The Barron Knights

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The Barron Knights are a British humorous pop group, originally formed in 1959 in Leighton Buzzard as The Knights of the Round Table. They became the Barron Knights on 5 October 1960.

Career

They started out as a straight pop group, and spent a couple of years touring and playing in English dance halls before making their way to Hamburg, Germany. In 1963, at the invitation of Brian Epstein, they were one of the support acts on The Beatles' Christmas shows at the Finsbury Park Astoria in London. They became one of the few acts to tour with both The Beatles and The Rolling Stones.

They first came to fame in 1964 with the number "Call Up the Groups". It overcame copyright restrictions and parodied a number of the leading pop groups of the time including The Searchers, Freddie and the Dreamers, The Dave Clark Five, The Bachelors, The Rolling Stones, and The Beatles. The song imagined the various artists singing about being conscripted, or "called up" into the British Army. Actual conscription had ended a few years before. The single climbed to number 3 in the UK Singles Chart. As an example, the song "Bits and Pieces" by the The Dave Clark Five was parodied as "Boots and Blisters".

In 1967 the group released the single "Lazy Fat People", a satirical song written by Pete Townshend of The Who.

They achieved four other hit singles in the 1960s and 1970s but their only U.S. Billboard Hot 100 charted single, "The Topical Song", was another comedic parody written by the American poet, Robert Spring White. White, who also took the 1980 American Song Festival award in the folk category for "Where Does The River Go", confined his humorous lyric compositions for The Barron Knights.

The group continues to perform for a world-wide audience.

Original band member details

• Duke D'Mond (born Richard Edward Palmer, 25 February 1943, Dunstable, Bedfordshire, England) - Vocalist
• Barron Anthony (born Anthony John Osmond, 15 June 1934, RAF Abingdon, Abingdon, Oxfordshire, England) - Guitarist / Vocalist
• Butch Baker (born Leslie John Baker, 16 July 1941, Amersham, Buckinghamshire, England) - Guitarist / Vocalist replaced Jud Hopkins.
• Peter Langford (born 10 April 1943, Durham, County Durham, England) - Bassist / Vocalist
• Dave Ballinger (born David Alan Ballinger, 17 January 1939, Slough, Buckinghamshire, England) - Drummer

As of 2007, only Langford remains from the original line-up. Fellow founding member, Butch Baker, retired in January 2007, and was replaced by Len Crawley.

UK singles chart hits

• "Call Up the Groups" (1964) #3 - Columbia
• "Come to the Dance" (1964) #42 - Columbia
• "Pop Go the Workers" (1965) #5 - Columbia
• "Merry Gentle Pops" (1965) #9 - Columbia
• "Under New Management" (1966) #35 - Columbia
• "An Olympic Record" (1968) #35 - Columbia
• "Live in Trouble" (1977) #7 - Epic
• "A Taste of Aggro" (1978) #3 - Epic
• "Food for Thought" (1979) #46 - Epic
• "The Topical Song" (1979) #70
• "The Sit Song" (1980) #44 - parodying dog trainer Barbara Woodhouse - Epic
• "Never Mind the Presents" (1980) #17 - Epic
• "Blackboard Jumble" (1981) #52 - CBS
• "Buffalo Bill's Last Scratch" (1983) #49 - Epic

U.S. singles chart hit

UK albums chart hits

• Night Gallery (1978) #15 - Epic
• Teach the World to Laugh (1979) #51 - Epic
• Jesta Giggle (1980) #45 - Epic

References

External links

• The Barron Knights Home Page
• Lyrics to Call up the Groups
• The British Beat Boom website biography

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Last updated on Friday July 25, 2008 at 08:45:16 PDT (GMT -0700)
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