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479. Adam and the Ants – Stand & Deliver! (1981)

/ robbarker1979

The Intro

Adam and the Ants captivated children of the 80s – myself included. Adam Ant was my first ever musical hero, and where my love of music began. Here’s how a new wave band with niche appeal became a sensation and shot to number 1 for the first time with Stand and Deliver!.

Before

Adam Ant was born Stuart Leslie Goddard in Marylebone, London on 3 November 1954. Goddard’s grandfather on his mother’s side was Romanichal, which planted the seed of protecting minorities that would become a common theme in Goddard’s music.

His parents divorced when he was seven, and his mother worked as a domestic cleaner to make ends meet. In 1967, she briefly cleaned Paul McCartney’s house, and her son later vividly recalled going round there after school.

Goddard was educated at Robinsfield Infants School, where he got into trouble by throwing a brick through the headmaster’s office on two consecutive days. Ironically, this proved to be a wise move, as he was placed under the supervision of a teacher who encouraged his creative side.

At Barrow Hill Junior School, Goddard enjoyed boxing and cricket. He passed his A-plus and went to St Marylebone Grammar School, an all-boys school, where he became a prefect and gained three A-levels. Next was Hornsey College of Art, where he studied graphic design. But before he could complete his BA, he was swayed by a growing love of music, and he dropped out.

Goddard joined the pub rock band Bazooka Joe in 1975 as their bassist. Although the band also featured John Ellis, who became one of The Vibrators, they are most famous for being the headliners of the first ever Sex Pistols gig, at Central St Martins College of Art and Design on 6 November. Goddard was fascinated by the Pistols, while the rest of Bazooka Joe disagreed so strongly, he decided to leave the group and an idea began to form.

Under his new guise, Ant (named ‘Adam’ after the first man and ‘Ant’ after a creature that would survive a nuclear explosion) formed the B-Sides, featuring lead guitarist Lester Square and Andy Warren. On 23 April 1977, with drummer Paul Flanagan, they became The Ants, holding their first band meeting at a Siouxsie and the Banshees gig at the Roxy in Covent Garden. Ant was in the right place at the right time, as the punk scene was exploding, and he became close friends with Jordan, who worked at Malcolm McLaren and Vivienne Westwood’s SEX boutique. She soon became his band’s manager.

Square only lasted a month before leaving to concentrate on his course at art school, though he later formed The Monochrome Set. He was replaced by Mark Ryan, and The Ants began performing regularly around London. Flanagan was replaced in early June by Dave ‘Barbe’ Barbarossa, and The Ants entered a studio for the first time, recording Deutscher Girls and Beat My Guest. These two songs featured in Derek Jarman’s drama Jubilee (1978), in which Ant made his acting debut as The Kid. The Ants sacked Ryan, replaced him with Johnny Bivouac, and became Adam and the Ants.

The leather-clad, post-punk Adam and the Ants had a penchant for controversial fetishist imagery, and were unpopular with the music press, but they gained a cult following. 1978 was a big year, as they made their radio debut, recording a session for John Peel in January. Jordan featured on vocals for their final track Lou, which she used to do regularly at their gigs, but she quit as their manager in May and a day later, Bivouac left the band, to be replaced by Matthew Ashman.

Adam and the Ants recorded a second Peel session in July and at the end of the month they signed a two-single deal with Decca Records. Young Parisians was released in October, but plans for a follow-up were shelved by Decca.

A third Peel session was recorded in March 1979, and the band signed with independent label Do It Records. Second single Zerox was released in July and a month later they began recording their debut album, written and produced by Ant. Soon after, he sacked Ashman and Warren, and the latter joined The Monochrome Set, but Ashman was allowed back. Warren was replaced by Lee Gorman. The LP, Dirk Wears White Sox ( a reference to actor Dirk Bogarde), was released in November. It’s an interesting album, but don’t expect any of the brilliant pop that was around the corner. It did however make it to number 1 on the fledgling UK Independent Albums Chart that launched in early January 1980.

Ant asked Malcolm McLaren to take over as manager of the band, and the former Sex Pistols manager proved to inadvertently have a positive effect on Ant’s career. How? By dropping him and stealing his band. By the end of January, McLaren had persuaded Ashman, Gorman and Barbe to jump ship and join his new group, Bow Wow Wow. Their lead singer was 13-year-old Annabella Lwin, who was briefly joined by George O’Dowd before he became better known as Boy George. Whether Ant

Undeterred, Ant went looking for new Ants. Marco Pirroni, who had been one of Siouxsie’s Banshees, became the new guitarist. They were briefly joined by future Culture Club drummer Jon Moss (using the name Terry 1+2) to remake Dirk Wears White Sox opener Cartrouble as a contractual obligation for Do It, with Pirroni also on bass. The single was produced by Chris Hughes, who Ant subsequently asked to become his new drummer.

Kevin Mooney picked up bass duties, and unusually, there were now two drummers as Terry Lee Miall also joined the band. Ant was to co-write the new material with Pirroni and they signed a publishing deal with EMI. They worked on new material at Matrix Studios and went on the Ant Invasion tour while Ant took the new material to prospective record companies.

The change in direction was startling. Ant and Pirroni used Hughes (now known as Merrick) and Miall to create Burundi-style African drumming to underpin a new sound that was a commercial yet unique mix of pop and new wave. They ditched the leathers and instead of a monochrome look they added tons of colour, dressing as pirates with Native American make-up, and looking and sounding not unlike Johnny Kidd and the Pirates.

Whether these ideas were stolen from McLaren (as their former manager claimed) or vice versa, Ant, who was always incredibly handsome and charismatic, now looked and sounded like a real pop star. It wouldn’t take long to persuade the public he was, either.

Kings of the Wild Frontier was their next single, and what a call to arms it was. Over that soon to become familiar Burundi beat and Pirroni’s rockabilly guitar, Ant began his mission statement by chanting ‘A new Royal family, a wild nobility, we are the family’. He also sang about Native American suffering and declared ‘Antpeople are the warriors, Antmusic is our banner!’ Tremendous stuff, that somehow only scraped into the charts at 48 that summer.

In October came their next single, Dog Eat Dog, which streamlined the formula into a more chart-friendly format. This song, about bands in competition with one another and inspired by a phrase used by Margaret Thatcher, deservedly went all the way to number four.

