1960s – Page 77 – PowerPop… An Eclectic Collection of Pop Culture

Beatles – Please Please Me

This song broke it open for the Beatles in the UK. After Love Me Do peaked at #17 in the UK charts…this one shot to #1 in the New Musical Express, Disc and Melody Maker charts in 1963. The song would later peak at #3 in the Billboard 100 in 1964 after Beatlemania had hit.

George Martin never cared much for Love Me Do and told the Beatles that. He did like Please Please Me and thought it had potential if they would increase the tempo. They had played it to him very slow like a Roy Orbison song. They worked on it for the next studio visit and it started to take shape.

The song was a vast improvement over Love Me Do. The quick catchy riff with those harmonies are hard to resist. The climbing “come on come on come on” led to a perfect chorus hook.

John Lennon was partly inspired by a line from a Bing Crosby song that read, “Please lend a little ear to my pleas.” He recalled: “I remember the day I wrote it, I heard Roy Orbison doing “Only The Lonely”, or something. And I was also always intrigued by the words to a Bing Crosby song that went, ‘Please lend a little ear to my pleas’. The double use of the word ‘please’. So it was a combination of Roy Orbison and Bing Crosby.”

From Songfacts

This was The Beatles first single released in America, and getting it issued in the States was a struggle. The Beatles first recorded “Please Please Me” on September 11, 1962. That version was rejected for release. They re-recorded the song on November 26, 1962 and that version was first issued in England on the EMI-owned Parlophone label on January 12, 1963. After EMI’s US affiliate, Capitol Records, rejected the song (and a lot of other early Beatles material), the small, Chicago-based Vee Jay label stepped in and released “Please Please Me” stateside on February 25, 1963 and again on January 30, 1964 and August 10,1964. The only release that charted was the second, when The Beatles finally made a name for themselves in America.

John Lennon, who was a big Roy Orbison fan, wrote this in the style of Orbison’s overly dramatic singing. Beatles producer George Martin suggested it would sound better sped up. In 2006, Martin told The Observer Music Monthly, “The songs the Beatles first gave me were crap. This was 1962 and they played a dreadful version of ‘Please Please Me’ as a Roy Orbison-style ballad. But I signed them because they made me feel good to be with them, and if they could convey that on a stage then everyone in the audience would feel good, too. So I took ‘Love Me Do’ and added some harmonica, but it wasn’t financially rewarding even though Brian Epstein bought about 2,000 copies. Then we worked for ages on their new version of ‘Please Please Me,’ and I said: ‘Gentlemen, you’re going to have your first #1.'”

This was rumored to be about oral sex. The Beatles denied this, since they had a very clean image to maintain at the time. Lennon said of the song: “I was always intrigued by the double use of the word ‘please.'”

Although in the UK this was officially a #2 record, three of the four charts used at the time – Melody Maker, NME and Disc – listed it #1. Only the Record Retailer chart had it at #2.

The group’s name was misspelled “Beattles” on the record label on the first American release of the single.

Typical for the verse in “Please Please Me,” and for many of Lennon’s songs, are the long notes (legato) that are also used in hymns – even sounding a bit like Mendelssohn’s Wedding March in A Midsummer Night’s Dream. When Lennon was a little boy he used to go to church on Sunday. Afterwards he improvised his own counterpoints to the hymns.

The climbing in the melody “Come on, come on…” is similar to parts of two traditional folk songs: “New’s Evens Song” and “Come Fair One.” >>

In the UK, this was re-released in 1983 to coincide with the 20th anniversary of it’s initial release.

The Beatles performed this on their second Ed Sullivan Show appearance in 1964. Sullivan was not a fan of many rock groups, but loved The Beatles and had them on his show whenever he could.

This was the second Beatles single released in England, the first being “Love Me Do.”

An early version of this song with session drummer Andy White playing drums instead of Ringo can be found on Anthology 1.

The Please Please Me album was The Beatles debut long player. When they recorded it at Abbey Studios in London, John Lennon was struggling with a streaming cold and all were tired after a tour supporting Helen Shapiro. However with the help and encouragement of producer George Martin within nine hours and 45 minutes they had recorded their groundbreaking LP.

The album was released to cash in on the success of this single in the UK. It took them about 12 hours to record, and was basically a re-creation of their live show, which was mostly cover songs. The album was released with the text “Please Please Me with Love Me Do and 12 other songs.” >>

The Beatles performed this on Thank Your Lucky Stars on January 19, 1963. It was their first ever UK television appearance.

The British Prime Minister Gordon Brown revealed in an interview on the British TV program GMTV that this was the first record that he ever bought.

George Martin told Music Week magazine that the first time the Beatles played this to him, he wasn’t very impressed. He recalled: “I listened to it and I said: ‘Do you know that’s too bloody boring for words? It’s a dirge. At twice the speed it might sound reasonable.’ They took me at my word. I was joking and they came back and played it to me sped up and put a harmonica on it, and it became their first big hit.”

Lennon was a great fan of Bing Crosby and when in 1978, Yoko gave him a vintage ’50s Wurlitzer jukebox for his birthday he loaded the machine with as many 78-rpm records by the easy-listening vocalist as he could find.

This is Keith Richards’ favorite Beatles song. He told Jimmy Fallon: “I’ve always told McCartney, ‘Please Please Me.’ I just love the chimes, and I was there at the time and it was beautiful. Mind you, there’s plenty of others, but if I’ve got to pick one, ‘Please Please Me’… oh, yeah!”

Lennon-McCartney was the standard alphabetical credit for their Beatles songwriters compositions except on Please Please Me, where for reasons unknown, the names were reversed.

