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“Wedding Bell Blues” - Laura Nyro song.

In 1958 jazz singer Helen Merrill was dating a married man named Bill Carter, a b-film actor. He was at the time married to Nancy “Trink” Wiman (Wakeman-Carter), heiress to the John Deere fortune. Helen Merrill and Bill co-owned a jazz club named The Night Owl (not the Greenwich Village rock venue) and were having a very high profile and public romantic relationship. But the club was likely funded by Mrs. Wiman-Carter' significant John Deere inheritance money. The affair was so serious in fact that Mrs. Wiman-Carter had private detectives invade Helen Merrill’s apartment at 800 Grand Concourse (Bronx) in 1958. The ensuing newspaper scandal was the reason Helen Merrill left for Europe in 1959 to reside there for many years. Of course the Carter / Merrill owned Night Owl club was closed down once all this came to light. Bill Carter and Nancy “Trink” Wiman both passed away in 1996, after leading very separate lives. They both re-married after the scandal caused their divorce. Helen Merrill never got to marry Bill, who instead married pretty young actress Elaine Stewart not long after this debacle,  in October 1959. 

American musician/singer songwriter Phil Trainer (aka Phil Steele) of the late sixties GS band The Lead (RCA) in Japan, later a member of The Clinic, taking bassist Archie Leggett’s place in that British band. Here in this photo at #9 Vicarage Gate, London England W8 in the summer of 1969 where he was working on a very short lived band project called Heartbeat, a group produced by Michael Aldred of “Ready Steady Go” TV fame. They did one demo for Decca records UK but didn’t get a record deal. The band dissolved due to the failure of their manager Elizabeth Gardener to get them a record deal.

Jazz singer Helen Merrill singing with Romano Mussolini’s trio backing her up on the Bussola On Stage tour of Italy 1961.

Mr. Chow restaurant Knightsbridge London England, summer 1977. Left to right - Steve Gould (Rare Bird / Runner / Alvin Lee band) and his wife Carmen (BBC1 TV host, “Cheggers Plays Pop”) June Bolan (T. Rex Marc’s wife), Paul Varley (Arrows / Little Free Rock / Purple Haze).

Freddie Mercury and Gary Glitter, 1987.

Bob Dylan and guitarist Mike Bloomfield in the studio 1965 NYC.

First dates gone terribly wrong. “Bride Of Frankenstein” with Boris Karloff and Elsa Lanchester.

Rare single by the talented chart hit UK harmony band Arrival titled “Jun” (1970) a song written by Frank Collins. This was a song written specifically for the Jun clothing company for on air commercial broadcasts and sale in record shops. Produced by the band’s manager Tony Hall and recorded in Japan.

The band are: Tony O’Malley (keyboards), Don Hume (bass), Lloyd Courtney (drums) Paddy McHugh, Frank Collins, Dyan Birch, Carroll Carter (vocals).

On London/King records, released in Japan only 1970. (London TOP-1569)