The Shanes (band)
The Shanes were one of the four dominant pop groups in Sweden in the 1960s , along with the Hep Stars , the Tages and Ola & the Janglers . They were founded by Tor-Erik Rautio, Tommy Wåhlberg, Staffan Berggren and Svante Elfgren. In the autumn of 1964 Lennart Grahn from the Marshalls in Luleå joined them. The name was - so the legend goes - from a film role name of John Wayne ( My Great Friend Shane , 1953). Home were The Shanes in the far north of the country in Kiruna .
The first record was the instrumental single Gunfight Saloon (B-side: The Ripper ) in spring 1963 , which after a short time made it into both national radio hit lists ("Tio i Topp", "Kvällstoppen"), but only for a week. With the single Let Me Show You Who I Am , The Shanes came in 1964 for the first time at number one by Tio i Topp . In the same year they released their first LP ( Let Us Show You ).
The real breakthrough came in 1965 with the change from the Odeon record company to Columbia and the release of an EP together with the Stockholm band Moonlighters . In 1966, six singles were released, including Blue Feeling and Hi-Lili, Hi-Lo , which were able to place in both Tio i Topp and Kvällstoppen . Further successes followed in the following years, partly recorded in the EMI studio on Abbey Road in London (including Chris-craft no 9 ).
Staffan Berggren, who had written most of the pieces by then, had to leave the group in 1966 because the others found him too dominant. In his place came Kit Sundqvist, who also took over his role as a songwriter. It hit the group that four of its members were drafted into military service in 1967, and it was not possible to adapt to new musical tendencies, so that they ended their activity towards the end of the 1960s.