Way back in the early days of The Rally, I did a post about one of my Dad's old 45s. In that earlier post (here) I talk about how I played the B-Side of one of the singles without flipping it over for about 15 years (shades of Father Dougal McGuire, methinks). So here are some other great B-Sides!
[pictured above]
Completely mental song, featuring a deranged vocal performance from a man with so few mates that he doesn't even have a name. If he keeps making the "Waaa-ooow!!" noise (first appearance at 0:37), then frankly I'm not surprised.
Love the music-therapy feel of the glockenspiel in the background but let's be honest, they've thrown the lot at this and fair play to them for that. Seemingly-pissed guitar makes first appearance at 0:46.
In the second verse he dreams of a dog without a collar that he can befriend. Could singer Mike Kogel have given any more in this performance? I think not - I especially love the impassioned "help me!" bits. "Black Is Black" was Number 2 in the UK, Number 4 in the US. And this piece of genius-lunacy was on the other side. Los Bravos - I salute you!
One of those great tracks where it sounds like they've left themselves with 15 minutes at the end of the session to write and record the B-Side. It's a lazy shuffle with Eva intoning her love for a (in short order) thick, lazy, ugly so-and-so who happens to be good at kissing. The piano solo from 1:48 is a work of genius, especially the bit where they obviously didn't finish writing it - there's also a great stumble right at the end, which they obviously couldn't be arsed to correct. Plus the backing vocals sound like they've been phoned in!
It sounds like I hate it, but the ramshackle nature and the matter-of-fact coolness sell it to me every time. I would happily trade in much of my more "fashionable" music collection for more songs like this.
But the thought that this feckless swine might be the guy who inspired "He Hit Me (And It Felt Like A Kiss)" is pretty troubling, don'tcha think?
The GREAT thing about this track is the fantastic vocal support from The Halos - they're not quite there all the way through... hell, let's face it there are some proper CLAMS - that opening chord is a bit shonky for a start. And what's going on in that final section?
But this has such a great feel and a great matinee idol lead vocal from Curtis Lee. Great lyrics, fantastic instrumental backing.... God I love this song! Great memories of singing along with this one on the way back from the pub in the back of our mate's Land Rover!
Buy - Los Bravos
Buy - Little Eva
Buy - Curtis Lee
Read - Los Bravos on Answers.com
Read - Little Eva on Wikipedia
Read - Curtis Lee on Wikipedia
4 comments:
cool post dude. let's have more of these old b-sides w/ commentary in the future.
ted
What he said! I love the commentary - best post in ages! Music is pretty damn good as well...that Little Eva...I'd show her a good time..
My fav b-side (non-album track) is "Daytime Nightime Suffering" by Wings...much better than the a-side, the disco-y "Goodnight Tonight"
I went back and read that Nino Tempo and April Stevens post and here's a few reasons why "Deep Purple" is so fucked up-
The origional was a standard from the 1930's onward, covered by Nat King Cole, Bing Crosby, Guy Lumbardo, and scores of big band crooner/orchestra combos.
The reasons for picking this ancient chesnut and bossanovastrollinizing it are unknown. Perhaps The Vanity Fair can explain it during opening arguments before the magistrate
when their trial for thinking that doing a version of Cole Porter's "Anything Goes" was cool and hip (in 1967).
2) The record label concocted a "do they or dont they/ are wedding bells in the future for this tuneful twosome?" scenario for NT & AS.
Only problem was -they were brother and sister!
3) Nino sat at the tiny feet of Phil Spector (at the height of his powers) until Phil got paranoid (who knew?) and booted him-only to replace him with another goofy kid
who was hanging around the studio blowing goats and making tea; a kid named Sonny Bono.
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