The following month saw the release of their first hit LP. Kings of the Wild Frontier proved Adam and the Ants weren’t going to be a one-hit wonder. Released as the New Romantic movement was exploding, it contained another mission statement in Antmusic, which peaked at number two in January 1981, being held off the top spot by Imagine in the wake of John Lennon’s death.

Adam and the Ants were so popular, Decca and Do It rushed to plunder their earlier material for a cash grab. Incredibly, Young Parisians climbed to nine. In February the band performed on The Royal Variety Show in a spellbinding performance that caused Ant to shout at Mooney at the close for seemingly going off script. It would be Mooney’s last performance with the Ants, and Gary Tibbs, who had starred in Breaking Glass (1980), took his place. A re-release of the single Kings of the Wild Frontier soared to two.

The band set to work on what was to be the final Adam and the Ants album. Prince Charming’s lead single was to be Stand and Deliver!, in which Ant adopted a new image as ‘the dandy highwayman that you’re too scared to mention’. Ant was a history buff and loved the Georgian era of bawdy flamboyance. He saw it as a perfect vehicle for ‘looking flash and grabbing your attention. And it definitely worked.

Inspiration may have come from several places, including the film The Charge of the Light Brigade (1968), the Monty Python’s Flying Circus 1973 sketch ‘Dennis Moore’, Carry on Dick (1974) – the final entry in the series to star Sid James – and the London Weekend Television series Dick Turpin, that was running on ITV at the time.

Review

It was inevitable that Stand and Deliver! should become Ant’s first number 1, after several near misses. The drums are toned down from previous singles, now providing an exciting underpinning to pure brilliant pop, and Pirroni’s guitar is more modern than the rockabilly sounds of what came before.

There’s memorable vocal hook after hook here, too. If it’s not the opening line, or the triumphant chorus, or the ‘HUH’ after the drums in the chorus, it’s the nonsensical but suitably camp ‘Fa diddley qua qua’ as the song draws to a close.

While you can argue Adam and the Ants were too retro or rock to be New Romantics, this song fits the template, as Ant bemoans the lack of colour and fantasy in pop music. The Blitz Kids may have preferred more electronic sounding music, but they’d have totally agreed with lines like ‘The way you look you’ll qualify for next year’s old-age pension’. And the idea of using fashion as a weapon – ‘Not a bullet or a knife’ will have greatly appealed. It certainly did to little young me, and boys across the country. Ant was already cool, but mutating into a Dick Turpin-style character was bloody genius. In the early 80s I thought Sid James in Carry on Dick was cool. Ant as similar? Simply mind-blowing.

To change from edgy S&M stylings to cartoon childhood heroics is quite a transformation, but Ant more than pulled it off. As a child, he was just amazing. Incredibly handsome, charismatic, flamboyant and fun, Ant was a cartoon hero brought to life. I may have missed out on Beatlemania and Flower Power, glam rock and punk, but I feel proud to have been a young boy when Ant was at the height of his fame.

In theory I was too young – I was only two when this was number 1. But I can remember leaping from chair to settee in our living room to Adam and the Ants’ videos, and there’s a photo of me proudly holding an Ants’ single. So the band must have already split by the time I was in love with them, so brief was their fame. But listening to this and watching the video now, it’s clear that Adam and the Ants could only ever be huge for a short time – in a similar way to early T Rex. But what a time!

Ashes to Ashes may have heralded the start of the rise of music videos in the 80s, but with Stand and Deliver!, Ant grabs the torch and gallops away with it. Ant worked with director Mike Mansfield to create ‘a Hollywood movie in three minutes’, and they certainly succeeded. Ant is going round holding up mirrors to his victims – including a man who looks scarily similar to Boycie from Only Fools and Horses, which started this same year. The video, which also features Ant’s then-girlfriend Amanda Donohoe, climaxes with our hero about to be hanged before escaping with the rest of the Ants, and then ends with a topless Ant staring at himself in the mirror, alone. What did this mean? Was it Ant contemplating his own lyrics? Was it his true self, behind the mock heroics? Or was it just a chance to look hot and make his female fans swoon? Whatever it was, it hinted at the title track of their last LP, and next number 1.

After

Stand and Deliver! was an instant smash, debuting at number 1 and staying there for five weeks. It was the third biggest-selling single of 1981, and solidified Ant as a household name that year.

The Outro

20 years later, a troubled Ant made a well-meaning but ill-advised new version of his first number 1, called Save the Gorilla. Ant was trying to raise awareness of the plight of mountain gorillas in Central Africa, and the production is decent enough, but an overweight Ant trying to squeeze his new lyrics into one of his classics just seemed a bit silly. Pirroni helped to block its release.

The Info

Written by

Adam Ant & Marco Pirroni

Producer

Chris Hughes

Weeks at number 1

5 (9 May-12 June)

Trivia

Births

13 May: Labour Party MP Luciana Berger
15 May: Equestrienne Zara Phillips
16 May: Actor Joseph Morgan/Actor Jim Sturgess
17 May: Footballer Leon Osman
20 May: 5ive pop star Sean Conlon
22 May: Comedian Sara Pascoe
26 May: Broadcaster James Wong
29 May: Rugby union player Rochelle Clark
9 June: Backstroke swimmer Helen Don-Duncan/Scottish football plater Alex Neil/Musician Anoushka Shankar
11 June: Scottish field hockey goalkeeper Alistair McGregor

Deaths

9 May: Footballer Ralph Allen/Socialite Doris Harcourt
10 May: Conservative Party MP Geoffrey Stevens
15 May: Liberal Party MP Margery Corbett Ashby
17 May: Classical scholar WKC Guthrie
18 May: Novelist Verity Bargate
19 May: Ornithologist Collingwood Ingram
23 May: Radio producer Rayner Heppenstall
24 May: Actor Jack Warner
27 May: Scientist Kit Pedler/Philologist Anne Pennington
28 May: Archaeologist John Bryan Ward-Perkins
29 May: Organist John Dykes Bower
31 May: Economist Barbara Ward, Baroness Jackson of Lodsworth
10 June: Welsh journalist Sir Trevor Evans

Meanwhile…

9 May: The 100th FA Cup final at Wembley Stadium ends as a 1-1 draw between Manchester City and Tottenham Hotspur. 

11 May: Andrew Lloyd Webber’s musical Cats debuts at New London Theatre.

12 May: 25-year-old Francis Hughes becomes the second IRA hunger striker to die in Northern Ireland.

13 May: The New Cross fire inquest returns an open verdict on the thirteen people who died as a result of their injuries in the New Cross fire.

