Eager, Gentle, Fury

ROCK 'N' ROLL

"Dicky," scolded the energetic young man, "your sideburns need darkening with charcoal." Dicky made an embarrassed grin, for as one of Britain's hottest young rock-'n'-roll artists, he should have known. The man whose keen eyes noticed the slip was Larry Parnes, impresario, housemother, and guiding light of one of the strangest firms in show business.

Entrepreneur Parnes's merchandise is all live, and it all sings rock 'n' roll. In his six-room Kensington flat he houses, feeds, clothes and trains five young singers whom he dug up from mines, slums and back-alley pubs. Parnes guarantees each of the hipsters $2,800 his first year, $11,200 by his third year, plus 60% of all recording royalties. For the other 30%, plus 10% agent's fees, he watches over their appearance (longish hair, with an occasional permanent), their manners and morals ("the more they can date the better, but no late nights and no alcohol"). He also works like a sand hog to get them bookings in nightclubs, on TV, and even in straight plays. Says 27-year-old Parnes: "You've got to put the goods in the window."

British teen-agers have taken to the window dressing fervently enough to buy a total of 1,140,000 records the five have made, including more than a million by the Presley of the group, gangling, 19-year-old Marty Wilde. Two years ago, Wilde was just plain Cockney Reg Smith, plunking away for $1.40 a night in a London club. Parnes, a onetime dress-shop owner who had hopped on the bandwagon with top British Rocker Tommy Steele (TIME, Dec. 30, 1957), picked up Smith and gave him his new name. Parnes is as mystical as a horse breeder about the importance of names, and the monikers sprouted as fast as his stable: Billy Fury, 17, light-sideburned Dicky Pride, 17, Vince Eager, 18, and Johnny Gentle, the old man of the group at 22. "What you have to do with a name is bring out their inward personality," Parnes explains.

On the stage, the boys' styles are so derivative that more appropriate names might have been Elvis Presley, Jerry Lee Lewis or Ricky Nelson. But British teenagers are rapidly turning the muscle-named singers into national heroes. And the boys themselves, in wry comment on how well Parnes is doing on the deal, have given him a new name too: "Parnes, Shillings and Pence."

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