Quite often people from all over the world who visit my website and read my RSS Feeds ask me why I am called "The BlackCat" and why the website is called "BlackCat Rockabilly Europe". Well, since you're obviously all quite curious, I thought I'd write down the story for you.

It all started back in 1979. I had been a DJ for over 10 years then and I had my own Oldies Drive-In, I was a fan of what we called "oldies music", which included music from the 40s, 50s and early 60s. In a local pub in the small village of Schijndel, Netherlands, where I live, we (my girlfriend and I) went to see a band named "Black Cat" from the UK. We had never heard of them before, so we figured we'd check 'em out. Wow, we were very impressed! From that day in 1979, I was a "rocker" and not just an oldies fan anymore.

We got acquainted with the bandmembers Chris, Vic, Doug, Ricky and Terry and the next time they played in Holland, they all stayed over at our place and we became good friends. In 1981 my girlfriend and I got married and we went on our honeymoon in the UK, spending most of our time touring with "our" band. We stayed over at Doug's and Terry's house and we even spent a night in a tent in Chris's garden. We had the best honeymoon anyone could have wished for!!

Because I had become a big fan, I stitched "BLACK CAT" on the back of my leather jacket with huge letters. After a while people started calling ME the BlackCat, because of the letters on my back. I've kept the name ever since, I still have that jacket, and I still wear it with pride.

25 Years Old Leather Jackets, 2005

In the mid en late 80s I knew more about rock 'n' roll and rockabilly than most, and I was also a fan of Gene Vincent and Eddie Cochran.
I started writing down lyrics of their songs and fellow rockers asked me for copies, because at that time the lyrics to most rockabilly songs were not available anywhere. I got the idea of issuing lyrics books, the first two containing all of Gene Vincent's songs. They were home printed, and I could hardly keep up with the demand. I got more and more requests for other songs and by 1989 I had released 6 books.

1990 was the beginning of the digital age for me and I started a Bulletin Board System from my home. You could log in with a modem and download pictures and lyrics. Of course I needed a name for the system, and "BlackCat BBS" was the obvious choice.

In 1993 the Internet became more accessible for home users and I moved my BBS to the Internet, renaming it to "The BlackCat Rockabilly Homepage" and later changed that to "BlackCat Rockabilly Europe".

Now, 25+ years on the move, I have several friends helping me out with writing reviews and lyrics and we have over 5500+ pages on our website and over 2 million hits each month. That makes us the largest rockabilly website in Europe by far! I still work on it almost every day, and I still enjoy it very much.

The band Black Cat unfortunatly broke up in the mid 80s, but we always stayed friends. Chris has constantly been active on the rock 'n' roll scene as "Chris Black, The Fenderman". I was very thrilled to hear that Chris and Ricky started a band again using the same name "Black Cat" and playing all the old favorites. Chris's "Ghostriders in the Sky" is still the very best rendition I ever heard.

More about Black Cat:
http://chrisblack.blackcat.nl 

Story by The BlackCat, 2005-2012-2015-2016

2006 update:
Last July (2006) me and my gal were married 25 years and we threw a heck of a party in our backyard. Special guests were Chris Black (founding member of Black Cat) and Claire Black (Chris's daughter and bass player of the new Black Cat). They played a unbelievable jam for over 2 hours with the help of PV & The Heartbeats bass player "Uncle B" plus harmonica wizard MikeVV. I even played a couple of songs myself on the bluesharp. This was the best anniversary any rocker could hope for!! Thanks to Chris & Claire Black and everybody else who added lots of music to overwhelm our neighbourhood.

The BlackCat & Chris Black, 2005