Click on the headline to link to a YouTube film clip of Dale Ward performing his classic 1960s teen angst Letter From Sherry, with lyrics provide below, in order to give a flavor of the times to this piece
CD Review
The Heart Of Rock ‘n’ Roll: 1962-1963, take two, various artists, Time-Life Music, 1997
Scene: Brought to mind by one of the songs in this compilation, Dale Ward performing his classic 1960s teen angst Letter From Sherry, with lyrics provide below, in order to give a flavor of the times to this piece.
Nobody said being a teenager was going to be easy now, in 1860 or whenever they invented teenagers, 1960 the time period of this piece, or, hell, 2360. Teen angst, short term or long, comes with the territory. However sometimes something, in this case a song, will sum up just exactly how hard teen life really is. I admit this one had me a little weepy for a while over the fate, a common fate, of one of the characters. That is until I realized, wait a minute this is teen stuff, next week the configuration will have totally changed, or the boys (or girl) in this teen triangle will have sworn off girls (or boys, for the girl). Ya, right.
Rather than leave the reader in any more suspense let me give the details of the heart-rending dilemma. It seems that Robert, well let’s call him Robert because Roberts always seem to be the kind of guys who draw the short end of the stick in teen life, was head over heels in love with Sherry, and had been ever since they met a couple of summers back down at the far end, the teen far end, of Olde Saco Beach up in cold climate Maine so it must have been July, no later. Needless to say they were both “enjoying” the rite of passage teen bored-to-death vacation with their ever-loving families (dogs, optional, although included here since they met while walking the respective family dogs) when the dogs met, and presto Robert and Sherry met. Things went fine for a while, as such summer romances go, and they wrote during the winter with all kinds of expectations of another high school teen romance summer, with maybe a little more than just kissing this time.
As luck would have it though Robert, studious, shoulder to the wheel if smitten Robert, had an opportunity to work at Ben’s Market in Olde Saco that next summer in order to help with his soon to be impeding college tuition. Naturally he had to “jump” at the opportunity (with a very big “friendly” push from his parents). And that is when things started to fall apart.
Nature, and teen nature is a pure scientific example of that law, abhors a vacuum. Especially a foxy Sherry on the beach alone, no Robert alone, (and no dog along for introductions this time) when Eddie, let’s call him Eddie, not Edward, not, Ed, not Eduardo, just Eddie because it is always Eddies who scoop up the foxes in teen life came swaggering up the beach, sat right beside Sherry and started, well, started in his version of fast eddie love talk. Just like that. And Sherry, well, Sherry was just in the mood to hear such talk, if not from "shoulder the wheel" Robert then Eddie, kind of hunky Eddie, would do just fine. After all a girl has to look out for herself in this wicked old world. The long and short of it was that Sherry made a date with Eddie, a happy date when she found out that Eddie had a “boss” ’57 Chevy for that date. Robert’s was working at his silly old market job anyway so he would be none the wiser. That night, it might have been the stars, it might have been the moon, it might have been Sherry mad at Robert, or it just might have been the time of her time, but Sherry let Eddie have his way with her down at the far, far, far end of Olde Saco beach. The place where only teenagers with something on their minds other than throwing pebbles in the surf go, no one else not even the cops.
So far still nothing remarkable, right. A million teens lost in the moon-beam night learning about the ways of the world, the adult sex world that they keep hush-hush about but which every teen since Socrates, maybe before, gets hip to, one way or another. But here is where it gets dicey. See Eddie already had a foxy girlfriend back home, Lula Belle, who outfoxes Sherry six ways to Sunday. And is rather possessive of her man. Switchblade-like possessive if it came to it. And Eddie, frankly, while he enjoyed Sherry was in it for kicks, for just doing it when the opportunity arose, and moving on. So that is exactly what he did. Sherry though, after the short summer tryst was over, started writing Eddie asking when he was coming back and all that kind of stuff, girl crush stuff.
Still not that remarkable though. What was though was that Eddie and Robert attended the same regional high school, Arundel High over the other side of Sanford (although they do not live in the same town) together and were both on the football team. (Robert the steady plebeian pulling guard, Fast Eddie, well, the fleet-footed halfback, natch) So one afternoon Eddie, Eddie acting as peacock, showed Robert, in the presence of his best friend, Josh Breslin and so that is how this situation became public, well, school knowledge, one of Sherry’s letters. Eddie went on a little about what he and Sherry did and what a cluck she was for writing a breeze guy like Eddie such stuff. And Eddie said right then and there that he bet Robert five dollars, five serious dollars, that he could write a couple of lines to Sherry about not having enough dough for postage stamps to write her before, or something, as his reason for not writing and he could be right back down there at the far, far, far end of Olde Saco Beach with Sherry anytime he wanted. Well, maybe not anytime because on hearing that Robert reared back and gave Eddie a punch that dropped him to the ground in nothing flat. So floor-fast Eddie and his jaw were on the bench for a while if Sherry wanted to know his whereabouts just then.
***********
Letter From Sherry lyrics-Dale War
A letter from Sherry
Oh boy, what a girl
But to the boy who really loves her
Its the end of the world.
A letter from Sherry
Brings teardrops to my eyes
A letter from Sherry
Oh why, Sherry, why?
My best friend named Eddie
Came by just yesterday
With a letter from Sherry
Heres what she had to say
Dear Eddie Dear Eddie, I love you I love you
With all my heart with all my heart
Vacation last summer
Was grand
And though you
You never write
I pray I pray
Each day and night
For Im yours
And yours alone
And dear Sherry, shes comin home
A letter from Sherry
Oh boy, what a girl
But to the boy who really loves her
Showing posts with label teen love. Show all posts
Showing posts with label teen love. Show all posts
Saturday, October 15, 2011
Saturday, July 30, 2011
Rick’s Flying Saucer Rock Moment- The Rock ‘n’ Rock Era; Weird, Wild & Wacky
Click on the headline to link to a YouTube film clip of the Royal Teens performing their classic, Short, Shorts.
CD Review
The Rock ‘n’Roll Era: Weird, Wild & Wacky, various artists, Time-Life Music, 1991
He was glad, glad as hell that angel thing, that guardian angel thing, was over and done with. You know that Sunday school thing they beat you over head with about how your guardian angel was there to keep you on the straight and narrow, or else. Yes, Rick Roberts certainly was glad that was over although now that he thought about it it just kind of passed out of sight as he got older and other things filled his mind. Things like his June ("June Bug" was his pet name for her but he had better not hear you call her that, especially one Freddie Jackson, or else). Yes, Rick was now large, strong enough, and smart enough strong, not to have to worry about some needlepoint guardian angel looking out for him. Although truth to tell he was worried, a little anyway, about this Cold War Russian bear thing coming over here to take his brain away, or maybe put the big heat on him, the A-bomb heat and creating alien things from outer space to haunt his dreams. But only a little.
What was exercising Rick these days was his June (you know her pet name but don’t say it, please) and causing him no end of sleepless nights was that thing about Freddie Jackson, June’s old flame. At least according to his sister, Celia, a reliable source of North Adamsville High gossip, and not afraid to spread it when it pleased her, was that Freddie was taking his peeks at June, and she was peeking back. So, lately, in order to pass those sleepless nights Rick had begun to sit up in his bedroom at night with his transistor radio on, the one that he had forced his parents to buy him, batteries included, for last Christmas, rather than the practical ties they had intended to foist on him. And what Rick listened as the hour turned to midnight was The Crazy Lazy Midnight Madness Show on WMEX, the local be-bop, no stop, all rock radio station the that got the sleepless, the half-awake, the lame and the lazy through the 1950s Cold War night, and into the dawn.
Now this Crazy Lazy Show fare was strictly for night owls, stuff that would not appeal to daytime rockers, you know, those listening to guys like Elvis, Carl, Bo, Little Richard, and Jerry Lee, or just stuff that appealed to Lazy’s off-center, off-beat funny bone. One night, one really restless night, as Rick was revving up the transistor around midnight
he heard Buchanan and Goodman’s silly The Flying Saucer, parts one and two back to back no less, so you see Crazy was serious about presenting goofy stuff. That was followed by Sheb Wooley’s devouring the Purple People Eater, and then, for a change of pace The Royal Teens be-bop Short, Shorts and that got his to thinking about how good June looked in them, and then back to zaniness when Bobby Picketts flattened Monster Mash and, as he got a little drowsy, The Detergents waved over Leader of the Laundromat.
That last one got to him, got to him good, because, believe it or not the song had sentimental value to him. See he met June at the North Adamsville All-Wash Laundromat one day. His mother’s washing machine had broken down and she needed to bring the Roberts laundry to the All-Wash and Rick drove her over. During that time June had passed by, he had said hi, they had talked and then more seriously talked, and that was that. Freddie Jackson was after that dust, a memory, nothing to June.
All this thinking really got Rick tired this night and as the last chords of Laundromat echoed in his head he fell into a deep sleep. Around four o’clock in the morning though he was awoken with a start, with the high pitched whining sound coming from some where outside his window. Next thing he knew a huge disc-like object was hovering over most of Adamsville, and stayed there for maybe a minute before departing just as quickly as it appeared. Rick took this for a sign, a sign that he and June would hang together. And a sign that Freddie Jackson probably should have taken a trip on that flying saucer while he could, or else.
CD Review
The Rock ‘n’Roll Era: Weird, Wild & Wacky, various artists, Time-Life Music, 1991
He was glad, glad as hell that angel thing, that guardian angel thing, was over and done with. You know that Sunday school thing they beat you over head with about how your guardian angel was there to keep you on the straight and narrow, or else. Yes, Rick Roberts certainly was glad that was over although now that he thought about it it just kind of passed out of sight as he got older and other things filled his mind. Things like his June ("June Bug" was his pet name for her but he had better not hear you call her that, especially one Freddie Jackson, or else). Yes, Rick was now large, strong enough, and smart enough strong, not to have to worry about some needlepoint guardian angel looking out for him. Although truth to tell he was worried, a little anyway, about this Cold War Russian bear thing coming over here to take his brain away, or maybe put the big heat on him, the A-bomb heat and creating alien things from outer space to haunt his dreams. But only a little.
What was exercising Rick these days was his June (you know her pet name but don’t say it, please) and causing him no end of sleepless nights was that thing about Freddie Jackson, June’s old flame. At least according to his sister, Celia, a reliable source of North Adamsville High gossip, and not afraid to spread it when it pleased her, was that Freddie was taking his peeks at June, and she was peeking back. So, lately, in order to pass those sleepless nights Rick had begun to sit up in his bedroom at night with his transistor radio on, the one that he had forced his parents to buy him, batteries included, for last Christmas, rather than the practical ties they had intended to foist on him. And what Rick listened as the hour turned to midnight was The Crazy Lazy Midnight Madness Show on WMEX, the local be-bop, no stop, all rock radio station the that got the sleepless, the half-awake, the lame and the lazy through the 1950s Cold War night, and into the dawn.
Now this Crazy Lazy Show fare was strictly for night owls, stuff that would not appeal to daytime rockers, you know, those listening to guys like Elvis, Carl, Bo, Little Richard, and Jerry Lee, or just stuff that appealed to Lazy’s off-center, off-beat funny bone. One night, one really restless night, as Rick was revving up the transistor around midnight
he heard Buchanan and Goodman’s silly The Flying Saucer, parts one and two back to back no less, so you see Crazy was serious about presenting goofy stuff. That was followed by Sheb Wooley’s devouring the Purple People Eater, and then, for a change of pace The Royal Teens be-bop Short, Shorts and that got his to thinking about how good June looked in them, and then back to zaniness when Bobby Picketts flattened Monster Mash and, as he got a little drowsy, The Detergents waved over Leader of the Laundromat.
That last one got to him, got to him good, because, believe it or not the song had sentimental value to him. See he met June at the North Adamsville All-Wash Laundromat one day. His mother’s washing machine had broken down and she needed to bring the Roberts laundry to the All-Wash and Rick drove her over. During that time June had passed by, he had said hi, they had talked and then more seriously talked, and that was that. Freddie Jackson was after that dust, a memory, nothing to June.
All this thinking really got Rick tired this night and as the last chords of Laundromat echoed in his head he fell into a deep sleep. Around four o’clock in the morning though he was awoken with a start, with the high pitched whining sound coming from some where outside his window. Next thing he knew a huge disc-like object was hovering over most of Adamsville, and stayed there for maybe a minute before departing just as quickly as it appeared. Rick took this for a sign, a sign that he and June would hang together. And a sign that Freddie Jackson probably should have taken a trip on that flying saucer while he could, or else.
Tuesday, June 14, 2011
Where Have The Girls Gone- When Young Women’s Voices Ruled the Airwaves Before The British Rock Invasion, Circa 1964- Early Girls, Volume One
Click on the headline to link to a YouTube film clip of Carol King performing It Might As Well Rain Until September.
Early Girls, Volume One, various singers, Ace Records ,1997
As I mentioned in a review of a two-volume set of, for lack of a better term, girl doo wop some of the songs which overlap in this five volume series, I have, of late, been running back over some rock material that formed my coming of age listening music (on that ubiquitous, and very personal, iPod, oops, battery-driven transistor radio that kept those snooping parents out in the dark, clueless, about what I was listening to, and that was just fine, agreed), and that of my generation, the generation of ’68. Naturally one had to pay homage to the blues influences from the likes of Muddy Waters, Big Mama Thornton, and Big Joe Turner. And, of course, the rockabilly influences from Elvis, Carl Perkins, Wanda Jackson, and Jerry Lee Lewis on. Additionally, I have spent some time on the male side of the doo wop be-bop Saturday night led by Frankie Lymon and the Teenagers on Why Do Fools Fall In Love? (good question, right). I noted there that I had not done much with the female side of the doo wop night, the great "girl" groups that had their heyday in the late 1950s and early 1960s before the British invasion, among other things, changed our tastes in popular music. I would expand that observation here to include girls’ voices generally. As there, I make some amends for that omission here.
As I also noted in that earlier review one problem with the girl groups, and now girl vocals for a guy, me, a serious rock guy, me, was that the lyrics to many of the girl group songs, frankly, did not “speak to me.” After all how much empathy could a young ragamuffin of boy brought up on the wrong side of the tracks like this writer have for a girl who breaks a guy's heart after leading him on, yes, leading him on, just because her big bruiser of a boyfriend is coming back and she needs some excuse to brush the heartbroken lad off in the Angels' My Boyfriend’s Back. Or some lucky guy, some lucky Sunday guy, maybe, who breathlessly catches the eye of the singer in the Shirelles' Met Him On Sunday from a guy who, dateless Saturday night, was hunched over some misbegotten book, some study book, on Sunday feeling all dejected. And how about this, some two, or maybe, three-timing gal who berated her ever-loving boyfriend because she needs a good talking to, or worst, a now socially incorrect "beating" in Joanie Sommers’ Johnny Get Angry.
And reviewing the material in this volume gave me the same flash-back feeling I felt listening to girl doo wop sounds. I will give examples of that for this volume, and this approach will drive the reviews of all five of these volumes in the series. Ya, for starters what is a girl-shy boy to make of a song that when some big-voiced woman is telling one and all that her man is no good just because he was catting on her around in Betty Everett’s Your No Good; or some girl all chained up by a guy (not S&M stuff but worst, in a way, chains of mixed-up love) in Chains by The Cookies; or get all weepy about the trauma of a girl who is boy-less all summer by a girl-less guy for all seasons in It Might As Well Rain Until September by Carole King.
And how could a young ragamuffin get catch a break listening to some girl spreading the glad tidings about her new found love in the girls' lav Monday morning in I'm Into Something Good by Earl-Jean; or, the same kind of message, except maybe at the local pizza parlor, in I've Told Every Little Star by Linda Scott. And it goes on and on. Christ, even guys wearing pink shoe laces and looking like some goof have their devotees (but what about no song poor boy, plaid flannel-shirted, black chino-ed, with cuffs, Thom McAn-shoed guy, no way right) in Pink Shoe Laces by Dodie Stevens. And the love eternal love-style songs were worst, for example, a giggling, gaffing girl all plushed up by her boy in I Love How You Love Me by The Paris Sisters. Jesus, that could have been me.
And is there a place for such a lad even in the love’s trials and tribulations-type songs like when the moon took a holiday from looking out for lovers in Dark Moon by Bonnie Guitar; or when it didn’t in You by The Aquatones and was absolutely beaming in the incredible paean to everlasting love, 'Til by The Angels. Hell, even no account, long gone, no stamps, no stationary, no pen, no time to write Eddie has someone pining over him pining big time in Eddie My Love by The Teen Queens. And Eddie was nothing but long gone and never coming back. But the one that gets me, gets me big time, is a total song homage by some sweet girl just because he is her guy in Dedicated To The One I Love by The Shirelles. Lordy, lord.