Please Please Me

Last night I said these words to my girl
I know you never even try, girl
Come on, come on, come on, come on
Please, please me, woah yeah, like I please you

You don’t need me to show the way, love
Why do I always have to say, love
Come on, come on, come on, come on
Please, please me, woah yeah, like I please you

I don’t want to sound complaining
But you know there’s always rain in my heart
I do all the pleasing with you,
It’s so hard to reason with you
Woah yeah, why do you make me blue?

Last night I said these words to my girl
I know you never even try, girl
Come on, come on, come on, come on
Please, please me, woah yeah, like I please you
Woah yeah, like I please you
Woah yeah, like I please you

The Nerf Ball… a brief history

The name NERF actually comes from drag racing. In the late ‘60s, foam-covered bars sometimes called “nerf bars” were put on the front of the trucks that pushed racers to the starting line. This prevented damage to cars.

I had many Nerf Footballs and small Nerf basketballs growing up and they were always fun to bonk someone in the head.

In 1968 Reyn Guyer who invented Twister helped invent the Nerf Ball. He was testing a new caveman game with colleagues. The prototype included a bunch of foam-rubber rocks that, the men soon discovered, were more fun to throw at one another than use in the game. He then thought (and probably saved a lot of broken lamps…and spankings) they could be used as balls and played within a home.

In 1969 Reyn tried to sell the idea to Milton Bradley but they didn’t want it, but Parker Brothers did. The first Nerf product as a 4-inch polyurethane foam ball. They marketed it as “world’s first official indoor ball” and soon they had blasters, footballs (Fred Cox, kicker for the Vikings actually invented the Nerf Football), basketballs, living room baseball and a line of Nerf products.

Parker Brothers handed the company off to Kenner Products, a sister company, in 1991, when Hasbro acquired the Nerf line. Throughout the 1990s and early 2000s, the Nerf brand served under the subsidiaries OddzOn and Larami before Hasbro took full control of the brand.

Monkees Nerf Ball Commercial

Smokey Robinson & The Miracles – The Tracks of My Tears

Smokey has one of the smoothest voices I ever heard. On top of that, he is one of the top songwriters of popular music. Bob Dylan called him “America’s greatest living poet.” and John Lennon was heavily influenced by him. The song peaked at #16 (only 16???) in the Billboard 100 and #9 in the UK in 1965.

Miracles members Smokey Robinson, Warren Moore, and Marv Tarplin wrote this song. Robinson penned the lyrics; Tarplin, The Miracles’ guitarist, came up with the riff. Tarplin got the idea for the music after listening to a calypso tune: Harry Belafonte’s “The Banana Boat Song (Day-O).”

From Songfacts

One of the most gut-wrenching songs on record, this one is about a man who tries to hide his pain, but cannot conceal the tracks made by his tears. He has come out of a relationship with the love of his life, and the song is his confession to her that his high spirits are just an act and she’s the only one for him, or perhaps what he wants to tell her but can’t.

Miracles leader Smokey Robinson came up with the concept when he was looking in the mirror one day, and thinking, What if a person would cry so much that you could see tracks of their tears in their face?

Robinson recalled: “‘Tracks of My Tears’ was actually started by Marv Tarplin, who is a young cat who plays guitar for our act. So he had this musical thing [sings melody], you know, and we worked around with it, and worked around, and it became ‘Tracks of My Tears.'”

Robinson had the music Tarplin wrote on a cassette, but it took him about six months to write the lyrics. The words started coming together when he came up with the line, “Take a good look at my face, you see my smile looks out of place.” From there, it was a few days before he got the lines, “If you look closer it’s easy to trace… my tears.”

What to do with those tears was a problem, as he wanted to say something no one has said about tears. In a 2006 interview with NPR, he explained that he finally came up with the image of tears leaving lasting marks, and the song came together. “One day I was listening, and it just came – the tracks of my tears,” said Robinson. “Like footprints on my face. So that was what I wrote about.”

Four different artists have charted with this song in America. Johnny Rivers had the biggest hit, taking it to #10 in 1967. Two of the most acclaimed female vocalists of their time, Aretha Franklin and Linda Ronstadt, also charted covers, Franklin’s making #71 in 1969 and Ronstadt’s going to #25 in 1976.

Other notable versions of this song include renditions by Go West in 1993 and Adam Lambert in 2009.

When he first recorded this song with The Miracles, Robinson left out the last chorus, fading it out on the “I need you, I need you” line. He was convinced to end on the chorus when he played the song at one of the famous Monday morning meetings at Motown, where songs were scrutinized by their team.

Robinson wrote a similar song a few weeks later called “My Girl Has Gone,” which was released as the next Miracles single.

Motown head Berry Gordy has said that this song represents Smokey Robinson’s best work.

The song was popular among American soldiers fighting in the Vietnam War, which is reflected in the 1986 Oliver Stone movie Platoon, where the song is used.

Other films to feature the song include The Big Chill (1983), The Walking Dead (1995) and Bobby (2006). TV series to used the song include The Wonder Years and Wife Swap.

Tracks Of My Tears

People say I’m the life of the party
Because I tell a joke or two
Although I might be laughing loud and hearty
Deep inside I’m blue
So take a good look at my face
You’ll see my smile looks out of place

If you look closer, it’s easy to trace
The tracks of my tears
I need you, need you
Since you left me if you see me with another girl
Seeming like I’m having fun
Although she may be cute

She’s just a substitute
Because you’re the permanent one
So take a good look at my face
You’ll see my smile looks out of place
If you look closer, it’s easy to trace
The tracks of my tears

I need you, need you
Outside I’m masquerading
Inside my hope is fading
Just a clown oh yeah
Since you put me down
My smile is my make up

I wear since my break up with you
So take a good look at my face
You’ll see my smile looks out of place
If you look closer, it’s easy to trace
The tracks of my tears

Beatles – The Word

It took a few listens to this song for me to fully appreciate it. It was not released as a single but it was on the Rubber Soul album in 1965. This song expressed desire and optimism for universal peace and love.

