Ah the boss sounds of ’60s rock ‘n’ roll, the Barons, Jades, Cynics and Elite. Who? No, not the Who, they’re from England. I’m talking the mid-decade garage rock glory of Cowtown.

Blame it on the Beatles. Fort Worth, like other towns across America, exploded with beat combos in wake of the Fab Four’s 1964 Ed Sullivan Show appearance.

Or, as Johnny Nitzinger, guitarist with the Barons, puts it:

“They changed my life I tell you. I woke up with long hair the next morning.”

“Teen A Go Go” — produced by Mark Nobles, a Times-Review freelance writer — delves into the Fort Worth scene as inspired by the Beatles and the British invasion that followed. It’s a glorious ride through a more innocent, and exhilarating, time when the music really mattered.

Panther City in the ’60s was big enough to cultivate its own scene, yet isolated enough to retain uniqueness, Billy Miller, owner of Norton Records argues. Records released by Fort Worth bands between 1964 to 1968, most being local-label 45s, have a “very high batting average,” Miller said, compared to similar scenes across the country.

In addition to vintage clips of, and current interviews with, the bands showcased, “Teen A Go Go” gives such well-known names as Bobbie Wygant, Ron Chapman, Bruce Channel, Lenny Kaye, Bugs Henderson, Johnny Reno and Ira Robbins a chance to chime in their thoughts of the period. Chapman — who hosted “Sump’n Else”, a local ’60s TV show, similar to Dick Clark’s American Bandstand — featured numerous local and national bands.

As did Fort Worth’s legendary disc jockey Mark ‘Marky Baby’ Stevens on KFJZ. “Teen A Go Go” contains perhaps the last interviews with Stevens, who passed away in October.

Radio in the ’60s, not yet the moribund bore it is today, promoted local bands and tallied local charts, which gave many Fort Worth bands airplay alongside the Rolling Stones, Kinks and Supremes.

Although none reached those levels of fame, several did achieve considerable local notoriety, complete with fan clubs and followers. Pretty heady stuff for kids still in middle and high school.

“Here we were up on stage,” said Rodger Brownlee, guitarist with the Elite. “With a go-go girl [dancing] on the right, a go-go girl on the left, and a bunch of screaming girls down front.”

Several of the Fort Worth bands landed choice gigs at Will Rogers Coliseum, opening for the Yardbirds, Doors, Animals and other big names. The Kandy Kanes, one of Fort Worth’s few girl groups, lent their amplifiers to a largely unknown at the time English band. That event being the Rolling Stones’ first-ever Fort Worth appearance, a 1964 concert at Will Rogers, attended by about 100 people.

Chasing rock ‘n’ roll dreams, especially in a band with a 12-year-old drummer, could be an eye-opening experience, explained Phil Strawn of the Orphans, discussing the McKinney band’s first gig in a Dallas club.

“So we get up and play our bit and then go sit down in the club,” Strawn said. “And then, well, out come the strippers.”

As a counter to such antics, the go-go clubs sprang up in Fort Worth. Teen A Go Go, Action A Go Go, Candy Stick A Go Go and others provided Cowtown teens with music and fun weekend nights and an alternate to drive-in movies and cruising Camp Bowie. Friday nights, prime go-go action time, saw a drop in juvenile delinquency, one local paper reported at the time.

The film also covers in part Fort Worth’s musically rich legacy of country, rockabilly, R&B and soul that both shaped the later teen scene, and influenced the British bands who inspired it.

It’s also fun to hear the Fort Worth musicians lob several choice barbs Dallas’ way. And, while none of the bands featured hale from Johnson County, several mention fans from Burleson and Alvarado, and fond memories of playing Cleburne’s National Guard Armory back in the day.

Nobles and company have already screened “Teen A Go Go” at several film festivals around the country, and plan more, in addition to a possible TV airing. No need to wait for all that, however, as you can just hop over to www.teen-a-go-go.com to get the skinny on how to score your own personal DVD copy. A “Teen A Go Go” book is also in the works.

On a related note, anyone interested in checking out Fort Worth’s ’60s sounds would do well to check out “Fort Worth Teen Scene”, a three-CD collection of Fort Worth garage greats, many of whom appear in “Teen A Go Go”, released on Norton Records and compiled by Fort Worth residents Larry Harrison and David Campbell.

Visit www.nortonrecords.com for details or take a drive to Fort Worth to Record Town, across the street from TCU, where you can pick it up on CD or, better yet, genuine American vinyl.