So you get the idea, this stuff could not “speak to me.” Now you understand, right? Except, surprise, surprise foolish, behind the eight- ball, know-nothing youthful guy had it all wrong and should have been listening, and listening like crazy, to these lyrics because, brothers and sisters, they held the key to what was what about what was on girls’ minds back in the day, and maybe now a little too, and if I could have decoded this I would have had, well, the beginning of knowledge, girl knowledge. Damn. But that is one of the virtues, and maybe the only virtue of age. Ya, and also get this- you had better get your do-lang, do-lang, your shoop, shoop, and your best be-bop, be-bop into that good night voice out and sing along to the lyrics here. This, fellow baby-boomers, was our teen angst, teen alienation, teen love youth and now this stuff sounds great. And from girls even.
Early Girls, Volume One, various singers, Ace Records ,1997
As I mentioned in a review of a two-volume set of, for lack of a better term, girl doo wop some of the songs which overlap in this five volume series, I have, of late, been running back over some rock material that formed my coming of age listening music (on that ubiquitous, and very personal, iPod, oops, battery-driven transistor radio that kept those snooping parents out in the dark, clueless, about what I was listening to, and that was just fine, agreed), and that of my generation, the generation of ’68. Naturally one had to pay homage to the blues influences from the likes of Muddy Waters, Big Mama Thornton, and Big Joe Turner. And, of course, the rockabilly influences from Elvis, Carl Perkins, Wanda Jackson, and Jerry Lee Lewis on. Additionally, I have spent some time on the male side of the doo wop be-bop Saturday night led by Frankie Lymon and the Teenagers on Why Do Fools Fall In Love? (good question, right). I noted there that I had not done much with the female side of the doo wop night, the great "girl" groups that had their heyday in the late 1950s and early 1960s before the British invasion, among other things, changed our tastes in popular music. I would expand that observation here to include girls’ voices generally. As there, I make some amends for that omission here.
As I also noted in that earlier review one problem with the girl groups, and now girl vocals for a guy, me, a serious rock guy, me, was that the lyrics to many of the girl group songs, frankly, did not “speak to me.” After all how much empathy could a young ragamuffin of boy brought up on the wrong side of the tracks like this writer have for a girl who breaks a guy's heart after leading him on, yes, leading him on, just because her big bruiser of a boyfriend is coming back and she needs some excuse to brush the heartbroken lad off in the Angels' My Boyfriend’s Back. Or some lucky guy, some lucky Sunday guy, maybe, who breathlessly catches the eye of the singer in the Shirelles' Met Him On Sunday from a guy who, dateless Saturday night, was hunched over some misbegotten book, some study book, on Sunday feeling all dejected. And how about this, some two, or maybe, three-timing gal who berated her ever-loving boyfriend because she needs a good talking to, or worst, a now socially incorrect "beating" in Joanie Sommers’ Johnny Get Angry.
And reviewing the material in this volume gave me the same flash-back feeling I felt listening to girl doo wop sounds. I will give examples of that for this volume, and this approach will drive the reviews of all five of these volumes in the series. Ya, for starters what is a girl-shy boy to make of a song that when some big-voiced woman is telling one and all that her man is no good just because he was catting on her around in Betty Everett’s Your No Good; or some girl all chained up by a guy (not S&M stuff but worst, in a way, chains of mixed-up love) in Chains by The Cookies; or get all weepy about the trauma of a girl who is boy-less all summer by a girl-less guy for all seasons in It Might As Well Rain Until September by Carole King.
And how could a young ragamuffin get catch a break listening to some girl spreading the glad tidings about her new found love in the girls' lav Monday morning in I'm Into Something Good by Earl-Jean; or, the same kind of message, except maybe at the local pizza parlor, in I've Told Every Little Star by Linda Scott. And it goes on and on. Christ, even guys wearing pink shoe laces and looking like some goof have their devotees (but what about no song poor boy, plaid flannel-shirted, black chino-ed, with cuffs, Thom McAn-shoed guy, no way right) in Pink Shoe Laces by Dodie Stevens. And the love eternal love-style songs were worst, for example, a giggling, gaffing girl all plushed up by her boy in I Love How You Love Me by The Paris Sisters. Jesus, that could have been me.
And is there a place for such a lad even in the love’s trials and tribulations-type songs like when the moon took a holiday from looking out for lovers in Dark Moon by Bonnie Guitar; or when it didn’t in You by The Aquatones and was absolutely beaming in the incredible paean to everlasting love, 'Til by The Angels. Hell, even no account, long gone, no stamps, no stationary, no pen, no time to write Eddie has someone pining over him pining big time in Eddie My Love by The Teen Queens. And Eddie was nothing but long gone and never coming back. But the one that gets me, gets me big time, is a total song homage by some sweet girl just because he is her guy in Dedicated To The One I Love by The Shirelles. Lordy, lord.
So you get the idea, this stuff could not “speak to me.” Now you understand, right? Except, surprise, surprise foolish, behind the eight- ball, know-nothing youthful guy had it all wrong and should have been listening, and listening like crazy, to these lyrics because, brothers and sisters, they held the key to what was what about what was on girls’ minds back in the day, and maybe now a little too, and if I could have decoded this I would have had, well, the beginning of knowledge, girl knowledge. Damn. But that is one of the virtues, and maybe the only virtue of age. Ya, and also get this- you had better get your do-lang, do-lang, your shoop, shoop, and your best be-bop, be-bop into that good night voice out and sing along to the lyrics here. This, fellow baby-boomers, was our teen angst, teen alienation, teen love youth and now this stuff sounds great. And from girls even.
Tuesday, June 7, 2011
Those Oldies But Goodies…Out In The Be-Bop ‘50s Song Night- The Dubs- “Could This Be Magic”
Click on the headline to link to a YouTube film clip of The Dubs performing the classic, Could This Be Magic.
THE DUBS
"Could This Be Magic"
Could this be magic
My dear
My heart's all aglow
Could this be magic
Loving you so
Could this be magic
My dear
Having your love
My prayers were answered
So far from above
I thought it would be
Just a memory
To linger my heart in pain
But too much pride
I opened up my eyes
And I'm with you dear once again
Could this be magic
My dear
Having your love
If this is magic
Then magic is mine
Could this be magic
Then magic is mine
I suppose everybody in America knows, knows by heart now, that John O’Connor and I, Jenny Dolan, are an “item.” The poster boy and girl sweethearts of North Adamsville High according to one piece of gossip that I heard, or overheard, Joanne Doyle saying sarcastically, in the girls’ lav at school one Monday morning when she was giving her weekend round-up report to all who would listen. What I couldn’t spread around about her and lover boy, Frankie, but that was old Jenny, old miserable Jennie, before I got my John, and got him good. Of course Joanne only retells what the pizza pie in your eye corner boy king, so-called, Frankie, Frankie Riley if your one of the about three people in the Class of 1964 who doesn’t know him, has already started spreading around. The gist of tale is that he has lost his ace-in-the-hole (really just his bodyguard for when he makes the wrong move on some real tough guy's girl), Jumping John O’Connor (although I am putting a stop to calling him that name, and fast) to a frill (that’s me, or that’s me when Frankie does his 28 flavors of disrespect to girls thing, except no-nonsense mistress Joanne, by calling them frills, molls, frails and everything else that he has picked up from watching too many 1930s gangster films, and reading too many Raymond Chandler crime novels). See John and Frankie go back to first grade together over at North Adamsville Elementary and somehow Frankie thought that was enough to keep the “twists” (girls again) at a distance so John could be his full-time “body-guard.”
And if Frankie hasn’t spread the news around about John and me then Peter Paul Markin, clueless Peter Paul when it come to knowing anything about girls (and girls and guys who get together for more than reading books at the library, or going to a debate or stuff like that) did, once Frankie unleashes him to spread it around. Now everybody respects Peter Paul for his knowledge, for his devotion to learning more about stuff, and for sticking up for the, as he calls them, “fellow down-trodden” of the earth but he has been strictly blind-sided by Frankie ever since he came to North Adamsville. When I was lonely (lonely for my John, if you want to know) I went out with Peter Paul, once, but no thanks. So between Joanne (really Frankie), Frankie (really Joanne) and Peter Paul (really Frankie, and maybe Joanne) you’ve probably got the story all wrong. Like the why behind why John and I did not get together until just now, although we were made for each other and that’s the truth, and has been the truth for a long time.
Let me tell the story, my side, and see if it is anything like you heard from Frankie, or Peter Paul. Although now that I think about it if you got it from Peter Paul then you haven’t finished reading the treatise on the subject of John O’Connor and Jennifer Dolan yet and I can save you some time, and save your eyes too. See back in sixth grade when I was just starting to get a little shape but was still really just a stick I went to Chrissie Mc Namara’s twelfth birthday party. Now Chrissie and I had been friends for ages so I expected to be the party but what really got my girl temperature up was that John was going to be there.
Now John was good-looking even then, kind of quiet, a good all-around athlete (a great football player-in-the-making even then, even then in little Pop Warner League), and, I think, shy around girls but I had eyes for him. Big eyes, and not just twelve year old big eyes, but going way back to first communion at Sacred Heart where we were boy white suit and girl white dress paired together to walk down to the communion rail and I had to calm him down because he was scared of the idea of eating the wafer, the body and blood of Christ. No, I was not every day in every way crushed up on him, but crushed up somewhere deep inside since then. In sixth grade time though when I started getting my shape a little, you know, I couldn’t keep from thinking of him. So at Chrissie party I was flying high in expectation. I had my best dress on, had taken a long soapy bath, and worn some of my mother’s perfume (don’t tell her, okay). And I wasn’t disappointed because he asked me to dance, dance close, dance airless close. I almost kissed him then but I waited until the lights went out that signaled the time for some “petting” games to start and then ran over to the sofa and planted the biggest, hardest kiss I could on him. Boy, did I have my signals crossed because he pushed me aside (not hard but definitely aside) and ran out of the house. That’s how he got the name Jumping John O’Connor once Frankie got the story out. He hated the name, and I did too.
After that I didn’t run into him enough to get nervous because at school we were in different classes and, obviously, I wasn’t hanging around shabby, two-bit, greasy pizza parlors wasting my good time and energy listening to Frankie (and his lap dog, Peter Paul) play his lordship. Besides Joanne, Joanne Doyle, Frankie’s plain jane, so-called girlfriend, and I never got along every since I told her that Frankie was calling me up on the telephone any time they had a “misunderstanding.” She flat-out didn’t believe me but ask Peter Paul, he knows, he knows everything about Frankie Riley and his “love” life.
This year though, sophomore year, John and I have our daily last period study class together and a couple weeks into the class I noticed that he kept looking (for a second anyway) in my direction. And more than once. And I started looking in his direction (for a second anyway, and more than once). As we found out later everybody in the class, including the study class monitor, Miss Wilmot, the old dyke, knew we were “making eyes” at each other. Except, of course, maybe Peter Paul who was also in the study hall down front and reading. Still, naturally, that will not stop him from claiming in his treatise that he was the key to introducing John and I.
Believe me I didn’t know what to do at first. I was “gun-shy” from that sixth grade fiasco party so I was afraid to think that he might be interested in me. But, and I admit it, I was miserable, and had been pretty miserable since John’s rebuff that Chrissie’s party night, even though I went out with lots of boys. Then one day I figured out (and talked to Chrissie about it, and she agreed) that John, shy, quiet John wasn’t going to do anything about me unless I started the ball rolling. And here is what I figured out to do (on my own, no Chrissie help). I was going to go into the lion’s den, the holy of holies, Salducci’s Pizza Parlor where Frankie and his boys, including John, hung out a lot and just flop myself in John’s lap and dare him, no double dare him, to throw me off in a public place. And I was going to do it too, once I got my courage up, or was miserable enough to try anything.
Well, one Friday night, one October Friday night, a few weeks ago I got so miserable at home that I decided to go for broke. I walked up the Downs and entered Salducci’s, fearful, very fearful, but then I saw John sitting on the outside of the booth with the boys (Frankie, Peter Paul, Fingers Kelly John and a couple of other denizens) and saw my chance. I quickly walked over and flopped myself on John lap. And you know what he said. “I’m sorry” as he gently, very gently, broke my fall with his strong arms. My heart went crazy with fear. I thought that I had misinterpreted his looks at me in study class just like at the party and started to get up. But as I started to get up John held me close, held me close like maybe it was going to take the whole football team, both offense and defense, and scrubs and water boys thrown in to get me of his lap before he finished his red-faced say.
And this is what he said, and said in a way that he had been thinking about it for a while. “I’m sorry, real sorry, that I pushed you away at Chrissie’s birthday party and ran out and never apologized. I just didn’t know what to do then.” And he added, “Will you forgive me?” Frankie and the boys were flabbergasted but John, red-faced and all, maybe more so after saying his piece, held his ground. I wanted to say all kinds of witty, smart things but all I could blurt out was, “yes.” I started to get up but he would not let me up (and truthfully I wasn’t trying hard anyway) until he asked to walk me home. You know the answer so I will not be coy. As we walked and talked it seemed like an instant until we got to my house. The lights were out but John said he wanted to talk a little, and we did, boy and girl things that you don’t need to know about. And while we were talking he reached out and held my hand. And I got all red-faced, especially when every once in a while he would loosen up his grip and then gently squeeze my hand again like he was afraid to let go. And I was afraid to let him let it go. I will tell you that night, I swear, John could have done anything he wanted with me, anything, but we just held hands, tight hands. Okay, you have the story straight now.
THE DUBS
"Could This Be Magic"
Could this be magic
My dear
My heart's all aglow
Could this be magic
Loving you so
Could this be magic
My dear
Having your love
My prayers were answered
So far from above
I thought it would be
Just a memory
To linger my heart in pain
But too much pride
I opened up my eyes
And I'm with you dear once again
Could this be magic
My dear
Having your love
If this is magic
Then magic is mine
Could this be magic
Then magic is mine
I suppose everybody in America knows, knows by heart now, that John O’Connor and I, Jenny Dolan, are an “item.” The poster boy and girl sweethearts of North Adamsville High according to one piece of gossip that I heard, or overheard, Joanne Doyle saying sarcastically, in the girls’ lav at school one Monday morning when she was giving her weekend round-up report to all who would listen. What I couldn’t spread around about her and lover boy, Frankie, but that was old Jenny, old miserable Jennie, before I got my John, and got him good. Of course Joanne only retells what the pizza pie in your eye corner boy king, so-called, Frankie, Frankie Riley if your one of the about three people in the Class of 1964 who doesn’t know him, has already started spreading around. The gist of tale is that he has lost his ace-in-the-hole (really just his bodyguard for when he makes the wrong move on some real tough guy's girl), Jumping John O’Connor (although I am putting a stop to calling him that name, and fast) to a frill (that’s me, or that’s me when Frankie does his 28 flavors of disrespect to girls thing, except no-nonsense mistress Joanne, by calling them frills, molls, frails and everything else that he has picked up from watching too many 1930s gangster films, and reading too many Raymond Chandler crime novels). See John and Frankie go back to first grade together over at North Adamsville Elementary and somehow Frankie thought that was enough to keep the “twists” (girls again) at a distance so John could be his full-time “body-guard.”
And if Frankie hasn’t spread the news around about John and me then Peter Paul Markin, clueless Peter Paul when it come to knowing anything about girls (and girls and guys who get together for more than reading books at the library, or going to a debate or stuff like that) did, once Frankie unleashes him to spread it around. Now everybody respects Peter Paul for his knowledge, for his devotion to learning more about stuff, and for sticking up for the, as he calls them, “fellow down-trodden” of the earth but he has been strictly blind-sided by Frankie ever since he came to North Adamsville. When I was lonely (lonely for my John, if you want to know) I went out with Peter Paul, once, but no thanks. So between Joanne (really Frankie), Frankie (really Joanne) and Peter Paul (really Frankie, and maybe Joanne) you’ve probably got the story all wrong. Like the why behind why John and I did not get together until just now, although we were made for each other and that’s the truth, and has been the truth for a long time.
Let me tell the story, my side, and see if it is anything like you heard from Frankie, or Peter Paul. Although now that I think about it if you got it from Peter Paul then you haven’t finished reading the treatise on the subject of John O’Connor and Jennifer Dolan yet and I can save you some time, and save your eyes too. See back in sixth grade when I was just starting to get a little shape but was still really just a stick I went to Chrissie Mc Namara’s twelfth birthday party. Now Chrissie and I had been friends for ages so I expected to be the party but what really got my girl temperature up was that John was going to be there.
Now John was good-looking even then, kind of quiet, a good all-around athlete (a great football player-in-the-making even then, even then in little Pop Warner League), and, I think, shy around girls but I had eyes for him. Big eyes, and not just twelve year old big eyes, but going way back to first communion at Sacred Heart where we were boy white suit and girl white dress paired together to walk down to the communion rail and I had to calm him down because he was scared of the idea of eating the wafer, the body and blood of Christ. No, I was not every day in every way crushed up on him, but crushed up somewhere deep inside since then. In sixth grade time though when I started getting my shape a little, you know, I couldn’t keep from thinking of him. So at Chrissie party I was flying high in expectation. I had my best dress on, had taken a long soapy bath, and worn some of my mother’s perfume (don’t tell her, okay). And I wasn’t disappointed because he asked me to dance, dance close, dance airless close. I almost kissed him then but I waited until the lights went out that signaled the time for some “petting” games to start and then ran over to the sofa and planted the biggest, hardest kiss I could on him. Boy, did I have my signals crossed because he pushed me aside (not hard but definitely aside) and ran out of the house. That’s how he got the name Jumping John O’Connor once Frankie got the story out. He hated the name, and I did too.
