Live It Up! V/A

UK collection. With Live It Up! Bayswater Beat Girls 1964-1967, Ace focuses on neglected female pop gems that originated from Stanhope House in Stanhope Place, Bayswater, London W2: the address of the UK arm of Philips Records and it's associated labels, Fontana and Mercury. Once Dusty Springfield became a chart regular, the Philips group of labels, in common with all the other companies of the period, readily climbed aboard the beat girl bandwagon, signing up more local female talent, hungry to discover the next Cilla, Sandie, Lulu or Marianne. And they came from near and far. In terms of geography, Live It Up! Splits the talent fairly equally between lasses from London and the South-East, and young misses from the Midlands and the North: and just to variegate the mix even further, there are inclusions from relocated American, Jamaican and South African-born gals. This gorgeously packaged 25-track collection comes with a bumper booklet featuring scarce photos and ephemera, an introduction by genre-expert Ian Chapman and a 5000-word track commentary by compiler Mick Patrick.