Multi-part vocals over a simple chord structure that sounds so different to what they did the year before. From I Want To Hold Your Hand to The Word shows The Beatles refusing to use a formula and continuing to move forward. They would stick to this pattern and lead the way until the end of the sixties.

Rubber Soul would peak at #1 in the Billboard album charts in 1966.

Paul McCartney said of the song:

“To write a good song with just one note in it – like ‘Long Tall Sally’ – is really very hard. It’s the kind of thing we’ve wanted to do for some time. We get near it in ‘The Word.’

John on the song:

“It sort of dawned on me that love was the answer, when I was younger, on the ‘Rubber Soul’ album. My first expression of it was a song called ‘The Word.’ The word is ‘love.’ ‘In the good and the bad books that I have read,’ whatever, wherever, the word is ‘love.’ It seems like the underlying theme to the universe. Everything that was worthwhile got down to this love, love, love thing. And it is the struggle to love, be loved and express that (just something about love) that’s fantastic. I think that whatever else love is – and it’s many, many things – it is constant. It’s been the same forever. I don’t think it will ever change. Even though I’m not always a loving person, I want to be that, I want to be as loving as possible.”

From Songfacts

This is another brilliant musical innovation from the Rubber Soul album, the first point at which The Beatles shrugged off the “mop tops” image and went for bolder artistic horizons. “The Word” sounds almost like evangelizing; as opposed to a standard boy-girl love song, the lyrics here embrace love as more of a concept, the way the Flower Power movement was thinking about it.

The lyrics of “The Word” also mark an important point at which The Beatles began to realize that they were, in fact, spokespeople for a new generation. Their songs started packing a stronger message, bridging their way to the future when John and George would make their lyrics more political.

Lead vocals on this song were shared by John Lennon, Paul McCartney and George Harrison. Beatles producer George Martin played the harmonium, an organ-like keyboard instrument.

Yoko Ono gave the sheet music of this song as a gift to the composer John Cage, who later published it in his book Notations. Ono studied under Cage, even sharing the occasional stage with him, before she met John Lennon.

Out of all the zillions of times that music fans claim that something was composed on drugs, this is one of the rare times when a performer actually states that they did drugs while creating it. Paul McCartney reported in interviews that they’d blazed some reefer before setting down to do the lyrics, and reports that far from enhancing their ability, it actually got in the way.

In 2002, Joan Jett covered this for the album, It’s All About Eve (Music For The Cure), a charity compilation to support breast cancer research. It was produced by Rob Stevens, who had worked with John Lennon.

Rubber Soul is often cited as the first album issued without the artist’s name on its cover, but that honor really goes to Elvis Presley for his 1959 album For LP Fans Only.

The Word

Say the word and you’ll be free
Say the word and be like me
Say the word I’m thinking of
Have you heard the word is love?

It’s so fine, it’s sunshine
It’s the word, love

In the beginning I misunderstood
But now I’ve got it, the word is good

Spread the word and you’ll be free
Spread the word and be like me
Spread the word I’m thinking of
Have you heard the word is love?

It’s so fine, it’s sunshine
It’s the word, love

Every where I go I hear it said
In the good and bad books that I have read

Say the word and you’ll be free
Say the word and be like me
Say the word I’m thinking of
Have you heard the word is love?

It’s so fine, it’s sunshine
It’s the word, love

Now that I know what I feel must be right
I’m here to show everybody the light

Give the word a chance to say
That the word is just the way
It’s the word I’m thinking of
And the only word is love

It’s so fine, it’s sunshine
It’s the word, love

Say the word love
Say the word love
Say the word love
Say the word love

Yardbirds – Train Kept A-Rollin’

This track was produced by Sam Phillips of Sun Records, the man who signed Elvis Presley. It was recorded at Phillips Recording studio, a newly updated state-of-the-art studio in Memphis TN. Jeff Beck, who is a fan of early rockabilly, said that he introduced the song to the group: “They just heard me play the riff, and they loved it and made up their version of it”

I’ve always liked this version and Beck’s filthy sound he had on his guitar.

It was written by Tiny Bradshaw, Howard Kay, and Lois Mann, this song was originally performed by Tiny Bradshaw’s Big Band in 1951. Johnny Burnette recorded a rock version in 1956, and The Yardbirds popularized the song with their rendition in 1965.

Aerosmith covered it in 1974, often playing the song as their encore in their early years. In the ’60s, Aerosmith was on the same bill as The Yardbirds for some shows, and former Yardbird Jeff Beck opened some shows for them in the ’70s.

The song didn’t chart in Billboard but was included on the album “Having A Rave Up” in 1965 which peaked at #53.

From Songfacts

This song is about a guy who is blown away by a woman, but he has to act cool to make sure he doesn’t scare her away. The train rolling is in reference to sex.

In the beginning of the song, Jeff Beck used his guitar to create the train whistle sound.

There are two voices singing throughout the song. Both belong to lead singer Keith Relf. In the beginning, they sing different words, but by the end, both sing in unison.

When Jimmy Page joined the band and he was playing lead guitar with Jeff Beck, the Yardbirds appeared in the 1966 Michelangelo Antonioni film Blowup playing a new version of this song re-titled “Stroll On.” The Yardbirds appeared as a band in the film, which is about a London fashion photographer who may have witnessed a murder. It was one of the first major films with a full frontal nudity scene.

