Formation and early years (1962–1966) The Bonzo Dog Doo-Dah Band was officially formed on 25 September 1962, at 162c Rosendale Road,
West Dulwich, when
Vivian Stanshall (lead vocals, tuba and other wind instruments) and fellow art student
Rodney Slater (saxophone/clarinet) bonded over the late-night transatlantic broadcast of a
boxing match between
Floyd Patterson and
Sonny Liston, after being introduced by Slater's flatmate Tom Parkinson. At the time, Slater was already playing in a traditional jazz band at college with Parkinson on sousaphone, and Chris Jennings on trombone. Trumpeter Roger ('Happy' Wally) Wilkes and banjo-player Trevor Brown were the founders of this loose conglomerate at the Royal College of Art, although the lineup is thought to have been exceptionally fluid and constantly revolving, consisting of as many as forty to fifty rotating members if Stanshall's later recollections are to be believed. Stanshall joined the band in September 1962. He and Slater rechristened it The Bonzo Dog Dada Band. In the 2004 BBC Four documentary
Vivian Stanshall: The Canyons of His Mind, Slater claims that the name was inspired by playing a
Dadaist word game using
cut-up technique, which involves writing words or phrases on paper, tearing the paper into strips and then randomly re-assembling the strips to form new phrases. One of the phrases created was "Bonzo Dog Dada Band": Bonzo Dog after
Bonzo the dog, a popular British cartoon character created by artist
George Studdy in the 1920s, and
Dada after the early 20th-century art movement. In the early 1960s comedic pop records by artists such as
Charlie Drake,
Bernard Cribbins and
Spike Milligan were popular in the UK and enjoyed chart success alongside pop music parodies by pop cabaret acts such as
The Barron Knights, and this fledgling version of the Bonzos was already slowly turning its style from more orthodox music towards the comedy-tinged 1920s popular jazz-style sound of groups such as
The Alberts and
The Temperance Seven. This original lineup (centred on Stanshall, Slater, Wilkes, Brown, Parkinson, Jennings, saxophonist Claude Abbo and drummer Tom Hedge) soon imploded. Flatmates Stanshall, Slater and Parkinson had seriously overspent their Autumn Term's grant money on good food, clothing and musical instruments, and in December they were evicted for non-payment of rent andthanks to Stanshall's failed attempt at making
scrumpy in the bathdamage to the property. Stanshall and Slater then parted ways. Slater dedicated himself to the resurrection of the band. In 1963 the two reunited with Wilkes. They added new band members: Goldsmiths College lecturer Vernon Dudley Bowhay-Nowell on banjo, double bass and later bass guitar; and
Neil Innes, his lodger, songwriter/pianist and later guitarist. Bowhay-Nowell was already familiar with the band's earlier incarnation and happily came on board. Innes proved pivotal to the band's continued existence and their later success. He had a musical education and a philosophical bent, and he marshaled the band's disparate talents into something resembling cohesion. Innes has spoken often about his first meeting with Slater and Stanshall in a London pub — Stanshall wore a Victorian frock coat, checked trousers, pince-nez glasses and large rubber false ears on his head whilst carrying a
euphonium under his arm. The band worked with trombonist John Parry and drummer Ed Chamberlain before Slater recruited Martin Ash, a percussionist who later took the stage name of Sam Spoons. Spoons secured the band their first regular pub gig at The Kensington in
Notting Hill, where they were joined by banjo player "Big" Sid Nicholls. Nicholls in turn introduced
Roger Ruskin Spear (son of the British artist
Ruskin Spear) to the band. Spear was interested in sculpture and the manufacture of early electronic gadgets, objets d'art, and sound-making systems, and had played in a one-off scratch band with Slater and Innes. From his own defunct band The Jungle Orchestra, Spear brought with him trumpeter Leon "Lenny" Williams to replace the departing Wilkes. Band members continued to come and go throughout 1963 and 1964 but by 1965 the band had settled to a stable lineup of Stanshall (lead vocal/mime), Slater (clarinet/saxophone), Innes (piano/guitar/vocals), Bowhay-Nowell (basses/banjo), Spoons (drums/percussion), Spear (saxophone/devices), Nicholls (banjo), Williams (trumpet), Parry (trombone) and Raymond Lewitt (tuba). The line-up changed again later that year with the departure of Parry (who later became a founding member of
The Pasadena Roof Orchestra), and the final 'classic' Bonzos band member,
"Legs" Larry Smith, joined to replace the outgoing Lewitt. Smith was a long-standing friend of Stanshall's, the two having been students together at Central College of Art. Stanshall had long had designs on somehow insinuating his erstwhile drinking companion—Smith was a notorious
bon viveur—into the band despite his lack of any apparent musical talent, with a view to exposing the world to Larry's undoubted charisma. While Smith's musical input at this point was, by his own admission, limited, he still brought a keen sense of showmanship to the Bonzos; strongly influenced by the movie
