Cathy Mc Gowan - After Ready Steady Go!

After Ready Steady Go!

Once RSG had ended, McGowan's star began to wane. By way of illustration, the Sunday Times, previewing an exhibition of photographs by Patrick, Earl of Lichfield 40 years later, has described Queen's use of his shots in 1967:

was ... a great one for persuading people to join in, even if the outcome was not always the one they expected. In the 1960s he took a series of group portraits for Queen magazine supposedly documenting the movers and shakers of the time — except that some, such as Jonathan Aitken and Cathy McGowan, were deemed not to be "in", and were labelled as "out" in the magazine. But Lichfield, with his impeccable manners, refused to upset his subjects by letting them know that in advance.

However, in 1978, McGowan was the subject of a tribute "I'm in love with Cathy McGowan" — by the English band Generation X in the song "Ready Steady Go", a single that hit no. 47 on the UK charts. The social historian Alwyn W. Turner has cited the band's "hymning" of McGowan as an example of punk's indebtedness to mod culture.