VA - Please Stay (Joe Meek's Tea Chest Tapes) (2024)

• The latest release from Joe Meek’s legendary Tea Chest Tapes.
• Featuring numerous unreleased tracks.

Liverpool beat band The Cryin’ Shames left behind a slim legacy of just two singles before splitting but they gave producer Joe Meek his last Top 30 hit in 1966 with the magnificent, haunting, tearjerker, ‘Please Stay’ and freakbeat fans love the B side, ‘What’s News Pussycat’, that sounds like the early Stones covering Dylan!

Their second single combined another ballad ‘Nobody Waved Goodbye’ with the infectious beat of ‘You’, but now alongside the four single sides, many other recordings have been unearthed from the Tea Chest Tapes including alternative versions and works in progress but also many previously unissued tracks such as interpretations of The Marvelettes’ ‘I’ll Keep Holding On’, Marvin Gaye’s ‘No Good Without You Baby‘ and Them’s ‘Gloria’. Highlights abound with ‘Let Me In’ (also recorded by The Sorrows) and the previously unknown ‘Breakout’, particular stand outs.

Offshoot band Paul And Ritchie And The Crying Shames formed by Charlie ‘Paul’ Crane and Ritchie Routledge (both formerly of The Cryin’ Shames) are represented by both sides of their sole single, including freakbeat classic, ‘Come On Back’ and three tracks recorded for the BBC’s Saturday Club. Five songs from The Cryin’ Shames’ impressive audition with Joe Meek (when they were still known as The Bumblies) that persuaded him to sign the band are also included. Plus two unreleased tracks by Cryin’ Shames member Derek Cleary’s band Friendly Persuasion. Bonus track ‘Feels Like Loving’ is believed to have been recorded by singer Charlie ‘Paul’ Crane with session musicians but planned as a Cryin’ Shames release.