by the fighting in Vietnam, no fears were held for their safety. The spokesman said 205 Australian civilians, mostly aid workers and business men, had been registered with the Australian Embassy in Saigon at the end of 1967. But Australian civilians were not obliged to register.

A great many Australian and United States bands toured Vietnam during this period, including Suzi Quatro and her sisters in the Pleasure Seekers, and the Jules Blattner Group. Both the Vamps and the Pleasure Seekers shared the same management at the time. Between 1967 and 1971 some 50 Australian troupes took part in such tours.

Overseas and the United States

After leaving Vietnam in March 1968 the Vamps worked in Singapore and Mt Isa, Queensland, before returning to Sydney and Melbourne. By this stage Valerie Fallon had left to return to England where she worked as a journalist. She was replaced by Joy Carrol. In September the Vamps headed off on an extensive South East Asia and the Pacific Islands tour, including Tahiti, Taiwan, the Phillipines, Thailand and Singapore. Britt noted in regards to the musical arrangements at the time that "anyone who came into the band to play bass I taught them to play rhythm guitar, and vice versa, because I wanted to switch off. When Julie Hibberd played – a dynamite keyboard player – we used to do lots of soul and instrumentals – James Brown, Wilson Picket, Otis Redding. That’s what we played on the TV shows."

On Mothers Day (May) 1969 Britt took the Vamps to the United States for a six week tour which eventually lasted for six years. According to her biographical outline on the Skyz The Limit band website, the Vamps appearing in 38 states whilst in the United States, including Las Vegas. During their six years there they also received a Billboard award as "Best Female Vocal and Instrumental Group". 

In the United States the Vamps were a road group, constantly touring alongside bands such as Buddy Rich, the Eagles and Suzi Quatro's Cradle. It was usual for them to do 2-3 week residencies. The Vamps and Quatro shared the same management again around 1970. At one point both bands were in Green Bay, Wisconsin, and they all stayed at the same hotel and jammed, with Suzi playing the bass

of Britt's husband John Kirk. Suzi's sister was noted by Britt as a great lead player. The members of the Vamps were able to see a lot of music during this time as it was common for bands who had early shows to go and check out other bands in towns. This resulted in Britt seeing legends such as Fats Domino and jamming in hotel rooms with the likes of Quatro and members of her band.

Whilst in the US the Vamps were playing the pop music of the time, covers - no originals, soul and rhythm and blues, much like most other bands on the circuit. In some instances they were working for the Mafia, who treated the Vamps well and "no questions were asked" by the expatriates. At one gig there was a fight in the audience and a man with shot with an M16 rifle as Joy Hibberd was out front singing House of the Rising Sun. Eventually members of the band got homesick and/or fell in love. One of the bands they came into contact with was the Jules Blattner Group, a soul group which had also toured Vietnam at the time of the Tet Offensive and similarly been caught up in helicopter gunship evacuations and sniper bullets. Margaret later married the bass play from the group, Jon Kirk, and when they disbanded he joined her in Jon and the Australian Vamps.

According to Britt, perhaps the best band she was ever in was the final version of Jon and the Australian Vamps during 1972-5. It was an 8 piece with three women and five men, and Britt the only Australian. Everyone in the band played at least five instruments, with Britt on congas, timpany, banjo, bass, keyboards and lead guitar. Her husband Jon fronted the band, dancing, rapping and singing. During 1972 Jon and the Australian Vamps recorded four songs for the military forces in the United States - Britt sang Me and Bobby McGee; Julie Hibberd did Too Late Baby; and John did Feeling Alright and Are You Ready by Pacific Gas & Electric.

Back home and Peaches

Britt and her husband Jon returned to Australia in 1976 and the following year she formed the new all-girl Australian band Peaches. They had a hit during 1978 with the Willie Harry Wilson pop song Substitute. It was originally released in the United States by the Righteous Brothers during 1975. A clip of the band performing the song on Australian pop music show Countdown is available on YouTube. Footage of the band was also taken for a New Zealand television program around that time.

Substitute, Peaches, Countdown, 1978 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ouPhCuqT9aY

This was the final line-up of the band, apart from the keyboard player. The Peaches 7" 45rpm single Substitute / Keep on Dancing was released by Laser Records Pty. Ltd. in Australia as a Disc Jockey Production.