After that I didn’t run into him enough to get nervous because at school we were in different classes and, obviously, I wasn’t hanging around shabby, two-bit, greasy pizza parlors wasting my good time and energy listening to Frankie (and his lap dog, Peter Paul) play his lordship. Besides Joanne, Joanne Doyle, Frankie’s plain jane, so-called girlfriend, and I never got along every since I told her that Frankie was calling me up on the telephone any time they had a “misunderstanding.” She flat-out didn’t believe me but ask Peter Paul, he knows, he knows everything about Frankie Riley and his “love” life.
This year though, sophomore year, John and I have our daily last period study class together and a couple weeks into the class I noticed that he kept looking (for a second anyway) in my direction. And more than once. And I started looking in his direction (for a second anyway, and more than once). As we found out later everybody in the class, including the study class monitor, Miss Wilmot, the old dyke, knew we were “making eyes” at each other. Except, of course, maybe Peter Paul who was also in the study hall down front and reading. Still, naturally, that will not stop him from claiming in his treatise that he was the key to introducing John and I.
Believe me I didn’t know what to do at first. I was “gun-shy” from that sixth grade fiasco party so I was afraid to think that he might be interested in me. But, and I admit it, I was miserable, and had been pretty miserable since John’s rebuff that Chrissie’s party night, even though I went out with lots of boys. Then one day I figured out (and talked to Chrissie about it, and she agreed) that John, shy, quiet John wasn’t going to do anything about me unless I started the ball rolling. And here is what I figured out to do (on my own, no Chrissie help). I was going to go into the lion’s den, the holy of holies, Salducci’s Pizza Parlor where Frankie and his boys, including John, hung out a lot and just flop myself in John’s lap and dare him, no double dare him, to throw me off in a public place. And I was going to do it too, once I got my courage up, or was miserable enough to try anything.
Well, one Friday night, one October Friday night, a few weeks ago I got so miserable at home that I decided to go for broke. I walked up the Downs and entered Salducci’s, fearful, very fearful, but then I saw John sitting on the outside of the booth with the boys (Frankie, Peter Paul, Fingers Kelly John and a couple of other denizens) and saw my chance. I quickly walked over and flopped myself on John lap. And you know what he said. “I’m sorry” as he gently, very gently, broke my fall with his strong arms. My heart went crazy with fear. I thought that I had misinterpreted his looks at me in study class just like at the party and started to get up. But as I started to get up John held me close, held me close like maybe it was going to take the whole football team, both offense and defense, and scrubs and water boys thrown in to get me of his lap before he finished his red-faced say.
And this is what he said, and said in a way that he had been thinking about it for a while. “I’m sorry, real sorry, that I pushed you away at Chrissie’s birthday party and ran out and never apologized. I just didn’t know what to do then.” And he added, “Will you forgive me?” Frankie and the boys were flabbergasted but John, red-faced and all, maybe more so after saying his piece, held his ground. I wanted to say all kinds of witty, smart things but all I could blurt out was, “yes.” I started to get up but he would not let me up (and truthfully I wasn’t trying hard anyway) until he asked to walk me home. You know the answer so I will not be coy. As we walked and talked it seemed like an instant until we got to my house. The lights were out but John said he wanted to talk a little, and we did, boy and girl things that you don’t need to know about. And while we were talking he reached out and held my hand. And I got all red-faced, especially when every once in a while he would loosen up his grip and then gently squeeze my hand again like he was afraid to let go. And I was afraid to let him let it go. I will tell you that night, I swear, John could have done anything he wanted with me, anything, but we just held hands, tight hands. Okay, you have the story straight now.
Saturday, June 4, 2011
Those Oldies But Goodies…Out In The Be-Bop ‘60s Song Night- The Chiffons’ “He’s So Fine”
Click on the headline to link to a YouTube film clip of The Chiffons performing their classic, He's So Fine.
THE CHIFFONS
"He's So Fine"
(Do-lang, do-lang, do-lang)
(Do-lang, do-lang)
He's so fine
(Do-lang-do-lang-do-lang)
Wish he were mine
(Do-lang-do-lang-do-lang)
That handsome boy over there
(Do-lang-do-lang-do-lang)
The one with the wavy hair
(Do-lang-do-lang-do-lang)
I don't know how I'm gonna do it
(Do-lang-do-lang-do-lang)
But I'm gonna make him mine
(Do-lang-do-lang-do-lang)
He's the envy of all the girls
(Do-lang-do-lang-do-lang)
It's just a matter of time
(Do-lang-do-lang)
He's a soft [Spoken] guy
(Do-lang-do-lang-do-lang)
Also seems kinda shy
(Do-lang-do-lang-do-lang)
Makes me wonder if I
(Do-lang-do-lang-do-lang)
Should even give him a try
(Do-lang-do-lang-do-lang)
But then I know he can't shy
(Do-lang-do-lang-do-lang)
He can't shy away forever
(Do-lang-do-lang-do-lang)
And I'm gonna make him mine
(Do-lang-do-lang-do-lang)
If it takes me forever
(Do-lang-do-lang)
He's so fine
(Oh yeah)
Gotta be mine
(Oh yeah)
Sooner or later
(Oh yeah)
I hope it's not later
(Oh yeah)
We gotta get together
(Oh yeah)
The sooner the better
(Oh yeah)
I just can't wait, I just can't wait
To be held in his arms
If I were a queen
(Do-lang-do-lang-do-lang)
And he asked me to leave my throne
(Do-lang-do-lang-do-lang)
I'll do anything that he asked
(Do-lang-do-lang-do-lang)
Anything to make him my own
(Do-lang-do-lang-do-lang)
For he's so fine
(So fine) so fine
(So fine) he's so fine
(So fine) so fine
(So fine) he's so fine
[Fades]
(So fine) oh yeah
(He's so fine) he's so fine
(So fine) uh-huh
(He's so fine)
He's so fine.....
*****
That Frankie, Frankie Riley, really gets to me sometimes. Here he has the best girl around, Joanne Doyle, smart, cute, maybe more than cute but I don’t dare say it here just in case he has the joint cased (or maybe she will see it and be embarrassed), and he is catting around, catting around like crazy trying to make every twist not tied to a big bruiser of a guy. Even then, if she is a boffo, he will take a run at her and hope his track shoes are fast enough. or faster than her boyfriend anyway.
And here I am all by myself,girl-less, Johnny O’Connor, Jumping Johnny O’Connor they call me but I don’t like it, don’t like it at all. See, back in sixth grade, back before Markin, Peter Paul Markin, came on the scene and took my place, my rightful place, as Frankie’s right-hand man we were at a “petting” party, a girl’s birthday party really, but you know how kids' stuff gets going, boy and girl kids' stuff, and this stick tried to kiss me hard, some sweet perfumed, freshly soaped stick (I can still smell her smell now), when the lights went out and I jumped up and ran out of that birthday girl’s house. Now, and probably for eternity, I am Jumping Johnny O’Connor. But I still don’t like it. And funny that stick girl, I’ll just call her by her first name, Jenny, turned out to be lately, well she turned out to be cute, maybe more than cute but I don’t dare say it just in case she has her spies around.
Now don’t get me wrong, Peter Paul’s a good guy, a funny guy really, and he has about twelve million facts that he seems to keep tied up in a bag and has ready for any occasion, any Frankie-needs-facts-occasion. So I can see where Frankie could use him as maybe second right hand guy, and I could be first. See, where Peter Paul has those facts I’ve got the beef, the well-muscled beef, that Frankie really needs if, and when, those track shoes aren’t fast enough when that boffo girl’s big bruiser boy friend gets the word.
Some people call me a stup and a simp for hanging around with a weirdo like Frankie but that’s not right. I just don’t like to read a lot of books, and stuff like that. I like my sports, and getting some serious attention, some serious girl attention, except no dice from Joanne and ever since that party nothing but ice from that Jenny, for being good at them. But see, Frankie, and now Peter Paul, are into that new be-bop beat thing, and I have noticed that Joanne is playing right into it, even liking it when Peter Paul starts going on and on about this and that in the universe, poetry, politics, history, and not sports. But I am a sensitive guy about stuff like that jumping name, and no way would I do Peter Paul’s soap box tirade stuff or Frankie’s catting if ever I could find a true love girl.
Enter Jenny:
O
h there's John O’Connor across the street sitting in the window seat at Salducci’s Pizza Parlor alone. And there, as usual, walking over to him is Frankie Riley, the most esteemed high exalted leader of that pack of foolish beatniks who hang there after school and at night whenever he can escape the leash, the Joanne Doyle leash, and, of course, Peter Paul Markin, his slavish dribbling (oops) scribbling scribe who fancies himself a man of letters, whatever that is. Gee, I wish John would get away from that crowd. He doesn’t fit in. I know him and Frankie go way back, first grade at North Adamsville Elementary I think, but since Peter Paul and his eleven thousand useless facts made the scene a couple years ago John has been second fiddle. It’s a shame because John is so sexy and such a good athlete, football, basketball, baseball that he doesn’t need those flannel-shirt wearing, black chino-wearing, work-boot–wearing, sunglass-wearing, ah, men of some letters that I can think of.
Maybe you know the story about John and me in sixth grade already but let me just tell you my side. I’ve heard a lot of different stories about how he got the name, wrong stories, so let me set you straight. They call John Jumping John O’Connor because of me. See, I have had a crush on him since, well, since, so when Chrissie McNamara had her twelfth birthday and told me John was coming I was crazy to go too. I took a long bath, dressed up in my best dress, and wore some of my mother’s perfume (don’t tell her, alright). Okay, okay I wasn’t a beauty like Chrissie but I sure was prettier than that Joanne Doyle. And I didn’t have a shape, then. I was a stick like the boys called us among themselves (so they thought, like such terms could be kept secret, secret with sisters around) back them, shapes and sticks.
The party was going pretty good and John, for some reason, asked me to dance, we danced and that was that, for him anyway. But as will happen at twelfth birthday parties, and on other occasions as well, the party was really a cover for “petting.” You know what petting is right, and if you don’t look it up. I was thrilled, heart-beating thrilled, pulse-pulsating thrilled that John danced with me, and misread the meaning of it big time. So when the lights went out I drew a bee-line to John and gave him a big kiss right on the mouth as hard as I could. He pushed me away like I was one of his football opponents, jumped off the sofa he was on, and ran out the door. That’s the real story. Except for me, for my midnight alone sorrows. Since then he hasn’t spoken to me, or acknowledged my existence. Funny though, I have seen him in class lately looking over in my direction for a few seconds and then turning his head back when I have spotted him, at least I hope he is looking my way.
I admit it. I am miserable ever since that party a few years back. Sure I have gone out with other boys to parties, the movies, and for pizza. I even went out with Peter Paul once but he was so full of air, and of himself, that I put the geek (no go) sign on him. And, yes, Frankie, pure as the driven snow Frankie, just so you know, has made more passes at me than you can shake a stick at. And Joanne, Plain Jane Joanne Doyle, is clueless. But John is the only one who has my eyes since, well, since. Maybe one day, one day when I am just miserable enough, just miserable enough to say enough, I will walk into Salducci’s and just sit on his lap and dare, not double dare, John O’Connor to jump up. It’ll be harder to get me off of him than the whole opposing team on the football field on Saturday afternoon.
Reenter John:
Hey, there's Jenny at the bus stop. I wonder where she is going all by herself. I noticed that she noticed that I was looking at her, looking at her kind of long and easy, a couple of times in study class. I wonder if she is still sore at me for pushing her aside when she kissed me hard like that and I jumped out the door at Chrissie’s birthday party that time. I didn’t mean to do to it but I had never been kissed by a girl like that before. I wonder too if she knew when I asked her to dance then that I had had a crush on her since, well, since. Maybe some day, maybe some day when all the guys, all the guys with their be-bop wisdom wise-guy stuff, are not around, I’ll go over and apologize to her.
THE CHIFFONS
"He's So Fine"
(Do-lang, do-lang, do-lang)
(Do-lang, do-lang)
He's so fine
(Do-lang-do-lang-do-lang)
Wish he were mine
(Do-lang-do-lang-do-lang)
That handsome boy over there
(Do-lang-do-lang-do-lang)
The one with the wavy hair
(Do-lang-do-lang-do-lang)
I don't know how I'm gonna do it
(Do-lang-do-lang-do-lang)
But I'm gonna make him mine
(Do-lang-do-lang-do-lang)
He's the envy of all the girls
(Do-lang-do-lang-do-lang)
It's just a matter of time
(Do-lang-do-lang)
He's a soft [Spoken] guy
(Do-lang-do-lang-do-lang)
Also seems kinda shy
(Do-lang-do-lang-do-lang)
Makes me wonder if I
(Do-lang-do-lang-do-lang)
Should even give him a try
(Do-lang-do-lang-do-lang)
But then I know he can't shy
(Do-lang-do-lang-do-lang)
He can't shy away forever
(Do-lang-do-lang-do-lang)
And I'm gonna make him mine
(Do-lang-do-lang-do-lang)
If it takes me forever
(Do-lang-do-lang)
He's so fine
(Oh yeah)
Gotta be mine
(Oh yeah)
Sooner or later
(Oh yeah)
I hope it's not later
(Oh yeah)
We gotta get together
(Oh yeah)
The sooner the better
(Oh yeah)
I just can't wait, I just can't wait
To be held in his arms
If I were a queen
(Do-lang-do-lang-do-lang)
And he asked me to leave my throne
(Do-lang-do-lang-do-lang)
I'll do anything that he asked
(Do-lang-do-lang-do-lang)
Anything to make him my own
(Do-lang-do-lang-do-lang)
For he's so fine
(So fine) so fine
(So fine) he's so fine
(So fine) so fine
(So fine) he's so fine
[Fades]
(So fine) oh yeah
(He's so fine) he's so fine
(So fine) uh-huh
(He's so fine)
He's so fine.....
*****
That Frankie, Frankie Riley, really gets to me sometimes. Here he has the best girl around, Joanne Doyle, smart, cute, maybe more than cute but I don’t dare say it here just in case he has the joint cased (or maybe she will see it and be embarrassed), and he is catting around, catting around like crazy trying to make every twist not tied to a big bruiser of a guy. Even then, if she is a boffo, he will take a run at her and hope his track shoes are fast enough. or faster than her boyfriend anyway.
And here I am all by myself,girl-less, Johnny O’Connor, Jumping Johnny O’Connor they call me but I don’t like it, don’t like it at all. See, back in sixth grade, back before Markin, Peter Paul Markin, came on the scene and took my place, my rightful place, as Frankie’s right-hand man we were at a “petting” party, a girl’s birthday party really, but you know how kids' stuff gets going, boy and girl kids' stuff, and this stick tried to kiss me hard, some sweet perfumed, freshly soaped stick (I can still smell her smell now), when the lights went out and I jumped up and ran out of that birthday girl’s house. Now, and probably for eternity, I am Jumping Johnny O’Connor. But I still don’t like it. And funny that stick girl, I’ll just call her by her first name, Jenny, turned out to be lately, well she turned out to be cute, maybe more than cute but I don’t dare say it just in case she has her spies around.
Now don’t get me wrong, Peter Paul’s a good guy, a funny guy really, and he has about twelve million facts that he seems to keep tied up in a bag and has ready for any occasion, any Frankie-needs-facts-occasion. So I can see where Frankie could use him as maybe second right hand guy, and I could be first. See, where Peter Paul has those facts I’ve got the beef, the well-muscled beef, that Frankie really needs if, and when, those track shoes aren’t fast enough when that boffo girl’s big bruiser boy friend gets the word.
Some people call me a stup and a simp for hanging around with a weirdo like Frankie but that’s not right. I just don’t like to read a lot of books, and stuff like that. I like my sports, and getting some serious attention, some serious girl attention, except no dice from Joanne and ever since that party nothing but ice from that Jenny, for being good at them. But see, Frankie, and now Peter Paul, are into that new be-bop beat thing, and I have noticed that Joanne is playing right into it, even liking it when Peter Paul starts going on and on about this and that in the universe, poetry, politics, history, and not sports. But I am a sensitive guy about stuff like that jumping name, and no way would I do Peter Paul’s soap box tirade stuff or Frankie’s catting if ever I could find a true love girl.
