[Deathwatch] Tony Jackson, Searchers bassist, 63

[Deathwatch Central]

Searchers bassist dies
Thursday, August 21, 2003 Posted: 8:01 AM EDT (1201 GMT)

http://www.cnn.com/2003/SHOWBIZ/Music/08/21/searchers.death/index.html

LONDON, England -- Tony Jackson, bass player for the 1960s "Merseybeat"
band The Searchers, has died. He was 63. 

Jackson died Monday in a hospital in Nottingham, central England,
several newspapers and The Searchers' official Web site reported. He
had been ill for some time with ailments including arthritis and
cirrhosis of the liver. 

Jackson sang and played bass for The Searchers, a Liverpool band that
briefly rivaled The Beatles in popularity. Like contemporaries
including John Lennon and George Harrison, Jackson was inspired first
by the uniquely British sound of "skiffle king" Lonnie Donegan, and
then by Buddy Holly and other U.S. rock imports. 

Guitarists John McNally and Mike Pender, who had a duo act, named
themselves after John Wayne's classic western. 

Adding Jackson and then drummer Chris Curtis, The Searchers honed their
skills in Liverpool's nightclubs and -- like The Beatles -- in the
tough beer bars of Hamburg, Germany. After The Beatles' success made
Liverpool acts a hot property, The Searchers were signed by Pye
Records. 

Jackson was lead singer on the band's first two British hits, "Sweets
for My Sweet" and "Sugar and Spice," but played bass only on the
enduring "Needles and Pins" -- which made the U.S. Top 20 -- and "Don't
Throw Your Love Away." 

In 1964 the band toured the United States, appearing on "The Ed
Sullivan Show." Feeling sidelined, Jackson quit the group the same
year. His follow-up band, Tony Jackson and the Vibrations, failed to
score and he drifted out of the music business. 

In later years he tried to set up a Searchers revival band, but the
field was crowded, with two others already in existence. He served time
in jail in the 1990s after threatening a woman with an air pistol. 

There was no immediate word on surviving relatives, or funeral details.