by Richard Skelly » Thu Jan 25, 2018 12:57 am
Fronted by Terry and Susan Jacks, The Poppy Family generated serious industry buzz after their first Canadian hits Beyond The Clouds and What Can The Matter Be. Because they’d achieved such great results out of the late Robin Spurgin’s Vancouver Recording Studio (aka Psi-Chord), I assumed the band relied on it or another local studio for what became the Which Way You Goin’ Billy album.
But a recent ebook by ex-Province rock critic Tom Harrison tells otherwise. In Harrison’s profile of the title track, the long-divorced Terry and Susan recall how London Records Canada funded a trip to the UK. That’s where the rest of the album took shape. Originally titled Which Way You Goin’ Buddy, the song was first demoed in Vancouver by the couple’s former Music Hop colleague Michael Campbell. Terry tells Harrison the name/gender switch to Billy was due to his realization that it sounded better sung from a female perspective. For instance, listeners could now think it was a woman fearing for her man sent to fight in Vietnam. “It was a hit melody,” recalls Terry. “But I thought it would be stronger from a girl’s point of view.”
But why Billy? Apparently, Terry had long loved a song by fellow Canadians The Beau Marks called Billy, Billy Went A Walking. At least that’s the explanation proferred to Harrison. I remember rumours that Susan Jacks’ brother, Billy, also played a part. Like many a young man of the late ‘60s, Billy Pesklevits was struggling to make life decisions. Susan—and Terry—wanted him to make good ones. Decades later in one of those “rest of the story” developments, Billy donated a life-saving kidney to Susan.