MUSIC lovers have been able to follow a trail of plaques around Liverpool in honour of the city’s most famous sons, the Beatles, for years.

Now Canvey is set to follow suit by honouring its own musical heroes, legendary rhythm and blues band Dr Feelgood.

Their manager, Chris Fenwick, is in talks with Canvey Town Council about putting up plaques to mark locations across the island where their early album covers were shot.

There has been a surge of interest in the band, who peaked in 1976 when their album Stupidity hit number one in the charts, because of a new feature film about them, called Oil City Confidential.

The band still have dedicated fans at home and from all around the world.

It is hoped the plaques will attract large numbers of visitors to the island, eager to see where original members – singer Lee Brilleaux, songwriter and guitarist Wilko Johnson, bass player John B Sparks, and drummer John “Big Figure” Martin – grew up and posed for a string of iconic photos.

The most famous shot of the band was for the cover of their 1974 debut album Down By the Jetty.

They were pictured on the sea wall, by the Lobster Smack pub, off Haven Road, Canvey, with the Oikos Jetty in the background.

Chris recalled: “The photo was taken straight after we got back from a gig, at about six in the morning, to take advantage of the light, and no one had got any sleep.

“The photographer took colour and black and white shots, and the record company wanted to use the colour pictures.

“We preferred the black and white ones because it looked moodier.

“Lee looked sleepy in the shot and I think he actually nodded off while the photographer was fussing around.”

The cover for their second album, Malpractice, released in 1975, was of the band outside a barber’s shop in Morris Road, Canvey.

Chris said: “This was another black and white shot, outside an old parade of shops, which has long-since been demolished and replaced with houses.

“We chose them because they looked like something out of the wild west.

“They were made from timber and plaster, like a lot of the old buildings on Canvey.”

For the band’s fourth album cover Sneakin’ Suspicion, Brilleaux was photographed outside the Canvey Club, High Street, Canvey.

Chris said: “It’s still there and it’s always been called the Canvey Club, but for some reason which is beyond me now, we mocked up the photo to make it look like it was called the Alibi Club.

“We chose a Canvey location again, because our identity was really rooted in the island.

“Lee, Sparko and me used to be in the Southside Jug Band together before Wilko and the Big Figure joined.

“We used to play early gigs at the Canvey Club in the late Sixties and I used to play the jug, which you blew in to to make a bass sound.

“We also used to play at the Corner Club across the road, then we’d move up to the original Oysterfleet pub playing three gigs in one night.”

The cover to Dr Feelgood’s third album Stupidity, released in 1976, could not be commemorated on Canvey, as it is a live shot of Wilko and Brilleaux from a show they played at the Kursaal Ballroom, in Southend, in 1975.

Chris has high hopes for the plaques, which he insisted would have to be “vandal-proof”.

He said: “We shall have to work out what form they would take.

“I’d like the album images to be somehow recreated on the plaques.

“Fans could visit the sites where we shot them and reproduce the photos themselves, in the same way people pose crossing Abbey Road, in London, like the Beatles.”

Town councillor Dave Blackwell, 62, who is leader of the Canvey Independent Party, said: “I think it’s a great idea.

“Dr Feelgood are an important part of Canvey’s history, they’re legends.

“I’m sure if we put up plaques it would attract fans from all over the world, which would be great for tourism. They’re such a part of the community. Most people who have lived here for any length of time know someone from the band. Sparko is a friend of mine. His kids and mine grew up together.”

Chris recalled some other location-related trivia, which could possibly be incorporated into a future Dr Feelgood-themed tour of Canvey.

He recalled their local pub in the early days was the Admiral Jellicoe, in High Street, Canvey.

Lee and Chris lived in the original Dr Feelgood house, in Central Wall Road, Canvey, from 1972 to 1977, which had a practice room and office.

The band then bought a second house in Long Road, which had a bar in the front room they used for a private drinking club, called the Cluedo Club.

Chris said: “We had Stella on tap and used to have music playing. The house still exists, but I doubt they’ve got a bar in their living room.”

There is already a plaque outside the Oysterfleet Hotel, in Knightswick Road, Canvey, in honour of late-great singer and harmonica player Brilleaux, who passed from cancer away 15 years ago.

It commemorates his final gig performed at the site in January 1994, when it was still called the Dr Feelgood Music Bar, before it was converted into a hotel.

The current Feelgoods line-up will play their only Essex show this year at the Oysterfleet Hotel, on Sunday, December 13.

Tickets are available from the hotel by calling 01268 510111.