Posted in 1970s, Events dear boy. Events, Music at 10:00 on 14 November 2016
Now it’s Leon Russell……
Never as commercially successful in his own right as he perhaps deserved his songs are better known in their cover versions.
For Joe Cocker’s take on Delta Lady see here.
This is a much less rocky track perhaps most famous in its performance by The Carpenters.
Leon Russell: A Song For You
Leon Russell: 2/4/1942 – 13/11/2016. So it goes.
Posted in 1960s, Music at 12:00 on 12 June 2015
Firstly, a piece of English whimsy typical of Honeybus, which I have mentioned before.
Like last week’s offering – (Sittin’ On) The Dock of the Bay – Honeybus’s version of this Pete Dello song has brackets in its title.
Honeybus: (Do I Figure) in Your Life?
Joe Cocker reworked it in his own distinctive way – with title slightly amended, and no brackets. In Cocker’s hands the song has a totally different feel.
Joe Cocker: Do I Still Figure in Your Life?
Posted in 1960s, Events dear boy. Events, Friday On My Mind, Music at 12:00 on 23 December 2014
I was sorry to hear of the death of one of Sheffield’s finest, Joe Cocker. I’ve mentioned before his hit with the radical reworking of the Beatles’ song With a Little Help From My Friends and also his Mad Dogs and Englishmen tour.
From that tour here’s the live version of Delta Lady.
Joe Cocker (Mad Dogs and Englishmen): Delta Lady
John Robert (Joe) Cocker: 20/5/1944 – 22/12/2014. So it goes.
Posted in 1960s, 1970s, BBC, Music, Reelin' In The Years at 12:00 on 28 December 2012
I first heard this parody on the radio. Along with my elder brother I used to listen regularly (every week without fail) to the comedy programme I’m Sorry I’ll Read That Again (1964-1973) which along with Bill Oddie, the purveyor of this ditty, featured John Cleese, Tim Brooke-Taylor, Graeme Garden, Jo Kendall and David Hatch. I can still utter quotes from it even today. (Once heard, who could ever forget the strains of the Angus Prune Tune?)
Episodes from the series can be found on the BBC’s Radio 4 Extra pages. Relistening, it is now obvious from where I got my love of outrageous puns.
The track is a reimagining of a traditional Yorkshire song about the dangers of wandering on Ilkley Moor without a hat utilising the style Joe Cocker employed in With a Little Help From My Friends. It was eventually released as a single in 1970 but I’m sure must have been in a late 60s episode of the radio show. As I remember it the radio version carried more bite, though.
Bill Oddie:- On Ilkla Moor Baht’at
The B-side was another parody.
Bill Oddie:- Harry Krishna
Posted in 1960s, 1970s, Music, Reelin' In The Years at 18:00 on 21 December 2012
Another one from 1970, following on from last week’s 60s Boxtops song.
Joe Cocker is perhaps most famous for his reworking of the somewhat bland, almost throwaway, With a Little Help From My Friends from the Beatles’ Sergeant Pepper, making that song into something unforgettable (though eminently parodyable) and in his “Mad Dogs and Englishmen” incarnation also had a 1960s hit with the Leon Russell song Delta Lady, but they later also transformed the Boxtops hit The Letter.
Joe Cocker: The Letter
Here, for comparison purposes, is the version by the Box Tops:-
The Box Tops: The Letter