In an interview with Q Magazine January 2008, John Paul Jones recalls this was the first ever song he played with Robert Plant, Jimmy Page and John Bonham after joining Led Zeppelin: “I can remember the first song I played with Led Zeppelin in a tiny basement room in Soho in 1968, with wall-to-wall amps. That was ‘Train Kept A-Rollin’,’ the Yardbirds song, which I didn’t know at the time. But I knew immediately, ‘This is fun.”

Train Kept A-Rollin’

I caught the train, I met a dame,
She was a hipster, well and a real cool dame,
(She was handsome,)
She was pretty, from New York City,
Well and we trucked on down in that old Fairlane,
(Goin’ on,)
With a heave, and a ho,

Well, I just couldn’t let her go.
(Yes I did,)
Get along, sweet little woman, get along,
Be on your way,
Get along, sweet little woman, get along,
Be on your way,
With a heave, and a ho,
(Love the way you walk,)
I just couldn’t let her go.
(Yes I do now.)

Well, the train kept a-rollin’, all night long,
(Sweet little woman, get along,)
The train kept a-rollin’, all night long,
([You’re my queen?])
The train kept a-rollin’, all night long,
(Sweet little woman, get along,)
The train kept a-rollin’, all night long,
(You’re my queen?)
With a heave, and a ho,
(Love the way you walk,)
Well I just couldn’t let her go,
(Yes I do.)

We made a stop at Albuquerque,
She must have thought I was a real gone jerk,
We got out the train in El Paso,
Lookin’ so good, Jack, I couldn’t let her go.
Get along, sweet little woman, get along,
(Oh, right,)

Well, the train kept a-rollin’, all night long,
The train kept a-rollin’, all night long,
The train kept a-rollin’, all night long,
The train kept a-rollin’, all night long,
With a heave, and a ho,
Well I just couldn’t let her go.

Doris Troy – Just One Look

This song has a fifties quality to it. Doris Troy was a true one hit wonder. This is her only top 100 song. It peaked at #10 in the Billboard 100 in 1963. This was just the second Top 10 pop hit that was written and performed by the same woman, following “Gee Whiz (Look At His Eyes)” by Carla Thomas.

She appeared on Pink Floyd’s “Dark Side of the Moon” as a backup singer. In the UK, this was a #2 hit for The Hollies. It has also been covered by Lulu, and Linda Ronstadt, Mark Farner and Anne Murray.

From Songfacts

Doris Troy, born Doris Higginson in New York City, was an R&B singer/songwriter who first recorded as Doris Payne. When she was 16 years old, she got a job at the famous Apollo Theater, which featured many legendary black performers.

In a 1970 interview with Blues & Soul magazine, Troy explained: “I had the uniform and a flashlight and everything, and when I saw them stars up there performing I said to myself ‘that’s where I want to be someday,’ and I started to spend my off-duty hours in this restaurant in New York where out-of-work artists and composers hung out. I’d written ‘Just One Look’ and needed to make a demo. Well the demo got made, and it was the demo that was released. I was performing at the time, but I’d never looked on myself as ready for making hit records. I’d had a previous release out on Everest under the name of Doris Payne, but it didn’t mean a thing.

We’d taken the demo to Atlantic to sell the song, and as soon as they heard it they flipped and said they’d rush release it at once. I was on the road at the time touring with Chuck Jackson who was big then, and since I had no time to go in the studio and re-record it they issued the record straight off the demo-dub I’d had made. Wasn’t that a bitch? Well, the record took off so damn fast that it sold like crazy, and it was really lucky for me to be touring at the same time since Atlantic were able to arrange all sorts of promotional stints and interviews to tie in with the local radio stations where I was visiting.”

Troy wrote the song “How About That,” which hit #33 for Dee Clark in 1960. She worked as a session singer, appearing on recordings by Solomon Burke, Ben E. King, Dee Dee Warwick and The Drifters. “Just One Look” was her only American hit, but “Whatcha Gonna Do About It” nicked the UK charts at #37 in 1964. She moved to England in 1969 and signed with The Beatles’ Apple Records, where she release the Doris Troy album in 1970 before becoming a casualty of the rampant mismanagement at Apple. She resumed work as a session singer, and performed on The Rolling Stones’ “You Can’t Always Get What You Want” and also tracks by Tom Jones and Englebert Humperdinck. She also sang backup on the 1973 Pink Floyd album Dark Side of the Moon. Troy died in 2004 at age 67.

Troy’s version of this song appeared in a popular Pepsi commercial starring supermodel Cindy Crawford. It also appeared in a spot for DirectTV.

This appeared in the films Mermaids (1990), The Flamingo Kid (1984) and Buster (1988).

Just One Look

Just one look and I fell so hard
In love with you uh oh uh oh
I found out how good it feels
To have your love uh oh uh oh
Say you will, will be mine
Forever and always uh oh uh oh
Just one look and I knew
That you were my only one uh oh uh oh

I thought I was dreaming but I was wrong
Yeah yeah yeah
Oh but ah I’m gonna keep on scheming
‘Til I can ah make you, make you my own

So you see I really care
Without you I’m nothing uh oh uh oh
Just one look and I know
I’ll get you someday uh oh uh oh

Just one look, that’s all it took

The Who – A Quick One, While He’s Away

I first saw them perform this on The Kids Are Alright. The performance was electric. I like the studio version but the live versions they push a little harder. The song didn’t chart being so long. The album “A Quick One” peaked at #4 in the UK charts. The hit song of the album was Happy Jack.

