Would You Believe? – THE HOLLIES***

I Take What I Want/Hard Hard Year/That’s How Strong My Love Is/Sweet Little Sixteen/Oriental Sadness/I Am A Rock/Take Your Time/Don’t You Even Care/Fifi The Flea/Stewball/I’ve Got A Way Of My Own/I Can’t Let Go

Fourth album from The Hollies sees them still heavily dependent on covers. Would You Believe contains the UK No. 2 hit single I Can't Let Go. From this time onwards groups would start to focus more on albums. (UK:16)

"One thing's for certain: The Hollies were chewing on 1966 with sharper teeth than The Dave Clark Five. But that still wasn't sharp enough. They had plenty of stamina to last themselves through the 'great singles war', but their finest adversaries such as The Liverpudlians ended up duping them by shifting from singles to entire albums."

"In early 1966, The Hollies were in an interesting situation. They were writing stuff of their own, some of that even excellent, but their hits were constantly brought in by guest writers and their albums were half filled with covers."

"I Can't Let Go just happens to be one of the timeless classics. I do believe that no-one in Britain at the time could reproduce those vocal harmonies, or could probably begin to understand how on earth they were constructed in the first place."

"Would You Believe? had only four original songs and they tended to be derivative, like Hard Hard Year, or novelties such as Oriental Sadness and Nash's solo showcase Fifi The Flea. Meanwhile, the covers again mixed rock & roll and R & B oldies with borrowings from the folk and folk-rock repertoire."

"The best of the first four Hollies albums: the albums that made them popular, but also showed that they were a singles band. This album has better songs overall, and they sound more serious than on the previous works. Would You Believe? has very few weak points."

"Would You Believe is a clear indication that even greater songs and albums were to come. After this album the band began to write many of their hit-singles themselves, and the vast majority of the songs on their following albums were Clarke/Hicks/Nash material."