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There are 10 messages in this issue of Spectropop.
Topics in this Digest Number 192:
1. Re: Golden Oldies
From: Frank
2. Posted requests
From: Ton Borsboom
3. Aooooga
From: "David Mirich, Ph.D."
4. King of Pop
From: "Hans Ebert"
5. Re: Other "thefts"
From: Frank
6. Three Geniuses - was Other "thefts"
From: "Florie Gray"
7. VDP quote
From: LePageWeb
8. Beatles, Smile, and musique concrete
From: "Joseph Scott"
9. France Gall/Petula Clark/cops
From: Stewart Mason
10. Records on PHI-DAN
From: Barry.Green
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Message: 1
Date: Sun, 24 Jun 01 07:47:53 +0100
From: Frank
Subject: Re: Golden Oldies
Thanks Martin,
I love it when Spectroppers give us info on what's being
released in their neck of the world. The only thing I
will never understand is where anyone can find any
relations between Francoise Hardy's recordings and Phil
Spector ?
Frank
Martin wrote:
>
>Francoise Hardy "The Vogue Years" UK BMG74321 822322 rel
>'01 A must buy. 50 tracks of the very best of French,UK
>(Charles Blackwell) & even US (Mickey Baker) pop. Can't
>find any of my favourites missing, great Spector Sound A
>Likes, great attitude & great looks! Good colour booklet.
>All of these are French language recordings so I'd guess
>English vocal's compilation to follow. But don't wait
>buy this now! For those new to Francoise's charms start
>at track 14 her version of The Joys "I Still Love Him"
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Message: 2
Date: Sun, 24 Jun 2001 10:31:05 -0000
From: Ton Borsboom
Subject: Posted requests
Thank you all for the information on Darlene Love (#1321),
The Metros (#1329), The Crystals (#1339).
Regards,
Ton
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Message: 3
Date: Sun, 24 Jun 2001 09:24:47 -0600
From: "David Mirich, Ph.D."
Subject: Aooooga
I dunno Marc. The very baritone and multi-singer
chorus of "Aooooga Chaca ooooga", is such a distinctive
musical footprint, especially for 1967 pop
experimentation. That Jonathan King was a very
innovative person doesn't per"Swede" me that this could
have been invented in a parallel form at a later
time-- it is just tooooo identical to BWs SMiLE segment.
But I do agree with how Led Zep ripped some things from
others. What is the song from the Millennium that
reminds me so much of a later Zep song? BTW, Rbt.
Plant is covering many artists on his latest tour,
including 3 songs from Love.
Dave Mirich
Marc W. wrote in part:
> Not necessarily. That arrangement was created by
> British singer/producer Jonathan King for his own Top 30
> British hit, which was the first to add a reggae beat
> and "ooba-chakas" to the refrain. Could King have heard
> the SMILE session tapes? Anything's possible, but I
> personally think he was a fairly innovative guy in his
> own right, especially for his time.
>
> Dave had prevously written:
>
> > the hit song from 1973 called "Hooked On A Feeling" by
> > Blue Swede. There is a segment that goes "A oooga,
> > Chaca ooooga ooooga ooooga, Chaca ooooga ooooga ooooga."
> > This group must have gotten their hands on a Brian
> > Wilson Smile session bootleg
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Message: 4
Date: Sun, 24 Jun 2001 16:24:02 +0800
From: "Hans Ebert"
Subject: King of Pop
First, a few things about Jonathan King which most US
readers might not know about...
Having interviewed him in Hong Kong many moons ago when a
young journo, all I can say is that "bit" from Hooked On
A Feeling is all his.
As he did with his first solo hit, the very
tongue-in-cheeky Everyone's Gone To The Moon, King, who,
by the way, also named 10cc, loved to "mix it up" and
take the p*** out of the recording industry and record
buyers.
He still keeps the same flag flying at his popbitch.com
site which is never short of good true stories from
today's poposphere.
To me, King is up there with Brian Wilson, Spector, Joe
Meek, Derek Taylor et all for his eclectic, eccentric and
even elegant glance at the music scene and music.
