Del Shannon

"It's one of those things that kind of, people of a certain age obviously, differentiate between the kind of good and the bad: those people who think that Del Shannon's 'Runaway' was a better record than 'Hats Off To Larry', completely wrong, quite clearly." 
Del Shannon (born Charles Weedon Westover; December 30, 1934 – February 8, 1990) was an American rock and roll and country musician and singer-songwriter, best known for his 1961 number 1 Billboard hit Runaway. Westover's pseudonym was derived from Mark Shannon—a wrestling pseudonym used by a regular at the Hi-Lo Club—with Del, derived from the Cadillac Coupe de Ville, his favourite car.
His most successful songs used a Musitron, an adapted clavioline and forerunner of the synthesiser, thereby giving them a distinctive sound. Shannon was always more popular in the UK than America (although he never had another number one after Runaway) and was the first American to cover a Beatles song, From Me To You. His career slumped in the 1970s due to alcoholism but he returned to the stage with music produced by Dave Edmunds. There were rumours that he would replace the deceased Roy Orbison in the Traveling Wilburys: however, his final years were marked by a battle against depression and he committed suicide with a shotgun in 1990.
==Links to Peel==
Although Runaway was the more popular of the two songs, Peel much preferred the follow-up Hats Off To Larry, presumably because it was a loser's song, a genre he had a fondness for. The latter featured in the 1962 Peelenium. Shannon also co-wrote Sister Isabel with Brian Hyland, as Peel noted: the original would have been featured on 24 June 1995 (BFBS) had John been able to find it.
Like fellow early 1960s hit artists Bobby Vee and Bobby Darin, Del Shannon later attempted to move with the times by issuing an album under his own name (The Further Adventures of Charles Westover) but it was disappointingly received and diesn't appear to have been played on Top Gear. In 1990 JP noted Shannon's suicide, adding that Duane Eddy was to replace him on the All American Solid Silver 60s UK tour, Duane Eddy: More New Numbers, Less Old Hat, Independent On Sunday, 1990-04-08. Reprinted in Olivetti Chronicles, Bantam Press, 2008, p. 62. but seems to have neglected to play any of his music.
== Festive Fifty Entries ==
*None
==Peelenium==
*Peelenium 1962: 'Hats Off To Larry'
== Sessions ==
*None
== Other Shows Played ==
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*30 November 1987: Runaway (v/a CD - Cruisin' 1961) Design
*16 June 1995: 'Hats Off To Larry (CD-Greatest Hits)' (Charly)
*25 October 1999: 'Hats Off To Larry (7")' (London) Peelenium 1962
*02 November 2000: Kelly (7” - Two Kinds Of Teardrops) Big Top
== See Also ==
*Peel's 77 All Time Favourite Records List
== External Links ==
*Wikipedia
*AllMusic
;Footnotes
Category:Artists