UK NEWS

BRITAIN'S OLDEST ROCK BAND TOTTER UP THE CHARTS

ROCK OF AGES: Fan Roger Daltry

Monday May 28,2007

By Geoff Maynard

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THEY might sing “hope I die before I get old” but the members of Britain’s oldest rock band are set for their very first chart hit.

The Zimmers, a group of 40 pensioners with a combined age of more than 3,000 years, have covered The Who’s anthem of youthful rebellion My Generation.

And The Who’s own frontman Roger Daltrey, pictured here, is urging people to buy the CD which comes out today.

The old boy band was put together by documentary maker Tim Samuels, whose programme about The Zimmers, The Great Granny Chart Invasion, can be seen on BBC2 at 9pm tonight.

“This is about old people sticking it back to the society that has cast them aside,” said Samuels.

“We wanted to take them on a rock ’n’ roll journey that would challenge all our preconceptions of OAPs and give them a great time.”

Many of The Zimmers live in old people’s homes or suffer social isolation in their communities.

For Joan Bennett, who is in her 90s, making the record offered her the first opportunity to leave her London tower block flat in three years.

Care home resident Winifred Warburton, 99, from Derby, described the recording at London’s famous Abbey Road studios as “the best day in my life”.

The band’s lead singer is 90-year-old Londoner Alf Carretta. “I can’t believe this is happening. For me to have recorded a song in the same studio as The Beatles is just so exciting,” he said.

“I feel like the whole experience has brought me back to life. I was stuck in a rut and now I feel alive again.”

The Zimmers’ version of My Generation was produced by Mike Hedges, who has worked with the likes of U2 and the Manic Street Preachers.

The video was shot by Grammy Award-winner Geoff Wonfor and is already a cult hit on YouTube.

The Zimmers now have their own page on MySpace and have also been invited to appear as special guests on the Jay Leno show in the US alongside George Clooney.