14 May: Spurs are victorious in the FA Cup final replay with a 3-2 win. It’s the sixth time they’ve won the trophy.

15 May: The Brixton riots inquiry opens.

19 May: Peter Sutcliffe is found guilty of 13 charges of murder, and a further seven attempted murders.

21 May: The IRA hunger strike claims two more deaths – Raymond McCreesh (24) and Patrick O’Hara (23).

22 May: Peter Sutcliffe is sentenced to life imprisonment.

27 May: Liverpool FC becomes the first British team to win the European Cup for the third time, defeating Real Madrid 1-0 at Parc des Princes in Paris.

30 May: More than 100,000 people march to Trafalgar Square in London for the Trade Union Congress’s (TUC’s) March For Jobs.

3 June: Sherman wins the Epsom Derby.

11 June: Queen Elizabeth II opens the NatWest Tower.

387. Brotherhood of Man – Save Your Kisses for Me (1976)

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The Intro

My, my – 70s record buyers really were partial to cheese, weren’t they? In the week a new band called the Sex Pistols performed at the 100 Club for the first time, family-friendly pop quartet Brotherhood of Man started a six-week stint at number 1 with Save Your Kisses for Me, which not only became the biggest seller of the year, it also won the Eurovision Song Contest.

Before

Brotherhood of Man originally sprung from the mind of songwriter and producer Tony Hiller. Formed in 1969, he intended on a revolving door of session singers and the first line-up featured Tony Burrows (later the singer on Edison Lighthouse’s Love Grows (Where My Rosemary Goes)), John Goodison (who also wrote early material for Brotherhood of Man), Roger Greenaway (later the co-writer of The New Seekers’ I’d Like to Teach the World to Sing (In Perfect Harmony)) and Sue Glover and Sunny Lee. As Sue and Sunny they were backing singers on Joe Cocker’s version of With a Little Help from My Friends.

Debut single Love One Another didn’t dent the charts but United We Stand (written by Goodison and Hiller) was a number 10 smash in 1970. Burrows left soon after and Where Are You Going to My Love, which peaked at 22, was their last hit in six years. Goodison left in early 1971 and was replaced by US singer Hal Atkinson, then Greenaway followed soon after and was replaced by Russell Stone. They split when their record label Deram dropped them in 1972.

Undeterred, Hiller decided to install another line-up. He opted for singers Martin Lee, Nicky Stevens and Lee Sheriden. Lee and Sheriden were already writers for Hiller but displayed singing abilities, and Stevens was a session singer and had been searching for solo stardom. Their first single was scheduled for the end of the year but when they found out David Cassidy was releasing his version, it was pulled. First two singles Happy Ever After and Our World of Love bombed in 1973. Soon after Sandra Stevens joined Brotherhood of Man. She had been a big-band singer and performed with Eve Graham of The New Seekers in the group The Nocturnes.

They signed to Pye offshoot Dawn and their first single for them, When Love Catches Up on You in 1974, didn’t chart. Bar some European success with Lady the same year and Kiss Me Kiss Your Baby in 1975, this incarnation of the group looked to be going the same way as the first. Hiller wanted to harness and maintain that success abroad and bring it on home, so entering the Eurovision Song Contest was the perfect solution.

Save Your Kisses for Me had been written by Sheriden back in 1974 originally. When presented to the others, they found the title a little clumsy and it was changed to Oceans of Love. Sheriden wasn’t best pleased and it was shelved but when it came to recording the album Love and Kisses from Brotherhood of Man, they needed one more track. Come recording day it was decided it would work better if Lee sang lead instead.

Review

Save Your Kisses for Me draws up immediate comparisons with Dawn’s Tie a Yellow Ribbon Round the Ole Oak Tree. Lightweight, slushy and catchy as hell. I prefer Brotherhood of Man, if I had to pick, because the chorus really gets under my skin. It’s impossible to hear without the image of the foursome standing in line doing that ridiculous dance, hands on waists, raising their feet. It’s certainly no Tiger Feet.

And then of course there’s the twist in the lyric, which makes any enjoyment of this song even more of a guilty pleasure. Throughout you’re given the impression Lee is splitting up with someone, and seemingly couldn’t give a fuck as he’s happy as can be. But then at the end, the killer blow, right after the final chorus: ‘Won’t you save them for me/Even though you’re only three.’

What?! Wait, don’t panic. Though it’s easy, considering the decade, to take a cheap shot and imagine Lee is yet another 70s pop star paedophile, he’s talking about his child! Very sweet – but way too sickly. The way it wraps up is horrible, and reminds me of Gilbert O’Sullivan’s Clair. Seeing it at number 1 week after week on repeats of Top of the Pops was bad enough, so I consider myself lucky I wasn’t around at the time.

After

Save Your Kisses for Me went to number 1 a fortnight before Eurovision. Brotherhood of Man were first up on that fateful night, 3 April at The Hague in the Netherlands. I was going to make a jokey link about the fact it’s where war crimes are judged so it seems appropriate but it doesn’t quite work.

To say it went well is an understatement. According to John Kennedy O’Connor’s The Eurovision Song Contest – The Official History, it is the biggest selling single for a winning entry in the contest’s history. It also holds the record for the highest relative score under the voting system introduced in 1975 (which has been used in every contest since), with an average of 9.65 points per jury. Mindboggling.

The Outro

Brotherhood of Man would return to number 1 a year later with, ironically, a complete rip-off of the song that would finally topple Save Your Kisses For Me.

The Info

Written by

Tony Hiller, Lee Sheriden & Martin Lee

Producer

Tony Hiller

Weeks at number 1

6 (27 March-7 May) *BEST-SELLING SINGLE OF THE YEAR*

Trivia

Births

10 April: Actress Clare Buckfield
15 April: Olympic rower Steve Williams
18 April: Actor Sean Maguire

Deaths

22 April: Novelist Colin MacInnnes/Comedian Sid James (see below)
28 April: Novelist Richard Hughes
7 May: Writer Alison Uttley

Meanwhile…

5 April: Labour MPs voted Foreign Secretary James Callaghan as their new leader and the Prime Minister. He defeated Roy Jenkins and Michael Foot in the leadership contest. Callaghan had been endorsed by outgoing leader Harold Wilson.

