All about Status Quo

Status Quo are a British rock band known in their home country for their 12-bar boogie rock that they have been playing since the 70s. Between 1968 and 1990 they had numerous hits, with about 22 hits in the UK Top 10, including the most popular "Down Down" in 1974. In America, the biggest hit was the psychedelic "Pictures Of Matchstick Men", which peaked at number 12 in 1968.

Factual History of Status Quo

• The band was originally called The Scorpions and was founded by vocalist Francis Rossi and bassist Alan Lancaster still at school in London with classmates: a drummer Alan Keyand keyboardist Jesse Jaworski.

• The Scorpions' first performance was in 1963 at the Samuel Jones Sports Club in Dulwich, London. At that time, the group only performed covers.
• In 1963, the band changed "Scorpions" to "The Specters". There was a change in the repertoire, the group now began to perform their own compositions. It was Lancaster - he was the first to start writing his own material - his first composition was a song called "You're My Girl". Then, in the 66th, the band signed a five-year contract with Piccadilly Records. They released three singles that were doomed to fail in the charts.
• In 1967, when the group began to explore psychedelia, it changed the group's name several times. First to "Traffic Jam", but was forced to change the nickname again, since Stevie Winwood's "Traffic" group was called almost the same. Then, at the end of the 67th year, the band became known as "The Status Quo", at the same time they were joined by a close friend of Rossi, guitarist Rick Parfitt, he joined the original composition of the group.

• The band opened the Live Aid charity event at Wembley in July 1985. The first song they played was their famous cover of John Fogerty's "Rockin' All Over The World".

• Rossi and Parfitt made a couple cameo appearances on Coronation Street in 2005. In the story, they got into a fight with slacker Les Battersby at the Rovers Return bar and then played "live" at his concert as compensation.
• Status Quo organized an advertising campaign "Prices Go Down" for the Australian supermarket "Coles", in which they used the lyrics of the song "Down Down Down". It was the most requested video on Google. Many people wanted to see the 2012 Australian supermarket commercial featuring the band, but the media called the whole thing stupid.

• Several hits, including "Caroline," "Paper Plane" and "Down Down," were created by vocalist Francis Rossi along with tour manager and guitarist Bob Young.
• Guitarist Rick Parfitt tended to team up with keyboardist Andy Bown (they co-wrote the hit single "Whatever You Want") or bassist John Edwards. Francis Rossi later said:

“It's very difficult to record with Rick. Suppose an idea came to him, and if you say: “what you need”, he will answer that he can do better ... - and he plays and plays, and, in the end, loses it. So when he and John write together, they are surrounded by four microphones that record all the changes and monitor what is happening.

• Status Quo released their first feature film, Bula Quo! in 2013. In support of the film, shortly before its release, the band released a double disc of the same name. Rossi admitted that the band had no intention of dedicating an album to the film: "We went out and shot the film lightly"; and they told us, "There should be a soundtrack here." Then I thought, “Soundtrack? Perhaps it will have to be done together with the group.
• "Bula Bula Quo (Kua Ni Lega)" was the 100th single released by the group.
• Status Quo entered the Guinness Book of Records in 1991: they performed four shows at four different venues in one day: Sheffield International Centre, Glasgow Scottish Exhibition and Convention Centre, Birmingham National Exhibition Center and Wembley Arena, it was all as part of the "Rock Till You Drop" tour celebrating their 25th anniversary. The band played four shows in 11 hours and 11 minutes.
• Rick Parfitt has been facing health issues lately. He underwent a quadruple heart bypass in 1997, was diagnosed with throat cancer in 2005, and had three heart attacks in 2011, 2014 and June 2016. The latter forced Rick to leave the team.
• Lancaster and Coghlan left the bands in the 80s but returned for tours in 2013 and 2014. The last concert the quartet played together dates back to 2014 - "The Frantic Four's Final Fling: Live at the Dublin 02 Arena".

• Parfit died in a hospital in Marbella, Spain on December 24, 2016 from an infection. He passed away after doctors identified complications from a shoulder injury that Parfit suffered from a fall.
• The group's total world record sales exceed 118 million units.
• Francis Rossi said: “100 singles seems like an incredible event even for me, I recorded them all! When we started, we would have been happy to live in this business for at least a couple of years, so reaching this milestone is incredible.”

• The band has 106 appearances on the TV program "Top of the Pops" on BBC. It is a record, no other band has such a result.
• In total, the band lasted 415 weeks on the English singles chart, which is the eleventh place in the history of music.
• The band had 43 hit albums (27 studio albums, 11 compilation albums, 5 live albums) on the British Albums Chart, more than any other band except The Rolling Stones. They are second only to The Rolling Stones in UK hit albums
• During their 48-year history, the band is estimated to have played more than 6,000 live performances - a total concert audience of more than 25 million people. In doing so, the group traveled over four million miles and spent 23 years away from home.
• In 1991, the band was awarded the BRIT Award for its tremendous contribution to the music industry: the band's legacy was officially recognized,
• "Aquostic (Stripped Bare)" was the best-selling independent UK album of 2014 and helped mark their 500th week on the UK charts (meaning not the singles chart, but the album chart).