Maureen Cleave
Maureen Cleave wrote about pop music and culture for the London Evening Standard in the 1960s. Most famous for the Beatles interviews she conducted for the Standard, in 1966 she married Francis Nichols, whose work took her to Peru in the late 1960s. Returning to the UK, Maureen continued her career in journalism, writing for the Daily Telegraph, The Observer and other publications. She was diagnosed with ME in the '90s, and later with dementia after her husband’s death in 2015. She passed away in November 2021.
50 articles
List of articles in the library by date
Juliette Gréco: Gréco heads for Edinburgh...
Interview by Maureen Cleave, The Evening Standard, 2 September 1961
Plus band and her personal electrician ...
Chris Barber, Blues Incorporated, Alexis Korner, Mantovani: Mr. Korner and his weird front line...
Profile and Interview by Maureen Cleave, The Evening Standard, 26 May 1962
TOGETHER, THEY MAKE THE BEST TWISTING NOISE I'VE HEARD ...
Alma Cogan Adds Another Country To Her Collection
Interview by Maureen Cleave, The Evening Standard, 23 June 1962
THE JAPANESE are potty about Alma Cogan. It was a little number called 'Just Couldn't Resist Her, With Her Pocket Transistor' that won her the ...
Little Richard: Well, look who's back — it's Little Richard
Profile and Interview by Maureen Cleave, The Evening Standard, 6 October 1962
BOBOBALOOMBA Abimbamboom all Rootti Tutti Frutti. With this gnomic verse about ice-cream and a shriek of masochistic ecstasy, Little Richard exploded before a wondering world ...
Sam Cooke: When you're well-read and dress like wham!
Interview by Maureen Cleave, The Evening Standard, 20 October 1962
WE HAD the wireless on throughout. Sam Cooke wore red-patterned pyjamas, a black dressing-gown and a beaten gold ring, which he wears because he doesn't ...
The Everly Brothers: Phil Everly: He Can't Spell But He Can Sing Like A Million Dollars
Interview by Maureen Cleave, Sydney Morning Herald, the, 11 November 1962
From MAUREEN CLEAVE in London ...
The Beatles: Why The Beatles Create All That Frenzy
Profile and Interview by Maureen Cleave, The Evening Standard, 2 February 1963
THE BEATLES are the darlings of Merseyside. The little girls of Merseyside are so fiercely possessive about their Beatles that they forced Granada to put ...
Profile and Interview by Maureen Cleave, The Evening Standard, 27 April 1963
IT WOULDN'T be difficult to be exceedingly jealous of Brian Epstein. In fact, I should think a lot of people are — managers particularly. ...
Ray Charles, Margie Hendrix, The Raelets: I'll Stick To Ray, Says Margie Hendrix
Interview by Maureen Cleave, The Evening Standard, 18 May 1963
Why? Because Mr. Charles is nice ...
Billie Davis, John Leyton, Mike Sarne: Robert Stigwood: The Young Tycoon Behind Mike Sarne & Co.
Interview by Maureen Cleave, The Evening Standard, 22 June 1963
FEW GROWN up people, I find, have a genuine respect for the pop singer. They see him as a creature who makes inexplicably large sums ...
Kathy Kirby: But The Smile Does Have To Go On And On...
Interview by Maureen Cleave, The Evening Standard, 7 September 1963
KATHY KIRBY is the girl in Stars and Garters who looks like Marilyn Monroe. She has the same curves and the same defenceless, little-girl curls; ...
Bo Diddley: So Ethel Mae stayed — and so did the guitar
Interview by Maureen Cleave, The Evening Standard, 12 October 1963
'THE BIGGER THE CLOWN YOU ARE, THE MORE RECOGNITION YOU GET,' SAYS BO. 'WE DO EVERYTHING EXCEPT STAND ON OUR HEADS.' ...
Profile and Interview by Maureen Cleave, The Evening Standard, 11 January 1964
IT WAS A bad idea, perhaps, to interview them in a canteen. A great number of suet rolls and custards never got digested that day ...
Richard Anthony: Report from the land of Les Yé Yé
Profile by Maureen Cleave, The Evening Standard, 18 January 1964
PARIS, Saturday. ...
Profile and Interview by Maureen Cleave, The Evening Standard, 25 January 1964
THERE WAS a time when Phil Spector would have been Beau Spector and the rage of Bath. His clothes alone would have made him famous. ...
The Beatles: How the Frenzied, Furry Beatles Took Over England
Profile by Maureen Cleave, The San Francisco Examiner, 2 February 1964
'We Are Our Friends, Pals And Buddies' ...
