WITH the British contingent at the Monterey pop music festival this year was girl singer Beverley who, in the middle of last year quit the folk scene to make a career for herself in the pop world. As a folk singer Beverley did well and was highly rated, but fortune did not smile on her as a pop singer and Happy New Year, her first single, one of the two first releases on the then new Deram label, didn't make the charts.¹

But perhaps the most unfortunate blow fell more recently when she couldn't go with Donovan on his million-dollar Stateside tour. "It was all arranged," says Beverley, "then something happened about the permits and it never happened."

Beverley, a quiet, somewhat inscrutable girl if you don't know her, is at present writing songs and, since her return from the States, has done one gig - back on her old scene at Les Cousins Folk Club, London. As yet she is not really keen to get back to singing until she has thought out what she really wants to do.

The Monterey festival probably has something to do with her re-think. "It was the greatest get together and friendliest scene that I ever experienced," she says of the festival. "It was amazing all those people could get together and talk for three days."

Before Beverley returned from her U.S. visit, Deram issued another single, Museum,² in April. She wasn't very happy about it. "Nobody consulted me. I was annoyed. Now I am no longer work out."

"There are so many things I want to do, like cutting out all the commercial stuff. The future is just beginning again, particularly with the writing. I don't want to be a star. I think other people wanted me to be a star rather than me. All I really want to do is just sing and play and make music, perhaps work with others and form a group. I play on my own, with just the guitar mostly, but I'd want to do more than that. You can't do much on your own." - TONY WILSON.

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This article was published in Melody Maker of 11 November 1967.
¹ Happy New Year was released 30 September 1966 (DM 101). The song was written by Randy Newman, and Beverley was accompanied by Jimmy Page, John Paul Jones and Nicky Hopkins. Flipside Where The Good Times Are. They also recorded an unreleased single in the same year, Picking Up The Sunshine/ Gin House Blues. Happy New Year was chosen, together with I Love My Dog by Cat Stevens (DM 102), to launch Deram as the progressive branch of Decca.
² Museum was Beverley's third single, from 7 July 1967 (Deram DM 137). The song was written by Donovan. Flipside A Quick One For Sanity was by different artists, the Denny Cordell Tea Time Ensemble.