9 April: Young Liberals president Peter Hain is cleared of stealing £490 from a branch of Barclays Bank.

26 April: Much-loved comedy actor and Carry On actor Sid James dies of a heart attack on stage at the Sunderland Empire Theatre while performing in The Mating Season. Many in the audience initially mistake it as being part of the show.

1 May: Second division team Southampton FC win their first major trophy in their 91-year history when a goal from Bobby Stokes gives them a surprise 1–0 win over Manchester United in the FA Cup final at Wembley Stadium.

4 May: Liverpool FC win the Football League title for the ninth time with a 3–1 away win over relegated Wolverhampton Wanderers.

6 May: Local council elections produce disappointing results for the Labour Party, who win 15 seats and lose 829, compared to the Conservatives who win 1,044 new seats and lose 22. This setback comes despite the party enjoying a narrow lead in the opinion polls under new leader Callaghan.

369. Mud – Oh Boy (1975)

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The Intro

Mud were always too in thrall with the 50s, and clowning around far too much, to go down in history as glam rock lynchpins, which is a shame as Tiger Feet is one of my favourite number 1s of the 70s, and Lonely This Christmas is one of the more memorable festive number 1s. But this third and final number 1 shows how stale they, and the movement that made them famous, was becoming.

Before

Fresh from the success of their Christmas number 1, Mud tried to gain a Valentine’s Day chart-topper with The Secrets That You Keep. They nearly managed it too, reaching three. Their next single was a cover of Oh Boy! by The Crickets, which had reached three in 1958 and came from their debut album The ‘Chirping’ Crickets. Meaning Chinnichap were only involved with production this time around, and soon, their partnership with the band was over.

Review

I can’t work out why Chapman and Chinn, who had proven time and time again how to get the best out of pop for several years by this point, chose to suck this rock’n’roll classic of all its energy and turn it into a stately stadium rock-style stompalong. It does the song and Mud a disservice, and although smothering the production with harmonies perhaps masks its weakness to an extent, it also means there’s barely any sign of singer Les Gray. In the original, Buddy Holly puts across brilliantly the excitement of waiting to meet a lover that night. You get none of that feeling here.

There’s also a strange section where a mystery woman sings too, which is even weirder when you watch it being performed in the video above. If you don’t, Mud briefly pretend to hang a cleaner who mimes this part…

After

Further Mud releases came thick and fast throughout 1975, but the band parted ways with Chinnichap and they left RAK. Moonshine Sally, L-L-Lucy and Show Me You’re a Woman all went top 10, and they were briefly joined by keyboardist Andy Ball. They also appeared in a bizarre musical comedy called Never Too Young to Rock. In 1976 they moved away from glam, and the number 12 hit Shake It Down was a decent stab at disco. A cover of Bill Withers’ classic Lean on Me was their final hit, reaching seven that December. That year, Gray was part of the Green Cross Code public information campaign Children’s Heroes.

By 1978 they were signed to RCA Records, and Brian Tatum had joined as keyboardist, but Gray decided to try a solo career and quit. Mud tried to carry on, and hired Margo Buchanan as their new singer, but they couldn’t recapture the spark, and they split in 1979. The original incarnation of the band performed one final time, at drummer Dave Mount’s wedding, in 1990.

In 1980 Gray began a new incarnation, dubbed Les Gray’s Mud, that he toured with in various incarnations for the rest of his life. While fighting throat cancer, he died in the Algarve, Portugal in 2004. Les Gray’s Mud continued as Mud II with the rest of the original band’s blessing. Mount died in 2006. Bassist Ray Stiles joined The Hollies in 1986 and is still with them now. Guitarist Rob Davis, known for dressing up as a woman on stage, had the most prominent career post-Mud. Following a chance meeting with dance producer Paul Oakenfold in the late-80s, he began writing lyrics to club tunes. In 2000 he had two number 1 smashes – Toca’s Miracle by Fragma and then Groovejet (If This Ain’t Love) by Spiller. Most famously, he co-wrote Kylie Minogue’s classic Can’t Get You Out of My Head with Cathy Dennis in 2001.

The Outro

Oh Boy was, I think, Chinnichap’s last number 1, after several years of chart domination.

The Info

Written by

Sonny West, Bill Tighman & Norman Petty

Producers

Mike Chapman & Nicky Chinn

Weeks at number 1

2 (3-16 May)

Meanwhile…

3 May: West Ham United won the FA Cup for the second time, by beating Fulham 2-0 in the final at Wembley Stadium. Alan Taylor scored both goals.

348. ABBA (Bjorn, Benny, Anna & Frida) – Waterloo (1974)

/ robbarker1979 / 4 Comments

The Intro

I’m not giving you earth-shattering news when I point out that ABBA are one of the best-selling groups of all time. But here’s a few statistics to set the ball rolling. With nine UK number 1s between 1974 and 1980, they’ve had more than any other mixed-sex group in history. Seven of those number 1s occurred in the 70s, which is the most any single act had in that decade. They were the first group from a non-English-speaking country to have consistent success in English-speaking charts like the UK, US, Canada and Australia. Estimates suggest that their total sales are over 150 million. They’re easily the most successful group to have ever entered the Eurovision Song Contest, and ABBA Gold is one of the best-selling compilations of all time.

ABBA became cool again in the 90s, with their songs turned into the musical Mamma Mia! in 1999, before it was adapted into a hit film in 2008, spawning a sequel a decade later. In 2020 it was reported that they just might be making a comeback, though that could just be wishful thinking for a world turned on its heels that needs the pop bliss conjured up by Björn, Benny, Agnetha and Anni-Frid once more.

And yet despite all this – and I’m in agreement that Dancing Queen is one of the best number 1s of all time – a lot of ABBA’s output does little for me. I think a lot of it is down to the sheer overload during my 20s of ABBA covers and media coverage shoving them down the nation’s throats. Some truly awful acts were recording their songs, and they may have become guilty by association in my mind. Perhaps I will now grow to appreciate them more, as I work my way through their biggest hits?

Before

Before I look at the song that first made them stars, some background knowledge, as the story usually begins with ‘Swedish pop group ABBA entered Eurovision and became famous’.

Songwriter Benny Andersson, from Stockholm, joined his first band, The Hep Stars, aged 18, as their keyboardist. They were known as Sweden’s answer to The Beatles and often performed covers of international hits. Soon, Andersson was composing original material for them, and scored his first Swedish hit with No Response in 1965.

