Get into something good with Peter Noone & Herman's Hermits playing locally

GREENSBURG ― Peter Noone says he feels 16 again whenever he hits the stage and starts singing "I'm Into Something Good."

Feel young again with him, when the famed frontman and his four Herman's Hermits bandmates headline the Palace Theatre in Greensburg on June 25.

Performing Sixties pop hits like “Mrs. Brown, You’ve Got A Lovely Daughter.” “I’m Henry VIII, I Am,” “Can’t You Hear My Heartbeat,” and “There’s A Kind of Hush," Noone and Herman's Hermits later visit the PNC Arts Center Back LotHolmdel, N.J. on July 13; the Mayo Performing Arts Center in Morristown, N.J. on July 27; Batavia Downs Gaming in Batavia, N.Y. on July 28; Golden Nugget Hotel & Casino in Atlantic City, N.J. on July 29; Cape May Convention Hall on July 30; Tag's Summer Stage in Big Flats, N.Y. on Aug. 13; New York State Fairgrounds in Syracuse on Aug. 28 and NYCB Theatre at Westbury, N.Y. on Sept. 23.

Noone's hardcore fans, The Noonatics, will savor the chance to hear him sing and tell a few stories.

"I'm just a lead singer, remember, so, I've turned myself into a bit of an entertainer," Noone said. "I enjoy the concerts because it's great fun to think you go on stage and sing songs and people know the words and they remember things that happened to them. And while I'm singing, I remember things that happened to me."

What memories do Herman's Hermits hits stir up in his memory, like "A Kind of a Hush," for instance?

"Well, I'm thinking about watching John Paul Jones conducting the orchestra with a bass guitar in his hand," Noone said. "When I'm singing 'I'm Into Something Good' I remember being a 16-year-old boy in a studio in the basement vault of a bank with other teenaged boys making a monster record. And when I sing 'Henry VIII,' first of all I enjoy that everyone enjoys the song, and they might not always have enjoyed the song."

That was Herman's Hermits' second U.S. chart-topper, a remake of a silly English dance hall tune about a guy named Henry who got married to the widow next door after she'd been married seven times before to men named Henry. Herman's Hermits version is famed for Noone laying on the English accent extra thick and cheerfully accentuating the "second verse/Same as the first."

"I can remember it was the shortest No. 1 record," Noone said. "In my head, it's a bit longer now because I do three verses, but I remember we made the record in exactly how long the record is. If it's one-minute-57 seconds that's how long we took to record it. We didn't play it five times. We didn't overdub it. We just recorded it, which is actually brilliant because the Barry Whitwam drum piece is memorable and unusual, and (guitarist) Derek Leckenby played it like pure Chuck Berry. I think in music, if you catch those moments like 'All the children sing' in (The Beatles') 'Bungalow Bill,' they're all the things that make it special."

In its early club days, Herman's Hermits needed to do unique covers like "Henry VIII," "Mrs. Brown" and "My Boy Lollipop," because no other band was doing them.

"You couldn't do 'Roll Over Beethoven' because the Beatles did it better than everyone and you couldn't do 'Jambalaya' because Gerry & The Pacemakers did it better than everybody. You couldn't do 'Love Potion No. 9' because The Searchers did it better than everyone," Noone said, "So we were always looking for songs people didn't do or wouldn't do or couldn't do."

Herman's Hermits chose wisely when jumping at the chance in 1964 to record "I'm Into Something Good" written by the renowned songwriting team of Gerry Goffin and Carole King.

"I instantly liked the song, though I didn't know it would be a No. 1 and last forever. I still open the show on it because it's a good feeling for me to go on and feel 16 or 17 again." Noone said. "I had the same feeling when we made the record. 'This is great. This is a great song.' And it has meaning. Once upon a time, songs meant things to people who heard it. When my sister heard 'It's My Party' by Lesley Gore she knew what it's about."

Friends in rock 'n' roll bands from all eras have told Noone how much they admire the longevity of "There's a Kind of a Hush."

