UPUP...AND AWAY WITH THE BUGALOOS!
LI'L JOHN'S YEAR OF CHANGES!

This has been a year of firsts for John Philpott of the Bugaloos.  Although he'd already done some acting and had been in a musical group, the trip to London to audition for the part in the Bugaloos was his first trip to the swinging city.  

He was born and raised in Deal, Kent, and the 80-mile trip to London was a pretty big gamble for him - but it paid off.   Looking back now he recalls how he felt when he found out he had the part and would be going to America.  "We were all supposed to go to this hotel in London, and I thought it would be the last nine people that they'd gotten down to, but it was just the four of us - Caroline, Wayne, Big John and myself - and I knew then I'd made it and I felt great.  My mother was with me and she was very pleased.   

The next first was his first plane ride - a long one from London to New York to Los Angeles.  "I felt a bit funny taking off from London but it was great.  When we hit Los Angeles it was quite smoggy and so we couldn't see the whole city from the air like people had told us we could." 
And, of course, this was his first trip to America, a land he finds very big, but fantastic, too.   

How does he find American girls in comparison to British girls?  "Well, we've met a lot of American girls and there is a difference between American and British girls.  I can't really put it in words, but there is a difference.  I think the whole attitude of American girls is different.  They're nice, but not so warm.  Ask me again in a year."   

And now Li'l John, as he's called to keep the two Johns in the group straight, is into a few more firsts - he's hard at work on his first television series, the group's first single and their first album.   

His life has changed an awful lot in the last few months, but he's taken it all in stride with perhaps only one minor disappointment.  "I thought California would be all beaches, and Los Angeles, too.  But Los Angeles is just a big city.  I guess I was a bit disillusioned."  What little free time he has now, he usually spends with the rest of the group in the super large house they're living in on a hill above Los Angeles.  There he swims, plays pool and dances with the others in the group and the friends they've made so far.   

There have been a lot of firsts in John's life lately, but there are probably many more to come and he's looking forward to anything life can throw at him. 

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