The Rise and Fall of Legs Diamond, Larry adopted the name 'Legs' and took up tap-dancing, a skill he developed to such an entertaining level that it earned him a solo 'tap-dance extravaganza' spot in the band's stage show. By this point the Bonzos had turned semi-professional and were playing regular gigs at The Deuragon Arms in Homerton, East London and at The Tiger's Head in Catford, South London where their performances soon gathered an enthusiastic following. It was around this time that the band were approached by budding show business impresario Reg Tracey, who offered to manage them and introduce them to the dubious but lucrative delights of Northern England's
working men's club circuit. They proved popular on the club circuit and the lifestyle and steady income generated convinced the band members to turn fully professional. As a consequence they never stopped working and the clubs introduced them to all manner of 'unusual' characters who later populated their song catalogue. Thanks to Tracey's contacts, the band made their TV debut in February 1966, performing "Won't You Come Home Bill Bailey" on the children's show
Blue Peter, introduced by
John Noakes. In spring,
Bob Kerr replaced Leon Williams and shortly after this, Sid Nicholls left. In April, Tracey secured them a record deal with
Parlophone. Their first single, a cover of the 1920s song "My Brother Makes The Noises for the Talkies", However,
Bob Kerr happily agreed to help form a real New Vaudeville Band, allegedly taking the bulk of his former bandmates' stage act with him, a move which finally forced The Bonzos' hand over the change of direction (Kerr later went on to create his own long-standing early Bonzos/Vaudevilles-style band,
Bob Kerr's Whoopee Band, which included other ex-Bonzos Sam Spoons and Vernon Bowhay-Nowell in its future line-ups). According to Neil Innes, The Bonzos had learned a salutary lesson about the pitfalls of show business: Our trumpeter then was Bob Kerr, great player, and a fun guy. But he was friends with (songwriter and producer)
Geoff Stephens, who'd made "
Winchester Cathedral" with session men. And he knew Bob, so he rang Bob up saying: 'What am I going to do? "Winchester Cathedral"'s a hit, and I've got no band to promote it.' So Bob came, flushed with excitement, to the rest of us at our digs, saying, 'We can be The New Vaudeville Band!' and we said, 'Certainly not, no way!' So, Bob couldn't understand this, so we said, 'Well, go, you go and do it then, if you want to. Go, never darken our towels again!', kind of thing. But the next thing, on
Top of the Pops, was the New Vaudeville Band, with the singer looking exactly like Viv, in a sort of lamé suit, all the musicians wearing the kind of suits we were wearing, with two-tone shoes. They'd even nicked the cutout comic speaking balloons, which we made out of hardboard, with a fret saw, and painted white, and then wrote, 'Wow, I'm really expressing myself!' to hold over somebody's head while they did a saxophone solo. There was the entire image, and for the next few weeks people were saying to us, 'Hey, you're like that New Vaudeville Band!' And that's when I think Legs Larry Smith said, "Well, look ...'—he'd always been arguing for doing some more modern material, so we all said, 'Right, now we start writing our own stuff.' " The situation proved serendipitous, however, as they were able to capitalise on the burgeoning spirit of the times by combining their jazz stylings with increasingly fashionable psychedelic touches. As their popularity increased (especially among other musicians), they were asked by Paul McCartney to appear in the Beatles'
Magical Mystery Tour film at the end of 1967, performing "
Death Cab For Cutie". After signing with the US-based
Liberty Records label, the Bonzos released their first album,
Gorilla (1967), before including such improbable guest musicians as
John Wayne on
xylophone,
Adolf Hitler on
vibes,
J. Arthur Rank on
gong, Prime Minister
Harold Wilson on violin,
the Wild Man of Borneo,
Val Doonican,
Horace Batchelor, and
Lord Snooty and His Pals. The music was based on an excerpt from
Duke Ellington's "
C Jam Blues". The first album was recorded on a
four-track tape recorder, as was typical for 1967. Due to the limited number of tracks, most of the fictional non-band "guest stars" were simply faded in and out as required. {{Listen By December 1967, bassist Vernon Dudley Bowhay-Nowell and drummer Sam Spoons had been summarily fired from the band. Vernon had spent much of the year ill and had missed numerous recording sessions as a result, while Sam Spoons' musical ability in the studio had now been judged unsatisfactory according to Stanshall's increasingly perfectionist criteria. For all that, however, it was "Legs" Larry Smith who now moved to occupy the drum stool, despite his limited playing experience. Meanwhile, session player Dave Clague, who had deputised for Vernon on various "Gorilla" recording sessions, was hired as replacement bassist.
