South Shields born Vinny Edwards has featured on this site a few times. Type his name in the search bar for previous write ups about his time in the music biz including international chart hit Back Where We Started From which reached #2 in the USA and #8 in the UK. Recently he got in touch and told me another story about one of his songs.

I was living in a flat in Wandsworth in London when I wrote and recorded I Can’t Turn Back Time in 1967. It was my second solo single for United Artists after The Answers broke up. We recorded the A and B side The Lively One at Olympic studios within three hours can you believe!

The B side was used for a commercial for Texaco petrol in the UK and USA. I Can’t Turn Back Time was played mostly on the pirate radio stations London and Caroline. I believe it charted on both stations it also broke into some Northern Soul charts.

In America it was released under the name Tim Love on the Ascot label so I would not be confused with the American actor Vince Edwards who played Dr Ben Casey in the TV series. It was just after this I changed my name to J Vincent Edwards. The ‘J’ I took from Jarra or Jarrow if you were posh.

Later there were two more records on United Artists – County Durham Dream and Aquarius then along came the musical ‘Hair’ and a new record company CBS. They were crazy happy days for a 22year old lad from South Shields’ Ocean Road school.

Link to the American release on the Ascot record label of ‘I Can’t Turn Back Time’

>>> https://youtu.be/79W6RtoJjDM?si=IGSL09KbaSvNN57v

Alikivi   September 2025