On the 26 th march of 1966 they were booked as a support for The Rolling Stones in the southern town off Den Bosch. The public was very impressed with the Outsiders. It wasn’t the name off Mick Jagger the audience shouted for, but they called for Wally Tax and The Outsiders. It was this gig which gave them their nationwide attention, and definite breakthrough. Without shame they could show their faces in still beatcity number 1: the Hague. The whole month of april the played in the Pam Pam club. They earned 200 euros per night. A year later their fee was threedoubled. The refused an offer to play in the famous Boltini Circus. This circus had combined oldstyle acts with perfomances of beatgroups. This formula was copied from the German Kroone circus. In Boltini many famous international and national bands played like The Kinks, Peter & the Blizzards and The Bintangs.

Circus Boltini in 1966 

The first Relax single That's your problem was released in this period. From that moment on The Outsiders would be in the Hitparade (which doesn’t say a lot about the quality of the records in general, but still) till the end of ’67. The Outsiders had reached the top. A tv performance for the Tiener Magazine was another proof of that. One negative byeffect was the emergence of  soloaspirations growing in the mind of Wally Tax . It wasn’t very good for the groups community spirit. The manager liked the idea though, and like a real star he got his own separate contract, which among other things forbids Wally to mary within the next three years. If he would fail this clause, he had to pay a fine. A marriage would probably diminish his sexappeal for the many female fans.

 When they had to play in the most backward places of Holland,  a group of bodyguards went along. It wasn’t a show of stardom, but a necessity to keep overexcited girls and their jealous boyfriends away from the podium. Although a fysical risc, playing in the outer regions was financially interesting. Clubowners used to pay relatively high sums off money to get bands from the major cities. In july ’66 the first international adventure was scheduled. The Parisian club La Locomotive had the honour. The two nights were very successful, and even the Moody Blues who played there as well, were left behind in attention. In december of the same year they were invited to come back to La Locomotive.

The Outsiders aan de Seine

At the end off 1966 the single Touch/ballad off John B. was released. It would become the publics favourite, although they themselves weren’t very enthusiast about the quality off the recording. Instead off making Ballad off John B the A-side, as a tribute to their manager, he himself convinced them to do it the other way around for commercial reasons. Willem Duys even wanted to block the release completely, but luckily his decision was to late: the company had already cut the record, and destroying it now, would only mean money loss. As things turned out this record became a huge success.