Kenny
All the pop fans wanted to see Kenny when their record made the
charts. But when the group was invited to appear on Top of the
Pops, it's creators were in trouble - for there wasn't any
Kenny!
 Songwriters Bill Martin and Phil Coulter had used session
musicians to record their hit The Bump. So the two men
looked around for some young faces to fit their music.
They found
what they wanted in the cold storage department of a banana
warehouse in Enfield, Middlesex.
A group called Chuff was rehearsing there and the songwriters
signed them up. Chuff became Kenny, appeared on the TV show and
shot to overnight success on the record they didn't make.
Chris Spedding and Clem Cattini were among those heard
anonymously on Kenny's four UK smashes. All inconsequentially
catchy and topped with a trademark falsetto in unison with
Driscoll, these were The Bump (a dance craze ditty that
fought off competition from a b-side version by the Bay City
Rollers), Fancy Pants, Baby I Love You OK and
autumn 1975's Top 20 swansong, Bill Martin and Phil Coulter's Julie
Ann.
This chart run was rounded off neatly when the hits and some
makeweight tracks were lumped together on a self-titled album
which bubbled under the Top 50 in January 1976.
Despite Mickie Most's suggestion that the band members should
fight for the B-sides of their Martin/Coulter singles (and Yan
Stile and Rick Driscoll did compose Happiness Melissa
which was the B-side of Nice To Have You Home), the guys
in the band were struggling to make any money out of their deal.
They struggled for independence from the famous production team,
but Martin & Coulter were adamant that Kenny was their
creation and they were entitled to keep hold of the name -
regardless of what individual band members did.
A week in court resulted in a victory for the band and Kenny
signed a new deal with Polydor.
They released a single, Hot
Lips - which ironically was almost a carbon copy of a
Martin & Coulter composition - and a second album, Ricochet,
before disappearing without trace.
The band later provided the backing to the theme tune for UK
Television's popular Minder series, sung by Dennis
Waterman, and soldiered on with live appearances,
particularly in Germany.
But when Yan Stile was seriously injured
in a car crash, paralysing his arm, Kenny called it a day.
Chris Redburn is now a successful road haulage businessman (he
owns music transportation company, Redburn Transfer) and
still gigs with Andy Walton as The Legendary Old Brown Growlers.
Style runs his own PA hire company.
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