Stealers Wheel weren’t just Gerry Rafferty’s backing band. Joe Egan, who has died, was his fellow front man and wrote many of their songs himself as well as co-writing their most famous hit Stuck in the Middle With You with Rafferty.
Just before I went away came the news that songwriter Richard Sherman had died. He and his brother Robert wrote some of the most well-known songs from the mid to late twentieth century in their work for Disney and others.
Consider the beautifully constructed Feed the Birds from Mary Poppins.
Julie Andrews: Feed the Birds
For me though their masterpiece is I Wan’na Be Like You (The Monkey Song) from The Jungle Book.
The best bit is of course when Baloo the bear comes in with his scat singing, starting at “Da zap dan roani” with the crowning glory of the whole sequence his ecstatic cry of, “Take me home , Daddy.”
Louis Prima, Phil Harris: I Wan’na Be Like You (The Monkey Song)
Richard Morton Sherman: 12/6/1928 – 25/5/2024. So it goes.
I saw in Tuesday’s Guardian that acclaimed Albanian writer Ismail Kadare has died.
This seems to be a sad loss to the world of literature though I must confess that I have not read any of his books. (That is a situation I may be able to remedy as having checked Fife Libraries catalogue several of his books are available for lending out. Another factor preventing inroads into my tbr pile at home.)
The circumstances of a writer having to negotiate the exigencies of publishing under the regime of Enver Hoxha in his native country cannot have been easy to navigate.
In the 60s French artists didn’t usually reach the British charts. The yé-yé generation was kind of looked down on as I recall.
Françoise Hardy was an exception. (So too was The Singing Nun, but she was Belgian and really a novelty act.)
Hardy actually managed a minor hit in the UK in 1962, with her first recording, Tous les garçons et les filles. It reached no 36. The reason it sticks in my mind is because it was occasionally played during French lessons when I was in Secondary School.
Hardy, who had a sweet vocie, had three other ‘hits’ in the UK. Et même reached no 31 in 1964, All Over the World no 16 in 1965 and Autumn Rendezvous no 51 in 1966.
Françoise Hardy: Tous les garçons et les filles
Françoise Hardy: All Over the World
Françoise Madeleine Hardy: 17/1/1944 – 11/6/2024. So it goes.
I was sad to read that while I was away in The Netherlands Scottish poet and novelist John Burnside has died.
I only knew him through his prose, which I first came across through the inclusion on that list of the 100 Best Scottish Books (nearly all of which I have now read) of his novel Living Nowhere. After reading that I bought his other fiction books whenever I happened upon them. I have reviewed those I have read here, here, here and here. Every single one is excellent.
His yodelling style was not really to my taste but he certainly sounded distinctive.
In a commemoration like this, for this particular singer, there is only one song which is appropriate. The first of three consecutive UK No. 1s for him.
Frank Ifield: I Remember You
Frank (Francis Edward) Ifield: 30/11/1937 – 18/5/2024. So it goes.
Jimmy James and the Vagabonds is a band name I remember from the 60s. But I can’t say I could remember hearing any of their tracks. Their name appeared in the music newspapers of the day as a gigging and support band.
Lead Singer Jimmy James died a few weeks ago and his obituary was in The Guardian.
It was their version of the Neil Diamond song Red, Red Wine (a no 36 in 1968) that UB 40 latched onto to give them one of their biggest hits.
This was their first though very minor hit, a no 53 in 1967.
Jimmy James and the Vagabonds: I Can’t Get Back Home to My Baby
Jimmy (Michael) James: 13/9/1940 – 14/5/2024. So it goes.
I saw in the Guardian’s obituary column that Clarence “Frogman” Henry left us in April. So called because of the croak he employed in his first US hit Ain’t Got No Home, he only had three hits in the UK. I don’t remember ever hearing Lonely Street, but You Always Hurt the One You Love and (I Don’t Know Why) But I Do certainly rang a bell
Clarence “Frogman” Henry: (I Don’t Know Why) But I Do
Clarence “Frogman” Henry: 19/3/1937 – 7/4/2024. So it goes.
He was a mainstay of The Electric Light Orchestra (ELO) being Jeff Lynne’s right hand man in the group.
I note that the lyrics scrolling along the bottom of this video misrepresent the last vocoded words (which apparently Tandy voiced.) They are not “Mr Blue Sky” but instead “Please turn me over.” Mr Blue Sky was the last track on side three of the album Out of the Blue.
As I mentioned last week, Duane Eddy, the man who inspired so many electric guitarists of the 1960s, has died. He conjured a distinctive twang from his instrument.
This 1959 track, Peter Gunn, written by Henry Mancini for a TV series, might have been the inspiration for the theme tunes of all those 1960s spy movies. It certainly suited Eddy’s style.
Duane Eddy: Peter Gunn
DJ Johnnie Walker loved Eddy’s tune Because They’re Young (1960) so much that it became Walker’s signature tune.
Duane Eddy: Because They’re Young
But it is perhaps this track which is most appropriate for this post.