The Rolling Stones: This Horrible Lot – Not Quite What They Seem
Report and Interview by Maureen Cleave, The Evening Standard, 21 March 1964
"BUT WOULD YOU LIKE your daughter to marry one?" is what you ask yourself about the Rolling Stones. They've done terrible things to the musical ...
Sister Rosetta Tharpe: How Sister Rosetta gets them rolling
Interview by Maureen Cleave, The Evening Standard, 9 May 1964
THEY CALL her the Holy Roller. Sister Rosetta Tharpe is indeed a holy lady but she does roll in a way that would do credit ...
The Rolling Stones: But would you let your daughter marry one?
Report and Interview by Maureen Cleave, The Evening Standard, 11 May 1964
Take A Middle-Class Value, Stand It On Its Head: You've Got A "Stone ...
The Yardbirds: Well, they've got a bearded Russian manager!
Profile and Interview by Maureen Cleave, The Evening Standard, 23 May 1964
THERE ARE five Yardbirds and they have two interesting properties. The first is a Russian manager with a beard, dark glasses and a Lancia in ...
Carl Perkins: Here's the man to set you patting your blue suedes
Profile and Interview by Maureen Cleave, The Evening Standard, 6 June 1964
CARL PERKINS has a place of his own at the very beginning of the rock 'n' roll story. On January 1, 1956, he recorded a ...
Lulu, Millie: In this business where you're old at 20, Millie and Lulu are the Younger Fry
Profile and Interview by Maureen Cleave, The Evening Standard, 4 July 1964
WHILE THEIR elder sisters, Kathy Kirby, Dusty Springfield and Cilla Black sing moving songs about love and desertion, Millie and Lulu are to be found ...
Inez & Charlie Foxx: Inez and Charlie Foxx: Gospel Voice and Lunatic Gestures...
Profile and Interview by Maureen Cleave, The Evening Standard, 11 July 1964
CHARLES AND Inez Foxx are a handsome pair. To the initiated and fortunate few in this country who have heard them, they are known as ...
Andrew Loog Oldham, The Rolling Stones: Mr. Oldham Has Second Thoughts About The Stones...
Interview by Maureen Cleave, The Evening Standard, 8 August 1964
"I'D BE A FOOL TO GIVE UP ALL THAT LOOT" ...
The Beach Boys: Mr. Wilson hated rock — but he loved the Beach Boys
Profile and Interview by Maureen Cleave, The Evening Standard, 22 August 1964
THE NOISE the Beach Boys make is a wail with a touch of adenoid; the songs, they sing are about surfing and cars. What with ...
Burt Bacharach: The man who put neurosis into top pops
Profile and Interview by Maureen Cleave, The Evening Standard, 29 August 1964
THE INTRODUCTION of the Neurotic Ballad to British popular music is the responsibility of an American called Burt Bacharach. We first developed a taste for ...
Profile and Interview by Maureen Cleave, The Evening Standard, 10 October 1964
THE BEATLES have done terrible things to the American record industry. Nobody knows what to record any longer. Should they try to reproduce what is ...
Mort Shuman: Writing Songs Is So Easy
Profile and Interview by Maureen Cleave, Sydney Morning Herald, the, 11 October 1964
FOR SONG-WRITING we British make do with Lennon/McCartney. The Americans are more extravagant; they use Pomus and Shuman, Leiber and Stoller, Goffin and King, David ...
Brenda Lee: The man who'd barely heard of Brenda Lee (she married him)
Interview by Maureen Cleave, The Evening Standard, 14 November 1964
BRENDA LEE turned professional when she was six; she had actually been singing for two years before that. She appeared on the Steve Allen show ...
The Beatles: Beatles For Sale (Parlophone)
Review by Maureen Cleave, The Evening Standard, 28 November 1964
BEAUTIFUL BEATLES ...
The Chipmunks: He Is Those Chipmunks
Interview by Maureen Cleave, The San Francisco Examiner, 29 November 1964
Ross Bagdasarian's Electronic Creatures Are Vastly Real ...
The Righteous Brothers: The strange thing about the Righteous Brothers is that they're white...
Profile and Interview by Maureen Cleave, The Evening Standard, 16 January 1965
THE RIGHTEOUS Brothers are not brothers at all; nor indeed are they more than ordinarily righteous. Their names are Bobby Hatfield and Bill Medley, and ...
The Beach Boys, The Lettermen: Nobody bugs the Gutsy Greek — the sten guns see to that
Interview by Maureen Cleave, The Evening Standard, 1 May 1965
NICK VENET went into the American record industry when he was 18 years old for this reason: "I wanted," he said, "to do something devastating; ...
