She Wears Red Feathers

12. Guy Mitchell – Look at That Girl (1953)

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The Intro

The majority of number 1 singles so far have been a bit on the serious side, with maudlin ballads often ruling the roost. Finally, after Frankie Laine’s I Believe‘s final three-week stint at the top (making a record-breaking total of 18), cheeky chap Guy Mitchell was back. Thankfully, this time he’s avoiding the slight racism of She Wears Red Feathers, too.

Before

Bob Merrill, one of the era’s chief hitmakers, totted up a third number 1 songwriting credit here, after also being responsible for Mitchell’s She Wears Red Feathers and Lita Roza’s (How Much is) That Doggie in the Window?. With producing supremo Mitch Mitchell also back on board, Look at That Girl went to number 1 on 11 September and stayed there for an impressive six weeks.

Review

https://youtu.be/aE2mb_Lo9aY

Less impressive is the song itself. Yes, finally something a bit more light-hearted, but despite the bounciness of the tune and Mitchell giving it his all, it’s easily forgotten. A few things are of note though. Firstly, the lyrics are almost saucy, certainly if you compare them to previous number ones, although that’s not saying much.

‘Look at that girl, you see what I see
Oh look at that girl, she’s walking straight to me
That’s right, last night I held her tight
Ho ho it happens all the time
I look at that girl, and I can’t believe she’s mine’

Mitchell, you dirty dog! This is explicit, by 1953 standards. Also, Look at That Girl features two elements that would become pop staples in years to come, and haven’t featured in number ones yet. Handclaps! And, best of all, a guitar solo!

After

Obvious ingredients to pop tunes yet they sounded almost shocking when I first heard this, after what had come before. It was an unusual piece for Mitchell as well, who was more used to performing novelty songs. Just like She Wears Red Feathers, Look at That Girl was also more successful in the UK than the US. It didn’t even chart there, and it marked the end of the success for Mitchell, Merrill and Miller as a trio together. With names like that, perhaps they should have become a law firm.

The Info

Written by

Bob Merrill

Producer

Mitch Miller

Weeks at number 1

6 (11 September-22 October)

Trivia

Births

12 October: Comedian Les Dennis
21 October: Labour MP Peter Mandelson

Deaths

30 September: Physicist Lewis Fry Richardson

Meanwhile…

26 September: The government had sweet news when they ended post-war sugar rationing. Slowly, but surely, the UK was sweeping off the post-war malaise.

8. Lita Roza – (How Much is) That Doggie in the Window? (1953)

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The Intro

Here’s one we all know. (How Much is) That Doggie in the Window? is known to most as a timeless nursery rhyme rather than a chart-topper. It is about as far removed from a modern number 1 as it’s possible to get, but children of every generation since have grown up with it and loved it, including my own daughters.

Before

(How Much is) That Doggie in the Window? was written by Bob Merrill, author of the tacky She Wears Red Feathers, number 1 by Guy Mitchell a month previously. Loosely based on a folk song called Carnival of Venice, an earlier version, The Doggie in the Window, sung by one of the most famous singers of the 50s, Patti Page, is still the most well-known, and hit number 1 on the Billboard charts in the US, selling millions. But it didn’t make it to number one in the UK. Enter Lita Roza.

Roza, born Lilian Patricia Lita Roza on 14 March 1926, hailed from Liverpool. She credited her passion for music to her father, an accordionist and pianist. He was of Filipino ancestry, which is where Roza’s sultry looks originated too.

Her desire to make it in show business was with her as a child. Aged 12 she became a dancer, at 15 she was working with a comedian, and she first became a singer a year later. Roza signed up with The Harry Roy Orchestra in London but by the time she was 18 she had quit and moved to America with her new husband. The marriage was short-lived and shortly after World War Two she returned to the UK.

Roza became a singer with The Ted Heath Jazz Band and juggled this with a burgeoning solo career. She regularly topped polls in Melody Maker and the New Musical Express for best female singer.

A creditable artist, she didn’t want to record a novelty record, but her A&R, Dick Rowe, nagged her until she relented. However, she insisted on singing it in only one take, and refused to ever perform it live. Roza claimed in a 2004 interview that she kept her word, and so she began a long tradition of artists who hate the song they become best known for. Nonetheless, it immortalised her as the first UK solo act to become number 1.

Review

Listening to her cover alongside Patti Page’s (not something I can see myself doing more than once), I prefer Roza’s, as she sings with much less affectation than Page. Despite overfamiliarity (in a strange way, as how often have I heard it as an adult?), I can’t help but like this.

After

She remained popular until rock’n’roll took off, when she moved into TV work, and also appeared in the Eurovision Song Contest heats from 1957, 1959 and 1960.

However, Roza clearly had some affection or appreciation of (How Much is) That Doggie in the Window? as when she died she left £300,000 in her will to charities. £190,000 of this went to dog-related charities: Battersea Dogs and Cats Home, The Guide Dogs for the Blind Association and The Cinnamon Trust.

The Outro

She passed away on 14 August 2008, aged 82.

The Info

Written by

Bob Merrill

Producer

Dick Rowe

Weeks at number 1

1 (17-23 April)

Trivia

Births

20 April: Novelist Sebastian Faulks

7. The Stargazers – Broken Wings (1953)

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The Info

The ‘comic’ stylings of She Wears Red Feathers was knocked from number 1 on 10 April, and we were back to appropriately mournful ballad territory, but for the first time, it was a British vocal group.

Before

The Stargazers went through several incarnations following their inception in 1949. The original line-up consisted of Dick James, Cliff Adams, Marie Benson, Fred Datchler and Ronnie Milne. 