While touring, occasionally The Hep Stars would cross paths with folk-skiffle group The Hootenanny Singers, who featured Björn Ulvaeus as their songwriter and guitarist. In June 1966 the duo wrote their first song together, Isn’t It Easy to Say, which was recorded by The Hep Stars. The manager of The Hootenanny Singers (and later founder of Polar Music), Stig Anderson, encouraged them to write together more often. Andersson and Ulvaeus became friends and would occasionally join each other on stage in their respective bands, both of which were fracturing by 1969. Their first real hit together, written with Anderson, was Ljuva sextital (Sweet Sixties), recorded by Brita Borg that year.

Also in 1969, Andersson submitted Hej, Clown into Melodifestivalen 1969, the competition to decide Sweden’s Eurovision entry that year. He narrowly lost out, but he did meet a singer there called Anni-Frid Lyngstad, and within the month they had become a couple.

Lyngstad had become a jazz singer in 1967, winning national talent competition New Faces and appearing on television with the song En ledig dag (A Day Off). She signed with EMI Sweden and in early 1968 while appearing on TV she briefly met a singer named Agnetha Fältskog, who was performing her self-penned first single, Jag var så kär (I Was So in Love). A few months later Fältskog met Ulvaeus for the first time. In May 1969 they met again on a TV special and fell in love.

In 1970 Andersson and Ulvaeus recorded an album together called Lycka (Happiness). Both Lyngstad and Fältskog featured on the LP, with the latter co-writing a song. The two couples performed together for the first time while on holiday in Cyprus in an impromptu performance for soldiers stationed there. That November they presented a cabaret show, Festfolket (Party People) in Gothenburg, performing material by all four, but it was panned, and further collaborations were shelved, but not for long, as Hej, gamle man from Lycka, credited to Bjorn & Benny but featuring all four, became their first hit in Sweden.

Ulvaeus and Fältskog married in July 1971, and began performing live with Andersson regularly soon after. The collaborations became more frequent, and in 1972 the Swedish hit People Need Love was credited to Björn & Benny, Agnetha & Anni-Frid. Anderson had also encouraged them to make another attempt at entering Eurovision that year. They missed out again, but Säg det med en sång” (Say It with a Song), performed by Lena Anderson (another Anderson!), also did well in Sweden, and may have even done well in the US had it been on a bigger label.

In 1973, they tried for Eurovision again with Ring Ring, a direct, catchy pop song with interesting production techniques designed to emulate Phil Spector’s ‘Wall of Sound’, and English-translated lyrics by Neil Sedaka and Phil Cody. This was a good little pop song, but Eurovision still wasn’t ready for them. Despite that, it became the title track of their first album, credited to Björn Benny & Agnetha Frida. Anderson recognised this name was a bit unwieldy though, and began referring to them as ABBA, using the first letter of each member’s first name. It was also the name of a fish-canning company based in Gothenburg, and the band asked Abba for their blessing. They said it was fine as long as they didn’t do anything to make them feel shame for the association. I’m sure they were happy with the way things turned out.

In late 1973 the group was invited to take part in Melodifestivalen 1974, and set to work finding a song. They considered Hasta Mañana, sang by Fältskog, but decided to work on something that gave Fältskog and Lyngstad an equal chance to shine. Waterloo, originally titled Honey Pie, was inspired by the nostalgic rock’n’roll sound of Wizzard’s 1973 number 1 See My Baby Jive, and the lyrics came from Anderson.

Waterloo was a brave move for Eurovision, as at the time, the standard template was to use dramatic ballads, sung in the mother tongue of the country being represented. From 1973, the language rule was lifted, and Anderson and ABBA knew if they could garner a Eurovision win with an English language song, they could make it big beyond the competition.

Recording commenced on 17 December 1973, featuring regular ABBA session musicians Janne Schaffer on guitar (he wrote the guitar and bass parts), Rutger Gunnarsson on bass and Ola Brunkert on drums. Swedish and English versions were recorded, with German and French versions recorded in March and April 1974 respectively. The French version was adapted by Claude-Michel Schönberg, who later went on to co-write Les Misérables.

Review

I’ve a new-found appreciation of the fact Waterloo was something new for Eurovision, and I loved See My Baby Jive, so I should love the retro jive of Waterloo. The lyric is a clever conceit too – it’s a bold move to start a pop song in the mid-70s with ‘My my/At Waterloo Napoleon did surrender’ and to compare a historical moment with surrendering your love to someone. And I have always liked the way Andersson attacks the piano here. I just can’t love Waterloo, for some reason. I’d never listen to it by choice. One for the ‘admirable, but doesn’t connect with me’ pile.

But Waterloo connected like no Eurovision song ever had before with the public, or probably since. Credited to ABBA (Björn, Benny, Agnetha & Frida) in Sweden and ABBA (Björn, Benny, Anna & Frida) in the UK, it was released on 4 March, and on 6 April, they made history at The Dome in Brighton, rocking out in their glam rock-influenced outfits and huge platforms. The beautiful Faltskog particularly stood out – you could easily argue she may be the most beautiful woman to ever grace the pop world, without wishing to sound sexist. After winning the competition, ABBA partied all night in – of all places – the Napoleon suite of the Grand Brighton Hotel. Waterloo climbed the charts and a month later, they were number 1 in the UK. They also topped the charts all over Europe, and went top 10 in the US, but surprisingly didn’t hit number 1 in Sweden.

After

For a while however, it appeared ABBA could end up a one-hit wonder in the UK. Their second album, also named Waterloo, didn’t light up the charts, and a European tour led to cancelled dates due to poor ticket sales. Would ABBA become a footnote in 70s pop?

The Outro

Of course not. Waterloo was voted the best Eurovision song of all time at Congratulations: 50 Years of the Eurovision Song Contest in 2005.

The Info

Written by

Benny Andersson, Björn Ulvaeus & Stig Anderson

Producers

Benny Andersson & Björn Ulvaeus

Weeks at number 1

2 (4-17 May)

Trivia

Births

7 May: Singer Lynden David Hall

Deaths

9 May: Writer LTC Rolt

Meanwhile…

4 May: Liverpool win the FA Cup for the second time with a 3-0 victory over Newcastle in the final at Wembley, with two goals from Kevin Keegan and one from Steve Heighway.