Enter Jenny:
O
h there's John O’Connor across the street sitting in the window seat at Salducci’s Pizza Parlor alone. And there, as usual, walking over to him is Frankie Riley, the most esteemed high exalted leader of that pack of foolish beatniks who hang there after school and at night whenever he can escape the leash, the Joanne Doyle leash, and, of course, Peter Paul Markin, his slavish dribbling (oops) scribbling scribe who fancies himself a man of letters, whatever that is. Gee, I wish John would get away from that crowd. He doesn’t fit in. I know him and Frankie go way back, first grade at North Adamsville Elementary I think, but since Peter Paul and his eleven thousand useless facts made the scene a couple years ago John has been second fiddle. It’s a shame because John is so sexy and such a good athlete, football, basketball, baseball that he doesn’t need those flannel-shirt wearing, black chino-wearing, work-boot–wearing, sunglass-wearing, ah, men of some letters that I can think of.
Maybe you know the story about John and me in sixth grade already but let me just tell you my side. I’ve heard a lot of different stories about how he got the name, wrong stories, so let me set you straight. They call John Jumping John O’Connor because of me. See, I have had a crush on him since, well, since, so when Chrissie McNamara had her twelfth birthday and told me John was coming I was crazy to go too. I took a long bath, dressed up in my best dress, and wore some of my mother’s perfume (don’t tell her, alright). Okay, okay I wasn’t a beauty like Chrissie but I sure was prettier than that Joanne Doyle. And I didn’t have a shape, then. I was a stick like the boys called us among themselves (so they thought, like such terms could be kept secret, secret with sisters around) back them, shapes and sticks.
The party was going pretty good and John, for some reason, asked me to dance, we danced and that was that, for him anyway. But as will happen at twelfth birthday parties, and on other occasions as well, the party was really a cover for “petting.” You know what petting is right, and if you don’t look it up. I was thrilled, heart-beating thrilled, pulse-pulsating thrilled that John danced with me, and misread the meaning of it big time. So when the lights went out I drew a bee-line to John and gave him a big kiss right on the mouth as hard as I could. He pushed me away like I was one of his football opponents, jumped off the sofa he was on, and ran out the door. That’s the real story. Except for me, for my midnight alone sorrows. Since then he hasn’t spoken to me, or acknowledged my existence. Funny though, I have seen him in class lately looking over in my direction for a few seconds and then turning his head back when I have spotted him, at least I hope he is looking my way.
I admit it. I am miserable ever since that party a few years back. Sure I have gone out with other boys to parties, the movies, and for pizza. I even went out with Peter Paul once but he was so full of air, and of himself, that I put the geek (no go) sign on him. And, yes, Frankie, pure as the driven snow Frankie, just so you know, has made more passes at me than you can shake a stick at. And Joanne, Plain Jane Joanne Doyle, is clueless. But John is the only one who has my eyes since, well, since. Maybe one day, one day when I am just miserable enough, just miserable enough to say enough, I will walk into Salducci’s and just sit on his lap and dare, not double dare, John O’Connor to jump up. It’ll be harder to get me off of him than the whole opposing team on the football field on Saturday afternoon.
Reenter John:
Hey, there's Jenny at the bus stop. I wonder where she is going all by herself. I noticed that she noticed that I was looking at her, looking at her kind of long and easy, a couple of times in study class. I wonder if she is still sore at me for pushing her aside when she kissed me hard like that and I jumped out the door at Chrissie’s birthday party that time. I didn’t mean to do to it but I had never been kissed by a girl like that before. I wonder too if she knew when I asked her to dance then that I had had a crush on her since, well, since. Maybe some day, maybe some day when all the guys, all the guys with their be-bop wisdom wise-guy stuff, are not around, I’ll go over and apologize to her.
Friday, May 13, 2011
Let's Have A Party-In The Golden Age Of Classic Rock- The Year 1957 – A CD Review
Click on the headline to link to a YouTube film clip of The Tune Weavers performing their classic last dance of the night song, Happy Happy Birthday Baby.
CD Review
1957, various artists, Time-Life Music, 1995
Although I am not completely familiar with the range of their efforts, and of their purpose, I have already extensively reviewed many CD compilations from Time-Life Music’s Rock ‘N’ Rock Era series. A highlight of that series has been the cover artwork that has evoked, and evoked strongly, the themes that dominated our lives, our hubristic teenage lives, in the classic age of rock as we watched it unfold. Things like last dance school dances, lovers’ lanes, dancing the night away to the latest rock music, drive-in movies, drive-in restaurants, summer beach life and on and on. This later series also driven by year dates, at least as observed through the cover art, seems to be less concerned with strong old time evocations by flashy artwork. Nevertheless sometimes just a simple photograph as appears on the 1957 cover evokes those memories in a more subtle way.
And what does that photograph picture. Well, Johnny (we’ll just call him that for our purposes here, okay) suited up in sports coat, white shirt, and tie (pants not observed although they had to be black chinos, cuffed or uncuffed, and shoes, well, loafers for sure) and Susie (ditto Johnny) dressed up in her best frilly party dress (no bobby socks or nylons showing so I cannot discuss that issue here nor will I venture into the girl shoe night anymore than I would today into the woman’s shoe night) are comparing notes on the latest 45s.
For those not long in the tooth who may have wandered into this space and are not sure why that was the size record we played on our old time record players (no not wind-up Victrolas, wise guys) when we wanted to drown out ma, pa, and sibling noises about homework, chores, or just the stuff of everyday life. Each record had a one song A side (the hit) and a one song B side, each side a little over two minutes long. That idea didn’t last too long before responding to the crush of the market they started making LPs, records with several songs on each side. Oh, I forgot, for those who don’t know what a record is, long or short, look it up on Wikipedia. I have given enough time to the subject.
And in the year 1957 what might they be comparing on this night, this house party night (or on other school dance nights) well here, as usual the “battle of the sexes” will be played out just like from teen time immemorial. At least records and record player time immemorial. While Buddy Holly, Patsy Kline, Rickey Nelson, and the Everly Brothers have entries on this CD compilation the real fight, the real important fight, school dance or house party, is what song will be played for the last dance. Yes, the key last dance to see whether the evening continues when they hold each other tight after a night of apart self-expression rock and roll dancing. So the battle really boils down to Could This Be Magic? by The Dubs or Happy Happy Birthday Baby by the Tune Weavers and if Johnny does not want to be lonely tonight he better make the right choice. Good luck, brother Johnny.
CD Review
1957, various artists, Time-Life Music, 1995
Although I am not completely familiar with the range of their efforts, and of their purpose, I have already extensively reviewed many CD compilations from Time-Life Music’s Rock ‘N’ Rock Era series. A highlight of that series has been the cover artwork that has evoked, and evoked strongly, the themes that dominated our lives, our hubristic teenage lives, in the classic age of rock as we watched it unfold. Things like last dance school dances, lovers’ lanes, dancing the night away to the latest rock music, drive-in movies, drive-in restaurants, summer beach life and on and on. This later series also driven by year dates, at least as observed through the cover art, seems to be less concerned with strong old time evocations by flashy artwork. Nevertheless sometimes just a simple photograph as appears on the 1957 cover evokes those memories in a more subtle way.
And what does that photograph picture. Well, Johnny (we’ll just call him that for our purposes here, okay) suited up in sports coat, white shirt, and tie (pants not observed although they had to be black chinos, cuffed or uncuffed, and shoes, well, loafers for sure) and Susie (ditto Johnny) dressed up in her best frilly party dress (no bobby socks or nylons showing so I cannot discuss that issue here nor will I venture into the girl shoe night anymore than I would today into the woman’s shoe night) are comparing notes on the latest 45s.
For those not long in the tooth who may have wandered into this space and are not sure why that was the size record we played on our old time record players (no not wind-up Victrolas, wise guys) when we wanted to drown out ma, pa, and sibling noises about homework, chores, or just the stuff of everyday life. Each record had a one song A side (the hit) and a one song B side, each side a little over two minutes long. That idea didn’t last too long before responding to the crush of the market they started making LPs, records with several songs on each side. Oh, I forgot, for those who don’t know what a record is, long or short, look it up on Wikipedia. I have given enough time to the subject.
And in the year 1957 what might they be comparing on this night, this house party night (or on other school dance nights) well here, as usual the “battle of the sexes” will be played out just like from teen time immemorial. At least records and record player time immemorial. While Buddy Holly, Patsy Kline, Rickey Nelson, and the Everly Brothers have entries on this CD compilation the real fight, the real important fight, school dance or house party, is what song will be played for the last dance. Yes, the key last dance to see whether the evening continues when they hold each other tight after a night of apart self-expression rock and roll dancing. So the battle really boils down to Could This Be Magic? by The Dubs or Happy Happy Birthday Baby by the Tune Weavers and if Johnny does not want to be lonely tonight he better make the right choice. Good luck, brother Johnny.
Tuesday, May 3, 2011
Those Oldies But Goodies…Out In The Be-Bop ‘50s Song Night- Billie’s Lament-Elvis’ One Night
Click on the headline to link to a YouTube film clip of Elvis Presley performing One Night Of Sin.
Markin comment:
This is the back story, the teen listener back story if you like, going back to the primordial youth time of the mid to late 1950s with its bags full of classic rock songs for the ages. Of course, any such efforts have to include the views of one Billie, William James Bradley, the schoolboy mad-hatter of the 1950s rock jailbreak out in our “the projects” neighborhood. Ya, in those days, unlike during his later fateful wrong turn trajectory days, every kid, including best friend Markin, me, lived to hear what he had to say about any song that came trumpeting over the radio, at least every one that we would recognize as our own.
Billie and I spent many, many hours mainly up in his tiny bedroom, his rock heaven bedroom, walls plastered with posters of Elvis, Bo Diddley, Chuck Berry, somewhat later Jerry Lee Lewis, and of every new teen heartthrob singer, heartthrob to the girls that is, around; on his night table every new record Billie could get his hands on, by hook or by crook; and, neatly folded piles of clothing, also gathered by that same hook or by crook, appropriate to the king hell king of the schoolboy rock scene, the elementary school rock scene between about 1956 to 1960. Much of that time was spent discussing the “meaning” of various songs, especially their sexual implications, ah, their mystery of girls-finding-out-about worthiness.
Although in early 1959 my family had started the process of moving out of the projects, and, more importantly, I had begun to move away from Billie’s orbit, his new found orbit as king hell gangster wannabe, I still would wander back there until mid-1960 just to hear his take on whatever music was interesting him at the time. These commentaries, these Billie commentaries, are my recollections of his and my conversations on the song lyrics in this series. But I am not relying on memory alone. During this period we would use my father’s tape recorder, by today’s standard his big old reel to reel monstrosity of a tape recorder, to record Billie’s covers of the then current hit songs (for those who have not read previously of Billie’s “heroics” he was a pretty good budding rock singer at the time) and our conversations of those song meanings that we fretted about for hours. I have, painstakingly, had those reels transcribed so that many of these commentaries will be the actual words spoken during those conversations (somewhat edited, of course). That said, Billie, king hell rock and roll king of the old neighborhood, knew how to call a lyric, and make us laugh to boot. Wherever you are Billie I’m still pulling for you. Got it.
*********
One Night-Elvis Presley
Intro: E A A11 E
[NC] Riff 1 Riff 1
One night with you
B7
Is what I'm now praying for
B7
The things that we two could plan
E
Would make my dreams come true
[NC] Riff 1 Riff 1
Just call my name
B7
And I'll be right by your side
B7
I want your sweet helping hand
E E7
My loves too strong to hide
Riff 2 Riff 2
Always lived, very quiet life
Riff 1
I ain't never did no wrong
Riff 3
Now I know that life without you
B7
Has been too lonely too long
One night with you
Is what I'm now praying for
The things that we two could plan
Would make my dreams come true
Always lived, very quiet life
I ain't never did no wrong
Now I know that life without you
Has been too lonely too long
One night with you
Is what I'm now praying for
The things that we two could plan
E A A11 E B7 E7
Would make my dreams come true
*****
Billie, William James Bradley, comment:
Ya, I know I haven’t talked to you in a while like I was suppose to. I was suppose to tell you all about Markin’s, Peter Paul Markin's, my best friend over Adamsville Elementary School, ill-fated attempts to single-handedly close the space gap they keep talking about ever since the commies put that Sputnik satellite up in orbit last year. I will have to put that on hold for now, because I still kind of broken up about something. See I got caught up, well I might as well just come out with it, with woman trouble, alright girl trouble okay. Some of you may know about how old best buddy Peter Paul tried to used Jerry Lee Lewis to cut my time with Laura, Laura Doyle. Ya Laura, the hottest frill in school, and maybe in this dead old town if you just count twelve or thirteen year old girls. And for right now all that counts, anyway. Got it.
Oh you think that Peter Paul, old best pal but definitely strictly junior varsity when it comes to the women, ah, girls took Laura away from me. Jesus, are you kidding? Come on now, if you know the story then you know that’s a joke, and if you don’t you should still know it is a joke. Hell, I swept Laura back even before the next school dance. I just let, once I figured out that Laura was really dazzled more by Jerry Lee’s hopped-up piano on High School Confidential than Peter Paul’s book shuffle dancing, nature take its course and she was back in my arms before you knew it. Maybe I will tell you the details of that one some time but unlike that space thing, that Markin single-handed space thing, don’t hold me to telling you that story. Just say that nature is one thing you can’t escape from, nature and the king of the rock night around here, me, putting on his charm, his high Elvis charm and it was all over. Markin’s white flag was flying all over the place almost before it began.
No, what has me down in the dumps, seriously down in the dumps is that Laura moved away from the neighborhood a couple of weeks ago. Now I don’t know if Markin explained what this “projects” neighborhood thing is here down in Adamsville but it started out with guys like Markin’s father Prescott (a good guy although he is nothing but a Protestant, a Southern Baptist or something like that, but not a Roman Catholic like most of us here, and definitely not Irish like most of us too, but everybody likes him even William James Bradley Senior, Billie Senior, my father, and he doesn’t like anybody usually, anybody without a beer bottle in his hand giving it to him anyway) and my father coming back from the war, World War II, and needing some housing, some cheap housing to hold them over until better times came along. And that’s how it worked for lots of people,
Well, except for Markin’s father and mine, who seem are going to be here forever and you can forget the better times. Well the ship finally came in for Laura’s father, a veteran like Prescott and Billie, Sr., and so they are moving to New Hampshire to some better place in the country or something. Laura showed me a picture of the place and it looked pretty good.
But see here is the bitch, excuse my language. No question Billie, William James Bradley, is strictly a love ‘em and leave guy. I have had plenty of girlfriends already, most of them sticks, no shapes, if you know what I means, eleven and twelve year sticks, maybe one or two ten, sticks like Theresa, Karen and Donna (Cool Donna O’Toole, not my older sister Donna who is no stick but who I don’t talk to lately, if I can help it, what with her not liking anything in the world just because I like it). Laura though was my first step-up not stick girl, with a nice shape, a shape like a woman, or trying to be, and it showed, the trying part. Definitely something to invest some time in, some Billie time, and I did.
Here is where the bitch part comes in. Not only was Laura smart, and had those curves, that shape I just told you about. But as it turns out she had some great kind of kiss, long kisses, longer than any of the stick girls, way longer. And Laura was not afraid, once I put on the charm, to let me feel her up. I am not bragging and she is gone far away and so I am not talking behind her back but a few times, about four or five, she and I well, we acted like adults that way. And it wasn’t all me pushing either. See I knew that from my sister Donna, when were talking more, that girls like this kind of stuff as well as guys do although they usually don’t let on. So, if you excuse me, I am kind of down in the dumps because I will now be left with just the sticks. And you know they don’t go for that sex stuff, or even think about it, or maybe even dream about it like it was a mortal sin. And maybe it is but don’t tell me that, or Laura.
And do you know how we set the mood for our fooling around once Laura got over that one-hit Jerry Lee thing? Well, I’ll give you a hint. A guy from Mississippi with long sideburns and a wicked sneer that made all the girls act crazy, and women too. Sure, Elvis. But not just any Elvis song. One Night. That was OUR song. And if you think about the lyrics a minute it talks about a guy being lonely, finding the right girl and making plans for the future. That guy was me, me with Laura because, and just ask Peter Paul, otherwise I am a love ‘em and leave ‘em guy. But now she’s gone, gone to some freaking farm country and will probably wind up showing some hayseed a good time, if you know what I mean. But, as Billie Senior says, says all the time-“that’s the breaks, kid.”
See, now that I am over my period of mourning, two weeks is enough for any girl, shape or no shape, and I am talking to Peter about different records I might as well tell you what I discovered in checking up on history, Elvis history what else? That One Night thing was strictly kid’s stuff, goodie, goodie Ed Sullivan, and good parenting seal of approval kid’s stuff to make us act just like grown-ups. Find a girl or guy, make plans, settle down and maybe listen to Elvis all day and all night until we are old, like thirty maybe. Square, very square, if not just plain cube.
There is the real thing though and I can hardly wait to try it out on my next chick, my next love ‘em and leave ‘em chick. I found a recording up at Benny’s Record Shop in Adamsville Square that Elvis recorded that has the same beat as One Night but with different lyrics, One Night Of Sin. Ya, that’s more like it, more like real Elvis, more like Billie, William James Bradley, king of the rock night around here. And guess what? I have been noticing that Donna O’Toole, Cool Donna O’Toole is starting to have some shape, some woman’s shape, or trying to and maybe I‘ll give her another chance. Peter Paul, mad man Peter Paul Markin, heard that Donna cried no tears, no tears at all, when Laura headed north. I know one thing for sure I am going to make One Night Of Sin my song, and I don’t mind paying for my sins after. Got it.
