About Me
When I first joined these networking sites I quickly became members of both Myspace and Facebook. I got them confused and found myself inviting people to come on Myface. It wasn't long before I had thousands of friends.For more songs visit our web-site www.chevronz.comFor more videos click on the video button on our main page. or vistit our web-site www.chevronz.com for links to our Youtube site.The history of the Chevrons and how they became Chevronz.In 1978 Gary South answered an advertisment in Melody Maker from Dave Ford for "Power Pop for Tomorrow People" or some such rubbish. Dave and Gary met up at Gary's place, played a few simple twelve bars together to make sure that the other could actually play, this being the era of punk rock of which the two were both fans. Dave then rifled through Gary's record collection and was pleased to see that in an alphabetical order, Commander Cody and his Lost Planet Airmen could sit quite comfortably next to The Clash, that The Ramones could sit next to The Rolling Stones, that Gram Parsons and Graham Parker and The Rumour were neighbours, and that Mott The Hoople could share shelf space with Madonna and Madness, neither of whom had made a record yet. They then got a band together, Dave brought along a drummer Neil McAllister and a bassist Tony Bateman from a heavy metal band called Nevermor and Gary brought a singer, Mick Telford, who he had been playing with in an accoustic duo . The band had a few rehearsals at Harefield Squash Club and played their first gig at Carey Place in Watford supporting The Bears. Tony Bateman who had been a member of seminal punk band The Maniacs smashed up his bass on stage and left after the first gig.The Chevrons then replaced Tony Bateman with Tim Jones, a singer/songwriter who learnt to play bass to join The Chevrons. Mick Telford left the band and wasn't replaced, with Gary and Tim taking over lead vocals.The Chevrons recorded their anthem Break Your Heart at a studio in South London that was frequented by The Damned- Rat Scabies' set list was written on the snare drum- with the intention of making it their first single. Tim Jones sang lead vocal on the track then left the band on the way home from the recording session.Gary and Dave then held auditions to recruit a new bassist and a second singer. Sixteen year old Ana Marie Borg auditioned to join the band after singing along to Reunited by Peaches And Herb on the juke box at the band's local, the Gateway in Harrow. The Chevrons then had to recruit a bassist, they held auditions at a rehearsal studio in Watford, the two applicants being a French guy who turned up smoking a joint and offering it around whilst dressed in the traditional French stripy T-shirt and hippy hat, and an Italian ticket inspector for London Underground who arrived in his uniform. Never to be accused of being racist or anti -French or Italian,no prizes for guessing who they chose, step foward Denis Bertin mon frere.Once Denis was chosen the band set about gigging in a serious way and soon became a "Name Band" playing in all of London's best venues, for example The Rock Garden, Marquee Club, The Music Machine, Dingwalls The 101 Club, The Windsor Castle, not THE Windsor castle, the one in Windsor where Liz and Phil live but the one on the Harrow Road, The John Bull in Chiswick, The Swan in Hammersmith and other such prestigious gigs. By mid-1979 Denis Bertin had become unreliable and after one gig at the Duke Of Lancaster in Barnet when Denis didn't appear as he was stuck at The Reading Festival, the decision was made to replace him. At the gig on the night the bass duties were shared between Gary, Dave, the roadies and members of the audiience but in the cold light of day Dave was sent to tell Denis he was out of the band. Denis pre-empted this by telling Dave that he should employ Brian Baker as bassist, and Denis would continue as band manager. It just so happened that Brian was the owner of a thousand watt PA system and the band went from strength to strength.Towards the end of 1979 the band recruited Jenny Monroe from Brian's old band Smiffy as another girl singer to work alongside Ana-Marie Borg. This line-up was the most successful Chevrons' period ever. In 1980 they recorded their double B side single No More Tears (Sally-Ann) b/w (Sindy's Got An) Action Man on Shy Talk Records at Airport Studios in Southall, a short walk from Gary's house on the day of the Iranian Embassy seige.The Chevrons found themselves really busy in the early eighties, as well as a punishing gig schedule they were renting out their PA system on nights off and Gary and Ana Marie were getting regular session work as backing singers, notably for Spider, the boogie band from Liverpool, on their singles and albums. Spider's bassist Brian Burrows had produced The Chevrons' single and Gary reciprocated by producing their first live two B-sides to Children Of The Street and College Luv.In early 1980 Gary was called to a meeting with Alien Records at which Spider signed their life away. Gary was then offered a solo recording contract with Alien Records if he would leave The Chevrons. Charlene from Alien records told Gary that he was the sexiest and most fanciable live singer she had seen since Jim Morrison. Gary turned them down, not