The Milkshakes – It’s You
Milkshakes Records – BILK-0 [1982]
It’s You / Please Don’t Tell My Baby
Mickey Hampshire (guitar and vocals) and Mark’ Banana Bertie’ Gilbert played with two friends in a band called Mickey and the Milkshakes. They also accompanied the Pop Rivets (featuring Billy Childish on vocals and Bruce Brand on guitar) during a tour of Europe as roadies. When half of the Milkshakes lost interest in the band, and the Pop Rivets broke up, the natural move was to merge both bands. Childish learned to play the guitar in the process, and Brand switched to drums.
Childish and Hampshire quickly began to pen minor classics one after another, becoming the Garage rock equivalent of Lennon & McCartney, Childish bringing the Punk energy and Hampshire the melodic side.
The career of the Milkshakes was placed under the double influence of the early Beatles and the Kinks (with always some Link Wray thrown in for good measure.) The A-side of this single is clearly on the Kinks’ side. It’s You bears more than one common point with the Kinks’ I Need You (B-side of Set Me Free.)
Sung in a husky voice, Please Don’t Tell My Baby is more desperate and shows the band’s Punkish side. But lyrics like “Please don’t tell my baby I saw her last night / I saw her kiss that boy / Please don’t tell her that I know / ’cause when I catch her gonna get it all / I’m gonna put it on the line / That I’ll take her…all her lying / She made me very mad / I’m gonna treat her bad / She gonna wish she never told the lie she had” remain close to the Beatles’ Run For Your Life.
The Milkshakes – Soldiers of Love
Upright records – UP-6 [1983]
Soldiers of Love / Shimmy Shimmy
By 1983, Russ Wilkins, formerly of the Pop Rivets, had replaced Mark Gilbert on bass, but that was the only change in the band since, stylistically-wise, the Milkshakes didn’t change their musical formula. Their second single was a vivid demonstration of their love for the Star Club days of the Beatles. If both songs weren’t from the pen of Lennon and McCartney (Soldiers of Love was an Arthur Alexander song and Shimmy Shimmy derivated from a traditional jazz tune), the Milkshakes versions were obviously inspired by the covers of the same songs made by the Beatles; they even got the same wrong credit as the Beatles for Shimmy Shimmy.
Soldiers of Love is also the first apparition by the Milk-Boilers who soon became the Delmonas.
The Milkshakes – Milkshakes IV – The Men With The Golden Guitars
Damaged Goods DAMGOOD629-LP [released 1983 – reissue 2025]
Chatham Drive – General Belgrano – Scapa Flow – The Wrong Man – The Klansmen Kometh – Thunderbird – Mumble The Peg – The Yorkshire Ripper – Flatfoot – Dogwatch On Monkey’s Paw – Every Corner – Can You Tell? – Dreadnaught – Shed Country ‘83
In 1983, for their fourth album, the Milkshakes (helped by Martin Waller on saxophone on a few tracks) decided to commit commercial suicide by releasing an all-instrumental album. It’s not that the Top Ten was waiting for them, but an instrumental album probably didn’t help them break into the mainstream market, especially an instrumental album done the Milkshakes way. You won’t find sparkling guitars here nor sterile tour de force. The band aimed at a basic sound, mostly menacing, ranging from the Link Wray-tinged Chatham Drive or The Yorkshire Ripper to the Chuck Berry-sounding The Wrong Man and Can You Tell? The majority of the remaining tunes are mostly moody with a somber and threatening edge, sounding like the soundtrack of a late 1950s/early 1960s British B-movie whether it’s a suspense film (The Klansmen Kometh, Dogwatch and Monkey’s Paw) a spy flick (Flatfoot) or a desperate western (Thunderbird).
Thanks to Damaged Goods, this long-out-of-print jewel has now been reissued on vinyl.
Available at bandcamp or on Damaged Goods website
Debbie & Jackie