The Who had 10 minutes left to fill on the album. Kit Lambert, The Who’s manager, suggested to Pete Townshend that he write “something linear… perhaps a 10-minute song.” Townshend responded by saying that rock songs are “2:50 by tradition!” Lambert then told Townshend that he should write a 10-minute story comprised of 2:50 songs.

The song was a “mini-opera,” paving the way for the other mini-opera “Rael” and eventually full-length rock operas Tommy and Quadrophenia.

From Songfacts

The plot of the story is simple. A girl is sad that her boyfriend is away. Her friends suggest that she take a substitute lover, Ivor The Engine Driver. When the boyfriend returns, she confesses her infidelity and is forgiven.

The Who performed this on the Rolling Stones Rock And Roll Circus, which was going to be a TV special. It never aired on television but it was released on VHS in 1996 and DVD in 2004. The Who’s performance of this was included in The Kids Are Alright, a 1979 film about The Who.

According to legend, Rock And Roll Circus didn’t air because the Rolling Stones felt that they were showed up by The Who. Jethro Tull, Taj Mahal, Marianne Faithful, John Lennon, Eric Clapton, and Mitch Mitchell all appeared on Rock And Roll Circus.

A live version of this song appears on Live At Leeds and the soundtrack for The Kids Are Alright.

The Who wanted to put Cellos on the track but Kit Lambert said they couldn’t afford it. So they sang “cello, cello, cello, cello,” where the Who thought they should go. >>

This was used in the Wes Anderson film Rushmore starring Jason Shwartzman and Bill Murray

A Quick One, While He’s Away

Her man’s been gone
For nearly a year
He was due home yesterday
But he ain’t here

Her man’s been gone
For nigh on a year
He was due home yesterday
But he ain’t here

Down your street your crying is a well-known sound
Your street is very well known, right here in town
Your town is very famous for the little girl
Whose cries can be heard all around the world

Fa la la la la la
Fa la la la la
Fa la la la la la
Fa la la la la

We have a remedy
You’ll appreciate
No need to be so sad
He’s only late

We’ll bring you flowers and things
Help pass your time
We’ll give him eagle’s wings
Then he can fly to you

Fa la la la la la
Fa la la la la
Fa la la la la la
Fa la la la la
Fa la la la la la
Fa la la la la la

We have a remedy
Fa la la la la la la
We have a remedy
Fa la la la la la la
We have a remedy
Fa la la la la la la
We have a remedy
Fa la la la la la la

We have a remedy.
We have!

Little girl, why don’t you stop your crying?
I’m gonna make you feel all right

My name is Ivor
I’m an engine driver

I know him well
I know why you feel blue
Just ’cause he’s late
Don’t mean he’ll never get through

He told me he loves you
He ain’t no liar, I ain’t either
So let’s have a smile for an old engine driver
So let’s have a smile for an old engine driver

Please take a sweet
Come take a walk with me
We’ll sort it out
Back at my place, maybe

It’ll come right
You ain’t no fool, I ain’t either
So why not be nice to an old engine driver?
Better be nice to an old engine driver
Better be nice to an old engine driver

We’ll soon be home
We’ll soon be home
We’ll soon
We’ll soon, soon, soon be home

Come on, old horse

Soon be home
Soon be home
Soon
We’ll soon, soon, soon be home

We’ll soon
We’ll soon, soon, soon be home

We’ll soon be home
Soon be home

Dang, dang, dang, dang, dang, dang, dang, dang, dang

Cello, cello, cello, cello, cello, cello
Cello, cello, cello, cello, cello, cello
Cello, cello, cello, cello, cello, cello
Cello, cello, cello, cello, cello, cello

I can’t believe it
Do my eyes deceive me?
Am I back in your arms?
Away from all harm?

It’s like a dream to be with you again
Can’t believe that I’m with you again

I missed you and I must admit
I kissed a few and once did sit
On Ivor the Engine Driver’s lap
And later with him, had a nap

You are forgiven, you are forgiven, you are forgiven

You are forgiven

Jimi Hendrix – All Along the Watchtower

Bob Dylan wrote this song and it was on his John Wesley Harding album. It was the longest time that I finally started to like Jimi’s version. The song peaked at #20 in the Billboard 100 in 1968. This was Jimi’s only top 40 hit in the Billboard 100.

I do like the simplicity of Bob’s original version also.

Bob said this about Jimi Hendrix in a 2015 speech: “We can’t forget Jimi Hendrix. I actually saw Jimi perform when he was with a band called Jimmy James and the Blue Flames. Something like that. And Jimi didn’t even sing. He was just the guitar player,” Dylan said. “He took some small songs of mine that nobody paid any attention to and brought them up into the outer limits of the stratosphere, turned them all into classics. I have to thank Jimi, too. I wish he was here.”

From Songfacts

This was written and originally recorded by Bob Dylan in 1967, but it was the Jimi Hendrix cover that made the song famous. Many other artists have covered it, including Eric Clapton, Neil Young, U2, Dave Matthews Band and The Grateful Dead. Dylan was so impressed with Jimi’s version that Dylan for years played it the way that Jimi had recorded it.

This was Hendrix’ only Top 40 hit in the US, where his influence far outpaced his popularity. He charted a few times in the UK, where he rose to fame before making a name for himself in America.

This was recorded while Hendrix played with the Jimi Hendrix Experience: Hendrix on guitar, Noel Redding on bass, and Mitch Mitchell on drums. For this song, however, Redding was not on bass; Hendrix did it. Redding was also the guitar player for his band Fat Mattress, which Hendrix referred to as Thin Pillow. Hendrix often felt that Redding did not put his heart into the bass and was concerned that Redding concentrated more on Fat Mattress than he did on the Experience. Things like these led to him being replaced by Billy Cox. >>

The original version of this song is very slow. Jimi Hendrix’ version had a large impact on Dylan which made him make his own version “heavier.”