*****
One Night Of Sin lyrics
One night of sin, yeah
Is what I'm now paying for
The things I did and I saw
Would make the earth stand still
Don't call my name
It makes me feel so ashamed
I lost my sweet helping hand
I got myself to blame
Always lived, very quiet life
Ain't never did no wrong
But now I know that very quiet life
Has cost me nothing but harm
One night of sin, yeah
Is what I'm now paying for
The things I did and I saw
Would make the earth stand still
Always lived, very quiet life
Ain't never did no wrong
But now I know that very quiet life
Has cost me nothing but harm
One night of sin, yeah
Is what I'm now paying for
The things I did and I saw
Would make the earth stand still
Markin comment:
This is the back story, the teen listener back story if you like, going back to the primordial youth time of the mid to late 1950s with its bags full of classic rock songs for the ages. Of course, any such efforts have to include the views of one Billie, William James Bradley, the schoolboy mad-hatter of the 1950s rock jailbreak out in our “the projects” neighborhood. Ya, in those days, unlike during his later fateful wrong turn trajectory days, every kid, including best friend Markin, me, lived to hear what he had to say about any song that came trumpeting over the radio, at least every one that we would recognize as our own.
Billie and I spent many, many hours mainly up in his tiny bedroom, his rock heaven bedroom, walls plastered with posters of Elvis, Bo Diddley, Chuck Berry, somewhat later Jerry Lee Lewis, and of every new teen heartthrob singer, heartthrob to the girls that is, around; on his night table every new record Billie could get his hands on, by hook or by crook; and, neatly folded piles of clothing, also gathered by that same hook or by crook, appropriate to the king hell king of the schoolboy rock scene, the elementary school rock scene between about 1956 to 1960. Much of that time was spent discussing the “meaning” of various songs, especially their sexual implications, ah, their mystery of girls-finding-out-about worthiness.
Although in early 1959 my family had started the process of moving out of the projects, and, more importantly, I had begun to move away from Billie’s orbit, his new found orbit as king hell gangster wannabe, I still would wander back there until mid-1960 just to hear his take on whatever music was interesting him at the time. These commentaries, these Billie commentaries, are my recollections of his and my conversations on the song lyrics in this series. But I am not relying on memory alone. During this period we would use my father’s tape recorder, by today’s standard his big old reel to reel monstrosity of a tape recorder, to record Billie’s covers of the then current hit songs (for those who have not read previously of Billie’s “heroics” he was a pretty good budding rock singer at the time) and our conversations of those song meanings that we fretted about for hours. I have, painstakingly, had those reels transcribed so that many of these commentaries will be the actual words spoken during those conversations (somewhat edited, of course). That said, Billie, king hell rock and roll king of the old neighborhood, knew how to call a lyric, and make us laugh to boot. Wherever you are Billie I’m still pulling for you. Got it.
*********
One Night-Elvis Presley
Intro: E A A11 E
[NC] Riff 1 Riff 1
One night with you
B7
Is what I'm now praying for
B7
The things that we two could plan
E
Would make my dreams come true
[NC] Riff 1 Riff 1
Just call my name
B7
And I'll be right by your side
B7
I want your sweet helping hand
E E7
My loves too strong to hide
Riff 2 Riff 2
Always lived, very quiet life
Riff 1
I ain't never did no wrong
Riff 3
Now I know that life without you
B7
Has been too lonely too long
One night with you
Is what I'm now praying for
The things that we two could plan
Would make my dreams come true
Always lived, very quiet life
I ain't never did no wrong
Now I know that life without you
Has been too lonely too long
One night with you
Is what I'm now praying for
The things that we two could plan
E A A11 E B7 E7
Would make my dreams come true
*****
Billie, William James Bradley, comment:
Ya, I know I haven’t talked to you in a while like I was suppose to. I was suppose to tell you all about Markin’s, Peter Paul Markin's, my best friend over Adamsville Elementary School, ill-fated attempts to single-handedly close the space gap they keep talking about ever since the commies put that Sputnik satellite up in orbit last year. I will have to put that on hold for now, because I still kind of broken up about something. See I got caught up, well I might as well just come out with it, with woman trouble, alright girl trouble okay. Some of you may know about how old best buddy Peter Paul tried to used Jerry Lee Lewis to cut my time with Laura, Laura Doyle. Ya Laura, the hottest frill in school, and maybe in this dead old town if you just count twelve or thirteen year old girls. And for right now all that counts, anyway. Got it.
Oh you think that Peter Paul, old best pal but definitely strictly junior varsity when it comes to the women, ah, girls took Laura away from me. Jesus, are you kidding? Come on now, if you know the story then you know that’s a joke, and if you don’t you should still know it is a joke. Hell, I swept Laura back even before the next school dance. I just let, once I figured out that Laura was really dazzled more by Jerry Lee’s hopped-up piano on High School Confidential than Peter Paul’s book shuffle dancing, nature take its course and she was back in my arms before you knew it. Maybe I will tell you the details of that one some time but unlike that space thing, that Markin single-handed space thing, don’t hold me to telling you that story. Just say that nature is one thing you can’t escape from, nature and the king of the rock night around here, me, putting on his charm, his high Elvis charm and it was all over. Markin’s white flag was flying all over the place almost before it began.
No, what has me down in the dumps, seriously down in the dumps is that Laura moved away from the neighborhood a couple of weeks ago. Now I don’t know if Markin explained what this “projects” neighborhood thing is here down in Adamsville but it started out with guys like Markin’s father Prescott (a good guy although he is nothing but a Protestant, a Southern Baptist or something like that, but not a Roman Catholic like most of us here, and definitely not Irish like most of us too, but everybody likes him even William James Bradley Senior, Billie Senior, my father, and he doesn’t like anybody usually, anybody without a beer bottle in his hand giving it to him anyway) and my father coming back from the war, World War II, and needing some housing, some cheap housing to hold them over until better times came along. And that’s how it worked for lots of people,
Well, except for Markin’s father and mine, who seem are going to be here forever and you can forget the better times. Well the ship finally came in for Laura’s father, a veteran like Prescott and Billie, Sr., and so they are moving to New Hampshire to some better place in the country or something. Laura showed me a picture of the place and it looked pretty good.
But see here is the bitch, excuse my language. No question Billie, William James Bradley, is strictly a love ‘em and leave guy. I have had plenty of girlfriends already, most of them sticks, no shapes, if you know what I means, eleven and twelve year sticks, maybe one or two ten, sticks like Theresa, Karen and Donna (Cool Donna O’Toole, not my older sister Donna who is no stick but who I don’t talk to lately, if I can help it, what with her not liking anything in the world just because I like it). Laura though was my first step-up not stick girl, with a nice shape, a shape like a woman, or trying to be, and it showed, the trying part. Definitely something to invest some time in, some Billie time, and I did.
Here is where the bitch part comes in. Not only was Laura smart, and had those curves, that shape I just told you about. But as it turns out she had some great kind of kiss, long kisses, longer than any of the stick girls, way longer. And Laura was not afraid, once I put on the charm, to let me feel her up. I am not bragging and she is gone far away and so I am not talking behind her back but a few times, about four or five, she and I well, we acted like adults that way. And it wasn’t all me pushing either. See I knew that from my sister Donna, when were talking more, that girls like this kind of stuff as well as guys do although they usually don’t let on. So, if you excuse me, I am kind of down in the dumps because I will now be left with just the sticks. And you know they don’t go for that sex stuff, or even think about it, or maybe even dream about it like it was a mortal sin. And maybe it is but don’t tell me that, or Laura.
And do you know how we set the mood for our fooling around once Laura got over that one-hit Jerry Lee thing? Well, I’ll give you a hint. A guy from Mississippi with long sideburns and a wicked sneer that made all the girls act crazy, and women too. Sure, Elvis. But not just any Elvis song. One Night. That was OUR song. And if you think about the lyrics a minute it talks about a guy being lonely, finding the right girl and making plans for the future. That guy was me, me with Laura because, and just ask Peter Paul, otherwise I am a love ‘em and leave ‘em guy. But now she’s gone, gone to some freaking farm country and will probably wind up showing some hayseed a good time, if you know what I mean. But, as Billie Senior says, says all the time-“that’s the breaks, kid.”
See, now that I am over my period of mourning, two weeks is enough for any girl, shape or no shape, and I am talking to Peter about different records I might as well tell you what I discovered in checking up on history, Elvis history what else? That One Night thing was strictly kid’s stuff, goodie, goodie Ed Sullivan, and good parenting seal of approval kid’s stuff to make us act just like grown-ups. Find a girl or guy, make plans, settle down and maybe listen to Elvis all day and all night until we are old, like thirty maybe. Square, very square, if not just plain cube.
There is the real thing though and I can hardly wait to try it out on my next chick, my next love ‘em and leave ‘em chick. I found a recording up at Benny’s Record Shop in Adamsville Square that Elvis recorded that has the same beat as One Night but with different lyrics, One Night Of Sin. Ya, that’s more like it, more like real Elvis, more like Billie, William James Bradley, king of the rock night around here. And guess what? I have been noticing that Donna O’Toole, Cool Donna O’Toole is starting to have some shape, some woman’s shape, or trying to and maybe I‘ll give her another chance. Peter Paul, mad man Peter Paul Markin, heard that Donna cried no tears, no tears at all, when Laura headed north. I know one thing for sure I am going to make One Night Of Sin my song, and I don’t mind paying for my sins after. Got it.
*****
One Night Of Sin lyrics
One night of sin, yeah
Is what I'm now paying for
The things I did and I saw
Would make the earth stand still
Don't call my name
It makes me feel so ashamed
I lost my sweet helping hand
I got myself to blame
Always lived, very quiet life
Ain't never did no wrong
But now I know that very quiet life
Has cost me nothing but harm
One night of sin, yeah
Is what I'm now paying for
The things I did and I saw
Would make the earth stand still
Always lived, very quiet life
Ain't never did no wrong
But now I know that very quiet life
Has cost me nothing but harm
One night of sin, yeah
Is what I'm now paying for
The things I did and I saw
Would make the earth stand still
Tuesday, April 5, 2011
In The Time Of The Be-Bop Baby Boom Jail Break-Out- “The Rock ‘n’ Roll Era- 1959-Still Rocking”- A CD Review
Click on the headline to link to a YouTube film clip of the Falcons performing You're So Fine.
CD Review
The Rock ‘n’ Roll Era: 1959-Still Rocking, various artists, Time-Life Music, 1989
I have recently been on a tear in reviewing individual CDs in this extensive Time-Life Rock ‘n’ Roll series. A lot of these reviews have been driven by the artwork which graces the covers of each item, both to stir ancient memories and reflect that precise moment in time, the youth time of the now very, very mature (nice sliding over the age issue, right?) baby-boomer generation who lived and died by the music. And who fit in, or did not fit in as the case may, to the themes of those artwork scenes. This 1959 is a case of the latter, of the not fitting in for this reviewer. On this cover, a summer scene (always a nice touch since that was the time when we had least at the feel of our generational breakout), two blondish surfer guys, surf boards in tow, are checking out the scene.
That scene although not pictured (except a little background fluff to inform you that you are at the beach, the summer youth beach and no other, certainly not the tortuous family beach scene with its lotions, luggage, lawn chairs, and longings, longings to be elsewhere in early teen brains), can only mean checking out the babes, girls, chicks, or whatever you called them in that primitive time before we called them sister, and woman. No question that this whole scene is nothing but a California come hinter scene. No way that it has the look of Eastern pale-face beaches, family or youth. These is nothing but early days California dreamin’ cool hot days and cooler hot nights with those dreamed bikini girls. These are, no question “beach bums”, no way that they are serious surfer guys, certainly not Tom Wolfe’s Pump House LaJolla gang where those surfers lived for the perfect wave, and nothing else better get in the way. For such activity one needed rubberized surf suits complete with all necessary gear. In short these guys are “faux” surfers. Whether that was enough to draw the attention of those shes they are checking out I will leave to the reader’s imagination.
As for the music, the 1959 music, that backs up this scene we are clearly in a trough, the golden age of rock with the likes of Jerry Lee Lewis, Elvis, and Chuck Berry is fading, fading fast into what I can only describe as “bubble gum” music. Sure I listened to it, listened to it hard on my old transistor radio, mainly because that was all that was presented to us. It will be a while until the folk, folk rock, British invasion, and free expression rock engulfs us. As the bulk of this CD’s contents will attest to we are marking time. There are, however, some stick-outs here that have withstood the test of time. They include: La Bamba, Ritchie Valens; Dance With Me, The Drifters; You’re So Fine (great harmony),The Falcons; Tallahassee Lassie (a favorite then at the local school dances by a local boy who made good), Freddy Cannon; Mr. Blue (another great harmony song and the one, or one of the ones, anyway that you hoped, hoped to distraction that they would play for the last dance), The Fleetwoods; and, Lonely Teardrops, Jackie Wilson (a much underrated singer, then and now, including by this writer after not hearing that voice for a while).
Note: After a recent trip to the Southern California coast I can inform you that those two surfer guys are still out there and still checking out the scene. Although that scene for them now is solely the eternal search for the perfect wave complete with full rubberized suit and gear. No artist would now, or at least I hope no artist would, care to rush up and draw them. For now these brothers have lost a step, or seven, lost a fair amount of that beautiful bongo hair, and have added, added believe me, very definite paunches to bulge out those surfer suits all out of shape. Ah, such are the travails of the baby-boomer generation. Good luck though, brothers.
CD Review
The Rock ‘n’ Roll Era: 1959-Still Rocking, various artists, Time-Life Music, 1989
I have recently been on a tear in reviewing individual CDs in this extensive Time-Life Rock ‘n’ Roll series. A lot of these reviews have been driven by the artwork which graces the covers of each item, both to stir ancient memories and reflect that precise moment in time, the youth time of the now very, very mature (nice sliding over the age issue, right?) baby-boomer generation who lived and died by the music. And who fit in, or did not fit in as the case may, to the themes of those artwork scenes. This 1959 is a case of the latter, of the not fitting in for this reviewer. On this cover, a summer scene (always a nice touch since that was the time when we had least at the feel of our generational breakout), two blondish surfer guys, surf boards in tow, are checking out the scene.
That scene although not pictured (except a little background fluff to inform you that you are at the beach, the summer youth beach and no other, certainly not the tortuous family beach scene with its lotions, luggage, lawn chairs, and longings, longings to be elsewhere in early teen brains), can only mean checking out the babes, girls, chicks, or whatever you called them in that primitive time before we called them sister, and woman. No question that this whole scene is nothing but a California come hinter scene. No way that it has the look of Eastern pale-face beaches, family or youth. These is nothing but early days California dreamin’ cool hot days and cooler hot nights with those dreamed bikini girls. These are, no question “beach bums”, no way that they are serious surfer guys, certainly not Tom Wolfe’s Pump House LaJolla gang where those surfers lived for the perfect wave, and nothing else better get in the way. For such activity one needed rubberized surf suits complete with all necessary gear. In short these guys are “faux” surfers. Whether that was enough to draw the attention of those shes they are checking out I will leave to the reader’s imagination.
As for the music, the 1959 music, that backs up this scene we are clearly in a trough, the golden age of rock with the likes of Jerry Lee Lewis, Elvis, and Chuck Berry is fading, fading fast into what I can only describe as “bubble gum” music. Sure I listened to it, listened to it hard on my old transistor radio, mainly because that was all that was presented to us. It will be a while until the folk, folk rock, British invasion, and free expression rock engulfs us. As the bulk of this CD’s contents will attest to we are marking time. There are, however, some stick-outs here that have withstood the test of time. They include: La Bamba, Ritchie Valens; Dance With Me, The Drifters; You’re So Fine (great harmony),The Falcons; Tallahassee Lassie (a favorite then at the local school dances by a local boy who made good), Freddy Cannon; Mr. Blue (another great harmony song and the one, or one of the ones, anyway that you hoped, hoped to distraction that they would play for the last dance), The Fleetwoods; and, Lonely Teardrops, Jackie Wilson (a much underrated singer, then and now, including by this writer after not hearing that voice for a while).
Note: After a recent trip to the Southern California coast I can inform you that those two surfer guys are still out there and still checking out the scene. Although that scene for them now is solely the eternal search for the perfect wave complete with full rubberized suit and gear. No artist would now, or at least I hope no artist would, care to rush up and draw them. For now these brothers have lost a step, or seven, lost a fair amount of that beautiful bongo hair, and have added, added believe me, very definite paunches to bulge out those surfer suits all out of shape. Ah, such are the travails of the baby-boomer generation. Good luck though, brothers.
