Neil Christian / Don Fardon He's Got The Action - Anthology 1962 - 1974 (2-CD)

(Cherry Red Records) 57 tracks,  6-panel digipack with 24 page booklet

including the A- and B-sides of Neil Christian's singles and EPs released in the UK, Germany, France and Portugal.
- Also included are outtakes from singles sessions and his originally unreleased four-song audition recorded for legendary producer Joe Meek, a BBC session and other rarities.
Musicians in Christian's band The Crusaders included at various times a Jimmy Page (before the Yardbirds and Led Zeppelin), Deep Purple guitarist Ritchie Blackmore and pianist Nicky Hopkins. Christian's debut single “The Road To Love” was also the first released recording to feature the youthful Jimmy Page.
Together with producer Miki Dallon, Christian landed the British Top 20 hit “That's Nice”, followed by the pirate radio station favorites “Oops” and “Two At A Time”, and in the same year he accompanied the Small Faces on Radio England's “Swinging 66 Tour”.
Christian became a star in Germany and had several releases there that didn't appear in his home country, including the wild 1968 single “My Baby Left Me”, which was accompanied by “Yaketty Yak” and featured Ritchie Blackmore on guitar.
The album contains numerous rare tracks, including Christian's four songs that he played to legendary producer Joe Meek, as well as the sessions for Christian's Meek-produced debut single “The Road To Love” and the B-side “The Big Beat Drum”, all from Meek's Tea Chest Tapes. We recorded versions of both songs from Christian's debut single without Meek's overdubs so that the guitar played by Jimmy Page can be heard clearly for the first time.
There are never commercially released versions of the singles 'That's Nice' and 'Oops', taken from the BBC World Service program Top Of The Pops.
Recordings from 1974, including 'She's Got The Power', show Christian experimenting with glam rock.

Ähnlich wie Graham Bonney war Ende der 60er Jahre der blonde Engländer Neil Christian ein Teenagerstar. Allerdings schaffte er die Karriere nur in Deutschland, in seiner englischen Heimat versuchte er vergeblich, in die Hitparaden zu kommen. „Two at a Time' war 1967 sein größter Hit. Er lebte lange Jahre in München und in Köln, heiratete auch eine Deutsche - verspielte sein Glück aber leicht-sinnigerweise. Undiszipliniert erschien er oft zu spät oder gelegentlich gar nicht zu Auftritten und als dann auch noch seine deutsche Plattenfirma zu tief in die roten Zahlen geriet und dicht- machte, war es auch mit seiner Karriere aus. Um einen neuen Plattenvertrag bemühte er sich vergebens. 1974 wurde sein Oldie „That's nice' noch einmal veröffentlicht. Das auch heute noch unvergessene Lied verhalf ihm jedoch zu keinem Comeback. Original Presse-Info: TELDEC Schallplatten GmbH