Sue Kirby, one of the members, made the following brief comment on the YouTube site in regards to her time with Peaches: "The song made No 1 in Tasmania April 1979. After touring there for 8 weeks, we headed off to New Zealand for 4 months. Yes, I agree, this band should have hit the big time. Always issues with management." Noel McGrath's rather strange entry for the band in his 1978

Australian Encyclopedia of Rock & Pop - which makes no reference to the Vamps or the Pussycats - reads as follows:

PEACHES

Line-up: Hitler (also known as Margaret Kirk, lead vocals, guitar); Huck (drums); Trop (bass); The Nun (keyboards). The all-girl Sydney band was formed in 1976 and was based around the experience and talent of Margaret Kirk. The drummer, Huck, had previously played with Suzi Quartro. In September 1978 Peaches had a hit in Sydney with their version of Substitute. The song charted well enough in Sydney to crack national top twenty. The other version of the song by the South African band Clout sold well elsewhere in Australia and reached number twelve. Peaches Substitute was backed by Keep on Dancing.

The Hitler reference arises out of the fact that Britt was seen as a very hard taskmaster by those associated with the band. Britt had to disband Peaches in Perth during 1980 due to ill health. She subsequently found out that she was suffering the effects of Agent Orange arising out of her tour of Vietnam in 1968. Following the demise of Peaches, Margaret Britt continued to perform, receiving a number of Australian MO Awards for her performance with the production show The Fifties. She also appeared as a solo performer at various resorts in Australia and the Pacific. Britt is a member of ALVA - the Australian Ladies Variety Association.

The Eighties

Britt toured the South Pacific island of Noumea on a number of occasions, with the Vamps, Peaches and solo. She was so popular there that she wrote a couple of songs for her fans and in the native language. During the 1980s Britt appeared in The Fifties showband and received a MO Award for her work there. She also performed at their reunion show. She also played a residency at the New Orleans hotel in Kings Cross - this involved working 7 nights a week for thee years, though she remembers this time fondly, with "magic playing" on many occasions. Musicians such as the singer Delilah would join the band on stage to jam. Others to join in included the bass player from the visiting  US band Bananarama, the drummer from the Beach Boys, and friends Doug Clark and Peter Northcote.

Britt also used to freelance during this time, and at one stage was a member of two working bands - a popish trio comprising Neil Pepper on bass and Keith Longham from Ol'55 and Jeff St John and the Id from 7 until 10, and then another - at the Texas Tavern, Kings Cross, into the wee small hours. This latter band would play more rhythm and blues music, such as J.J. Cale and rocky numbers such as Born to be Wild.

Skyz the Limit 

During the 2000s Britt teamed up with New Zealand musician Michael Derwin to form Skyz The Limit - a covers band which performed in the New South Wales club circuit, with a wide range of covers from the fifties to the present. The following shot is from the band's website (http://www.skyzthelimit.com.au/).

Margaret Britt and Michael Derwin, Skyz The Limit, 2013

Britt had also worked for many years with bass player Terry McDonough. She continues to plays a Gibson SG and appears to have preferred this guitar since the 1960s. Brett continues to play lead guitar, bass, harmonica and vocal. She has overcome health problems during her career to continue performing, booking her own gigs and "hustling" to remain on the circuit. Her belief in the saying "If you don't use it you loose it" has continued to drive her performance. She is an aggressive guitar player, preferring rhythm and blues, though able to play any modern genre. She has been a lead guitar player for 50 years and continues to enjoy playing bass and harp (harmonica). Instrumentals are a forte. 

Linda Cable

Lead vocalist Linda Cable came to the Vamps from the Melbourne-based rhythm and blues band Grown Up Wrong, in which she also played guitar. Cable was later a member of the pop group the Pussycats, along with original Vamps bassist Terri Scott and drummer Marilyn Ockwell. After returning to Australia  from Vietnam she joined the band Rockwell T. James and the Rhythm Aces, based in Melbourne. When they moved to Sydney at the end of 1968 to open the Cheetah Room their name was changed to Rotary Connection. In both bands Cable played bass and sang. The 8-piece Rotary Connection left Australia mid 1969 for England and the Continent, including a tour of Germany. On numerous occasions she wrote to Britt whilst the latter was in the United States, seeking gigs there for her band. Linda Cable continues working as a jazz singer, performing and writing songs.