Wednesday, March 23, 2011
Those Oldies But Goodies…Out In The Be-Bop ‘50s Song Night- The Shirelles “Will You Still Love Me Tomorrow?”- Billie’s, Billie The Pope Of “The Projects” Night, View
Click on the headline to link to a YouTube film clip of The Shirelles performing the classic Will You Still Love Me Tomorrow?.
Markin comment:
This is another tongue-in-cheek commentary, the back story if you like, in the occasional entries under this headline going back to the primordial youth time of the mid to late 1950s with its bags full of classic rock songs for the ages. Of course, any such efforts have to include the views of one Billie, William James Bradley, the schoolboy mad-hatter of the 1950s rock jailbreak out in our “the projects” neighborhood. Ya, in those days, unlike during his later fateful wrong turn trajectory days, every kid, including best friend Markin, me, lived to hear what he had to say about any song that came trumpeting over the radio, at least every one that we would recognize as our own.
Note:
Billie and I spent many, many hours mainly up in his tiny bedroom, his rock heaven bedroom, walls plastered with posters of Elvis, Bo Diddley and Chuck Berry and of every new teen heartthrob singer, heartthrob to the girls that is, around, every new record Billie could get his hands on, by hook or by crook, and neatly folded piles of clothing, also gathered by that same hook or by crook, appropriate to the king hell king of the schoolboy rock scene, the elementary school rock scene between about 1956 to 1960. Much of that time was spent discussing the “meaning” of various songs, especially their sexual implications, ah, their mystery of girls-finding-out-about worthiness.
Although in early 1959 my family was beginning to start the process of moving out of the projects, and, more importantly, I had begun to move away from Billie’s orbit, his new found orbit as king hell gangster wannabe, I still would wander back until mid-1960 just to hear his take on whatever music was interesting him at the time. These commentaries, these Billie commentaries, are my recollections of his and my conversations on the song lyrics in this series. But I am not relying on memory alone. During this period we would use my father’s tape recorder, by today’s standard his big old reel to reel monstrosity of a tape recorder, to record Billie’s covers of the then current hit songs (for those who have not read previously of Billie’s “heroics” he was a pretty good budding rock singer at the time) and our conversations of those song meanings that we fretted about for hours. I have, painstakingly, had those reels transcribed so that many of these commentaries will be the actual words (somewhat edited, of course) that appear in this space. That said, Billie, king hell rock and roll king of the old neighborhood, knew how to call a lyric, and make us laugh to boot. Wherever you are Billie I’m still pulling for you. Got it.
********
Will You Still Love Me Tomorrow? Lyrics
Carole King
Will You Still Love Me Tomorrow
Tonight you're mine completely,
You give your love so sweetly,
Tonight the light of love is in your eyes,
But will you love me tomorrow?
Is this a lasting treasure,
Or just a moment's pleasure,
Can I believe the magic of your sighs,
Will you still love me tomorrow?
Tonight with words unspoken,
You said that I'm the only one,
But will my heart be broken,
When the night (When the night)
Meets the morning sun.
I'd like to know that your love,
Is love I can be sure of,
So tell me now and I won't ask again,
Will you still love me tomorrow?
Will you still love me tomorrow?
**********
Billie back again, William James Bradley, if you didn’t know. Markin’s pal, Peter Paul Markin’s pal, from over the Adamsville Elementary School and the pope of rock lyrics down here in “the projects.” The Adamsville projects, if you don’t know. Markin, who I hadn’t seen for a while since he moved “uptown” to North Adamsville, came by the other day to breathe in the fresh air of the old neighborhood and we got to talking about this latest record, Will You Still Love Me Tomorrow? by the Shirelles. They are hot.
Fair’s fair right, so I’ll give you Markin’s, Peter Paul’s, take on the lyrics, so I can come crashing down on his silly pipe dream ideas. By the way if you don’t know, and he will tell you this himself if he is honest, he was behind, way behind, in figuring out girls, and their girlish charms. I had to practically tell him everything he knows. Where did I learn it? Hell like everybody else from the older kids, the older guys, and my older sisters too if you can believe that. So I know a lot, or at least enough to keep old Peter Paul from being a total goofball. Still, see, he thinks the main thing is that the girl in the song here is worried about her reputation because she has just given in, in a moment of passion, to her boyfriend, it’s way too late to turn back and yet she is having second thoughts, second thought regrets, about it, and about what he will think of her and whether it will get around that she “does it.”
Ya, she does it, now officially certified a woman, or at least acting like a woman can act, that is what my sister Donna says, and from the feel of the song, probably in some back seat of some “boss” convertible, a Chevy I hope. Her guy, some under the hood day and night guy making that baby, his real baby, hum against the in-stock store-bought standards of his father’s car, his old fogy father’s car. She was breathless weeks ago when her Chevy guy came up gunning that beast behind her walking home from school and said “Hop in.” And she did, now she's the queen bee of the high school adventure car hop night. All the other girls, friend or foe, frantic at her fortune and ready to leap, girls’ “lav” leap, all over her come Monday morning finely-tuned grapevine gossip time. So tonight is paying back time, car hop queen bee paying back time. No turning back.
I hope, I really hope, they “did the deed” down by the seashore, big old moon out, big old laughing moon, waves splashing against the rocks and against the sounds of the night, the sounds of the be-bop moaning and groaning night. Call me a romantic but at least I hope that is where she gave it up. Or, maybe, away from coastal shoreline possibilities it was at some secluded lovers’ lane mountain top, tree-lined, dirt road, away from the city noise, some be-bop music playing on the car radio, just to keep those mountain fears away, motor humming against the autumn chill and the creaking sun ready to devour that last mountain top and face the day, and face the music.
But see that’s where Markin has got it all wrong, all wrong on two counts, because Chevy guy two-timing her, or spreading the “news” about his conquest, or even that hellish girls’ lav whirlwind inferno is not really what’s bothering her. Markin has got this starry-eyed thing, and I think it is from hanging around, or being around, all those straight lace no-go Catholic girls, who do actually worry about their reputations, at least for public consumption. That is why high Catholic that I am, just like old Markin, I don’t go within twenty yards of those, well, teasers. Ya, teasers but that’s a story for another time, because right now we have only time for women, or girls who act like women. What’s bothering moonstruck girl, number one, is that she likes it, she liked doing it with Chevy guy, and is worried that she’ll go crazy every time a boy gets within arms length of her. She “heard” that once a girl starts doing it they can’t help themselves and are marks, easy marks, for every guy who gives them the eye. Jesus, where did she ever get that idea. Must have been out in the streets, although I personally never heard such an idea when I was asking around. This is what I heard, well, not from the street but from my sister Donna, she said it was okay, natural even, for girls to like sex. If the moment was right, and maybe the guy too. It wasn’t some Propagation of the Faith, do-your-sex-duty to multiply thing we heard in church. Hell, Donna said she liked it too, and believe me, old Donna doesn’t like much if you listen to her long enough. So moonstruck girl don’t worry.
But number two you do have to worry about, although I don’t know what you can do about it now I never did ask Donna about that part. Pregnant. Ya, the dreaded word for girls and guys alike when you were just trying to have a little fun, just liking it. Now everything your mother told you about “bad” girls, about leaving school, about shot-gun weddings, or about having to go to “Aunt Bessie’s” for a few months, flood memories and as the sun comes up there is momentary panic. Like I say I don’t know what you can do. I don’t know the medical part of the thing. But Peter Paul, leave it to Peter Paul, who knows diddley about sex (except what I tell him) says do you know about “rubbers.” And he got all in a lather telling me that there is some new pill coming out, and coming out soon, so you don’t have to worry. This from a guy was practically missed the first time he kissed a girl. But if he is right, and I ain’t saying he is, then check it out and then you can still like “doing it.” And not worry.
Markin comment:
This is another tongue-in-cheek commentary, the back story if you like, in the occasional entries under this headline going back to the primordial youth time of the mid to late 1950s with its bags full of classic rock songs for the ages. Of course, any such efforts have to include the views of one Billie, William James Bradley, the schoolboy mad-hatter of the 1950s rock jailbreak out in our “the projects” neighborhood. Ya, in those days, unlike during his later fateful wrong turn trajectory days, every kid, including best friend Markin, me, lived to hear what he had to say about any song that came trumpeting over the radio, at least every one that we would recognize as our own.
Note:
Billie and I spent many, many hours mainly up in his tiny bedroom, his rock heaven bedroom, walls plastered with posters of Elvis, Bo Diddley and Chuck Berry and of every new teen heartthrob singer, heartthrob to the girls that is, around, every new record Billie could get his hands on, by hook or by crook, and neatly folded piles of clothing, also gathered by that same hook or by crook, appropriate to the king hell king of the schoolboy rock scene, the elementary school rock scene between about 1956 to 1960. Much of that time was spent discussing the “meaning” of various songs, especially their sexual implications, ah, their mystery of girls-finding-out-about worthiness.
Although in early 1959 my family was beginning to start the process of moving out of the projects, and, more importantly, I had begun to move away from Billie’s orbit, his new found orbit as king hell gangster wannabe, I still would wander back until mid-1960 just to hear his take on whatever music was interesting him at the time. These commentaries, these Billie commentaries, are my recollections of his and my conversations on the song lyrics in this series. But I am not relying on memory alone. During this period we would use my father’s tape recorder, by today’s standard his big old reel to reel monstrosity of a tape recorder, to record Billie’s covers of the then current hit songs (for those who have not read previously of Billie’s “heroics” he was a pretty good budding rock singer at the time) and our conversations of those song meanings that we fretted about for hours. I have, painstakingly, had those reels transcribed so that many of these commentaries will be the actual words (somewhat edited, of course) that appear in this space. That said, Billie, king hell rock and roll king of the old neighborhood, knew how to call a lyric, and make us laugh to boot. Wherever you are Billie I’m still pulling for you. Got it.
********
Will You Still Love Me Tomorrow? Lyrics
Carole King
Will You Still Love Me Tomorrow
Tonight you're mine completely,
You give your love so sweetly,
Tonight the light of love is in your eyes,
But will you love me tomorrow?
Is this a lasting treasure,
Or just a moment's pleasure,
Can I believe the magic of your sighs,
Will you still love me tomorrow?
Tonight with words unspoken,
You said that I'm the only one,
But will my heart be broken,
When the night (When the night)
Meets the morning sun.
I'd like to know that your love,
Is love I can be sure of,
So tell me now and I won't ask again,
Will you still love me tomorrow?
Will you still love me tomorrow?
**********
Billie back again, William James Bradley, if you didn’t know. Markin’s pal, Peter Paul Markin’s pal, from over the Adamsville Elementary School and the pope of rock lyrics down here in “the projects.” The Adamsville projects, if you don’t know. Markin, who I hadn’t seen for a while since he moved “uptown” to North Adamsville, came by the other day to breathe in the fresh air of the old neighborhood and we got to talking about this latest record, Will You Still Love Me Tomorrow? by the Shirelles. They are hot.
Fair’s fair right, so I’ll give you Markin’s, Peter Paul’s, take on the lyrics, so I can come crashing down on his silly pipe dream ideas. By the way if you don’t know, and he will tell you this himself if he is honest, he was behind, way behind, in figuring out girls, and their girlish charms. I had to practically tell him everything he knows. Where did I learn it? Hell like everybody else from the older kids, the older guys, and my older sisters too if you can believe that. So I know a lot, or at least enough to keep old Peter Paul from being a total goofball. Still, see, he thinks the main thing is that the girl in the song here is worried about her reputation because she has just given in, in a moment of passion, to her boyfriend, it’s way too late to turn back and yet she is having second thoughts, second thought regrets, about it, and about what he will think of her and whether it will get around that she “does it.”
Ya, she does it, now officially certified a woman, or at least acting like a woman can act, that is what my sister Donna says, and from the feel of the song, probably in some back seat of some “boss” convertible, a Chevy I hope. Her guy, some under the hood day and night guy making that baby, his real baby, hum against the in-stock store-bought standards of his father’s car, his old fogy father’s car. She was breathless weeks ago when her Chevy guy came up gunning that beast behind her walking home from school and said “Hop in.” And she did, now she's the queen bee of the high school adventure car hop night. All the other girls, friend or foe, frantic at her fortune and ready to leap, girls’ “lav” leap, all over her come Monday morning finely-tuned grapevine gossip time. So tonight is paying back time, car hop queen bee paying back time. No turning back.
I hope, I really hope, they “did the deed” down by the seashore, big old moon out, big old laughing moon, waves splashing against the rocks and against the sounds of the night, the sounds of the be-bop moaning and groaning night. Call me a romantic but at least I hope that is where she gave it up. Or, maybe, away from coastal shoreline possibilities it was at some secluded lovers’ lane mountain top, tree-lined, dirt road, away from the city noise, some be-bop music playing on the car radio, just to keep those mountain fears away, motor humming against the autumn chill and the creaking sun ready to devour that last mountain top and face the day, and face the music.
But see that’s where Markin has got it all wrong, all wrong on two counts, because Chevy guy two-timing her, or spreading the “news” about his conquest, or even that hellish girls’ lav whirlwind inferno is not really what’s bothering her. Markin has got this starry-eyed thing, and I think it is from hanging around, or being around, all those straight lace no-go Catholic girls, who do actually worry about their reputations, at least for public consumption. That is why high Catholic that I am, just like old Markin, I don’t go within twenty yards of those, well, teasers. Ya, teasers but that’s a story for another time, because right now we have only time for women, or girls who act like women. What’s bothering moonstruck girl, number one, is that she likes it, she liked doing it with Chevy guy, and is worried that she’ll go crazy every time a boy gets within arms length of her. She “heard” that once a girl starts doing it they can’t help themselves and are marks, easy marks, for every guy who gives them the eye. Jesus, where did she ever get that idea. Must have been out in the streets, although I personally never heard such an idea when I was asking around. This is what I heard, well, not from the street but from my sister Donna, she said it was okay, natural even, for girls to like sex. If the moment was right, and maybe the guy too. It wasn’t some Propagation of the Faith, do-your-sex-duty to multiply thing we heard in church. Hell, Donna said she liked it too, and believe me, old Donna doesn’t like much if you listen to her long enough. So moonstruck girl don’t worry.
But number two you do have to worry about, although I don’t know what you can do about it now I never did ask Donna about that part. Pregnant. Ya, the dreaded word for girls and guys alike when you were just trying to have a little fun, just liking it. Now everything your mother told you about “bad” girls, about leaving school, about shot-gun weddings, or about having to go to “Aunt Bessie’s” for a few months, flood memories and as the sun comes up there is momentary panic. Like I say I don’t know what you can do. I don’t know the medical part of the thing. But Peter Paul, leave it to Peter Paul, who knows diddley about sex (except what I tell him) says do you know about “rubbers.” And he got all in a lather telling me that there is some new pill coming out, and coming out soon, so you don’t have to worry. This from a guy was practically missed the first time he kissed a girl. But if he is right, and I ain’t saying he is, then check it out and then you can still like “doing it.” And not worry.
Monday, March 21, 2011
Those Oldies But Goodies…Out In The Be-Bop ‘50s Song Night- The Shirelles “Will You Still Love Me Tomorrow?"
Click on the headline to link to a YouTube film clip of The Shirelles performing the classic Will You Still Love Me Tomorrow?.
Markin comment:
This is another tongue-in-cheek commentary, the back story if you like, in the occasional entries under this headline going back to the primordial youth time of the 1950s with its bags full of classic rock songs for the ages.
Will You Still Love Me Tomorrow? Lyrics
Artist:Carole King
Will You Still Love Me Tomorrow
Tonight you're mine completely,
You give your love so sweetly,
Tonight the light of love is in your eyes,
But will you love me tomorrow?
Is this a lasting treasure,
Or just a moment's pleasure,
Can I believe the magic of your sighs,
Will you still love me tomorrow?
Tonight with words unspoken,
You said that I'm the only one,
But will my heart be broken,
When the night (When the night)
Meets the morning sun.
I'd like to know that your love,
Is love I can be sure of,
So tell me now and I won't ask again,
Will you still love me tomorrow?
Will you still love me tomorrow?
*****
Christ, finally a teen-oriented set of lyrics that you can sink your teeth into. A teen angst, teen alienation, teen love question that was uppermost in all our minds, one way or the other, sex. Ya, I don’t know about you but I was getting kind of tired, and Billie, William James Bradley, my old schoolboy friend, elementary schoolboy friend from the old Adamsville projects days was too, of these outlandish side issue things. Like the whereabouts of Eddie, his intentions, his financial condition, his ability to write and so on in Eddie My Love. Or the dumb cluck bimbo, as old Billie called her in Teen Angel who didn’t have enough sense to know that Mr. Right, Mr. High School Right, gave her some cheapjack class ring when she went running back to the car, a car stuck, by the way, on some lonesome railroad track, with the train bearing down as far as we know in the story. Needless to say said bimbo did not make it. Or how about the forlorn lover, almost like in some Greek mythical tragedy, in Endless Sleep who after some spat decided that life was not worth living and goes down to the sea, our homeland the sea, and is ready to desecrate that space by ending it all and then giving a siren call to her lover boy to join her. Even Billie, sympathetic as he was to her plight, had to balk at that one.
