friday random ten, 1961 edition
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Artist:
1. Lee Dorsey, "Ya Ya." I'm not sure this is even double entendre. Single, or maybe triple.
2. Bobby Lewis, "Tossin' and Turnin'." Memory is a tricky thing ... you'll think about some old baseball player, remember that he played for your favorite team forever when you were a kid, then you look it up and he was only with them for a year and a half. I feel like I heard "I couldn't sleep at ALLLLL last night" a thousand times a day in the summer of 1961, when I was 8 years old. This time, I may be remembering correctly ... it was #1 for seven weeks, and was the #1 song of the entire year.
3. Ricky Nelson, "Travelin' Man." You should probably click on the video link, since some have argued it is the first music video.
4. Ben E. King, "Spanish Harlem." This lovely song, King's first solo hit, was written by Jerry Leiber and ... Phil Spector.
5. Patsy Cline, "Crazy." Written by Willie Nelson, recorded soon after Cline was in a serious auto accident, so serious it was hard for her to hit the high notes in the song because it hurt her ribs.
6. Ray Charles, "Hit the Road, Jack." Wikipedia claims this song was a tribute to On the Road. Never heard that one before.
7. Elvis Presley, "Little Sister." The video has the King doing a "Little Sister/Get Back" medley, and how often do you get to hear Elvis singing the Beatles?
8. Dion, "Runaround Sue." Getting back to memory playing tricks, I can remember reading something long ago ... can't remember who wrote this ... the idea was that this song represents Dion giving himself over to his female audience, because while in "The Wanderer" he bragged about being the guy who got around, in "Runaround Sue" it was the girl making him the loser. Made a certain amount of sense, but maybe I remember it wrong, because "Runaround Sue" was released before "The Wanderer."
9. The Tokens, "The Lion Sleeps Tonight." There are enough fascinating stories to be told about this song that you could fill a book (Rian Malan wrote a longish essay, "In the Jungle") ... or at least a feature-length movie, which is what François Verster did. Wikipedia gets most of the facts, but I've always been partial to Dave Marsh's version, from The Heart of Rock and Soul, placing the Tokens' record within the context of the Folk Revival movement: "It's fitting, therefore, that the folk revival's best hit was "The Lion Sleeps Tonight," the most musically exciting record of the genre for reasons that have everything to do with its inauthenticity and vulgarity" (218).
10. Roy Orbison, "Running Scared." This isn't really a very hard trivia question, but there is a person who appears in three of the ten video links in this week's edition of the Random Ten.
Locating MOG account...
Comments (7)
Without even looking at the videos I'll guess James Burton. When I was a kid I thought it was Ricky Nelson who played those great guitar licks - in later years I appreciated how smart he was to make sure he got the best band in town to back him. OK, I had to watch the Orbison video - my absolute favourite from this period when I was growing up. Funny to see both Costello and Springsteen reading charts - the concentration on Bruce's face is particularly interesting. And isn't that Jennifer Warnes in the backing singer lineup?
Actually, Dion was pretty high in my list of favourites too - the way he wrapped his lips around the phrasing of "She goes out with other guys" was a moment that always made me excited and satisfied. It's intersting how a "best of" list from any of these supposed dead years comes up with 10 gems. 'The Lion Sleeps Tongiht' indeed.
Yes, that's Jennifer Warnes. I just picked that show up on Blu-ray ... can't wait to see how it looks and sounds.
Not to mention Bonnie Raitt, KD Lang and JD Souther all on backup vocals. What a collection of talent that show was!
I think Nelson's legacy has gotten short-changed over the years. I much prefer him to Presley and that string of singles including this one that he did with Burton are near untouchable.
For those that care.....Dion recently released a very strong cd revisiting some old hits of the era.
you always hear about how R&R was in a fallow period after Elvis went into the Army and before the Beatles, but how can anyone look at this list, and listen to these records, and not scoff at that theory? Pop, soul, country, folk/doowop...
I see six members of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame on that list, plus Patsy, and who would argue that the Bobby Lewis and Lee Dorsey tracks aren't supercool?
A great Top 10, sez me.
Yeah, Masoo, Every one's a winner this Friday. Literally, not a song on there that I don't revere,
thank U Masoo ! for a while, I was 6 yrs old again.