Sérgio Mendes, who popularised Bossa Nova in the 1960s, has died.
I remember this very familiar tune as getting a lot of airplay at the time but it wasn’t a hit in the UK. (Only Never Gonna Let You Go was, and it only got to no. 45 in 1983.) It is however probably the one for which he will be most remembered.
Sergio Mendes and Brasil ’66: Mas Que Nada
Sérgio Santos Mendes: 11/2/1941 – 5/9/2024. So it goes.
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.
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.
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.
No sooner had I heard the news on the radio that Duane Eddy had died (and Richard Tandy of ELO too) than I opened the Guardian’s obituary page to find that Mike Pinder of the Moody Blues has made his final voyage.
Pinder was the last of the original five members of the Moody Blues still standing. Now only Justin Hayward and John Lodge remain of the later classic line-up.
Pinder’s contribution to that classic line-up was immense. It is fair to say that without his ability on the mellotron (an instrument he personally brought to the attention of The Beatles) The Moody Blues would not have sounded as they did, nor had the same success.
His piano solo on the original group’s biggest hit Go Now was no small part of its effectiveness.
This song written by Pinder was the B-side to Ride My See-saw but later appeared on the odd album Caught Live + Five. It was later a hit for The Four Tops but as usual Levi Stubbs shouted his way through it.
The Moody Blues: A Simple Game
This is another of my favourite Pinder songs:-
The Moody Blues: The Best Way to Travel (from In Search of the Lost Chord)
I always loved the piano ending to this track which was sandwiched between Have You Heard Part 1 and Have You Heard Part 2 on the LP On the Threshold of a Dream.
The Moody Blues: The Voyage
Michael Thomas (Mike) Pinder: 27/12/1941 – 24/4/2024. So it goes.
This was Love Affair’s second last UK hit (out of five) but was the least successful in terms of chart position. It’s a better song than the other four though.