"Urban Spaceman" and beyond (1968–1970) The Bonzos began to be featured more regularly on television and radio during 1968. The group also became a popular live attraction off the back of their ongoing tour schedule, continuing with the working men's clubs and now also taking in the nightclub and university circuits. All this hard work began to pay off when the group achieved a Top Five hit single in October with Neil Innes' "
I'm the Urban Spaceman", produced by
Paul McCartney and
Gus Dudgeon under the collective pseudonym "Apollo C. Vermouth". Batchelor had earlier been name-checked (alongside "Zebra Kid") performing on percussion in "The Intro and the Outro". As for the
Keynsham album itself, it is an intense, surreal, but near-impenetrable conceptual piece that depicts the town of Keynsham as an enclosed psychiatric hospital, populated by anxious and disturbed characters in search of meaning or enlightenment. However this only becomes even slightly apparent to the listener once they have read Vivian Stanshall's original liner notes (which unfortunately are usually omitted from reissues of the album), although there are a few clues to the theme in the short linking passages between songs. Despite the vagueness of the concept,
Keynsham remains for the most part a strong musical collection. Innes' songwriting in particular had developed in subtlety and maturity, to a point that equalled many 'serious' artists of the era. Stanshall's songs, such as "Tent", while still overtly humorous had now taken on a much darker aspect, or, as with "Sport (The Odd Boy)" a new and urgent poignancy. Even "Mr Slater's Parrot", Stanshall's sole concession to The Bonzos sound of old, had an unsettlingly manic edge to it. Although the band considered
Keynsham their creative zenith, unfortunately their artistic satisfaction did not translate into healthy record sales on its release in November. This perceived lack of success, exacerbated by Stanshall's continuing problems and the rapidly deteriorating relationship with Liberty Records, effectively destroyed the group's morale for good. Disheartened and at a creative impasse, the core members elected to go their separate ways while they were still on good terms (with the notable exception of founder member Rodney Slater, who claims not to have even known the band were breaking up until Stanshall announced it on stage). In January 1970 they summoned the collective will to go out on a high by embarking on a lengthy farewell tour of the UK. As popular as ever in a live setting and with the creative pressure finally off them, the tour went surprisingly well and The Bonzos played their final gig at
Loughborough University in March.
First reunion (1972) While the group formally disbanded in 1970, their record company compelled them to reunite in late 1971 to fulfil a contractual obligation and record a final album. Titled ''
Let's Make Up and Be Friendly, the album was released in 1972. Since October 2008, they have undertaken regular gigs. They have included appearances from "Legs" Larry Smith and Vernon Dudley Bowhay-Nowell. Three Bonzos and a Piano launched a new CD Hair of the Dog
at the Bloomsbury Theatre, London on 6 February 2010, featuring new numbers from all band members and some re-workings of older favourites. Larry and Vernon were at the Bloomsbury gig. In 2012 they released another CD, Bum Notes''. Innes toured the United States in 2009 and 2010, having performed a number of shows in 2009 in the UK. He subsequently played with the Idiot Bastard Band, along with Phill Jupitus, Adrian Edmondson, and
Raw Sex drummer
Rowland Rivron. They played a mixture of original comedy songs and covers, including some Bonzos numbers. In 2009, Angry Penguin Ltd published the first history of the band,
Jollity Farm, written by
Bob Carruthers and edited by David Christie, with comprehensive interviews with all the core members of the group. The first release also included a limited edition DVD featuring the band's 2007 reunion performance at the Shepherd's Bush Empire, which included several performances from that show which had not been previously released. A configuration under the name 'Almost the Bonzo Dog Doo Dah Band' performed from 2012, more regularly featuring Legs and the now 82-year-old Vernon. This grouping played their final gig together as a five-piece, alongside Andy Roberts, Dave Glasson and the eleven-piece Keynsham Town Band in
Milton Keynes. The following week, Sam Spoons' "Bill Posters Will Be Band" played their last, and the week after, "Bob Kerr's Whoopee Band" (with Vernon guesting) also disbanded. Spoons died on 27 September 2018 following a long illness. In 2019 the members of the band became embroiled in a legal battle with "Anglo Atlantic Media Limited" which had trademarked their name, two years previously, without their permission. One of the directors of Anglo Atlantic Media Limited is their former promoter Bob Carruthers. The trademark had made it impossible to perform or record under the band name. In November, 2019, the case was eventually decided in the band's favour, although with the demise of Sam Spoons and also Neil Innes a month after the decision, the surviving band members have not performed under that name again. ==Band members==