6 May: The inauguration of full electric service on British Rail’s West Coast Main Line through to Glasgow.

17 May – The Loyalist paramilitary Ulster Volunteer Force carries out the Dublin and Monaghan bombings in the Republic of Ireland. 34 people died in the bombings, which caused the single deadliest death toll in the Troubles

329. Dawn (Featuring Tony Orlando) – Tie a Yellow Ribbon Round the Ole Oak Tree (1973)

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The Intro

These number 1s of the early-to-mid-70s seem to fall roughly into three categories. You have the teen pop idols like the Osmonds and David Cassidy, the glam rock movement for older teenage boys and girls and young adults, and then the really odd or bad, often old-fashioned easy listening-styled light entertainers, who must have been bought in their droves by older parents and grandparents. The difference between the three resulted in very disparate chart-toppers, and trawling through does at times make me miss the often wall-to-wall classics of the mid-60s.

So here’s another weird one, and the biggest of 1973, to boot. Two years after Dawn were at number 1 with Knock Three Times, here they were again, with singer Tony Orlando getting a credit this time around. Which is fair enough, considering Dawn were now him and backing singers Telma Hopkins and Joyce Vincent Wilson, settling on that line-up after the overwhelming sales of Knock Three Times required a stable act for live shows.

Before

Their first, eponymous album under their new name was released in 1971, and What Are You Doing Sunday was another big hit in the UK, reaching number three. Somehow 1972 passed with no chart entries, but they certainly made up for it with this track.

So what the hell is a song with a title like Tie a Yellow Ribbon Round the Ole Oak Tree all about? US songwriters Irwin Levine and L. Russell Brown were writing from the point of view of a convict whose sentence is up. He’s written to his woman and is wondering whether she wants him back or not after three years apart. If she does, he wants her to tie a yellow ribbon round a tree. Interestingly, they offered the song to Ringo Starr but Al Steckler of Apple Records found the idea ridiculous and told the duo they should be ashamed of themselves.

Is this song meant as a sequel to Knock Three Times? Let’s not forget that it concerned a guy seemingly stalking a woman who lived below her, who’d asked her to knock on the ceiling if she liked him. Perhaps he freaked her out and has been to jail over the situation? The punchline is, after asking the bus driver to check for him, as he’s too scared, the whole bus cheers, as there’s a hundred ribbons. So, either all is forgiven, and his old flame really loves him/really likes tying ribbons, or the dirty bugger has sent multiple letters to multiple women!

Weird as the premise is, it does have historical precedent, and has taken on new meaning since. A song, ‘Round Her Neck She Wears a Yeller Ribbon dates back hundreds of years, and in the 19th century, women would wear them in their hair as a sign to their partners serving in the US Cavalry. John Wayne starred in She Wore a Yellow Ribbon in 1949. Arguments over the song’s origin nearly caused Levine and Brown to face a court battle, when newspaper columnist Peter Hamill claimed they stole the idea from an article he wrote for the New York Post in 1971, in which students met an ex-con who was waiting for a yellow ribbon to be tied to a tree for real. It was turned into a TV movie in 1972. The lawsuit was dropped when Levine and Brown could prove how far back the idea went.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_dggAQk5peA

Review

It’s a very weird one, this. A happy, jolly ditty in which we’re meant to feel sympathetic towards a former prisoner, who may also be a serial shagger. Had they made him a solider, I might feel a bit more sympathy. Orlando’s performance is soulless. He doesn’t sound concerned in the slightest about this ribbon. Although, if he’s had a hundred women, I guess he thought the odds were in his favour he could look forward to more nookie. I’m hoping to never hear this again.

After

To say Tie a Yellow Ribbon Round the Ole Oak Tree was huge would be an understatement. It wasn’t just the UK that showed questionable taste – it was also number 1 in the US, Australia, Canada, Austria, Belgium, Ireland, Norway… the list goes on.

Following their next top 20 hit, Say, Has Anybody Seen My Sweet Gypsy Rose, the trio became known as Tony Orlando and Dawn. Their final top 40 entry was Who’s In the Strawberry Patch with Sally, also in 1973. But their popularity remained in the US, to the extent they even had their own variety show in 1974 called Tony Orlando and Dawn. He Don’t Love You (Like I Love You) was their second US number 1, in 1975, but their fortunes faded from then on.

In 1977, Dawn split. Orlando had issues with cocaine, obesity and depression, and he had recently lost his sister and close friend Freddie Prinze, who had committed suicide. Following a brief spell in an institution, he went solo and had a few hits before beginning a residency in Las Vegas and occasionally acting. Vincent and Hopkins also continued alone in showbiz, performing in concerts and making film and TV appearances respectively. The trio have reformed as Tony Orlando and Dawn several times.

The Outro

Tie a Yellow Ribbon Round the Ole Oak Tree has been covered by a multitude of artists, including Kay Starr, Dean Martin and even S Club 7. Connie Francis made an answer song in 1973 called The Answer (Should I Tie a Yellow Ribbon Round the Old Oak Tree?). The original became popular in the wake of the Iranian hostage crisis of 1981, and again during the People Power Revolution of the Phillipines in the early-80s. Yellow ribbons became popular during the Hong Kong protests of 2014, with pro-democracy protestors tying yellow ribbons to street railings and using them on social media. It doesn’t take a genius to work out that this song subsequently became, surely, one of the most unlikely protest songs there’s ever been.

The Info

Written by

Irwin Levine & L. Russell Brown

Producers

Hank Medress & Dave Appell

Weeks at number 1

4 (21 April-18 May) *BEST-SELLING SINGLE OF THE YEAR*

Trivia

Births

26 April: Radio host Geoff Lloyd/Footballer Chris Perry
10 May: Scottish race car driver Dario Franchitti

Deaths

9 May: Singer Owen Brannigan
11 May: Cricketer Russell Everitt
14 May: Philosopher AC Ewing

Meanwhile…

28 April: Liverpool and Celtic were crowned football league champions in England and Scotland respectively.

1 May: 1.6 million workers went on strike over government pay restraints.

5 May: BBC Two aired the first edition of the landmark documentary series The Ascent of Man.

5 May: The FA Cup final stunned football fans when Sunderland AFC defeated Leeds United 1-0 at Wembley Stadium. It was the first time an FA Cup winning team had not contained a player to be capped at full international level, and the first postwar FA Cup to be won by a side outside the First Division.