The Stargazers became famous via their appearances on radio shows of the era, including The Family Hour and The Goon Show. By 1953 James had departed. He went on to be a music publisher, establishing Dick James Music in 1961 and becoming one of the founders of The Beatles publishing arm, Northern Songs in 1963. Bob Brown replaced him in the group.

Review

Broken Wings has not aged well. Written by John Jerome and Bernard Gunn, the lyrics point out correctly that with broken wings, no bird can fly. The subject of the song has been let down by their lover, who has been unfaithful.

‘With broken wings, no bird can fly
And broken promises mean love must fade and die
I trusted you, you can”t be true
My heart no longer sings
It”s wings are broken too’.

Musically, The Stargazers’ cover is a dirge, with only two points of interest. One is the sparse instrumentation, dominated by an electric piano. Very different to what had been top of the pops up to this point. Second is that the producer was Dick Rowe, the man who famously said ‘Guitar groups are on their way out, Mr Epstein’ when The Beatles failed their audition for Decca. He made up for his mistake by signing, among others, The Rolling Stones, Them, Tom Jones and Small Faces.

The Outro

If you want to hear a catchier song called Broken Wings, there is of course, this track by Mr Mister.

The Info

Written by

John Jerome & Bernard Gunn

Producer

Dick Rowe

Weeks at number 1

1 (10-16 April)

Trivia

Births

11 April: Mathematician Andrew Wiles 
13 April: Labour MP Stephen Byers 

Meanwhile…

13 April: Ian Fleming’s first James Bond novel, Casino Royale, was published, beginning an almighty cultural legacy.

6. Guy Mitchell with Mitch Miller & His Orchestra & Chorus – She Wears Red Feathers (1953)

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The Intro

Hmm. Novelty songs were all the rage back in the 50s. I’ve nothing against novelty songs if done right, but these early ones came way before anyone had even thought of political correctness. She Wears Red Feathers is the bizarre tale of an English banker’s love for a hula-hula girl, who apparently ‘lives on just cokey-nuts and fish from the sea’. The banker and his love get married in a ceremony involving an elephant and baboons playing bassoons… clearly, the weirdest number 1 up to this point.

This song didn’t do great in the US, but the British have always had a more eccentric sense of humour, and they welcomed it with open arms and sent cheeky US crooner and actor Guy Mitchell’s version to number 1 on 13 March.

Before

Mitchell’s real name was Albert George Cernik. The son of Croatian immigrants (parents who immigrated to the US seems to be a common theme among many of these early number 1 stars) was born on 22 February 1927. Cernik was signed to Warner Brothers Pictures when only 11 to sing and act.

During World War Two he served in the US navy before accepting an invitation to join Carmen Cavallaro’s big band, but solo stardom was right around the corner when he, like Al Martino, won the radio talent show Arthur Godfrey’s Talent Scouts in 1949. A year later he signed with Columbia, where Mitch Miller took him under his wing and dubbed him Guy Mitchell, because he seemed like a nice guy. Debut single My Heart Cries for You made him an instant success, narrowly missing out on the top spot in America. His first hit in the UK, the bizarre Feet Up (Pat Him on the Po-Po), was the first ever number two in the singles chart.

Review

Despite the lyrics to She Wears Red Feathers being highly questionable, (‘cokey-nuts’ is performed by Mitchell in a ‘comedy’ accent), the chorus is memorable. It’s the sort of tune you can imagine Nigel Farage singing after a skinful.

Worryingly, it’s the earliest number 1 I have heard. It’s been lurking somewhere in the dark corners of my mind all this time, as I recognised the title when I came upon it and the chorus started up in my brain automatically. I’ve no idea where I heard it. We certainly didn’t own a copy, so it must have been in a film or TV show.

The song was created in 1952 (all these early number ones so far have actually dated from the previous year) by US songsmith Bob Merrill. Merrill had an astounding hit rate and was the second most successful songwriter of the decade in this country. He co-wrote If I Knew You Were Comin’ I’d’ve Baked a Cake with Al Hoffman and Clem Watts in 1950, and specialised in comical, catchy tunes.

Merrill and Mitchell worked very well together, especially when produced by Mitch Miller, who was renowned for inventiveness and gimmickry. Miller hated rock’n’roll when it came about, calling it ‘musical baby food’, and he turned both Elvis Presley and the Beatles down. Not exactly forward-thinking, Mitch.

However, back in the early 50s, Mitchell, Merrill and Miller could do no wrong, and Mitchell scored another three number 1s.

The Outro

Glam rockers Mud recorded an awful cover of She Wears Red Feathers in the 70s, when being PC still didn’t matter, and you can hear it here, if you really need to.

The Info

Written by

Bob Merrill

Producer

Mitch Miller

Weeks at number 1

4 (13 March-9 April)

Trivia

Births

26 March: Author Christopher Fowler

Deaths

24 March: Queen Mary
6 April: Poet Idris Davies

Meanwhile…

24 March: Queen Mary, consort of the deceased King George V, died peacefully in her sleep.
On the same day, the discovery of several bodies at 10 Rillington Place shocked the country. The murderer, John Christie, had moved out four days earlier, leaving several bodies hidden around the house. He had killed at least eight people, including his wife Ethel.

31 March: Both the funeral of Queen Mary and the arrest of Christie took place. Mary had insisted that the Coronation of Queen Elizabeth II should not be delayed in the event of her death. The trial of Christie, later in the year, revealed a terrible miscarriage of justice in which a husband and father had been wrongly sentenced to death by hanging.