After returning to Australia Cable joined the ensemble Australian band Levi Smith's Clefs (http://www.mcaskill.com.au/levi_smiths_clefs_history.html). That band's history webpage states: In 1970, Barrie McAskill assembled a new Levi Smith's Clefs and returned to Whisky Au Go Go in Sydney. This line-up comprised of Linda Cable (vocals, The Vamps, The Pussy Cats), Steve Doran (keyboards), Peter Karlanek (guitar, Blues Syndicate), Doug Stirling (bass), John Freeman (drums, Red Angel Panic), who was lured away to join Fraternity when Buettel quit, to be replaced by

Michael Darby, (drums, Jack Stradbroke & The Action). A track featuring her singing the Janis Joplin classic Piece of My Heart is available here:

Levi Smith's Clef featuring Linda Cable (vocals), Piece of My Heart, circa September 1970 (audio).

http://youtu.be/ZLYGjUPdijU

Cable's extensive and varied CV outlining work since the 1980s can been seen on her website (lindacable.net/) and CD sale sites such as Ya-De-Ya (Move, 1986).

References

Britt, Margaret, Skyz the Limit [website],  http://www.skyzthelimit.com.au/. Accessed 10 April 2014.

Cockington, James, Mondo Weirdo: Australia during the Sixties, Mandarin Press, Port Melbourne, 1992, 355p. 

Linda Cable: Singer Songwriter [website], http://http://lindacable.net/. Accessed 10 April 2014.

Marks, Ian D. and MacIntyre, Iain, Wild About You: The Sixties Beat Explosion in Australia and New Zealand, Verse Chorus Press, 2011, 352p.

McFarlane, Ian, Encyclopedia of Australian Rock and Roll, 1999.

'Musician and Entertainer Absolutely Recommends Shin Yen', The Epoch Times, Sydney, 11 February 2011. [Interview with Margaret Britt]. 

McGrath, Noel, Noel McGrath's Australian Encyclopedia of Rock & Pop, Rigby, 1978, 410p.

Appendix 1

Grown Up Wrong, The Vamps, The Pussycats

Iain McIntyre

Ian D. Marks and Iain McIntrye, Wild About You! The Sixties Beat Explosion in Australia and New Zealand, Verse Chorus Press, Portland, 2010, pp.224-228.

During the 1960s it was unusual enough to find a woman fronting an R&B act, let alone one who actually played in the band. Melbourne's Linda Cable defied the stereotype of the doting female fan to play lead guitar and bass in a variety of groups. She started out in Grown Up Wrong, before moving on to the Vamps, an all-girl club act, winning the respect of audiences for her fiery playing. Then she toured South Vietnam with the Pussycats - lucky to survive the trip, she endured a number of experiences quite unlike those to be found in the teen dances and smoky bars of her home town.

What led you first to pick up a guitar and decide to play rhythm and blues?

LINDA CABLE: Although I'd heard rock 'n' roll and Elvis as a kid, it was the Beatles and the Rolling Stones who were the main bands of my generation. The Rolling Stones had a very strong R&B influence, which is what drew me in, and Eric Burdon and the Animals were a strong force, too. The blues were so emotive and expressive and inspired me to begin learning guitar. My sister had one sitting around the house. One day I picked it up and then couldn't be parted from it. I spent all my free time working out how to play, and got hooked. I'd started working at age 15 and began playing in bands at 16. I spent all my wages on buying equipment and by 17 was a professional, full-time musician. I'd come from England, and never went to high school here. All my friends were into music, so although it was rare to see female musicians doing this kind of music, it wasn't considered too strange. I was usually too busy playing to take much notice of how the crowd reacted anyway, but they took it in their stride. My family were supportive of anything I did as long as I was being sensible. Although a lot of people wouldn't have said playing in a band was very sensible! [laughs]

What are your memories of when the beat/R&B scene first took off in Melbourne?

