"Squeaky And The Black Knight" The Royal Guardsmen

In late 1966, a young rock band by the name of The Royal Guardsmen released a single on the Laurie record label called, "Snoopy And The Red Baron". By early 1967, the song was charging up the U.S charts, the group was appearing on television shows and concerts around the country and Charles M. Schulz, the creator of the Peanuts comic strip, was suing the group for copyright violations.

As attorneys were meeting to negotiate, Laurie Records was in a bit of a quandary. The record was doing well in the U.S and now they were ready to release it in Canada. But with the lawsuit still pending they were afraid to release the record up north for fear that the negotiations might fail.

As a result, Laurie decided to have the band go into the studio and record a new version of the song called, "Squeaky And The Black Knight".  Basically, this was the same song minus any reference to Snoopy or The Red Baron. The record was available in Canada for a short time and did receive airplay on a handful of radio stations.

Once a deal was made with Charles M. Schultz, Laurie pulled " Squeaky And The Black Knight" and released "Snoopy" in Canada. As a result, copies of "Squeaky" are extremely rare and go for big bucks whenever one turns up. You can listen to the song for no bucks at all below.