They say we're young and we don't know

Continuing my trip back through the 1965 album charts.

14/11/65 : Look At Us - Sonny & Cher


I think I only know Sonny & Cher from "I Got You Babe" (which always makes me think of Groundhog Day) so I'm intrigued to hear more of their work. It also means that over half the albums we've seen so far this year have had significant female input - who knew that 1965 would turn out to be quite so equitable?

But I had to wait for a bit to hear some other work of theirs because it starts with IGYB - and it's always a pleasure to hear it. It's then followed by "Unchained Melody", which is the fifth version we've met on our travels  and it's fair to say this isn't the best (I even prefer the version by that other power couple, Robson & Jerome). And then we get another cover in "Then He Kissed Me" - it's not a terrible version, but the production does demonstrate Phil Spector's genius because this feels very flat compared to the original. The next track "Sing C'est La Vie" is obviously original though - because it's quite dreadful. The rest of the album is a mix of original tracks and unrecognised covers, except for "You Don't Love" which was originally done by Willie Cobbs, but I know from the John Mayall version. It's not a great album, but is at least consistent in style so if you came for IGYB, then you'd probably stay - but you probably wouldn't come back too many times. You'd kill for Sonny's furry body warmer on the album cover though, wouldn't you?

We're at #8 in the charts this week on their sixth week of a twelve week run, with #7 being as high as it got. The top five this week were TSOM, The Beatles, Mary Poppins, The Rolling Stones and Andy Williams with one new entry in the chart for Gene Pitney (#17).

Wikipedia tells us this is their debut album and was thrown together quickly to capitalise on the success of "I Got You Babe". And that's pretty much it except for the extremely random fact that, before she was in ABBA, Agnetha Faltskog recorded a Swedish language version of "Sing C'est La Vie" - I'm far too scared to investigate it though.

"Customers also listened to" The Box Tops, Lesley Gore, The Rascals and Jay & The Americans - none of whom I can tell you anything about except that Lesley did the original version of "It's My Party" (which Wikipedia has just told me was produced by Quincy Jones - did you know he also did the soundtrack for The Italian Job?). Back to Sonny & Cher, I enjoyed checking up with this, but there really wasn't anything there of note except for "I Got You Babe".

07/11/65 - An entertaining first visit
21/11/65 - Decent voice, average songs

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

I'm not wishing I was back in the USA, coz I come from Morecambe and the skies are grey

Image
Continuing my trip forward in time through the album charts 15/11/24 : Earth To Grace - Massive Wagons I will listen to the new entry at #1, but there's absolutely NO WAY I'm writing a whole entry on it - so instead we have this which I know absolutely nothing about. But it has to be better than the abomination at #1. Well, it's something you don't hear too much of these days - I guess "hard rock" is probably as good a description as any. It’s not going to win any awards for musical complexity but it’s quite catchy - I was r eminded of Gary Moore in his heavier days that teenage me used to like. It also certainly doesn't take itself too seriously - "Free And Easy" tells us "I don't shoot guns, it's not healthy - I drive a Ford C-Max I got off my dad and it's filthy" and "Rabbit Hole" offers up an amusingly sceptical take on conspiracy theories and then abruptly ends "Auf wiedersehen, adios - this song fucking ...
Read more

And she'll tease you, she'll unease you

Image
  A first for me! Cheap tickets often pop up to various All Points East events through work, but it often coincides with holiday time - and the one time I did make an effort to go a train strike prevented me from making out into the wilds of East London. Until now when, for no obvious reason, I went to a day when I had no great interest in the headlining act. It's based in Victoria Park in Hackney and it's a BIG site. The set-up is similar to Reading Festival with two main stages which alternate between acts, involving a lot of audience migration across the site. The distance between the stages might even be bigger than at Reading, but there's also a sizeable tented stage about halfway between so you can always stop off if you're feeling tired - and I did, on several occasions! Also, unlike both Reading and BST Hyde Park, there is a lot of shaded area on site which was also much used throughout the day whilst a LOT of music was being enjoyed, because I saw... Liana Flor...
Read more

Who are ya?!?

Image
A point each for the name, the song and the artist. 1. Her boyfriend’s a dick – he brings a gun to school 2. He took me to the future in the flux thing and I saw everything 3. He lives on the second floor 4. She told my baby we'd danced 'til three, then she looked at me 5. He tempted her with his treacle tart and his tasty wholemeal bread (2 names) 6. He’s stepping through the door 7. His girlfriend's pregnant too - he’s about to be a father 8. She’s gotta be strong to fight them, so she’s taken lots of vitamins 9. She came from Miami, F.L.A - hitch-hiked her way across the U.S.A. 10. Her smile is like a breath of spring, her voice is soft like summer rain 11. He’s darning his socks in the night when there's nobody there 12. He was jamming good with Weird and Gilly 13. Two American kids doin' the best they can (2 names) 14. I just act like I don’t remember and she just acts like she don’t care 15. She got a double wide and she rode a plane 16. You could have heard a...
Read more