Hendrix: “All those people who don’t like Bob Dylan’s songs should read his lyrics. They are filled with the joys and sadness of life. I am as Dylan, none of us can sing normally. Sometimes, I play Dylan’s songs and they are so much like me that it seems to me that I wrote them. I have the feeling that Watchtower is a song I could have come up with, but I’m sure I would never have finished it. Thinking about Dylan, I often consider that I’d never be able to write the words he manages to come up with, but I’d like him to help me, because I have loads of songs I can’t finish. I just lay a few words on the paper, and I just can’t go forward. But now things are getting better, I’m a bit more self-confident.” >>

Hendrix had been working on and off with the members of the band Traffic as he recorded Electric Ladyland. Traffic guitarist Dave Mason caught Hendrix at a party and the two discussed Bob Dylan’s newest album, John Wesley Harding, containing “All Along The Watchtower.” Hendrix, long fascinated with Dylan, decided to cover the song on the album. On the resulting track, Mason plays rhythm on a 12-string acoustic guitar.

In our interview with Mason, he explained: “Hendrix just happened to be sitting in one of those semi-private clubs in London. He was there one night just sitting alone, and it was like, “F–k, I’m just going to go over and say hi and talk to him.”

Mason recorded the song himself in the Hendrix arrangement for his 1974 self-titled album. He also made the song a mainstay of his concerts. Mason says it’s a deceptively simple song: “It’s just the same three chords, and they never change.”

This was used in an episode of The Simpsons when Homer’s mother was telling him a story that took place in the ’60s about why she had to leave him.

In a 2008 poll conducted by a panel of experts in the Total Guitar magazine, this was voted the best cover song of all time. The Beatles’ rendition of “Twist and Shout,” first recorded by the Top Notes, came second, followed by the Guns N’ Roses version of the Wings song “Live and Let Die” in third place.

This was used in the 1994 movie Forrest Gump shortly after the title character arrives in Vietnam.

Yes this is Bob’s version…the only one I could find.

All Along The Watchtower

There must be some kind of way outta here
Said the joker to the thief
There’s too much confusion
I can’t get no relief

Business men, they drink my wine
Plowman dig my earth
None were level on the mind
Nobody up at his word
Hey, hey

No reason to get excited
The thief he kindly spoke
There are many here among us
Who feel that life is but a joke
But, uh, but you and I, we’ve been through that
And this is not our fate
So let us stop talkin’ falsely now
The hour’s getting late, hey

All along the watchtower
Princes kept the view
While all the women came and went
Barefoot servants, too
Outside in the cold distance
A wildcat did growl
Two riders were approaching
And the wind began to howl

Monkees – For Pete’s Sake

Thinking of Peter Tork who passed away Thursday at 77. This song would play over the closing credits of their TV show. Peter Tork (Peter Halsten Thorkelson) co-wrote the song with Joey Richards. “For Pete’s Sake” kicked off side two of the Monkees’ third album, 1967’s Headquarters. The song was not released as a single but the album Headquarters (the Monkees played their instruments on this one) and eventually peaked at #1 in the Billboard 100 until Sgt Pepper took over the spot.

The song has a garage band sound and lyrically it’s very 1967…and that is a good thing.

For Pete’s Sake

Love is understanding,
Don’t you know that this is true.
Love is understanding,
It’s in everything we do.

In this generation,
In this lovin’ time,
In this generation,
We will make the world shine.

We were born to love one another
This is something we all need.
We were born to love one another
We must be what we’re goin’ to be
And what we have to be is free.

In this generation,
In this lovin’ time,
In this generation,
We will make the world shine.

We were born to love one another
This is something we all need.
We were born to love one another
We must be what we’re goin’ to be
And what we have to be is free.

Love is undertanding, we gotta be free
Love is undertanding, we gotta be free
[Repeat and adlib]

Top 10 Favorite TV Themes 1-5

Some TV Themes can be annoying but many can be very catchy. I’m listing my top 10 on two posts. There are so many that narrowing it to ten was almost impossible. I’ve stuck with older ones for the post. I left out cartoons…

5. The Courtship of Eddie’s Father -Harry Nilsson sang this one staring the one and only Bill Bixby.

4. It’s Garry Shandling’s Show – The most brilliant theme…straight to the point.

3. Munsters – Cool sixties guitar driven theme.

2. Welcome Back Kotter – John Sebastian’s song Welcome Back peaked at #1 in 1976.

1. Monkees – Whenever I hear it I’m 7 again.

Top 10 Favorite TV Themes 6-10

10. WKRP – One of my favorite shows of the late 70s…not only did I like the theme song but the closing song.

And the closing

9. Barney Miller – Every bass player learns this one.

8. Rockford Files – The theme song made me want to watch the show.

7. Gilligans Island – I know every word and may have heard this theme more than Stairway to Heaven…and that is saying alot.

6. Hawaii Five-O – One of the ultimate themes… love the tidal wave.

Beatles – Got To Get You Into My Life

This song still sounds fresh today. Got To Get You Into My Life was on Revolver released in 1966. It was not released as a single at the time. Any other band would have released it as a single.

In 1976 it was released as a single and peaked at #7 in the Billboard 100…not bad for a song that was 10 years old. It was released off of the horribly packaged compilation album Rock and Roll Music. Capital Records seemed to forget The Beatles represented the 60s, not the 50s that the album cover represented. They probably wanted to capitalize on the 50s revival that was going on at the time… Bad Choice.

I owned this album and Hey Jude Again for my first exposure to the Beatles.