through any particular allegiance to The Chevrons but because he had a great working song-writing relationship with Dave Ford and he knew that Dave was enjoying his live performances with The Chevrons.The Chevrons were approached by a promoter called Marc Hall who was putting together a tour called the "Not So Famous Tour" with local bands Red Box and B-Film. With the Chevrons' thousand watt PA system and the fact that the Chevrons had already headlined most of the London venues that Hall was targeting this looked like a good proposition for all concerned. Hall courted much publicity with the music press, raising the Chevrons' profile. See Dave Ford's cyber novel "Many a Winding Turn" to find out how it all ended in tears.Later on in 1980 both girl singers Ana-Marie and Jenny left the band on the night of the long knives. The Chevrons were rehearsing in a studio they had built in Brian Baker's parent's garage. After the rehearsal the girls waited until Gary had gone home before quitting the band. Dave immediately phoned Gary to inform him of this development and to discuss what to do next. They decided to carry on as a four piece for the short term with Brian Baker and Neil McAlister. The next few gigs went very well but as Neil, Dave and Brian were non-singers it became obvious that The Chevrons would have to expand their line-up. They did this by recruiting Marc Hall's brother Francois on saxophone and Maxine Heasman on vocals. Francois played a few gigs then left to be replaced by Ralph Simpson on sax. After Francois left the band their rehearsal studio was broken into and all the band's guitars were stolen, whilst more valuable equipment was left behind. Favours were called in, guitars were borrowed and the band carried on gigging, even getting more publicity from the theft, Maxine getting her photo in the local rag with Gary's old acoustic guitar.Around this time Gary joined The Incognito Blues Band as George the harmonica player playing one-off gigs with Tony and Richard, two friends who had followed the Chevrons before forming their own band, playing blues clubs and biker fests.By this time the band were playing bigger venues nationwide but were in effect living on past glories. They toured with The Fruit Eating Bears and played the two tousand seater Music Machine in Camden Town and became massive in Burnley but the cracks were starting to appear. Brian Baker left the band and was replaced on bass by Steve "Ginger" Walker,a friend of Ralph Simpson's, a bassist who could only play what he had been shown to play by Gary or Dave.So keen were Dave and Gary to put the past behind them that they decided to change the name of the band to The Wailing Pumas which had been a part time project for Gary and Dave for some time. On occasions when they had to do a two set gig they would often support themselves as The Wailing Pumas as a three piece band with Dave on lead guitar, Gary on bass and Neil of course on drums. They would play a selection of covers by The Ramones, Rolling Stones, Jimi Hendrix etc and often go down better than themselves as The Chevrons. Neil McAlister left the band and was replaced by Gary Williams on drums. At the same time it became apparent to Dave and Gary that although Maxine could do very wonderful things with her mouth, singing through it wasn't one of them so she left the band too. Gary and Dave continued as The Wailing Pumas for some time and began recording demos at Heart 'n' Soul studios in East London. On one of these sessions they used a brass section consisting of Ralph Simpson on sax, Dave's brother Paul on trumpet and Dave's brother in law's brother Phil Berquist on trombone. They brought back Neil McAlister on drums, Ana-Marie Borg on backing vocals along with Judy Spicer, a friend of Gary's from a band called Takeaway. Thus, in 1982 were the seeds sown for their next project, the ambitious Gary South and the Prisoners of Rock'n'Roll.This was an eleven piece line up consisting of Gary on vocals and guitar, Dave on guitar, a bloke called Phil who worked for the council and was a friend of loyal roadie Gobber Jon on third lead guitar, the bassist from the Attendants who lived over the road from Dave, Ana-Marie Borg together with a friend of hers and her boyfriend on backing vocals, Neil McAlister once again on drums, and a brass section of Ralph Simpson, sax, Phil Berquist, trombone and Andrew"Spike"Ward on trumpet. This line-up rehearsed in the Railway Tavern in Wealdstone, famous for the Who's early gigs, and they hope some rock'n'roll fortune would rub off on them. With such a big line-up they had to have seperate band, vocal and brass section rehearsals and of course there was little money to share out between eleven musicians so after a lot of fun they eventually called it a day.Gary and Dave continued writing and recording demos together in a studio they built in Dave's garage, a practice they still continue to this day although the present day studio is a converted outside toilet. Then in 1984 they got a call from Al Foulcer from Heart 'n' Soul Records where they had made some demos previously. He was building a new studio in Walthamstow and was willing to pay for building work in studio time. Although Al had recorded the Chevrons several times before he was obviously