BBC Television Centre, the summer of 1976, and five lads from Liverpool, called The Real Thing, are sitting biting their nails in their dressing room.

“We were in the next room to The Wurzels,“ remembers Eddy Amoo. “Somebody came in and told us they’d sold 30,000 records that day. We’d just got in the top 56 – selling maybe 50 records a day. We’re sitting there thinking ‘what are we doing here?’

“It was very nerve wracking, I tell you that! We thought we’d blown it, we thought that was it for us.“

By the end of the month they were top of the charts with You To Me Are Everything, found themselves the cover stars of all the teen magazines and became the first British black group to reach a mainstream audience.

“Come the Monday, all of a sudden the whole thing exploded. It was amazing, all things fell into place at once.“

The group had an image. “We were out there – wearing flares, ridiculous platform heels, we grew big afros,“ recalls Eddy; and a soulful, R’n’B influenced sound rarely before heard from a British group. On that nervous night began a prolific recording career, generating further chart hits and stand-out album releases.

But for Eddy, the life-changing televised performance marked the end of what he calls his “13-year apprenticeship” in the music business that begins with a chance meeting with Paul McCartney at a Little Richard concert.

“Ha – we’re going way back now!“ says Eddy. “I was in a doo-wop group called The Chants. We formed for fun, we were just kids singing on the streets. You could put a record on, listen to the simple parts of the song and copy them.

“So one day we got chatting to Paul at this gig, we told him we’d got this acapella group. His ears pricked up, he was really fascinated.“

With the Beatles soon to depart for Hamburg, Paul told the group to come to The Cavern Club on their return for an audition.

“It was a lunchtime session. We’d never even used mics before – that was a pretty horrific experience! We started to sing and I remember they ran down to the front of the stage with their hamburgers - they were astonished.“

They were invited back that evening, after convincing the Beatles manager Brian Epstein. “At first he said ’my boys don’t back anybody’, but they changed his mind“, recalls Eddy, the fab four backed The Chants for their then biggest ever gig.

“It was an amazing experience for us – packed with screaming women and stuff. Us five just sheepishly strolled on, terrified!“

The Chants were invited to support the Beatles over the following six months.

“We used to have these long conversations with them,“ remembers Eddy, “have you heard The Miracles? Have you heard this new kid little Stevie Wonder? I can’t tell you some of the laughs we had. We used to travel to the gigs with them in their cars. You can imagine what it was like – complete Beatlemania.

“It was seeing the business from the very top but we were at the very beginning. In a sense we started at the top and worked our way down! Haha!

“It gave me a taste, mate. We knew this was what we wanted to do.“

By the mid-’70s, Eddy’s younger brother Chris had followed in his footsteps with his own group The Real Thing, which Eddy mentored and later joined. They forged a successful song-writing partnership, with songs that explored the serious social issues of the time, like Children of the Ghetto and Stanhope Street, as well as the dancefloor fillers we all know and love.

The two brothers and original member Dave Smith continue their major UK tour this month in Edmonton.

“I don’t think there’s anything like gigging,“ adds Eddy. “When you’re on the stage and you get that vibe with the crowd, there’s no feeling like it. I feel really privileged to still be doing it now – I’m enjoying it even more to tell the truth!“

The Real Thing come to The Millfield Theatre on Saturday, April 6 at 8pm. Details: 020 8807 6680