On another note, BJ Thomas: Is he still recording?
Would anyone also know if Jimmy Webb plans to release
anything soon and if he even has a recording deal?
As for 'soundalike' recordings, how many songs have been
"born" out of Gordon Lightfoot's "If You Could Read My
Mind?"
Listen to this song again, listen to the chord changes,
listen to the melody and ou should hear that many have
blatantly lifted "bits" of it to create something "new...."
but very borrowed.
Cheers,
Hans Ebert
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Message: 5
Date: Sun, 24 Jun 01 07:47:54 +0100
From: Frank
Subject: Re: Other "thefts"
>Michael Bolton - "Love is a Wonderful Thing." Bolton got
>sued big-time on this by The Isley Brothers, who wrote
>an identically-titled (but very different) song. While
>I don't think those songs are all that close -- even
>though Bolton eventually lost, to the tune of millions
>of dollars -- his song is very close to that of Marvin
>Gaye's 1969 Top 5 soul hit "Too Busy Thinking About My
>Baby." [I think this might be the all-time biggest
>plagiarism suit, just under George Harrison's "My Sweet
>Lord / He's So Fine" from 1970-71.]
And don't forget two others incredible law suits :
Feelings the Morris Albert song that was lifted (note
for note - with the help of his publisher) from an
obscure French song. The Brasilian publisher who
published the orginal French song was found guilty of
having masterminded the whole thing. Albert lost the
suit.
And more recently another very big one : Macarena.
Frank
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Message: 6
Date: Sun, 24 Jun 2001 23:41:14 -0000
From: "Florie Gray"
Subject: Three Geniuses - was Other "thefts"
David Mirich, Ph.D. wrote to Spectropop Group
> What are other examples of blatant "lifting" of songs
> or segments of songs?
Three names immediately come to mind:
Charles Ives
Carl Stalling
Van Dyke Parks
All three have liberally borrowed from the works of
others, used them well and made the finished product
their own.
Florie Gray
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Message: 7
Date: Sun, 24 Jun 2001 23:55:11 -0000
From: LePageWeb
Subject: VDP quote
Hi all,
I received a few off-list emails about the VDP quote in
my recent post, and I realize I should have mentioned the
source (not of the quote, but of where I read it...)
It came from an article residing on the cabinessence site
called "A Road Less Travelled - Reflections on the Career
of Van Dyke Parks"
"Idiosyncratic. Eccentric. Innovative. Legendary. These
words only begin to describe one of the most important
figures in popular music history. This page is a
wonderful biographical study of the man who has
contributed some of the most enduring and beautiful music
and lyrics of the last generation." as it says on the
Spectropop automated links page
Super highly reccomended reading...
http://www.cabinessence.com/agladwin/parks
Enjoy!
Jamie
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Message: 8
Date: Sun, 24 Jun 2001 15:24:05 -0600
From: "Joseph Scott"
Subject: Beatles, Smile, and musique concrete
Hi all,
Jamie quoted Van Dyke Parks:
"The year before [Sgt. Pepper], the Beatles had gone to
LA to listen to the eight-track Smile sessions, and what
they were looking for is revealed on that album. It was
improper for the Beatles to take the musique concrete
approach that Brian had started, and it was grievous....
(London Guardian, 12.10.99)"
This is not accurate. The Beatles, particularly Paul,
became seriously interested in musique concrete through
friends in the U.K. in late '65 and early '66. In
December '65, Paul gave the other three Beatles copies
of "Unforgettable," a musique concrete recording he'd
made in his demo studio. The Beatles' first commercial
recording to include musique concrete was "Tomorrow
Never Knows," recorded in early April '66 and released
on Revolver in early August '66. The Beatles visited L.A.
in August '66 promoting Revolver. None of the Beatles
visited L.A. again until April '67, when Sgt. Pepper had
already been recorded.
