Sandie Shaw followed up her first chart topper in 1964 with Girl Don’t Come – originally released as the B-side of her next single.

All I really know about Sandie Shaw is that she was famous for singing barefoot. She’s one of those ’60s pop stars whose name I knew but whose heyday happened when I was a little boy. 

The Swinging Sixties seemed to have lots of these female English pop singers – not just Sandie Shaw but Dusty Springfield, Petula Clark, Cilla Black and Lulu. 

Composed by her regular songwriter Chris Andrews, the strangely titled Girl Don’t Come was recorded by Sandie Shaw at the end of 1964.

Her first single, the Andrews-penned As Long As You’re Happy Baby, was a flop but she then topped the chart in October with the Bacharach-David song (There’s) Always Something There To Remind Me.

Sandie released another Andrews-penned song, I’d Be Far Better Off Without You, as the follow-up, with Girl Don’t Come on the flip side.

But radio DJs preferred the B-side, and so did the public – and it reached No.3, as well as becoming her biggest US hit (albeit at a lowly No.42).

Sandie was born Sandra Ann Goodrich in Dagenham, and worked at the Ford Dagenham factory after she left school. Also a part-time model, her music career began after she won second prize in a local talent contest.

Her prize was the chance to sing at a charity concert in London, where she was spottd by Adam Faith, leading to a contract with Pye Records. 

She went on to have two more No.1 singles here, Long Live Love and Puppet On A String – the first ever British winner of Eurovision – and a total of 16 Top 40 hits in all, including her 1984 comeback.

That’s probably when I saw and heard her for the first time when she returned to the charts with The Smiths singing their song Hand In Glove.

In later life, Shaw became politically active, joining an Amnesty International campaign to end human rights abuses in Azerbaijan when Eurovision was hosted there in 2012. 

She was also a voice against Scottish independence before their 2014 referendum, and a prominent Remainer before the Brexit referendum two years later.

Trivia fact: It’s Not Unusual was originally written for Sandie Shaw (by Les Reed and Gordon Mills) but she never recorded it because she was so impressed with the singer on the demo – Tom Jones – and encouraged him to release the song himself, launching his career and giving him his first hit.