There is a 5 piece horn section on this recording that sounds great. Paul McCartney has said the song was about pot…

“’Got To Get You Into My Life’ was one I wrote when I had first been introduced to pot. I’d been a rather straight working-class lad but when we started to get into pot it seemed to me to be quite uplifting. It didn’t seem to have too many side effects like alcohol or some of the other stuff, like pills, which I pretty much kept off. I kind of liked marijuana. I didn’t have a hard time with it and to me it was mind-expanding, literally mind-expanding.”

“So ‘Got To Get You Into My Life’ is really a song about that, it’s not to a person, it’s actually about pot. It’s saying, ‘I’m going to do this. This is not a bad idea.’ So it’s actually an ode to pot, like someone else might write an ode to chocolate or a good claret. It wouldn’t be the first time in history someone’s done it, but in my case it was the first flush of pot.”

From Songfacts

This beatific love song is actually about marijuana. Paul McCartney cleared this up in his 1998 book Many Years From Now when he explained that it was not about a particular person, but his desire to smoke pot. “I’d been a rather straight working-class lad but when we started to get into pot it seemed to me to be quite uplifting,” he said.

There are no obvious drug references in the song, so it appears to be about a guy who is blissfully in love:

Ooh, then I suddenly see you
Ooh, did I tell you I need you
Every single day of my life

A British rock group called Cliff Bennett & The Rebel Rousers released this song as a single around the same time it appeared on the The Beatles Revolver album. Bennett & The Rebel Rousers were an opening act for The Beatles on their European tour in early 1966; since there were no plans to release “Got To Get You Into My Life” as a single, Paul McCartney encouraged them to record it and produced the session.

Revolver appeared on August 5, 1966 and the Cliff Bennett & The Rebel Rousers version of this song showed up on the UK chart for the first time on August 17, rising to #6 on September 21. It ended up being the biggest hit for the group, which made #9 in 1964 with “One Way Love.”

Session musicians played trumpets and sax. It was the first time horns were used in a Beatles song.

Earth, Wind & Fire recorded a funky new version for the 1978 movie Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band. Beatles producer George Martin was in charge of the music, and the soundtrack was a success, but the movie, which starred Peter Frampton, The Bee Gees and Aerosmith, was a huge flop. Earth, Wind & Fire’s version of this hit #9 in the US.

The first group to chart with this song was Blood, Sweat & Tears, whose horn-heavy version made #62 in the summer of 1975. The Beatles version wasn’t issued as a single until 1976, when Capitol Records issued it in America backed with “Helter Skelter.”

This version went to #7 in July that year, becoming the first Beatles song to chart in the US since 1970. Later in 1976, Capitol issued “Ob-La-Di, Ob-La-Da,” which made #49.

John Lennon thought this was some of McCartney’s best work.

In the ’60s, Joe Pesci was an aspiring singer known as Joe Ritchie. He recorded a version of this that can be found on Rhino’s “Golden Throat” Series. His version merits the “Stick to Acting” award. >>

This song rarely licensed for movies or TV. The only time the Beatles rendition was used in a film is the 2015 movie Minions, where it plays under the end credits. In 2009, a version by Matthew Sweet and Susanna Hoffs appeared in the Eddie Murphy movie Imagine That, and in 2013 Kurt Hummel and Chris Colfer sang it on the “Love, Love, Love” episode of the TV series Glee.

Got To Get You Into My Life

I was alone, I took a ride
I didn’t know what I would find there
Another road where maybe I
Could see another kind of mind there
Ooh, then I suddenly see you
Ooh, did I tell you I need you
Every single day of my life

You didn’t run, you didn’t hide
And had you gone, you knew in time
We’d meet again for I had told you
Ooh, you were meant to be near me
Ooh, and I want you to hear me
Say we’ll be together every day
Got to get you into my life

What can I do, what can I be
When I’m with you I want to stay there
If I’m true I’ll never leave
And if I do I know the way there
Ooh, then I suddenly see you
Ooh, did I tell you I need you
Every single day of my life
Got to get you into my life

A quick look at Gomer Pyle USMC and Frank Sutton

I watched a few episodes this weekend. The show has a local connection for me because of Frank Sutton.

The show ran from 1964 to 1969 and was a spinoff from The Andy Griffith Show. The character of Gomer Pyle was portrayed by Jim Nabors and he left The Andy Griffith Show in the 4th season in an episode entitled Gomer Pyle, U.S.M.C.

Gomer was a naive country boy from Mayberry North Carolina who joined the Marines and Andy went with him for the induction and helped the clueless Gomer get accepted. Frank Sutton played quick tempered Sgt Carter who would be tormented by Gomer Pyle for five seasons. I would watch the show as a kid and I thought Sgt Carter was mean to Gomer…as an adult I could understand if Carter would have choked him.

The show was a major hit. It never placed lower than 10 in the Neilson ratings. In 1969 Jim Nabors wanted out because he wanted to do a variety show. No one could understand why he wanted out of a hit show but he wanted to be in a program where he could sing, dance, and do different bits.

CBS offered Nabors a variety show so he was happy. They also offered Frank Sutton his own show Sergeant Carter–USMC. It would employ a black recruit who, unlike Gomer, would always be one step ahead of the Sergeant. It could have been a big hit but he turned it down because he felt like he did everything he could do with the character.

Sutton ended up co-starring with Nabors on his variety show and Sutton worked well in the comedy bits but was not a dancer or singer. CBS told Nabors he had to fire Sutton but Nabors refused and the show was canceled.

The local connection with Sutton is he was born in Clarksville Tennessee, a few miles from where I live. Sutton appeared in movies and shows from the 50s thru the 70s. The Twilight Zone, Have Gun Will Travel, Gunsmoke, Route 66 and many more.

