I Listen to All The Music

Hello Susie - Amen Corner (peaked at Number 4)

Not to be confused with the Everly Brother's Wake Up Little Susie, this is a fresh number from everybody's favourite Welsh rockers. And true to form, this is a high-energy, bop-your-head number, lots of energy and bite to it, with some rocking guitar mixing with horns and some really solid drumming. With Andrew Fairweather Low wailing away over the top, giving it his all in his gloriously Welsh accent, you've got something that I do kind of like.

I will say, it's quite hard to parse what Andrew's actually singing, though, which does somewhat obscure the fact that the lyrics are actually telling a story. It's a bit of a strangely-told one, though. People are sat around waiting for somebody, a red carpet has been laid out as they're all waiting for her to come. But then looking through the band I see her waving her hands at me. This is Susie, who runs over, causing a scene. But I don't think the red carpet's for Susie, I think the band's actually meant to be playing at a royal visit of some kind? Hence the line about how her arrival shook the crowd enough to sway the interest from the queen. But it's not really made very obvious. Susie's then playing a transistor radio, I think, drowning out the band entirely, loud enough to stop the show. Very specific, very weird, not very clear at all.

But whatever, the second half of the song is just the chorus repeated, and this is definitely the most enjoyable part of it, that repeated hello Susie, hello Susie, tell me the news about yourself / Hello Susie. hello Susie, tell me that you've enjoyed yourself. It's a big, dumb line, catchy and bright and probably fun to scream with your friends in sing-along fashion. I suspect, as I often do with this kind of song, that anybody actually called Susie must have gotten heartily sick of this song about a week after it hit the charts. You just know that all of their friends and family spent a month just periodically popping up like "hello Susie, hello Susie!"

Honky Tonk Women - The Rolling Stones (1)

And then, the Rolling Stones. It's been a while, hasn't it? A quick google tells me it's been just over a year, in fact, and without even any lower-charting hits in-between, just Jumpin' Jack Flash at Number 1 and then nothing for a full year, and then this. What were they doing in the intervening time? Well, they did release an album, Beggar's Banquet, back in December, plus they were touring a bunch. Oh, and founding member Brian Jones left the band and then died, so they had to find a replacement. Which sounds like a mess, I can't blame them for not putting a tonne of singles out in-between all that, honestly.

Whatever the case, this is a heck of a track to come back with. In some ways it's the Rolling Stones going back to their country rock roots, with a song that feels very American, electric, but very bluesy, all about a man drinking in some old Western saloon-style bar, unable to get his ex off his mind. It starts sparse, just a cowbell and a pounding drum beat, but then the guitar kicks in with a riff that will carry the song. Once the vocals come in, you get these noodly little fills between the lines, and by the time you hit the chorus, it's all in double-time and you've got backing harmonies, it's a satisfying way to amp the energy up. Throw in a good old-fashioned sax solo, and you've got a proper rock and roll song, one that gets into a cool groove and just rides it all the way to the end.

But the strongest bit of this might be the lyrics, which conjure up an evocative image of this sleazy world of dive bar prostitution, or at least the sort of disreputable ladies you get hanging round that kind of establishment, as Mick Jagger sings nasally and kind of disjointedly about how I met a gin-soaked barroom queen in Memphis / She tried to take me upstairs for a ride / She had to heave me right across her shoulder / 'Cause I just can't seem to drink you off my mind. This is a lot. It's raunchy, but there's also almost a comedy element to it, as you imagine this delicate, pretty barroom beauty heaving Mick around like a sack of potatoes, very no-nonsense, very un-ladylike. And the physicality of it's also really obvious.

We then jump to New York, but it's the same story, with a divorcée who covers him in roses, and then she blew my nose and then she blew my mind. Again, we've got the contrast of the glamour of a lusty New York divorcée, a private apartment, a carpet of roses, and then in one of the smuttiest but also one of the grossest lines we've encountered yet, this coy and kind of prosaic way of describing what's clearly meant to be a sexual encounter (she blew your "mind", sure Mick). Like the last vignette, it's very physical, very unsentimental and honestly, Mick doesn't seem all that into it. Yes, his mind is blown, he clearly enjoys whatever she's doing. But he doesn't sound like a very active participant. And this despite that fact that if we take "honky-tonk women" to be prostitutes, he's quite possibly paying them for the pleasure. But he's so fixated on the song's mysterious addressee that he comes off as disengaged, letting these drunken hook-ups unfold without ever really pursuing it, it's just a distraction, unable to really fix the underlying issue.

(I should also say here that there was also reportedly a third verse that only ever got performed live which featured Mick wandering the streets of Paris naked, and taking up with a whole group of sailors - evidently this was too controversial to commit to vinyl, and fair enough, I'm genuinely not sure that 1969 was ready for that, much as the Stones did like pushing boundaries. Imagine if they had though...well. What a world that would be.)

Two proper rockers, this week. Which is nice, I'm still a rock girl at heart. One felt like it had significantly more to say than the other, though, I'm afraid. Even if we did have to put up with the gross nose-blowing line. Also, the Rolling Stones continue to be weird about women. But that's almost a given at this point, and honestly, I think Mick comes off this one looking as bad if not worse than the titular honky-tonk women.

A Way of Life - The Family Dogg (peaked at Number 6)

Okay, okay. I guess we're doing mellow, folksy pop rock? At least as thus one starts, it's firmly in a very chill, stripped-back mode, soft warbly vocals layered over a strummy guitar, as we get a sort of overview of life, with cowboys playing, / Young men slaying, / Old men praying / The world will change, followed by schoolgirls dating, / Daughters mating, / Mothers waiting / To rearrange.