more impressed by Dave and Gary's building rather than song-writing potential. The two of them carried on recording demos and played them on a portable cassette player whilst working on the new studio. Al Foulcer was so interested in these songs that he forgot about the two hour's building work in return for one hour's studio time rule and decided to record an album for Dave and Gary. A house band soon developed with Al playing keyboards, his brother Tony on bass, Cliff on drums, Dave and Gary on guitars. Added to this on backing vocals were Al's wife Geraldine and a friend of her's Fyzah who was to sing all of the female lead on what was to be The Chevrons' first album for Heart n'n Soul Records. The albums were recorded, not only for The Chevrons but also all the other artistes signed to the label and it culminated in a big launch party and gig at Walthamstow Town Hall, the Chevrons last ever live performance.The album was never released, in 1985 Dave Ford went to work full time as an engineer for Heart n'n Soul where he met singer songwriter Phil Ryan. He and Phil formed a production company, Storm Productions with ex-Chevron bassist Denis Bertin. They went on to write two musicals, Storm City and Silas Marner.Gary was keen to continue as a live performer, he joined local band Room 101 as singer, then when the bassist left he took over bass duties also. He changed the band's name and ambitions to The Lager Drinkers From Hell. Then in 1991 Gary heard that Ronnie and Tug from The Injections were forming an r'n'b band with ex-Lurker Pete "Manic Esso" Haines on drums. In the end Esso didn't join but once again Gary offered his services as a bassist, after Ronnie had to go and sew mail bags for the Queen Gary was promoted to lead singer/bassist. The band got through a series of drummers including Chris Lee from Takeaway, now in Release The Peach, and Big Al Alison who in his time drummed for The Everly Brothers, he was the drummer on Cathy's Clown, and for Emile Ford and the Checkmates' hit What Do Ya Wanna Make Those Eyes At Me For? Last heard of Al is in his seventies and a member of the rock'n'roll revival band The Wild Angels.Dave and Gary kept in touch over the years and in late 2003 Dave told Gary that he had recorded a new "Technobilly" version of an old Chevrons song "Do THe Coma" and invited Gary to sing on it. The two of them got together and recorded an album in 2004 and again the following year which they made available on their web-site www.chevronz.com . Former bass player Brian Baker found the site, got in touch and asked Dave and Gary if the band would re-form to play his fiftieth birthday party. This they did, enjoyed it so much that they decided to play again live more often. The next live excursion was Gary's wife Wendy's birthday party. Brian was on holiday in Florida so Dave and Gary played with a bassist and drummer from a band called Cover Up, also Judy Spicer joined up once again on backing vocals.When Brian returned from his holiday the three amigos got together for a rehearsal come party at Gary's house one sunny Saturday afternoon. The three set up on Gary's terrace and started playing, Gary's neighbours heard the noise and instead of complaining, turned up with bottles of wine and joined in the singing. Brian observed that although the three of them were now in their fifties they all still had full heads of hair. It's a genetic musician thing apparently. He also informed the others that when his father died he still had long flowing locks. Dave pointed out that his own father was blessed with a full tonsorial complement when he passed away but that Dave himself given the choice would rather be bald than dead.The decision was made to become a live band once again but just to play covers for fun. Gary recruited a drummer who had been around as a professional since the early seventies having played on hits such as Love Grows by Edison Lighthouse and Beach Baby by First Class. Dave found two girl backing singers, Lauren and Anne-Sarah, and once again The Chevrons were a live act. By now though, 2006, there was another band called The Chevrons who were playing the same circuit as the original Chevrons and much the same material. After much discussion about alternative names the band decided to be known as Chevronz. In September 2007 Lauren and Anne-Sarah left the band and Chevronz carried on as a four piece . In late October 2007 Gary was involved in a serious head-on car crash that nearly killed him and the band had to cool their heels whilst he recovered. A year and a half later Gary is still recovering after further surgery, the band played a few gigs in between times and bassist Brian Baker decided to call it a day in May 2008. A sad loss to the Chevronz. Brian has since formed a band called Voodoo Rising, gigging soon in the Guildford area. While Gary was recovering Dave was making videos including one he made with the help of ex-Chevron singer Maxine . You can view them on www.chevronz.com Gary is now on the way to recovery and the two have lined up a possible drummer and bassist but Dave has broken his ankle and is out of action for six weeks. When Dave is fit rehearsals will begin and hopefully the band will be recording and playing live very soon. Watch this space amigos..........