10 May: Jeremy Thorpe’s Liberal Party took control of Liverpool council in the local council elections. 

15 May: Prime Minister Edward Heath coined the phrase ‘unacceptable face of capitalism’ to describe payments made by conglomerate Lonrho to Duncan Sandys through the tax haven of the Cayman Islands. Little did he know at the time how much further down that road his party would go.

312. The Pipes and Drums and the Military Band of the Royal Scots Dragoon Guards (Carabiniers & Greys) Bandmaster W.O.I.CI. Herbert. Pipe Major W.O.II. J. Pryde – Amazing Grace (1972)

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The Intro

There are many baffling number 1s scattered through the years of the singles chart. This must be one of the biggest mysteries. Not only did The Pipes and Drums and the Military Band of the Royal Scots Dragoon Guards topple Without You from number 1 with their instrumental cover of the Christian hymn Amazing Grace – it became the biggest seller of 1972.

Before

One of the oldest known songs to reach the top spot, Amazing Grace dates back to 1772, when the words were first written by English poet and clergyman John Newton. He grew up a wayward soul, narrowly avoiding death several times and each time hoping to repent and become closer to God, before reverting to his old ways. He was pressed into the Royal Navy, but would take advantage of chances to overstay his leave, and he deserted to visit a lover. Because of this, he was traded as crew to a slave ship, and began a career in slave trading. How very unholy. Newton had a taste of his own medicine however. After falling out with crew members and writing obscene poems about the ship’s captain, he would be chained up like the slaves on the ship.

In 1748, the ship Greyhound was hit by a terrible storm and nearly capsized. Newton, who had been reading religious texts beforehand, exclaimed ‘Lord have mercy upon us!’. When the Greyhound was finally safe, Newton pondered if, indeed, God had saved them. Not that this was enough to convert him instantly – Newton married his lover, but remained in the slave trade for a while.

In 1756 the Newtons were living in Liverpool, and he became obsessed with religion. Eight years later Newton was offered the curacy of the small village of Olney in Buckinghamshire. He befriended a gifted writer, William Cowper, and became interested in writing hymns. The duo decided to present a new poem or hymn at each weekly prayer meeting. Newton wrote the lyrics in late 1772 and they were likely first read on New Year’s Day 1773. A collection of their work, Olney Hymns, was bound and published anonymously in 1779. ‘1 Chronicles 17:16–17, Faith’s Review and Expectation’ was the name of the hymn that began with ‘Amazing grace! (how sweet the sound)’.

Olney Hymns became very popular in Britain with evangelicals, although Amazing Grace wasn’t among the ones widely used. It was in the early-19th-century religious revival of communal singing in the US that it caught on. Nobody knows what, if any, music the hymn was set to initially, but the first known instance had it set to the tune Hephzibah by English composer John Husband in 1808. There were 20 differing versions until 1835 when American composer William Walker assigned Newton’s words to the song New Britain. His tunebook Southern Harmony, published in 1847, was a huge seller, and this became the definitive Amazing Grace, of which there are over a thousand recorded versions, including this one.

The first known recorded version was an a cappella performance by the Sacred Harp Choir in 1922. It was US gospel singer Mahalia Jackson’s 1947 recording that revived Amazing Grace in the 20th century and turned it into, ironically, a song used by African Americans to express their joy at being delivered from slavery. From there it became ever more popular for political reasons during the civil rights movement and opposition to the Vietnam War.

Folk singer Judy Collins (strangely credited for the song on the original vinyl by the Royal Scots Dragoon Guards) witnessed the song’s power on a civil rights march in 1964 and began performing it regularly. She recorded it a cappella for her 1970 album Whales & Nightingales and claimed it helped her through her alcohol dependency. It became a big hit, reaching number five in the UK.

And somehow this song that was used as a means of protest against war made its way to the Royal Scots Dragoon Guards. This cavalry regiment of the British Army was formed on 2 July at Holyrood, Edinburgh. Some time after, the pipes and drums recorded an LP, arranged by Stuart Fairbarn, based on Collins’ version. According to a 1972 article by The New York Times, late-night DJs picked this track from the album The Amazing Sound of the Royal Scots Dragoon Guards and it grew in popularity, which must surely have come as a surprise even at the time.

Review

Clearly, there must have been a love for bagpipes in the UK in the 70s, as this number 1 can’t help but bring to mind the fact that Mull of Kintyre, five years later, became one of the biggest-sellers of all time. Why was this? I can find no point of reference upon investigation. This wasn’t the theme for a TV show or film, for example. I wonder if, in the light of The Troubles, the English felt closer to the Scottish? Was the news of all the violence in Northern Ireland making people turn to Scottish culture? Quite possibly – but if so, how do you explain the fact it also went to number 1 in Australia, Canada, New Zealand and South Africa?

Personally speaking, I’m ok with bagpipes, which can be somewhat divisive. I like the droning quality they bring to music. My favourite use is when they appear unexpectedly on Parliament’s beautiful cover of Ruth Copeland’s The Silent Boatman. And who doesn’t love Amazing Grace? Difficult song to get wrong, and it’s tastefully done, with Pipe Major Tony Crease’s solo mirroring Collins’ voice. But after two listens, I’m no clearer to understanding just how this became the year’s biggest single.

After

Despite its huge success in 1972, the Pipe Major at the time was summoned to Edinburgh Castle for a telling off for demeaning the bagpipes. As the money rolled in, there must have been a softening of the rules as, The Royal Scots Dragoon Guards have released many albums since, including a remake of this song.

The Outro

The irony of reading how a song by a slave trader became so important to black people as the Black Lives Matter movement rages on around me hasn’t escaped me. I wonder if this song will soon be #cancelled along with the statues of racists, or whether it will escape the understandable anger due to its ubiquitous use in the black community.

The Info

Written by

Traditional

Producer

Pete Kerr

Weeks at number 1

5 (15 April-19 May) *BEST-SELLING SINGLE OF THE YEAR*

Trivia

Births

16 April: Motorcycle racer John McGuinness
17 April: Racewalker Vicky Lupton
22 April: Actress Sarah Patterson
2 May: Footballer Paul Adcock
3 May: Broadcast journalist Katya Adler
5 May: Olympic rower James Cracknell

Deaths

11 May: Poet EV Rieu

Meanwhile…

19 April: Lord Chief Justice Lord Widgery exonerated the British troops who opened fire on Bloody Sunday of blame, saying the demonstration had been illegal.

