It was between 1960 and 1963 that the guitar-melody Nivram, sounding from an open bedroom-window at the van Heuven Goedhartlaan in the town of Assen, fondled many ears.
It came from the red Fender of school-mate Ger Vlieger, an early and avid Shadows-follower. Now and than I tried to add a bit of Cliff to it, but Ger was already a real Pro in the way he played - I couldn't compete with him in that matter.
All the same we showed off, having a picture taken, while dreaming of a booming career.
We started a band: “Johnny and the Falcons”, two years later it was followed by a real group playing songs from the Stones and the Beatles, but also: These boots are made for walking!
Ger studied in Groningen on the MTS (technical education) where he met Koos van Dellen, who played base. Together with Sjoerd Feenstra on drums and Paul Overmars from Assen on guitar, we formed The Flashlights (fotogalery), in 1965.
We rehearsed in the canteen of Feenstra’s Verwarming in Groningen on saturday afternoons. The performances most of the time, were at very late student parties. Around three am, I often realised that rhythm-guitarist Paul, was still singing intune, more than I did . Slightly knocked out at seven in the morning, we took the train back to Assen. The job at the NMB (a dutch bank), was waiting.The group broke up after a show at a business party for the firm, Feenstra, where the Beatle's song Yesterday, was listend to breathlessly. Without doubt; it was an unforgetable experience.