In those days young people didn't have any other entertainment. As a teenager, you needed the music - it was very central, the biggest thing around. These were the days of the mods and rockers, depicted either by their mop-top hair and smart dress, or by greasy short hair and rough-and-ready look. The mods were looking for the new era of music that was coming out of England. They were generally well behaved. And alcohol was not served at the clubs and venues, as we were mostly underage. No one even missed alcohol. It wasn't sought after amongst that crowd, since the music was fresh and young and more than enough.

Tell us about your first band, Grown Up Wrong.

I had a garage band before that,that did some Beatles material. But I never played any Beatles songs live, because that [band] only lasted five minutes. I then put together Grown Up Wrong, which was more mean and a little eccentric and different. The singer took the name from a polling Stones track he liked . .. maybe he thought I'd "grown up wrong" because I was a girl playing guitar! I'd never met any of the members before we started. I sought out the right people, someone who looked like Mick

Jagger, perhaps, [laughs]. And we just started out of pure enthusiasm. I was the lead guitarist. I'd mucked a b o u t at home, but the moment I got an electric guitar with a tremolo bar, things got more serious. I initially copied the stuff that was being played by Keith Richards, but later on I started picking up on things from people like the Paul Butterfield Blues Band. Blues was my main thing, so bending notes was a priority! I played a semi-acoustic Maton, which was a great locally made guitar, but the amps were only a modest 60 watts, so I used to have to turn them up to 10. It came out distorted, but I didn't get the exact fuzz sound I wanted until later on, when foot pedals came out. By that time, though, I was more interested in feedback. Jimi Hendrix and the psychedelic thing was really in. I'd turn in close to my amp and make it squeal. There was a drummer, a rhythm guitarist, a bassist named Jamie Byrne, who later joined the Groove, and a singer, Peter Riley, who also put a few maracas in his hands. We played covers of our favourite songs. It didn't occur to me to write originals until much later. . . there was so much good stuff out in those days. We never ran short of material to play, and I was slow to realise that writing was where enormous sums of money could be made. After reading an article where the Stones talked about their influences, I began digging around to discover people like Muddy Waters and Mose Allison. We then played off these people who myself and others hadn't known of previously. We were so busy playing, we never really thought about recording or entering the Battle of the Sounds or any of those things.

Tell us about the venues you were playing?

We'd do Springvale Town Hall and those kind of dances, but I wasn't keen on the church halls. The inner-city clubs, like the Thumpin' Turn and Berties and Sebastians, were my favourites. They were usually dimly lit, some with psychedelic images dancing over the walls. In those days the clubs had two bands per night, so we'd finish at one place and then go set up at the next or hang around to see the other band. The Tum was like a second home for us.

How did you come to join the Vamps?

Grown Up Wrong just sort of drifted apart, and around the same time I got a phone call asking me to join this all-girl band from Sydney. The band had a six-nights-a-week residency at the Sound Lounge on the beachfront in St Kilda till 3 a.m. This gave me the opportunity to play bass; we'd do six sets a night with me on lead guitar for half of them. At first I told them I didn't play bass, but they said "Yes, you do'.' When we got together, I gave it a go and really took to it. I loved playing bass. We did songs like 'Johnny B Goode', 'Shaking All Over' and 'House of the Rising Sun'. We chose our own material, but from the agents' description we knew what was expected of us. With such a long set we were constantly learning new material. The money was great and although on paper six hours a night might seem long, it went just like that. It was so much fun. The crowds accepted an all female band doing rock and pop songs - obviously some ogled a little. The band leader, Margaret Britt, insisted we wear a uniform, in line with most house bands, and most of those were quite hideous in retrospect. Except for the catsuit – that was something!

Who were some of the bands you enjoyed hanging out with and seeing during this time?

The Five were a great band from Brisbane, who used to play so quietly the crowd would strain to hear them. You could hear a pin drop with the spellbinding mood they created. To tally opposite to rock 'n' roll, but they sure could hold a crowd. Another Brisbane band I spent a lot of time with was Bay City Union. They were a blues band with Glenn Wheatley [later of the Masters Apprentices] on bass. He was always into the business and was out hammering on doors all day. I dated Glenn for a while a little later down the track, and he was always a gentleman. The Vamps hung out with the Bay

City Union a lot and we always spent time listening to as much music as we could find. Later on I worked at Opus with Max Merritt and the Meteors, which I loved, as we got a chance to hang out in the band room and talk music. Now they were outrageous! Yuk Harrison on bass was a madman. We both ended up in Levi Smith's Clefs years later, with another residency at Chequers nightclub in Sydney.