No today we are in pure teen angst territory and rightly so. Back in those days what we did not, most of us anyway, know about sex, about the “birds and the bees”, about babies and where they came from, and how to protect against having them, would have filled volumes. Still, we were, most of us anyway, crazy to know more about sex, and do something about it. Whatever that was. Come on now, it was natural, natural as hell. Of course as the lyrics here indicate there was a price to be paid. See kids, meaning about anyone from thirteen to eighteen (maybe older even) were NOT suppose to do it, do the do I mean, and I guess if you listened to parents or teachers not even to think about it. But here is the dilemma in this story. Teens did it, and were anxious about that fact, for lots of reasons.
Obviously the most pressing question in 1960, the time of this song and the time just before the news of “the pill” got out (what “the pill” was you know, or should know, so I won’t go on about that) was getting pregnant, girls getting pregnant. So the disinformation, no information, no talk to your parents about it because they are afraid to talk about information, getting what you know on the streets information, really disinformation all over was part of it. But, and I think this is what the lyrics really speak to, it was as much about reputation, a girl’s reputation, about your good name, and about whether you were “easy.” See guys could be stud-of-the-week and, maybe mother, his mother, wouldn’t like it but everybody under eighteen saw you as cool. But gals were either virgins, known far and wide as such and don’t even bother messing with them, or willing but not wanting to be seen as “easy” held themselves back. And, while I do not know about other neighborhoods although I suspect the same was true, our mainly Irish and Italian working class Roman Catholic, made a very big issue out of the two, at least parents and gossip held forth that way.
Still when you went out on a date, a serious date, maybe to a dance, maybe to some party, maybe just down to the seashore and everything is all right to “pet,” or whatever, this question, this teen question of questions, always came up when the lights went down low. How many "no's" are there in the universe? And then some night some rainy night maybe, or maybe after that last dance and you held each other close, or maybe, you have a shot of booze, or, I don’t know, maybe you just felt like it because it was a warm spring evening and you were young, and life was just fine that day, or maybe your guy asked you to go steady, or some solid, teen solid thing like that, you said, “let’s see what it is all about.” And your guy, your ever-loving’ guy, your ever-loving’ horny guy was more than willing to take you for the ride. But then, in the afterglow, you had your doubts, especially in the wee morning hours when you knew you were going to get hell for being out so late. And maybe, that cold break of day, got you to thinking about what the girls in the "lav" would say, or what your guy will tell his friends, his snickering friends, and you get the nervous doubts about your course. Ya, this song speaks to that whole pre-sexual revolution generation, and maybe not so far off for teens today. Ms. King and friends certainly asked the right question, that’s for damn sure.
Markin comment:
This is another tongue-in-cheek commentary, the back story if you like, in the occasional entries under this headline going back to the primordial youth time of the 1950s with its bags full of classic rock songs for the ages.
Will You Still Love Me Tomorrow? Lyrics
Artist:Carole King
Will You Still Love Me Tomorrow
Tonight you're mine completely,
You give your love so sweetly,
Tonight the light of love is in your eyes,
But will you love me tomorrow?
Is this a lasting treasure,
Or just a moment's pleasure,
Can I believe the magic of your sighs,
Will you still love me tomorrow?
Tonight with words unspoken,
You said that I'm the only one,
But will my heart be broken,
When the night (When the night)
Meets the morning sun.
I'd like to know that your love,
Is love I can be sure of,
So tell me now and I won't ask again,
Will you still love me tomorrow?
Will you still love me tomorrow?
*****
Christ, finally a teen-oriented set of lyrics that you can sink your teeth into. A teen angst, teen alienation, teen love question that was uppermost in all our minds, one way or the other, sex. Ya, I don’t know about you but I was getting kind of tired, and Billie, William James Bradley, my old schoolboy friend, elementary schoolboy friend from the old Adamsville projects days was too, of these outlandish side issue things. Like the whereabouts of Eddie, his intentions, his financial condition, his ability to write and so on in Eddie My Love. Or the dumb cluck bimbo, as old Billie called her in Teen Angel who didn’t have enough sense to know that Mr. Right, Mr. High School Right, gave her some cheapjack class ring when she went running back to the car, a car stuck, by the way, on some lonesome railroad track, with the train bearing down as far as we know in the story. Needless to say said bimbo did not make it. Or how about the forlorn lover, almost like in some Greek mythical tragedy, in Endless Sleep who after some spat decided that life was not worth living and goes down to the sea, our homeland the sea, and is ready to desecrate that space by ending it all and then giving a siren call to her lover boy to join her. Even Billie, sympathetic as he was to her plight, had to balk at that one.
No today we are in pure teen angst territory and rightly so. Back in those days what we did not, most of us anyway, know about sex, about the “birds and the bees”, about babies and where they came from, and how to protect against having them, would have filled volumes. Still, we were, most of us anyway, crazy to know more about sex, and do something about it. Whatever that was. Come on now, it was natural, natural as hell. Of course as the lyrics here indicate there was a price to be paid. See kids, meaning about anyone from thirteen to eighteen (maybe older even) were NOT suppose to do it, do the do I mean, and I guess if you listened to parents or teachers not even to think about it. But here is the dilemma in this story. Teens did it, and were anxious about that fact, for lots of reasons.
Obviously the most pressing question in 1960, the time of this song and the time just before the news of “the pill” got out (what “the pill” was you know, or should know, so I won’t go on about that) was getting pregnant, girls getting pregnant. So the disinformation, no information, no talk to your parents about it because they are afraid to talk about information, getting what you know on the streets information, really disinformation all over was part of it. But, and I think this is what the lyrics really speak to, it was as much about reputation, a girl’s reputation, about your good name, and about whether you were “easy.” See guys could be stud-of-the-week and, maybe mother, his mother, wouldn’t like it but everybody under eighteen saw you as cool. But gals were either virgins, known far and wide as such and don’t even bother messing with them, or willing but not wanting to be seen as “easy” held themselves back. And, while I do not know about other neighborhoods although I suspect the same was true, our mainly Irish and Italian working class Roman Catholic, made a very big issue out of the two, at least parents and gossip held forth that way.
Still when you went out on a date, a serious date, maybe to a dance, maybe to some party, maybe just down to the seashore and everything is all right to “pet,” or whatever, this question, this teen question of questions, always came up when the lights went down low. How many "no's" are there in the universe? And then some night some rainy night maybe, or maybe after that last dance and you held each other close, or maybe, you have a shot of booze, or, I don’t know, maybe you just felt like it because it was a warm spring evening and you were young, and life was just fine that day, or maybe your guy asked you to go steady, or some solid, teen solid thing like that, you said, “let’s see what it is all about.” And your guy, your ever-loving’ guy, your ever-loving’ horny guy was more than willing to take you for the ride. But then, in the afterglow, you had your doubts, especially in the wee morning hours when you knew you were going to get hell for being out so late. And maybe, that cold break of day, got you to thinking about what the girls in the "lav" would say, or what your guy will tell his friends, his snickering friends, and you get the nervous doubts about your course. Ya, this song speaks to that whole pre-sexual revolution generation, and maybe not so far off for teens today. Ms. King and friends certainly asked the right question, that’s for damn sure.
Sunday, February 20, 2011
Out In The Be-Bop 1960s Night- Out In Jukebox Night - A CD Review
Click on the headline to link to a YouTube Film clip of Ben E. King performing Spanish Harlem.
CD Review
The Rock ‘N’ Roll Era: The ‘60s: Keep On Rockin’, various artists, Time-Life Music, 1988
Recently I, seemingly, have endlessly gone back to my early musical roots in reviewing various compilations of a Time-Life classic rock series that goes under the general title The Rock ‘n’ Roll Era. And while time and ear have eroded the sparkle of some of the lesser tunes it still seems obvious that those years, say 1955-62, really did form the musical jail break-out for my generation, the generation of ’68, who had just started to tune into music.
And we had our own little world, or as some hip sociologist trying to explain that Zeitgeist today might say, our own sub-group cultural expression. I have already talked about the pre 7/11 mom and pop corner variety store hangout with the tee-shirted, engineered-booted, cigarette (unfiltered) hanging from the lips, Coke, big sized glass Coke bottle at the side, pinball wizard guys thing. And about the pizza parlor juke box coin devouring, playing some “hot” song for the nth time that night, hold the onions I might get lucky tonight, dreamy girl might come in the door thing. Of course, the soda fountain, and…ditto, dreamy girl coming through the door thing, merely to share a sundae, please. And the same for the teen dance club, keep the kids off the streets even if we parents hate their damn rock music, the now eternal hope dreamy girl coming in the door, save the last dance for me thing.
Whee! That’s maybe enough memory lane stuff for a lifetime, especially for those with weak hearts. But, no, your intrepid messenger feels the need to go back again and take a little different look at that be-bop jukebox Saturday night scene as it unfolded in the early 1960s. Hey, you could have found the old jukebox in lots of places in those days. Bowling alleys, drugstores, pizza parlors, drive-in restaurants, and as shown in the cover art here at the daytime beach. While boy or girl watching. Basically any place where kids were hot for some special song and wanted to play it until the cows came home. And had the coins to satisfy their hunger.
A lot of it was to kill time waiting for this or that, although the basic reason was these were all places where you could show off your stuff, and maybe, strike up a conversation with someone who attracted your attention as they came in the door. The cover artwork on this compilation shows a dreamy girl waiting for her platters (records, okay) to work their way up the mechanism that took them from the stack and laid them out on the player. And tee-shirted sullen guy (could have been you, right?) just hanging around the machine waiting for just such a well-shaped brunette (or blond, but I favored brunettes in those days), maybe chatting idly was worth at least a date (or, more often, a telephone number to call). Not after nine at night though or before eight because that was when she was talking to her boy friend. Lucky guy, maybe.
But here is where the real skill came in, and where that white-tee-shirted guy on the cover seemed to be clueless. Just hanging casually around the old box, especially on a no, or low, dough day waiting on a twist (slang for girl in our old working class neighborhood) to come by and put her quarter in (giving three or five selections depending what kind of place the jukebox was located in) talking, usually to girlfriends, as she made those selections. Usually the first couple were easy, some old boy friend memory, or some wistful tryst remembrance, but then she got contemplative, or fidgety, over what to pick next.
Then you made your move-“Have you heard Spanish Harlem. NO! Well, you just have to hear that thing and it will cheer you right up. Or some such line. Of course, you wanted to hear the damn thing. But see, a song like that (as opposed to Chuck Berry’s Sweet Little Rock and Roller, let’s say) showed you were a sensitive guy, and maybe worth talking to... for just a minute, I got to get back to my girlfriends, etc, etc. Oh, jukebox you baby. And guess what. On that self-same jukebox you were very, very likely to hear some of the compilations from this CD: Here’s the list and there are some stick outs (and a few that worked some of that “magic” just mentioned above on tough nights):
1)My Boyfriend's Back - The Angels; 2)Nadine (Is It You?) - Chuck Berry; 3)Spanish Harlem - Ben E. King; 4)Come & Get These Memories - Martha & the Vandellas; 5)Perfidia - The Ventures; 6)Lover's Island - The Blue Jays; 7)Playboy - The Marvelettes; 8)Little Latin Lupe Lu - The Righteous Brothers; 9)It's Gonna Work Out Fine - Ike & Tina Turner; 10)When We Get Married - The Dreamlovers; 11)The One Who Really Loves You - Mary Wells; 12)Little Diane - Dion; 13)Dear Lady Twist - Gary "U.S." Bonds; 14)Heartaches - The Marcels; 15)Feel So Fine (Feel So Good) - Johnny Preston; 16)If You Gotta Make a Fool of Somebody - James Ray; 17)All in My Mind - Maxine Brown; 18)Maybe I know - Lesley Gore; 19)Heart & Soul - The Cleftones; 20)Peanut Butter - The Marathons; 21)I Count the Tears - The Drifters; 22)Everybody Loves a Lover - The Shirelles
CD Review
The Rock ‘N’ Roll Era: The ‘60s: Keep On Rockin’, various artists, Time-Life Music, 1988
Recently I, seemingly, have endlessly gone back to my early musical roots in reviewing various compilations of a Time-Life classic rock series that goes under the general title The Rock ‘n’ Roll Era. And while time and ear have eroded the sparkle of some of the lesser tunes it still seems obvious that those years, say 1955-62, really did form the musical jail break-out for my generation, the generation of ’68, who had just started to tune into music.
And we had our own little world, or as some hip sociologist trying to explain that Zeitgeist today might say, our own sub-group cultural expression. I have already talked about the pre 7/11 mom and pop corner variety store hangout with the tee-shirted, engineered-booted, cigarette (unfiltered) hanging from the lips, Coke, big sized glass Coke bottle at the side, pinball wizard guys thing. And about the pizza parlor juke box coin devouring, playing some “hot” song for the nth time that night, hold the onions I might get lucky tonight, dreamy girl might come in the door thing. Of course, the soda fountain, and…ditto, dreamy girl coming through the door thing, merely to share a sundae, please. And the same for the teen dance club, keep the kids off the streets even if we parents hate their damn rock music, the now eternal hope dreamy girl coming in the door, save the last dance for me thing.
Whee! That’s maybe enough memory lane stuff for a lifetime, especially for those with weak hearts. But, no, your intrepid messenger feels the need to go back again and take a little different look at that be-bop jukebox Saturday night scene as it unfolded in the early 1960s. Hey, you could have found the old jukebox in lots of places in those days. Bowling alleys, drugstores, pizza parlors, drive-in restaurants, and as shown in the cover art here at the daytime beach. While boy or girl watching. Basically any place where kids were hot for some special song and wanted to play it until the cows came home. And had the coins to satisfy their hunger.
A lot of it was to kill time waiting for this or that, although the basic reason was these were all places where you could show off your stuff, and maybe, strike up a conversation with someone who attracted your attention as they came in the door. The cover artwork on this compilation shows a dreamy girl waiting for her platters (records, okay) to work their way up the mechanism that took them from the stack and laid them out on the player. And tee-shirted sullen guy (could have been you, right?) just hanging around the machine waiting for just such a well-shaped brunette (or blond, but I favored brunettes in those days), maybe chatting idly was worth at least a date (or, more often, a telephone number to call). Not after nine at night though or before eight because that was when she was talking to her boy friend. Lucky guy, maybe.
But here is where the real skill came in, and where that white-tee-shirted guy on the cover seemed to be clueless. Just hanging casually around the old box, especially on a no, or low, dough day waiting on a twist (slang for girl in our old working class neighborhood) to come by and put her quarter in (giving three or five selections depending what kind of place the jukebox was located in) talking, usually to girlfriends, as she made those selections. Usually the first couple were easy, some old boy friend memory, or some wistful tryst remembrance, but then she got contemplative, or fidgety, over what to pick next.
Then you made your move-“Have you heard Spanish Harlem. NO! Well, you just have to hear that thing and it will cheer you right up. Or some such line. Of course, you wanted to hear the damn thing. But see, a song like that (as opposed to Chuck Berry’s Sweet Little Rock and Roller, let’s say) showed you were a sensitive guy, and maybe worth talking to... for just a minute, I got to get back to my girlfriends, etc, etc. Oh, jukebox you baby. And guess what. On that self-same jukebox you were very, very likely to hear some of the compilations from this CD: Here’s the list and there are some stick outs (and a few that worked some of that “magic” just mentioned above on tough nights):
1)My Boyfriend's Back - The Angels; 2)Nadine (Is It You?) - Chuck Berry; 3)Spanish Harlem - Ben E. King; 4)Come & Get These Memories - Martha & the Vandellas; 5)Perfidia - The Ventures; 6)Lover's Island - The Blue Jays; 7)Playboy - The Marvelettes; 8)Little Latin Lupe Lu - The Righteous Brothers; 9)It's Gonna Work Out Fine - Ike & Tina Turner; 10)When We Get Married - The Dreamlovers; 11)The One Who Really Loves You - Mary Wells; 12)Little Diane - Dion; 13)Dear Lady Twist - Gary "U.S." Bonds; 14)Heartaches - The Marcels; 15)Feel So Fine (Feel So Good) - Johnny Preston; 16)If You Gotta Make a Fool of Somebody - James Ray; 17)All in My Mind - Maxine Brown; 18)Maybe I know - Lesley Gore; 19)Heart & Soul - The Cleftones; 20)Peanut Butter - The Marathons; 21)I Count the Tears - The Drifters; 22)Everybody Loves a Lover - The Shirelles
Monday, January 31, 2011
Those Oldies But Goodies…Out In The Be-Bop ‘50s Song Night-Jody Reynolds' “Endless Sleep”
Click on the headline to link to a YouTube film clip of Jody Reynolds performing the classic Endless Sleep.