Petula Clark: A Lady In Show Business — Petula Clark
Profile and Interview by Maureen Cleave, Detroit Free Press, 9 May 1965
The Girl Who Sings 'Downtown' ...
Solomon Burke: Cost of Solomon's Cadillac: a couple of songs and two good funerals...
Interview by Maureen Cleave, The Evening Standard, 19 June 1965
THE LARGE, smiling, splendid man in the picture is called Mr. Solomon Burke. He is 25. His wife is called Dolores Othello and they have ...
Interview by Maureen Cleave, The Evening Standard, 10 July 1965
GROWN-UPS, it seems, squabble just as boringly over labels, like jazz and blues, as do the younger fry over rock 'n' roll and the genuine ...
Vicki from Inkpen, Berks, may not look like a girl with power — but she's got it, lots of it
Interview by Maureen Cleave, The Evening Standard, 31 July 1965
SHE'S BACK! THE GIRL WHO REALLY KNOWS THE POP PEOPLE ...
Marc Bolan: Knit Yourself A Pop Singer — Marc and Mike Will Tell You How
Report and Interview by Maureen Cleave, The Evening Standard, 23 October 1965
HUMILITY AMONG POP SINGERS used to be all the rage. "Mr. Presley," the interviewer would ask, "is it to luck or to talent that you ...
Joan Baez: A Lady in Show Business — Joan Baez
Interview by Maureen Cleave, Detroit Free Press, 12 December 1965
THERE WERE many things about Joan Baez, the folk singer, to give the impression that she was — if not slightly holier than most people ...
Mick Jagger, The Rolling Stones: Mick Jagger: Bad Joke into Social Lion
Profile and Interview by Maureen Cleave, The Evening Standard, 4 February 1966
THE ROLLING STONES WERE PLAYING in the Station Hotel, Richmond, two-and-a-half years ago when their two prospective managers came to take a look at them. ...
The Beatles, John Lennon: How Does a Beatle Live? John Lennon
Profile and Interview by Maureen Cleave, The Evening Standard, 4 March 1966
ON A HILL IN SURREY... A YOUNG MAN, FAMOUS, LOADED AND WAITING FOR SOMETHING ...
Report and Interview by Maureen Cleave, The Evening Standard, 11 March 1966
RINGO LIVES in Weybridge at the bottom of the hill of which John lives on top. His house, too, is large and Tudor-ish. It has ...
The Beatles, George Harrison: How A Beatle Lives Part 3: George Harrison — Avocado With Everything…
Report and Interview by Maureen Cleave, The Evening Standard, 18 March 1966
GEORGE HARRISON is 23, the youngest Beatle and the least well-known. He isn't one of the two who sing and he isn't Ringo; indeed some ...
Interview by Maureen Cleave, The Evening Standard, 25 March 1966
THE SCENE SHIFTS FROM WEYBRIDGE TO LONDON ...
The Beatles, Cilla Black: Brian Epstein: The Man Behind The Beatles And How He Lives
Profile and Interview by Maureen Cleave, The Evening Standard, 1 April 1966
Many theories developed about Brian Epstein: he was crooked, he was straight; he was a tough businessman, he was a lousy businessman; it was all ...
The Yardbirds: Simon Napier-Bell always tells the truth... especially about Simon Napier-Bell
Interview by Maureen Cleave, The Evening Standard, 13 May 1966
MAUREEN CLEAVE'S FRIDAY INTERVIEW ...
The Beatles, The Hollies: The Beatles: 'Paperback Writer'/'Rain' (Parlophone)
Review by Maureen Cleave, The Evening Standard, 11 June 1966
IT'S HARD to know what to say about either of these songs. One thing is certain: Ella Fitzgerald and all the gang of real singers ...
The Beatles: Revolver (Parlophone PMC 7009)
Review by Maureen Cleave, The Evening Standard, 30 July 1966
THIS COMES out next Friday. The cover shows the Beatles with huge heads of Beardsley hair and little photographs of themselves propped up on the ...
Little Richard: Even God can do better with Little Richard on his side
Interview by Maureen Cleave, London Express Service, 24 March 1985
GOD ALWAYS addresses Little Richard by name — it was the same with Moses and the prophet Samuel and St. Paul. ...
John Lennon: The John Lennon I knew
Memoir by Maureen Cleave, Daily Telegraph, 5 October 2005
The man who changed the course of pop music would have been 65 this week. Maureen Cleave, who knew the Beatles at the height of ...
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