"Because musicians hang with musicians, and they're all shocked the way the audience reacts so pleasantly. I go, 'There's a kind of a hush' and they go (imitates 1,000 people singing) 'All over the world.' Know what I mean? It's great. Then (musician friends) go, 'That's still got legs on it, that song.' Who'd have thought?'

The Greensburg, Pa., show brings Noone back to Pittsburgh, where he performed prominently, along with The Monkees' Davy Jones, in a '60s all-star concert at the Benedum Center that was filmed and became a huge fundraiser for PBS television stations nationally.

"I've got fond memories of it," Noone said. "And I used to do that 3WS concert there every year, and we've been to Greenberg at least three times before. We kind of have a big following around there."

The PBS oldies concert series reminds Noone of the good old days, when families gathered around the TV to watch musical entertainment.

"There used to be Ed Sullivan and Sonny and Cher and Jackie Gleason and Danny Kaye and Dean Martin, now there's none of that anymore," Noone, 75, said.

A new PBS pledge break show features highlights from the British TV program "Ready Steady Go!" the groundbreaking 1963-66 series featuring top English and American pop, rock and soul artists.

"It was like a fashion thing," Noone recalled. "My first memory of it was we were playing a gig in Liverpool opening for Manfred Mann and they had a record on the charts called "5-4-3-2-1," which was the theme tune for "Ready Steady Go!" and within a month we were on "Ready Steady Go!" with our first single. We were right at the start of "Ready Steady Go!" and four weeks later on (another hit British music show) "Top of The Pops."

At the age of 16, Noone found himself an international star, appearing on magazine covers.

"When you're 16, everyone treats you differently than when you're 22, so I got away with murder," Noone said. "I was very naïve and people helped me and showed me how to do this. One of the little-known facts about the British Invasion is all the people in it knew each other because it's a very small country and a lot of people living close to each other, so we'd all met everybody who was on the charts."

Those young British chart-toppers and taste-makers didn't pass on the chance to see and meet famous touring U.S. artists like the Everly Brothers, Roy Orbison, Tommy Roe, Bobby Vee and Del Shannon.

"We met all those people. They were oldies acts already so they were more available," Noone said. "When people have been around a few years, they find one of the most important things is to be around the people who like them."

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Sure, the English press played up rivalries like Beatles-versus-Rolling Stones, but the scene was nurturing and friendly, Noone said.

"The best way to explain it is The Who aren't like the Beatles and the Beatles aren't The Stones, and the Who, and the Beatles and The Stones aren't like Herman's Hermits. Everybody was kind of unique and different in their way and we didn't compete because we had different audiences. And you could buy all the records. Or people can like you and not buy the records. I bought Stones records. They probably didn't buy any Herman's Hermits records, but they still liked me."

The Beatles' spillover success into films paved the way for Herman's Hermits to star in three movies, including "Mrs. Brown You've Got a Lovely Daughter," named for the band's hit record with a plot finding Herman (Noone) and his working-class Manchester mates trying to make enough money at a band gig to pay the entry fee for a sure-thing racing greyhound named Mrs. Brown.

Looking back at Herman's Hermits' brief movie career, Noone says, "We weren't movie stars, we weren't actors or anything, so, given the situation, I think we kind of punked the movie business in a gentle way, We were like the Sex Pistols in the movies. We just played each other.

Noone grew comfortable in front of the camera, helping classic rock enter the digital age by hosting VH1's popular "My Generation" documentary program in the 1980s. Noone's good looks and charm scored him guest roles on TV's "Married With Children," "Quantum Leap," "Dave’s World," "Too Close for Comfort" and "Laverne and Shirley," and a recurring role as "Paddington" on the CBS soap "As The World Turns."

These days, he focuses on what he loves best, entertaining concertgoers with his songs and storytelling.

"There's no girl dancers and there's no fireworks or smoke bombs," Noone said. "We've gone back to the old days. I hope people come to the show and I hope they will enjoy it, and I hope they will buy a T-shirt and a CD and they go home and play it to death."

Scott Tady is entertainment editor at The Times and easy to reach at stady@gannett.com.

This article originally appeared on Beaver County Times: Peter Noone talks hits & Herman's Hermits history ahead of Greensburg show