Markin comment:
This space is noted for politics mainly, and mainly the desperate political fight against various social, economic and moral injustices and wrongs in this wicked old world, although the place where politics and cultural expression, especially post-World War II be-bop cultural expression, has drawn some of my interest over the past several years. The most telling example of that interest is in the field of popular music, centrally the blues, city and country, good woman on your mind, hard working, hard drinking blues and folk music, mainly urban, mainly protest to high heaven against the world’s injustices smite the dragon down, folk music. Of late though the old time 1950s kid, primordial, big bang, jail-break rock and roll music that set us off from earlier generations has drawn my attention. Mostly by reviewing oldies CDs but here, and occasionally hereafter under this headline, specifically songs that some future archeologists might dig up as prime examples of how we primitives lived ,and what we listened to back in the day.
*********
JODY REYNOLDS
"Endless Sleep"
(Jody Reynolds and Dolores Nance)
The night was black, rain fallin' down
Looked for my baby, she's nowhere around
Traced her footsteps down to the shore
‘fraid she's gone forever more
I looked at the sea and it seemed to say
“I took your baby from you away.
I heard a voice cryin' in the deep
“Come join me, baby, in my endless sleep.
Why did we quarrel, why did we fight?
Why did I leave her alone tonight?
That's why her footsteps ran into the sea
That's why my baby has gone from me.
I looked at the sea and it seemed to say
“I took your baby from you away.
I heard a voice cryin' in the deep
“Come join me, baby, in my endless sleep.
Ran in the water, heart full of fear
There in the breakers I saw her near
Reached for my darlin', held her to me
Stole her away from the angry sea
I looked at the sea and it seemed to say
“You took your baby from me away.
My heart cried out “she's mine to keep
I saved my baby from an endless sleep.
[Fade]
Endless sleep, endless sleep
**********
I want the iPhone number and e-mail address of the person who wrote this one. Whoever that person is (or they are, as the case may be) should be made to run the gauntlet, or put on a lonely desert isle, or, and this would be real justice in this case made to follow Socrates, who also corrupted the morals of the youth of his time. Why all the hubbub? Well, read the heart-breaking teen angst lyrics here on Endless Sleep. Old Lee (let’s call him that, although as in most cases with these 1950s teen lyrics, frustratingly, the parties are not named except things like teen angel, earth angel, etc.) and his honey, Laura (again name made up to give some personality to this sketch) had a spat, a big one from Laura’s reaction, and now she has flipped out and, as teenagers often will in a moment of overreaction to some slight, gone down to the seaside to end it all. Lee in desperation, once he hears from some unnamed third party apparently what she has done, frantically tries to find her out in the deep, dark, wave-splashed night. All the while the “sea” is calling out for him to join her.
And that last part, the part that practically begs for a joint teen suicide pact is where every right thinking person, and not just enraged parents either, should, or should have put his or her foot down and gone after the lyricist’s scalp, to speak nothing of the singer of such woe begotten lines. Ya, I know old Lee saved his honey from the endless sleep but still we cannot have this stuff filling the ears of impressionable teen-agers. Right?
Of course, from what I heard third-hand, this quarrel that old Lee speaks of , and that Laura went ballistic over, was about whether they were going to go bowling with Lee’s guy friends and their girls down the old Bowl-a-drome on Saturday or to the drive-in theater for the latest Elvis movie. Lee, usually a mild-mannered kid, reared up at that thought of going to another bogus Elvis film featuring him, the king, riding around in a big old car, having plenty of dough in his pocket and plenty of luscious young girls ready and waiting to help him spent that dough. Of such disputes the battle of the sexes abound, and occasionally other battles, war battles as well. However, after hearing that take on the dispute I think old Lee had much the best of it. And, also off of that same take I am not altogether sure I would have been all that frantic to go down to the seaside looking for dear, sweet Laura. Just kidding.
But that brings something up, something that I am not kidding about. Now I love the sea more than a little. But I also know about the power of the sea, about old Uncle Neptune’s capacity to do some very bad things to anything that gets in his way. From old double-high storm-tossed seawalls that crumble at the charging sea’s touch to rain-soaked, mast-toppled boats lost down under in the briny deep whose only sin was to stir up the waves. And Laura should have too. So I am really ticked off, yes, ticked off, that Laura should tempt the fates, and Lee’s fate, by pulling a bone-head water's edge stunt like that.
It reminds me , although in contrast, of the time that old flame, old hitchhike road searching for the blue-pink great American West night flame Angelica, old Indiana-bred, Mid-American naïve Angelica, who got so excited the first time she saw the Pacific Ocean, never having seen the ocean before, leaped right in and was almost carried away by a sudden riptide. It took all I had to pull her out. And that Angelica error was out of sheer ignorance. Laura had no excuse. When you look at it that way, and as much as I personally do no care a fig about bowling, would it really have been that bad to go bowl a couple of strings. Such are the ways of teen angst.
Markin comment:
This space is noted for politics mainly, and mainly the desperate political fight against various social, economic and moral injustices and wrongs in this wicked old world, although the place where politics and cultural expression, especially post-World War II be-bop cultural expression, has drawn some of my interest over the past several years. The most telling example of that interest is in the field of popular music, centrally the blues, city and country, good woman on your mind, hard working, hard drinking blues and folk music, mainly urban, mainly protest to high heaven against the world’s injustices smite the dragon down, folk music. Of late though the old time 1950s kid, primordial, big bang, jail-break rock and roll music that set us off from earlier generations has drawn my attention. Mostly by reviewing oldies CDs but here, and occasionally hereafter under this headline, specifically songs that some future archeologists might dig up as prime examples of how we primitives lived ,and what we listened to back in the day.
*********
JODY REYNOLDS
"Endless Sleep"
(Jody Reynolds and Dolores Nance)
The night was black, rain fallin' down
Looked for my baby, she's nowhere around
Traced her footsteps down to the shore
‘fraid she's gone forever more
I looked at the sea and it seemed to say
“I took your baby from you away.
I heard a voice cryin' in the deep
“Come join me, baby, in my endless sleep.
Why did we quarrel, why did we fight?
Why did I leave her alone tonight?
That's why her footsteps ran into the sea
That's why my baby has gone from me.
I looked at the sea and it seemed to say
“I took your baby from you away.
I heard a voice cryin' in the deep
“Come join me, baby, in my endless sleep.
Ran in the water, heart full of fear
There in the breakers I saw her near
Reached for my darlin', held her to me
Stole her away from the angry sea
I looked at the sea and it seemed to say
“You took your baby from me away.
My heart cried out “she's mine to keep
I saved my baby from an endless sleep.
[Fade]
Endless sleep, endless sleep
**********
I want the iPhone number and e-mail address of the person who wrote this one. Whoever that person is (or they are, as the case may be) should be made to run the gauntlet, or put on a lonely desert isle, or, and this would be real justice in this case made to follow Socrates, who also corrupted the morals of the youth of his time. Why all the hubbub? Well, read the heart-breaking teen angst lyrics here on Endless Sleep. Old Lee (let’s call him that, although as in most cases with these 1950s teen lyrics, frustratingly, the parties are not named except things like teen angel, earth angel, etc.) and his honey, Laura (again name made up to give some personality to this sketch) had a spat, a big one from Laura’s reaction, and now she has flipped out and, as teenagers often will in a moment of overreaction to some slight, gone down to the seaside to end it all. Lee in desperation, once he hears from some unnamed third party apparently what she has done, frantically tries to find her out in the deep, dark, wave-splashed night. All the while the “sea” is calling out for him to join her.
And that last part, the part that practically begs for a joint teen suicide pact is where every right thinking person, and not just enraged parents either, should, or should have put his or her foot down and gone after the lyricist’s scalp, to speak nothing of the singer of such woe begotten lines. Ya, I know old Lee saved his honey from the endless sleep but still we cannot have this stuff filling the ears of impressionable teen-agers. Right?
Of course, from what I heard third-hand, this quarrel that old Lee speaks of , and that Laura went ballistic over, was about whether they were going to go bowling with Lee’s guy friends and their girls down the old Bowl-a-drome on Saturday or to the drive-in theater for the latest Elvis movie. Lee, usually a mild-mannered kid, reared up at that thought of going to another bogus Elvis film featuring him, the king, riding around in a big old car, having plenty of dough in his pocket and plenty of luscious young girls ready and waiting to help him spent that dough. Of such disputes the battle of the sexes abound, and occasionally other battles, war battles as well. However, after hearing that take on the dispute I think old Lee had much the best of it. And, also off of that same take I am not altogether sure I would have been all that frantic to go down to the seaside looking for dear, sweet Laura. Just kidding.
But that brings something up, something that I am not kidding about. Now I love the sea more than a little. But I also know about the power of the sea, about old Uncle Neptune’s capacity to do some very bad things to anything that gets in his way. From old double-high storm-tossed seawalls that crumble at the charging sea’s touch to rain-soaked, mast-toppled boats lost down under in the briny deep whose only sin was to stir up the waves. And Laura should have too. So I am really ticked off, yes, ticked off, that Laura should tempt the fates, and Lee’s fate, by pulling a bone-head water's edge stunt like that.
It reminds me , although in contrast, of the time that old flame, old hitchhike road searching for the blue-pink great American West night flame Angelica, old Indiana-bred, Mid-American naïve Angelica, who got so excited the first time she saw the Pacific Ocean, never having seen the ocean before, leaped right in and was almost carried away by a sudden riptide. It took all I had to pull her out. And that Angelica error was out of sheer ignorance. Laura had no excuse. When you look at it that way, and as much as I personally do no care a fig about bowling, would it really have been that bad to go bowl a couple of strings. Such are the ways of teen angst.
Sunday, January 23, 2011
Those Oldies But Goodies…Out In The Be-Bop ‘50s Song Night-Mark Dinning's "Teen Angel"
Click on the headline to link to a YouTube film clip of Mark Dinning performing Teen Angel.
Markin comment:
This space is noted for politics mainly, and mainly the desperate political fight against various social, economic and moral injustices and wrongs in this wicked old world, although the place where politics and cultural expression, especially post-World War II be-bop cultural expression, has drawn some of my interest over the past several years. The most telling example of that interest is in the field of popular music, centrally the blues, city and country, good woman on your mind, hard working, hard drinking blues and folk music, mainly urban, mainly protest to high heaven against the world’s injustices smite the dragon down, folk music. Of late though the old time 1950s kid, primordial, big bang, jail-break rock and roll music that set us off from earlier generations has drawn my attention. Mostly by reviewing oldies CDs but here, and occasionally hereafter under this headline, specifically songs that some future archaeologists might dig up as prime examples of how we primitives lived ,and what we listened to back in the day.
************
First off, get used to hearing ad finitum about angels, earth-bound, heaven-sent, hell-sent, angelic, yes, angelic, heart-broken, heart-breaking angels, and how many angels can fit on the head of a pin, Enough angels to make old revolutionary Puritan poet John Milton's angel fights in Paradise Lost seem, well, punk by comparison. That is if you really want to know about 1950s rock subject matter, all of the above, naturally being teen angels (as if there were any other kind), maybe even Milton's, and that brings us to the heart of this Mark Dinning teen angst classic, Teen Angel.
Frankly, I am bewildered by the bizarre lyrics and story line here, although it rates high, very high on my newly constructed teen song angst-o-meter. Peggy and Billy, okay I know they are not named, or maybe nameable, in the universal teen night but let’s call them that to give name to the kinds of fools we are dealing with, were stranded out on railroad tracks in old Billy’s apparently dead-ender car, probably his father’s hand-me-down. That should have been the first tip-off to Peggy. There were a million guys in town with “boss” cars, including Linc with his ’57 cherry red Chevy by the look on his face every time you passed by, who would have been more than happy to give you a tumble.
Or maybe Billy just didn’t have gas dough and the clunker ran out, unfortunately, ran out on that old dreaded isolated track with all those signs saying don’t stop, please don’t stop, on the tracks because even if trains were going out of style in the big 1950s freeway car exodus they still ran every now and again. No dough Billy, christ I knew seven guys (although not Linc) who had plenty of dough , or could get it, to show you a good time, including Frankie (and Frankie, supposedly only had eyes for his ever lovin’ sweetie, Joanne).
Okay, the ways of love are strange, no question, so Billy it was. But, jesus, he pulled you out, you were safe and then you went ballistic over some f-----g, cheapjack ring, some cheapjack fake gold (like about four carat gold filigree, maybe) with fako diamond and barely legible stuff written on it class ring. And you knew, since you had been out with Billy for a while by then that it was cheapo. Come on you couldn’t have been that naïve. Now you have left Billy all choked up over his teen angel lost, and I know for a fact that he stayed that way, for a while. But just recently he seems to be on the mend because didn’t Tommy T. see him and Linda Lou, ya, sweet “hot stuff’ Linda Lou, walking hand and hand into Kay’s jewelry store, the upscale jewelry store. I wonder what they were looking for?
Markin comment:
This space is noted for politics mainly, and mainly the desperate political fight against various social, economic and moral injustices and wrongs in this wicked old world, although the place where politics and cultural expression, especially post-World War II be-bop cultural expression, has drawn some of my interest over the past several years. The most telling example of that interest is in the field of popular music, centrally the blues, city and country, good woman on your mind, hard working, hard drinking blues and folk music, mainly urban, mainly protest to high heaven against the world’s injustices smite the dragon down, folk music. Of late though the old time 1950s kid, primordial, big bang, jail-break rock and roll music that set us off from earlier generations has drawn my attention. Mostly by reviewing oldies CDs but here, and occasionally hereafter under this headline, specifically songs that some future archaeologists might dig up as prime examples of how we primitives lived ,and what we listened to back in the day.
************
MARK DINNING
"Teen Angel"
"Teen Angel"
Teen angel, teen angel, teen angel, ooh, ooh
That fateful night the car was stalled
upon the railroad track
I pulled you out and we were safe
but you went running back
Teen angel, can you hear me
Teen angel, can you see me
Are you somewhere up above
And I am still your own true love
What was it you were looking for
that took your life that night
They said they found my high school ring
clutched in your fingers tight
Teen angel, can you hear me
Teen angel, can you see me
Are you somewhere up above
And I am still your own true love
Just sweet sixteen, and now you're gone
They've taken you away.
I'll never kiss your lips again
They buried you today
Teen angel, can you hear me
Teen angel, can you see me
Are you somewhere up above
And I am still your own true love
Teen angel, teen angel, answer me, please
************That fateful night the car was stalled
upon the railroad track
I pulled you out and we were safe
but you went running back
Teen angel, can you hear me
Teen angel, can you see me
Are you somewhere up above
And I am still your own true love
What was it you were looking for
that took your life that night
They said they found my high school ring
clutched in your fingers tight
Teen angel, can you hear me
Teen angel, can you see me
Are you somewhere up above
And I am still your own true love
Just sweet sixteen, and now you're gone
They've taken you away.
I'll never kiss your lips again
They buried you today
Teen angel, can you hear me
Teen angel, can you see me
Are you somewhere up above
And I am still your own true love
Teen angel, teen angel, answer me, please
First off, get used to hearing ad finitum about angels, earth-bound, heaven-sent, hell-sent, angelic, yes, angelic, heart-broken, heart-breaking angels, and how many angels can fit on the head of a pin, Enough angels to make old revolutionary Puritan poet John Milton's angel fights in Paradise Lost seem, well, punk by comparison. That is if you really want to know about 1950s rock subject matter, all of the above, naturally being teen angels (as if there were any other kind), maybe even Milton's, and that brings us to the heart of this Mark Dinning teen angst classic, Teen Angel.
Frankly, I am bewildered by the bizarre lyrics and story line here, although it rates high, very high on my newly constructed teen song angst-o-meter. Peggy and Billy, okay I know they are not named, or maybe nameable, in the universal teen night but let’s call them that to give name to the kinds of fools we are dealing with, were stranded out on railroad tracks in old Billy’s apparently dead-ender car, probably his father’s hand-me-down. That should have been the first tip-off to Peggy. There were a million guys in town with “boss” cars, including Linc with his ’57 cherry red Chevy by the look on his face every time you passed by, who would have been more than happy to give you a tumble.
Or maybe Billy just didn’t have gas dough and the clunker ran out, unfortunately, ran out on that old dreaded isolated track with all those signs saying don’t stop, please don’t stop, on the tracks because even if trains were going out of style in the big 1950s freeway car exodus they still ran every now and again. No dough Billy, christ I knew seven guys (although not Linc) who had plenty of dough , or could get it, to show you a good time, including Frankie (and Frankie, supposedly only had eyes for his ever lovin’ sweetie, Joanne).
Okay, the ways of love are strange, no question, so Billy it was. But, jesus, he pulled you out, you were safe and then you went ballistic over some f-----g, cheapjack ring, some cheapjack fake gold (like about four carat gold filigree, maybe) with fako diamond and barely legible stuff written on it class ring. And you knew, since you had been out with Billy for a while by then that it was cheapo. Come on you couldn’t have been that naïve. Now you have left Billy all choked up over his teen angel lost, and I know for a fact that he stayed that way, for a while. But just recently he seems to be on the mend because didn’t Tommy T. see him and Linda Lou, ya, sweet “hot stuff’ Linda Lou, walking hand and hand into Kay’s jewelry store, the upscale jewelry store. I wonder what they were looking for?
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)