He took acting in East Nashville High School and graduated in 1941.

After high school, Sutton returned to Clarksville to become a radio announcer. He enlisted in the U.S. Army during World War II and served in the South Pacific, taking part in 14 assault landings. Sutton was a sergeant who served from 1943–1946 in the 293rd Joint Assault Signal Company. He was awarded the Bronze Star and Purple Heart; he had been medically rejected by the Marine Corps.

Frank, a heavy smoker, would only live to be 50. He would die of a heart attack in 1974 just a few months shy of his 51st birthday. In 2017 a statue of Frank Sutton was unveiled in Clarksville Tn. Here is a link to the story of the unveiling. Statue of Frank Sutton in Clarksville.

This is an interview with Frank Sutton that was never published around the time of the variety show.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frank_Sutton

Kinks – A Well Respected Man

Musically this is a sing-along song but the lyrics are full of social satire and anger. The Kinks record company Pye did not release this song in the UK at the time because they wanted harder songs like “You Really Got Me.” It was released in other countries and peaked at #13 in the Billboard 100 in 1965.

I first heard this song on a Kinks complication album along with “Dedicated Follower of Fashion” and The Kinks earlier songs. A Well Respected Man marked a turning point in Davies’s writing from rock/punk to more satirical, character-driven songs.

From Songfacts

Kinks frontman Ray Davies wrote this song after the group’s 1965 tour of the United States. The tour did not go well, with infighting, fatigue and a conflict with the musician’s union that kept them from performing in the country for another four years.Davies recovered from the tour with a vacation at the English resort town of Torquay, Devon. There, a wealthy hotel guest recognized him and asked Ray to play a round of golf. Far from being flattered by the invitation, he took great offense. “I’m not gonna play f–king golf with you,” he told him. “I’m not gonna be your caddy so you can say you played with a pop singer.”

Dense with lyrics describing the pretentious gentleman born to good fortune, Ray Davies says this was the first “word-oriented” song he wrote.

A Well Respected Man

Cause he gets up in the morning,
And he goes to work at nine,
And he comes back home at five-thirty,
Gets the same train every time.
‘Cause his world is built ’round punctuality,
It never fails.

And he’s oh, so good,
And he’s oh, so fine,
And he’s oh, so healthy,
In his body and his mind.
He’s a well respected man about town,
Doing the best things so conservatively.

And his mother goes to meetings,
While his father pulls the maid,
And she stirs the tea with councilors,
While discussing foreign trade,
And she passes looks, as well as bills
At every suave young man

‘Cause he’s oh, so good,
And he’s oh, so fine,
And he’s oh, so healthy,
In his body and his mind.
He’s a well respected man about town,
Doing the best things so conservatively.

And he likes his own backyard,
And he likes his fags the best,
‘Cause he’s better than the rest,
And his own sweat smells the best,
And he hopes to grab his father’s loot,
When Pater passes on.

‘Cause he’s oh, so good,
And he’s oh, so fine,
And he’s oh, so healthy,
In his body and his mind.
He’s a well respected man about town,
Doing the best things so conservatively.

And he plays at stocks and shares,
And he goes to the Regatta,
And he adores the girl next door,
‘Cause he’s dying to get at her,
But his mother knows the best about
The matrimonial stakes.

‘Cause he’s oh, so good,
And he’s oh, so fine,
And he’s oh, so healthy,
In his body and his mind.
He’s a well respected man about town,
Doing the best things so conservatively.

The Beau Brummels – Laugh Laugh

A garage band song released in the wake of the Beatles… It was written by written by guitarist Ron Elliott. They were as among the first wave of San Francisco groups to make the Charts. Laugh Laugh resembled the British Invasion songs that were dominating the charts at the time.

At the height of the band’s popularity, the Beau Brummels were seen as teen idols. The band appeared on several television productions such as American Bandstand, Shindig!, Hullabaloo and the cartoon series The Flintstones (as the animated version of themselves, the Beau Brummelstones). They appeared in movies as well, such as Village of the Giants and Wild, Wild Winter.

“Laugh, Laugh” became the Beau Brummels’ first hit, peaking at #15 on the Billboard 100 in 1965.

Laugh Laugh

I hate to say it but I told you so, don’t mind my preachin’ to you
I said “don’t trust ’em, baby” now you know
You don’t know ev’rything there is to know in school.
Wouldn’t believe me when I gave advice, I said that he was a tease
If you want help you better ask me now
So be sincere, convince me with a “pretty please”

Laugh, laugh, I thought I’d die
It seemed so funny to me
Laugh, laugh you met a guy who taught you how it feels to be
Lonely, oh so lonely

Don’t think I’m bein’ funny when I say you got just what you deserve
I can’t help feeling you found out today
You thought you would, you could, you had a lot of nerve

Won’t say I’m sorry for the things I said. I’m glad he packed up to go
You kept on braggin’ he was yours instead
Found you don’t know ev’rything there is to know

Laugh, laugh, I thought I’d die
It seemed so funny to me
Laugh, laugh you met a guy who taught you how it feels to be
Lonely, oh so lonely

Before I go I got to say one thing, don’t close your ears to me
Take my advice and you find out that he
Is just another guy who’ll cause you misery
Don’t say you can’t get any boy to call, do be so smug or else
You’ll find you can’t get any boy a’tall
You’ll wind up an old lady sittin’ on the shelf.

Laugh, laugh, I thought I’d die
It seemed so funny to me
Laugh, laugh you met a guy who taught you how it feels to be
Lonely, oh so lonely

Lonely, oh so lonely