I recently had the great pleasure of talking ot one of the most significant figures in the history of rockabilly and psychobilly music in the UK, first as a DJ at the Southgate Royalty and subsequently as the founder and owner of Nervous Records, Mr. Roy Williams. Asked where and when he first encountered rock and roll music, Roy is able to pinpoint it quite precisely, ‘it was on the pier in Aberystwyth in 1958′ where he was living at the time.

Fast forward to the late 70s and to the Mecca of rockabilly the Royalty in Southgate where Roy was plying his trade as DJ whilst bands such as Sandy Ford and the Flying Saucers were working their magic. A young band Londoners were eager to play the venue and kept bringing Roy cassettes of their rehearsals. However, Roy said that they were awful and told them to go to a studio and record a proper demo. Roy recalls being very impressed ‘by the band’s ‘vitality’ and was especially taken by the song ‘Rockabilly Guy’. Despite Roy’s enthusiasm for the band, he also says that the band ‘were a bit too punky for the die-hards.’ Roy gave the tape to the boss of the Royalty who was also very impressed. He describes the environment as being very exciting. Having taken the tape to several record companies, Roy says that they just laughed at him and so he decided to put the EP out himself. He pressed 2,000 copies and sold them all. Asked where he got the name Nervous Records from says that it was taken from a 1950s American act called Nervous Norvus.

At this point the Stray Cats had come over and raised the rockabilly roof. Roy describes the band as brilliant, but also notes that the band never played the Royalty. He says that the band’s management was against the idea of playing the venue as they didn’t want to pigeon-hole the band, management was also of the opinion that rockabillies tended to be racist and they didn’t wish to tar the band with that particular brush. 

The next band that Roy got hold of was an exciting young band hailing from St. Albans called the Deltas who played a more bluesy style of rockabilly.

I ask Roy to tell me a bit about his experience with Restless, who were one of the most talented and remarkable bands to grace the scene and who did two albums for Roy in the form of Why Don’t You Just Rock? And Do You Feel Restless? He says that ‘an old Teddy-boy friend recommended them to me. They had recorded a demo which sounded terrific. But it was all covers. They told me that they had their own songs and I signed them up. 

Roy then quickly got into psychobilly music. He went to the Klub Foot and describes it as ‘exciting’. 

I then asked Roy for his opinion of several of the bands on the neo rockabilly and early psychobilly scene. Beginning with The Meteors, Roy says that the ‘Meteors first album was magic and very influential.’ Of Demented Are Go, he says that they reminded him of the Cramps. Torment he describes as being ‘very creative’, Batmobile as ‘one of the best live bands’ that he saw, the Frantic Flintstones as ‘always busy working on new songs’, the Coffin Nails, as ‘sub-Meteors’, The Ratmen, as sub-Batmobile, and the Quakes as a ‘very good band, with American styling’.

I suggest to Roy that by 1990 the whole thing had rather fizzled out and ask him why he thought that was. He is quite explicit in identifying the demise of the Klub Foot as the principal cause ‘The Klub Foot was falling apart, the building was condemned.’ Asked for his take on the current state of ‘Billy’ music Roy is equally concise ‘It all moved to Europe: Too many covers. Not enough kids.’  Asked whether there any bands that he came across that he thought ought to have been bigger than they were? He identifies modern Teddy-boy band, Furious and The Rapids.

Nick Kemp