Joseph Scott
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Message: 9
Date: Sun, 24 Jun 2001 10:51:30 -0600
From: Stewart Mason
Subject: France Gall/Petula Clark/cops
Martin Roberts wrote:
> France Gall "Baby Pop" French? Philips 539 842-2. Didn't
> hold out that much hope for this when bought - but hard
> to leave a record shop empty handed! Her most well known
> (in Britain) 65 Eurovision Song (winner?) "Poupee de
> Cire Poupee de Son" is not on this straight LP reissue
> from '66 only 12 tracks but it's great!
I'm sure I've said this here before, but it bears
repeating: any fan of '60s girlypop who does not seek out
France Gall is doing themselves a tremendous disservice.
Barely a teenager when she was having her first hits,
France Gall was primarily the Gallic equivalent of Lesley
Gore, but in keeping with the French styles of the time,
she also did some perfectly credible jazz-pop songs
("Pense a Moi" is a favorite in that style) and her
psychedelic explorations were worlds better than anyone
else in the country managed. You can't go wrong with
anything she released in the '60s. (She's still
performing, but her material since the early '70s has
largely been forgettable.) And, it must be said, France
Gall was the most drop-dead gorgeous female pop singer of
the '60s.
[Ed. note: 2 France Gall sound clips:
http://mfile.akamai.com/3157/wm2/muze.download.akamai.com/2890/us/us_wma20/2800/287242_1_03.asx
http://www.kolumbus.fi/jarpen/poupee.wav">http://www.kolumbus.fi/jarpen/poupee.wav]
> Keeping in the Gaelic mood:- Petula Clark "En Vogue
> (Beat en Francais)" UK Castle CMDDD 214 rel'01 another
> 50 track double CD, great pics and with Mick's name at
> the end (along with Richard Harris) great sleeve notes.
> All songs sung in French and most more Girl Group
> slanted than her usual 'pop' style. Some very good
> recordings but I still find her to "clean/smiley, smiley"
> for my tastes. Jack Nitzsche produced her, "Downtown" is
> a classic and sleeve notes talk of sales of over 68
> million, think this is my problem not hers!
There's a multi-disc series on Vogue called ANTHOLOGIE
(six or seven discs, maybe more) that collects all of
Petula's French-language recordings, many of which are
terrific. Her French-language Beatles covers are
surprisingly wonderful.
Dan Hughes wrote:
> I have always been struck by the identicality (?) of
> the line in the chorus of the Drifters' I Count the
> Tears: "Nah nah nah nah nah late at night" and the
> line in the chorus of the Grass Roots' Let's Live For
> Today: "Nah nah nah nah nah live for today."
An oddly pedantic part of me feels the need to point out
that it was actually "Sha la lala lala live for today."
As someone else might have already pointed out here, the
Motors' "Forget About You" sounds way too close to the
Grass Roots' Gary Zekley-penned hit "Sooner or Later" for
comfort. (The Motors had a habit of copping other folks'
choruses--their last single "Love and Loneliness" is a
direct cop of Stephen Stills' "Love the One You're With.")
And of course, speaking of Stills, you can't fail to
mention Neil Young's blatant cop of the "Satisfaction"
riff on the Buffalo Springfield's "Mr. Soul." Or for
that matter, the way he not only swiped "Lady Jane" for
"Borrowed Tune," he wrote lyrics about why he did it.
Stewart
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Message: 10
Date: Sun, 24 Jun 2001 17:02:54 -0000
From: Barry.Green
Subject: Records on PHI-DAN
Hi,
I am a new member to the Spectropop group and am
finding the posts very informative. This may have been
discussed before but I have not seen anything in the
archives so far.
I have often wondered about the 'gaps' in the PHI-DAN
singles that are documented in the various Spector
books. With Phil having released from 100 to 136 on
Philles with no missing catalogue numbers I am
intrigued as to why there are no numbers relating to
5002 - 5003 and 5004 on PHI-DAN ? Does anyone know if
any 'demo's' or 'test-pressings' have ever turned up
for the missing numbers. Is there any rumours or
stories about any of these ?
Hope someone can shed some light on this ?
All the best,
Barry
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