Ronald Wycherley – born 17 April 1940 in Liverpool, England – became arguably the best rocker that Britain produced in the early 1960s.
The search for a British Elvis had long preoccupied pop svengalis like Larry Parnes, and Ronnie was as close as they got. Parnes signed the Liverpool deckhand to his so-called ‘stable of stars’ and gave him a new name – ‘Billy Fury’.
However, it was TV producer Jack Good who saw that the epithet of Billy Fury was appropriate.
He worked out his moves and the way to light them for his TV appearances on Oh Boy! and Boy Meets Girls, and made them even more outlandish for his stage shows.
Billy put the cardboard from a toilet roll down his trousers, and he would swing his hips like he meant it and writhe on the floor, caressing the microphone stand, while whipping up excitement with Just Because.
The controversy, especially in a staunchly religious Ireland, made him a star.
He wrote his own songs from the beginning (sometimes under the pseudonym ‘Wilbur Wilberforce’) and benefited from unusually skilful and sympathetic production. Maybe Tomorrow, Margot and Colette catapulted him to prominence in spring 1960.
His first album, The Sound Of Fury (May 1960), featured a young Joe Brown on lead guitar, with backup vocals by The Four Jays. Andy White, later to notably appear on The Beatles‘ first single Love Me Do, was the drummer on the LP. Keith Richards of The Rolling Stones described the album as “one of the pivotal rock ‘n’ roll albums”.
On 10 May 1960, The (Silver) Beatles were among other Liverpool bands auditioning for Parnes and Billy, at Wyvern Social Club in Liverpool, trying to get a break as Fury’s backing band. They failed the audition, but John Lennon left with Fury’s autograph.
Billy was also a classy pop crooner: witness Wondrous Place, a mysterious number which belongs in a David Lynch movie. And Halfway To Paradise (#3) – written by Carole King and originally a hit in 1961 for Tony Orlando – is a classic sulky rock ‘n’ roll love song, sung with real urgency and played with a staccato rhythm reminiscent of Johnnie Ray.
Hits like Jealousy (#2) and Like I’ve Never Been Gone (#3) kept him in the spotlight until 1966.
Ironically, four Liverpudlians who once tried to serve as his backing band would end his reign as king of the charts.
Naturally moody and reticent (which added enormously to his appeal), Fury didn’t like people much, preferring birds and horses – he even co-starred with his own racehorse in the movie I’ve Gotta Horse(1966).
Poor Billy didn’t have the best of luck either. Eddie Cochran had pledged to help him tour America, but then died in a car crash.
Around 1967, aged only 27, Billy lost interest in performing and concentrated on studying ornithology and supporting sick animals. He underwent heart surgery in December 1971 at London’s National Heart Hospital to repair two valves in his ticker.
He made occasional comebacks, recording a K-Tel album to settle his debts, but his health was poor, and his return in the early 1980s probably killed him.
He made a cameo appearance as Stormy Tempest in the David Essex film That’ll Be The Day (1974) and then returned to the fray with two minor hits in 1982.
On 28 January of the following year, he died in Paddington, London, of a heart attack. He was just 42 when he died – the same age as Elvis.
His premature death was commemorated in 2003 by a bronze statue outside the Piermaster’s house at the Albert Dock in his home city of Liverpool.
He worked out his moves and the way to light them for his TV appearances on Oh Boy! and Boy Meets Girls, and made them even more outlandish for his stage shows.
On 10 May 1960, The (Silver) Beatles were among other Liverpool bands auditioning for Parnes and Billy, at Wyvern Social Club in Liverpool, trying to get a break as Fury’s backing band. They failed the audition, but John Lennon left with Fury’s autograph.
