Recently I posted a thought about Buddy Holly and in the responses that followed there was a reference to listening to Apple/Spotify year by year pop hits. So I began a fun project of listening to two plus hours of the hits from 1955, 56, etc.
It’s been the most purely enjoyable listening I have done for a long time. I am frequently reminded of Dave Marsh’s premise in “Heart of Rock and Soul” that the album as statement does not suit this music and even goes as far to say that he regrets the primacy of the album even in his own work ( RS Record Guide). It’s been fascinating to see which singers pop their heads above the rest; not surprisingly ( or maybe it is) Elvis, Everly Brothers ( Cryin’ in the Rain just on now) , Dion and absolutely Sam Cooke. The Drifters keep making me turn my head and smile. The ones who did surprise me were Patsy Cline and Connie Francis – having never deliberately played either and never having given Connie Francis a first thought let alone a second one. If a song irritates, no problem, another will be along in two minutes.
There are times when the music taps into my melancholic sense of a world having disappeared beneath a wave of global events since this boy and girl music was made. Additionally, the weight of my own life ( a chronically ill son, recent loss of beloved pets, an aching body, uncertainty about future possibilities) make the songs simultaneously beautiful and achingly sad as they highlight the ephemerality of youth. The Cookies ‘Chains’ on now and I realise that I am enjoying a song that The Beatles enjoyed – it was a just a moment ago that there was no Beatles and yet Lennon died over forty years ago.
I can’t really enjoy Chubby Checker yet I never skip his songs. It was always dance music, on in the background of a life and lives that were just starting. Of course my father didn’t like it – those same chords over and again made it sound the same to him. The current song ‘What’s Your Name” by Don and Juan ( hilarious) I have never heard but like a blues song it is (merely?) a genre piece though with a little vocal kick at the end of the piece that catches me out. Bring it on Home to Me now and I have heard this 1000 times surely yet hearing Cooke and the band makes me listen closely to the way the piano kisses the chords.
When the two hours is up and the list finishes I feel the same slight sense of a good time over I felt when young a great film or album was over. You could watch it again of course and it would reward you but that moment, that specific moment had passed.
Finally: The Shirelles were really good. Who knew? Sha la la la la…
Golden Days Goodboy, memories of my mum, aunts and their friends singing & dancing in the kitchen, the lounge was for Sundays and special occasions, in the mid to late 50’s always make me smile. Even the sun seemed to shine every day.
The songs of the artists you name above stick in my memory. I’ve always loved a great pop tune, still do. I always found time to play them once I got my own Dansette type TT (cheaper) along with my Dylan and psychedelia as I got into my teen years in the 60’s.
The music press, 6 Music et al have gone down the “Rawk started in 1965” route so far that the abundance of gems from the Rock ‘n’ Roll to early Beatles period is like an undiscovered forest you can have all to yourself! And, as you say, these were the songs that The Beatles, Jimi, Dylan etc. heard as teenagers. That’s why I contend that the mid-to-late 50s was the best time by far to be that age.
I agree with the comment from Dave Marsh. I’ve never heard a Fats Domino L.P. – I will redress that this summer – but the As and Bs compilations on Ace are wonderful.
Sometimes I’m tempted to only listen to the mid-50s to early 60s.
Fresh from the carnage of Record Store Day, it’s also very cheap.
You’re unlikely to get fleeced by Fats or The Everly Brothers or Gene Vincent, unless you go out of your way to be so, you’re bound to be fleeced by The Rolling Stones.
That thing you repeat about ‘the best age’… it’s redundant really, isn’t it? None of us get a choice about when we’re born. It’s like the gammons honking about being ‘English and proud’. 🤔
No.
I love pre-Beatles girl groups. There’s so much brilliant teenage angst beyond the obvious Crystals, Shirelles, Ronettes etc – e.g.
or
or
The Charmaines – thanks so much – had never heard a single lick from them.
There’s a brilliant compilation called She’s So Fine: The Rise of the Girl Groups which has all this stuff on it.
Rather fond of this.
Whitney’s mum’s group were good.