How did you wind up going to South Vietnam with the Pussycats?

The Vamps had a six-month contract in Melbourne, and when that was up we went up to Sydney to do another six months there. Early on in the piece, myself and one of the others got an offer to be part of a similar all-girl band which was being put together specifically for a tour of Vietnam .The Vamps continued on without us. In order to get our set together the management sent us up to [remote Queensland mining town] Mount Isa to do a two-and-a-half-week residency. It was pretty much all male, very dry and dusty, and had just the one pub, which we played every night. We were the only thing on in town and quite frankly I don't think the guys cared if we played all that well, [laughs] The Pussycats got taken out to the town racetrack one afternoon for a picnic. By this time some of the girls had developed a taste for beer and we spent the whole afternoon in the bar. That night's show wasn't one of our better ones! Having played ourselves in, we headed off to Vietnam for around three months. We were young and gullible and had been told it would all be quite safe. They said we wouldn't be near the front line, but it turned out the front line was everywhere! Just driving around on the roads late at night after a show at one of the bases was dangerous. We were told to be careful, but how can you be careful when you're sitting in a big minibus? We were an obvious target for snipers. One night we got ambushed by both sides and were caught in the crossfire. You could see the red tracers from the machine-gun fire flying past us from both sides of the road. The driver was pretty cool and saved our lives. We all hit the floor and he took out his gun and just kept one eye over the dashboard with his foot flat to the floor. We got out of there safely, but it was a pretty scary ride home. On another occasion we found ourselves lying flat on the floor again in this small airport tower as the entire base we were playing at came under mortar fire. There were bombs going off all around us, and it was a long, scary night.

What sort of gigs were you doing over there?

We were based in Saigon, although we never actually played there. Instead we would drive out to various American bases. Most of the time we'd return to Saigon in the evening, but sometimes we'd stay on base for a few days and they'd put us up in some accommodation that was just about okay. One of the places was right on the beach with no windows. After all the tension, it was fantastic just to go to sleep to the sound of the waves. The shows themselves were phenomenal. You only had to walk out on the stage and the roar of approval from the guys was massive. They hadn't seen any western girls in a long time, so they were pleased to see us. [laughs] They were very well-behaved, however. Because of the crowd, we included more soul stuff in our set and they loved it.

Tell us about the problems you had leaving the country.

We were about to leave Vietnam when the Tet Offensive took place. We lost contact with the authorities, because all hell had broken out across the country. We were woken up in the middle of the night by machine-gun fire and an ambulance screaming. The place where we were staying was right next door to a telecommunications centre. The Vietcong were trying to take that, but failed. We were meant to be flying out the next day, but all the airports were closed for a week or two. They tried to move us to a safer place but, in doing so, lost track of where we were. We spent the whole

time indoors and under cover and couldn't get word out to anyone in Australia, where our situation had made the newspapers. The only way we got out, in the end, was to hitch a ride on a general's plane.

How did touring Vietnam shape the way you looked at the conflict there?

When you're 17, you just don't realise that war is real. We expected people to tell us the truth about where we were going and what we would find, and they didn't. The whole experience was an eye opener. People we would meet and get to know a bit, we'd later find out had been killed. By the time we got home, the whole "peace and love" era was beginning - and, of course, who wants war? It changed my whole understanding of it and taught me that war was not just a word.

On her return to Australia, Linda joined a six-piece soul band called Rotary Connection, which played residencies in Melbourne and Sydney before travelling to the UK with the Virgil Brothers and Sammy Gahar. After the band toured Europe, she returned in 1970 to sing with Barrie MacAskill's long-running Levi Smith's Clefs. Having learnt to sing and play in a variety of styles, she went on to record the first of five albums under her own name in the 1980s, before working extensively in TV, theatre and film. For more information on her music, see lindacable.net