Of the original groups that spearheaded the boom in the mid 50s, only two are still playing fulltime; Lonnie Donegan, the undisputed fountainhead of the music and Chas McDevitt, whose group with Nancy Whiskey on vocals, had a world-wide hit with FREIGHT TRAIN.

The success of this record took the group on tour with such international acts as; Slim Whitman, Frankie Lymon & The Teenagers, Freddy Bell & The Bell Boys and replacing Jerry Lee Lewis on his ill fated 1958 UK tour, with the Fabulous Treniers.  In July 1957, fully six years before the Beatles, Chas & his group appeared on the Ed Sullivan show on the same day as The Everly Bros. first performed BYE, BYE, LOVE.  The show had a viewing audience of 45,000,000.

Chas group had further success with GREENBACK DOLLAR and I’M SATISFIED.  They appeared at the first ever Skiffle concert at The Royal Festival Hall in April 1957 and  later at The Royal Albert Hall. After a record breaking tour of the Moss Empire Theatre circuit, Nancy Whiskey left the group to marry and was replaced by Shirley Douglas in September 1957. The group had more releases on Oriole including minor hits with REAL LOVE and TEENAGE LETTER.