The Top Hat in Littlehampton, West Sussex was a popular live venue during the early-to-mid 1960s. The venue wasn’t advertised regularly in the local press so I’d be interested to hear from anyone who can add any further details of groups that performed there.
According to the Littlehampton Gazette, the Top Hat featured bands every Wednesday, Friday, Saturday and Sunday throughout 1964 but rarely advertised the names of the artists.
The following are the only gigs I’ve been able to find:
25 March 1964 – The Beat Merchants (Wednesday) (Littlehampton Gazette)
26 March 1964 – Dave Storm, Jeff Spence & The Tremors (Thursday) (Littlehampton Gazette)
28 March 1964 – The Beat Merchants and The Tremors (Saturday) (Littlehampton Gazette)
30 March 1964 – The Sabres (Bank Holiday Monday) (Littlehampton Gazette)
14 May 1964 – Beat Merchants (Thursday) (Littlehampton Gazette) Advert says St Mary’s Youth Club
24 December 1964 – Dave Storme & The Tremors and Gary Grant & The G-Men (Thursday) (Littlehampton Gazette)
26 December 1964 – The Beat Merchants and Gary Grant & The G-Men (Saturday) (Littlehampton Gazette)
27 December 1964 – The Dave West Show (Sunday) (Littlehampton Gazette)
28 December 1964 – The Dave West Show and The Fleur De Lys (Monday) (Littlehampton Gazette)
31 December 1964 – Dave Storme & The Tremors and Force Four (Thursday) (Littlehampton Gazette)
The same applied for 1965. The Littlehampton Gazette started to advertise acts on 4 June 1965.
4 June 1965 – The Deltas (Friday) (Littlehampton Gazette)
5 June 1965 – Chapter Four and Sons of Man (Saturday) (Littlehampton Gazette)
7 June 1965 – The Giants (Monday) (Littlehampton Gazette)
Judging by the dates below, it looks like Wednesdays were given up to national acts
23 June 1965 – The Applejacks (Wednesday) (Chichester & Southern Post/Littlehampton Gazette)
30 June 1965 – Heinz (Wednesday) (Chichester & Southern Post/Littlehampton Gazette)
7 July 1965 – The Mojos (Wednesday) (Chichester & Southern Post/Littlehampton Gazette)
14 July 1965 – The Four Pennies (Wednesday) (Chichester & Southern Post/Littlehampton Gazette)
21 July 1965 – The Ivy League (Wednesday) (Chichester & Southern Post/Littlehampton Gazette) Van Morrison’s band Them replaced The Ivy League
28 July 1965 – The Measles (Wednesday) (Littlehampton Gazette)
4 August 1965 – Cliff Bennett & The Rebel Rousers (Wednesday) (Beat Instrumental/Littlehampton Gazette)
11 August 1965 – The In Crowd (Wednesday) (Littlehampton Gazette)
18 August 1965 – Tommy Quickly & The Remo Four (Wednesday) (Beat Instrumental/Littlehampton Gazette)
25 August 1965 – The Fourmost (Wednesday) (Beat Instrumental/Littlehampton Gazette)
1 September 1965 – The Nashville Teens (Wednesday) (Littlehampton Gazette)
8 September 1965 – Billie Davis & Platform 6 with The Beat Merchants (Wednesday) (Littlehampton Gazette)
15 September 1965 – Johnny Kidd & The Pirates (Wednesday) (Littlehampton Gazette)
22 September 1965 – The Merseybeats (Wednesday) (Littlehampton Gazette)
29 September 1965 – Goldie & The Gingerbreads (Wednesday) (Littlehampton Gazette)
6 October 1965 – The Applejacks (Wednesday) (Littlehampton Gazette)
13 October 1965 – Mike Berry (Wednesday) (Littlehampton Gazette)
15 October 1965 – The Deltas (Friday) (Littlehampton Gazette)
16 October 1965 – The Just Five (Saturday) (Littlehampton Gazette)
20 October 1965 – Silkie (Wednesday) (Littlehampton Gazette)
27 October 1965 – The Cherokees (Wednesday) (Worthing Gazette)
3 November 1965 – Tony Rivers & The Castaways (Wednesday) (Littlehampton Gazette)
5 November 1965 – The Force Four (Friday) (Littlehampton Gazette)
6 November 1965 – The Just Five and Chapter Four (Saturday) (Littlehampton Gazette)
There’s a gap until the following dates
24 December 1965 – Danny Boyd & The Profile and The Force Four (Friday) (Littlehampton Gazette)
26 December 1965 – Danny Boyd & The Profile and Dave & The Diamonds (Sunday) (Littlehampton Gazette)
29 December 1965 – The Profile (Wednesday) (Littlehampton Gazette)
31 December 1965 – The Deltas and The Defiants (Friday) (Littlehampton Gazette)
5 January 1966 – The Profile (Wednesday) (Worthing Gazette)
7 January 1966 – The Noblemen (Friday) (Worthing Gazette) Says just back from Italy
8 January 1966 – Dave & The Diamonds and The Defiants (Saturday) (Worthing Gazette)
The Littlehampton Gazette advertises that bands played every Wednesday, Friday and Saturday throughout the rest of 1966 but does not name the artists until the very end of the year. This is all there was:
23 December 1966 – The Four Inches (Friday) (Littlehampton Gazette)
24 December 1966 – The Omega Plus and 4 Bidden (Saturday) (Littlehampton Gazette)
26 December 1966 – The St Louis Checks and The Inspiration (Monday) (Littlehampton Gazette)
27 December 1966 – The Laymen (Tuesday) (Littlehampton Gazette)
30 December 1966 – The Fleur De Lys (Friday) (Littlehampton Gazette)
31 December 1966 – The Omega Plus and The Total (Saturday) (Littlehampton Gazette)
Hi Paul
Found a gig.
Friday, June 4, 1958: Johnny Kidd and the Pirates
Cheers
John
We used to go there every weekend – they had a resident blues band called The Deltas – also the Bo Street Runners performed there sometimes.
Dee or Deek Garland and the tremors, and Gene Cohen and the Chimes on a Saturday evening. Fabulous times..late 50s early 60s.
The Late, 14th October 1967
OMG memories of my youth. My friends and I used to love going to the top hat. It was all we had in that neck of the woods!
My brother Mick and I, along with milky and robin ellfick used to go there in bill Williams in bills Riley elf and robins car, then letter Mick and I on my lambretta. Crikey good memories.
I played there quite often with ‘John A, Kingdon and the Humperdinks’ maybe sometimes just billed as ‘The Humperdinks’.
Later on I played there again when I was in The Downliners Sect, but it was during a time of a changing line-up and repertoire and we performed a one-off gig (in-cognito), billed as ‘The Ginn’ (another name for a Genie) burning small incense blocks beside the stage!