THE HISTORY OF SWEENEY TODD THE BAND, IN NO PARTICULAR ORDER
 
Sweeney Todd was formed by Brothers Bob and Colin Young in Leamington Spa Warwickshire England in late 1969 early 1970.
We got the idea and name Sweeney Todd from the thirties film starring Todd Slaughter what a name eh.
The first line up of Sweeney Todd consisted of My self (Bob Young) on lead Vox and guitar, Colin on Guitar and backing Vox,
John Cirriani on bass and backing Vox and a drummer from Sunderland whose name Im afraid I cant remember. If any body remembers him please drop me a line.
Sweeney Todd used to rehearse in St Pauls church hall on Friars St Warwick just up the road from The Seven Stars Pub. Apologues to the neighbours.
We werent there long. We got chucked out because of the racket we made. Turn it down WHAT TURN IT DOWN WAIT A MO I,ll TURN IT DOWN. ah those were the days.
As Sweeney Todd we had various rehearsal rooms, mostly church halls. There were no Garage bands then, and amps were either on or off.
If you wanted that nice loud crunchy guitar sound you had to crank it up to number eleven and the neighbours didnt like it.
So to get to your rehearsal room you also had to have transport as well. We were lucky, my dad gave us an old Bedford minibus.
Just for fun we painted it matt black with runny blood red SWEENEY TODD letters on the back. We havent come across a photo of the Sweeney Todd van yet.
Again any body whose got one, we would love a copy. The state of this Sweeney Todd van  got me stopped by the cops about twice a day.
ah  perhaps they have a photo. Control to all cars...be on the lookout for a mat black van with sweeney todd written on the back
If you see this van lads stop it at all costs, its full of longhaired bleedin hippies and a danger to society as we know it.

I spent a lot of time producing my driving documents down at the cop shop, until the dreaded day when I got stopped yet again.
This time my  MOT TEST  CERTIFICATE (ministry of transport) was out of date. They finally got me. ( I wonder how many police hours it took)
I got fined twenty quid. about $30. I had to pay the fine off at two quid a week. I accidentally missed the last payment; I think we spent it on essentials.
A pack of  20 No6 ciggs and the rest we wasted down the pub.
Some days later there was a knock on the door, there stood a big burly sergeant copper. He said he had a warrant for my arrest. For two quid
and took me down the cop shop…I had to be bailed out…for two quid I ask you (less than $4) It wasn’t long after this the Sweeney Todd van got
swapped for a ford transit van, a dirty grey green one….nice and anonymous apart from the great iron bar and padlocks across the rear doors.
This van later blew up on the way to the M6 some where near Birmingham. We were on the way to a gig at the Cavern in Liverpool.
We had to hire a car to continue the Journey…..when suddenly, We were knee deep in Coppers again.
They were so pleased you would have thought they had captured The  Great Train Robbers in stead of Sweeney Todd.
By now the line up of Sweeney Todd consisted of Me on guitar, and kazoo,  Colin on Bass, Roger Prince on guitar, harmonica, and mandolin,
Fat Bas on accordion and I think Harry Heppingstall on drums. Unfortunately Roger was driving and got the speeding ticket,
we had run through the dreaded radar speed trap. Quite a novel thing for us to do as in those days there were probably only two in the country.
West midlands police had obviously been told we had swapped the van. We arrived at the Cavern with only guitars.
This was in the days when you took your own PA as well as all the back line with you. We used another bands gear for the gig.
Im ashamed to say I can’t remember who they were. I do remember that they were very good AH  ANOTHER PINT OF GROG ROGER? Slurrp  Ah! where was I.
ER I SEE!  PLASTIC GLASSES! ARE WE EXPECTING TROUBLE It all gets very hazy from here on in   But, Sweeney Todd were in the famous Cavern.
Aaah! you could smell the .........er...atmosphere.....!! ANOTHER PINT ROGER?     WELL THANK YOU I DO THINK I WILL We were on form and feelin' good.
After a few pints we went to our dressing room another sort of well cavern. down a few steps, ripped plastic covered benches around the walls,
nothing but the best for Sweeney Todd. Fat Bas lay down on the far bench opposite the door, muttering something about the lack of pies,
he farted and fell asleep. He only suffered from stage fright when he was more than five miles from a chip shop. We all sat around wondering what to do next.
We had a dressing room but apart from Colin who had a pair of new cowboy boots which sqeeked all by themselves we didn't have any stage clothes to dress up in,
although Roger did have some Brut aftershave.  Suddenly the door opened and in came a young lady in a very short black dress.
She lent against the door in a very provocative manner drooling slightly from the corner of her mouth.  The door closed as she lent on it…click!
we all looked up. what would happen next. she slowly slid down the door until she was sitting on the step skirt rolled up and all legs.
She got up and staggered over to where Bas was lying asleep..... on his back....on the bench.  For what seemed like an age she stood looking down
at this peaceful sleeping gian and then…...........threw up all over him.
To those of you who didn’t know Bas he was..... Ukrainian..... and seemed to be permanently angry, even when he was happy.
He awoke in an explosion of beer and vomit. We were all very sympathetic of course but we laughed until we cried.
Apart from the threats of violence it all turned out ok because as far as I remember he took her outside and had his evil way with her.
Consenting adults and all that.    If that was you drop us a li.. ...........No!!  No!!  what am I saying.  The gig turned out ok,
but we couldnt here ourselves sing this was in the days before monitor speakers. You monitored by listening to the sound bouncing off the back wall,
and there was always plenty of that.  Still we had played the Cavern and that was all that mattered.
I Don’t remember where the next gig was, in fact I don’t remember leaving the Cavern. I remember coming off stage and then………Bluuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuur it was 1973.
We used to frequent a pub in Leamington called the Coventry Arms (I often wondered if there was a Leamington Arms in Coventry…Please no e-mail)
We were all in the pub I think after a rehearsal, all having a jolly old time when the conversation got around to the music we were playing.
The set we were using had the title track SWEENEY TODD in it. All other songs referring to SWEENEY TODD had gradually been dropped
and replaced by other stuff of a much gentler nature and somehow the name Sweeney Todd didnt seem to fit what we were doing we werent a heavy rock band any more.
So in a drunken stupor we decided to change the name Sweeney Todd to something more suitable. Some one produced a matchbox,
one of those with the little sayings and proverbs on the back…this one was about a young lady trying to find a name for her baby
she said to her husband that she would like to call the baby GEORGE he said No,  every Tom, Dick and Harrys called George. Well we all fell about laughing
Believe me YOU HAD TO BE THERE. From then on we were called A BAND CALLED GEORGE a revolutionary name for the time
We dropped the SWEENEY TODD songs and changed the complete set and later that year released a single “NCB Man” on Bell Records (p) Island Music.
 
More from the memoirs of SWEENEY TODD after we have had a lay down
OK every one Heads on desks
To cover ourselves against e-mail from Sweeney Todd fans who have much better memories than us we would like to parody the late Eric Morecambe and say
 
 We have used all the right memories but not necessarily in the right order