Billy Chinnock - Crown Liquor

First performance: 01/06/1969

Coverinfo

Bruce covered the song 2 times:
 
1970-02-28 Center (The), Richmond, VA
With Steel Mill. One show, held at the school’s The Center (this venue will soon be renamed The String Factory in May 1970), with Steel Mill the sole act on the bill. A rare performance of Billy Chinnock’s composition "Crown Liquor". This gig is believed to have been bassist Vinnie Roslin’s final performance as a member of Steel Mill. His replacement will be Steven Van Zandt.
 
 
 
 
1969-06-01 Monroe Park, Richmond, VA 
The three listed songs are from a fan recollection that's deemed reliable. This is Child's first trip to Richmond (and Bruce's first known appearance in Virginia) and is a free outdoor concert. New Jersey band Brother Duck also make the trip and open the show. Child's performance here has a huge impact and many more trips to Richmond will follow over the next eighteen months. Mercy Flight drummer Davy Hazlett is in the audience. We've been contacted by a reader who recalled a guy sitting on a big water fountain which broke during the show - anyone else recall this? In a 1978 interview, Bruce also mentioned that the band played in North Carolina.
Complete set details are not known, although the three mentioned songs are from a fan recollection that's deemed reliable. "Jennifer" is a known Springsteen composition from the period that has yet to circulate on any tape. 
 
 
Child consisted of Springsteen (guitars & vocals), Vinnie Roslin (bass), Vini Lopez (drums) and Danny Federici (keyboards). The date of their first show is unclear, but is believed to be in early April of 1969. The four band members had been playing together in public during February and March, but the show on April 2nd at Pandemonium in Wanamassa is their first known advertised gig. Child changed their name to Steel Mill in November 1969 when they learned that another band had just released a record under that name. However, promotional material used both names in the months after to avoid confusion. 
 
 
  

Songinfo

William Chinnock (November 12, 1947 – March 7, 2007), also referred to as Bill Chinnock or Billy Chinnock, was an American singer-songwriter and guitarist. Born in Newark, New Jersey, Chinnock grew up in the nearby Essex County communities of East Orange and Millburn. He was a prominent member of the Jersey Shore music scene during the late 1960s, leading bands that included future members of the E Street Band. He subsequently moved away from the Shore and spent time in New York City and Nashville, Tennessee before eventually settling in Yarmouth, Maine. In 1987 he won an Emmy Award after his song, "Somewhere in the Night" was used as the theme on Search for Tomorrow. "Hold On To Love", a duet he recorded with Roberta Flack was also featured as a theme song on Guiding Light.
 
 
 

Other cover versions

Bruce on the artist

Thanks Albee Tellone for the missing information :
 
"Crown Liquor is the only Bill Chinnock song that Bruce ever sang. When Child got started, they needed a song to fill up a setlist for a concert. Vini had been playing in a band with Chinnock singing Crown Liquor. He liked it very much and wanted to use it. Bruce agreed, but it was never used after Child/Steel Mill disbanded. "
 
Vini Lopez on Bill Chinnock:
 
"The Boss before Bruce": Before drummer Vini "Maddog" Lopez joined Springsteen in bands like Child, Steel Mill, and the E Street Band, he played in Bill Chinnock's post-Storytellers outfit, the Downtown Tangiers Band. Lopez talked to Backstreets after learning of Chinnock's death:

I met Bill in 1965 at a teenage dance on the boardwalk in Belmar, NJ. I auditioned for his band, the Storytellers. I didn't get the job because I wouldn't play "Wipeout." So Chip Gallagher got the gig. Bill, truly, was one of my oldest friends. Bill was the BOSS before Bruce. You had to do it his way. He always made you a living with music. We did so many shows together all over the Northeast. He wrote so many great songs all through his life. I hope that those songs never get forgotten. I will never forget them. When I first met Bruce and we formed the band Child, the first song that we learned was a song by Bill Chinnock, "Crown Liquor." We still do that song in Steel Mill today. Now I want to learn "There's a Lion in the Park." The man and his music will be sorely missed by all who knew him
 

Lyrics

no lyrics found