30 April: The Brighton Belle Pullman car train made its final journey from London to Brighton.

3 May: In the first ever UEFA Cup final, Tottenham Hotspur beat Wolverhampton Wanderers 2-1 in the first leg at the Molineux in Wolverhampton.

6 May: Leeds United won the FA Cup for first time, defeating 1971 winners Arsenal 1-0 at Wembley Stadium.

8 May: Derby County won the Football League’s First Division title for the first time.

12 May: The Crown Court, established by the Courts Act 1971, replaced the Assize and Quarter Sessions in England and Wales. Also this day, property qualifications requiring jurors to be householders were abolished.  

17 May: Spurs completed a 3-2 aggregate win over Wolverhampton Wanderers at White Hart Lane to win the first UEFA Cup.

18 May: Queen Elizabeth II met her ill uncle, Edward, Duke of Windsor for the last time, at his Paris home.

299. Dave and Ansil Collins – Double Barrel (1971)

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The Intro

‘I, AM THE MAGNIFICENT!’. After six weeks at the top, T. Rex’s Hot Love made way for the first reggae number 1 since Desmond Dekker & the Aces’ Israelites in 1969, and one of two to come from Trojan Records, Britain’s most famous label for reggae, dub and ska artists.

Before

The label’s origins trace back to 1968, when Island records boss Chris Blackwell and Musicland’s Lee Gopthal pooled their resources and launched a devoted reggae sub-label. The name came from the Trojan truck used by Duke Reid as a sound system in Jamaica, which became known as ‘the Trojan sound’.

With the growing interest in reggae and ska in the UK and the rise of skinhead culture, by 1970 Trojan Records had scored several hits by artists including The Maytals, Lee ‘Scratch’ Perry’s Upsetters, and The Harry J All Stars. They did so by licensing Jamaican 7′ records by producers such as Reid and Leslie Kong. Dave and Ansell Collins were the lucky duo thrown together to record Double Barrel.

Dave, aka Dave Barker (my dad’s name) was a session vocalist, born David John Crooks on 10 October 1947 in Kingston, Jamaica. Crooks was raised by his grandmother and three uncles from the age of four. He developed a stammer as a result of beatings as a child, but by the time he was a teenager he was interested in singing, thanks to American radio stations playing James Brown.

Crook’s first group was The Two Tones, and from there he briefly joined The Techniques, led by his future producer Winston Riley. While one half of the duo Glen and Dave and working at Studio One, he was introduced to Perry, who took him on as a regular singer. It was Perry that told him to change his name to Dave Barker, and he also encouraged him to adopt his toasting style, in which he would shout over songs in the style of a US disc jockey and make grand pronouncements like the first line of this blog, which introduces Double Barrel. Which brings us to the other half of Dave and Ansil Collins – confusingly, musician Ansel Collins (his name was spelt differently on the record’s release).

Collins, born 1949, also in Kingston, began his career as a drummer before moving to keyboards in the mid-60s. At the end of the decade he was a member of The Invincibles alongside Sly Dunbar. Collins also played on two of The Maytals’ greatest tracks, Pressure Drop and Sweet and Dandy, both from 1969. He also began to work with Perry around this time, and it’s likely this is how Barker and Collins met.

Riley had written the instrumental Double Barrel and probably contacted his old colleague Barker to toast over the top while Collins provided organ and piano. Dunbar makes his recording debut on drums here, several years before becoming one half of Sly and Robbie with Robbie Shakespeare.

Review

Double Barrel is essentially very similar to The Harry J All Stars’ excellent instrumental The Liquidator from 1969. It’s a charming, quirky reggae/rocksteady track led by Collins’ nimble work at the piano, with organ at times. What made it edge to the top when The Liquidator (which is a superior tune) didn’t is likely down to Dave. His showing off at the start really gets your attention, and makes it one of the most memorable intros since The Crazy World of Arthur Brown’s Fire. Clearly, shouting before the music starts is the way to go, even if in Dave’s case, it’s not always clear what the hell he’s on about. He’s the Magnificent W-O-O-O, I get that, but the rest is vague due to the echo… something about soul, I think. Anyway, whatever it is, Dave’s enthusiasm is infectious, particularly ‘break’ (I think) over and over on the beat, and in a way you could see this as a forerunner of hip-hop thanks to his toasting. Double Barrel is short, sweet, and a nice taste of something different to mix things up a bit. 70s record buyers had their faults, but one look at 1971’s number 1s proves they were an eclectic bunch.

After

Dave and Collins also released an LP together called Double Barrel, and one of the tracks, Monkey Spanner, made it to number seven later that year. Dave’s intro this time ‘This is the heavy, heavy monster sound!’, combined with ‘Don’t watch that, watch this!’ from an earlier track he worked on, Funky Funky Reggae, were adopted by Chas Smash on the intro to Madness’s brilliant One Step Beyond in 1979.

The Outro

The duo parted company after this, bar a short-lived reunion in 1981. Barker remained in England and joined the vocal group Chain Reaction. He’s appeared on stage with The Selecter and The Riffs.

Collins continued as a session musician and solo artist at times, working with some of the world’s foremost reggae and dub artists, including Jimmy Cliff, Black Uhuru, Prince Tubby, Augustus Pablo and Prince Far I. He also collaborated with fellow UK number 1 star Serge Gainsbourg.

The Info

Written & produced by

Winston Riley

Weeks at number 1

2 (1-14 May)

Trivia

Births

9 May: Footballer Jason Lee/Oasis bassist Paul McGuigan

Deaths

1 May: RMS Titanic survivor Violet Jessop

Meanwhile…

1 May: Far-Left militants The Angry Brigade struck again when a bomb exploded in fashion company Biba’s Kensington store.
Also that day, the Daily Mail appeared as a broadsheet newspaper for the last time. It relaunched as a tabloid the day after.

8 May: Arsenal won the FA Cup final with a 2–1 win over Liverpool at Wembley Stadium. Arsenal’s Eddie Kelly became the first substitute to score in an FA Cup final, and this was only the second time that century (and the fourth time ever) that an English team had completed the double of the Football League First Division and the FA Cup.

11 May: Britain’s oldest tabloid newspaper, the Daily Sketch, was withdrawn from circulation after 62 years. It was absorbed by the Daily Mail.