I'm not sure what the mothers are rearranging here, or what view of the world exactly's being proposed. The opening lines suggest a young man growing up, learning violence, regretting it as an old man, which made me think at first that this was going to be a protest song, but the lines about the lady growing up just seems to be a very bland, stereotypical vision of a woman's "natural" trajectory towards wifedom and motherhood, with no obvious critique there. The lines following it about trainee workers and how social nurture won't let you down feels borderline socialist, but the song doesn't really stick the landing, dissolving into some rather strangely conservative lines about how at the end of the day you've just got to accept your lot in life, that you shouldn't get ideas above your station: tinker, tailor, soldier, sailor / Rich or poor man's wife / Some may wish to change their dish / But it's a way of life.

It's all very wet, isn't it? That's my main impression of this song. Lyrically and musically it's exceptionally dull for the entire first minute or two. Periodically you get some new vocalists, there's some ladies once the chorus comes in, but the end result's just a more boring version of the same sound that the Seekers were repping a full half-decade ago. Very lame. There's a slightly more fun bit in the middle, as the pace suddenly ramps up and you've got these jaunty congas and horns, some slightly Latin rhythms, but even then, it's nothing Tom Jones hasn't already done and better. Plus it only lasts, what, thirty seconds? There is one cheeky line in the middle that gave me a bit of a double take, where it tells you to be good to your wife in bed / And look after the art of living / And don't forget you're a long time dead. But somehow even this feels cringey more than it feels edgy, I'd honestly really rather they'd left it out.

Ah well. Only one other notable thing about this song, which is that it features the omnipresent Jimmy Page as a session musician, as well as possibly some other future Led Zeppelin members. Elton John also apparently guested somewhere on the album, though I can't work out if it was this track or another. I kind of hope it was another, Elton's better than this. Jimmy too, but I've just accepted at this point that he's in everything.

Frozen Orange Juice - Peter Sarstedt (10)

Now this is a bit more like it, a proper, jaunty, interesting track. Last time we heard from Peter, it was with Where Do You Go To (My Lovely), which I did enjoy as a snapshot of what people in 1969 found glamorous, but it also fell headlong into every sentimental Parisian cliché imaginable, down to the busker's accordion playing a faux-traditional waltz. It also felt kind of unnecessarily mean in the way it treated its subject, the suddenly rich and successful Marie-Claire. Fortunately, Peter seems to have learnt his lesson here, and I think the song's much better for it. Sure, he's on his travels again, this time in Madrid, but we've got no cheesy Spanish touches, no catalogue of clichés, and perhaps best of all, no obvious disdain for Peter's lover, this time round.

What that leaves is honestly quite a cute song. I love how specific Peter gets about what him and his love are getting up to on their holidays, as he sings about how I'll buy you one more frozen orange juice / On this fantastic day / We'll walk the sunny hills of Madrid / Laughing all the way. The details of the frozen orange juice is so specific, but it's exactly what you want when the weather's hot (take it from me, who weirdly enough froze a bunch of Capri-Suns last weekend, it's great!). And the niche, precise details continue. His love wants to run down a ravine, just for a lark, so they do that. I'll pick a flower from the road, he sings, and place it in your heart. They hold their breath together, and the echoes of the day will ring in Peter's head for good, you rescue me, I'll rescue, and that's it, that's the song. It's simple, it's effective, it feels romantic, but also very real and believable.

Yeah, good vibes all round here. I particularly like the little touches in the instruments, the glockenspiel, the twittering flutes, the harp glissandos. It's almost cartoonish, the sort of instruments that you'd use in an episode of Tom and Jerry or whatever to signal that they'd died and ascended to heaven. But it's subtly done, enough that it doesn't feel cheesy. Add in some other, weirder sounds, some steel guitar, a chugging, surprisingly heavy set of chords in the background on acoustic guitar and later on cello and even bassoon, plus what sounds like a vibraslap playing lightly but very consistently over the top of it all, and you've got something that sounds distinctive and interesting. And that's before it dissolves into a mess of Peters harmonising with themselves, repeating the frozen orange juice line again and again ad infinitum... it's nice.

Frozen Orange Juice feels very seasonally appropriate. It's a pretty, sunny song, perfect for early July, right as summer begins to heat up, as people start to dream of holidays in the sun, of sweeping holiday romances. A perfectly timed track, and I really do like the little glimpse it gives into a moment, imagined or otherwise, an impression of a time and a place captured between all these tiny, precise moments and details. Makes me want to go visit Madrid. Compare and contrast to Way Of Life, whose "timeless" wisdom didn't speak to me at all, except in that it made me roll my eyes at it, repeatedly.

Something in the Air - Thunderclap Newman (peaked at Number 1)

This song starts like you're easing into a warm bath, with a soft fade-in, lots of fuzzy guitar, washy cymbals, a guitar solo, all very smooth and warm-sounding. And then the lyrics, as the band - because Thunderclap Newman was a band, and not a person, as I'd initially assumed - encourage their listeners to call out the instigators / Because there's something in the air / We got to get it together sooner or later / Because the revolution's here. At which point you realise that yes, this is yet another hippie song! A full summer after the big hippie moment that was the Summer of Love, we're still basking in the afterglow of it all, I guess, calling for revolution, with the Marseillaise interpolated near the end, just in case you hadn't got the message.

Except there's something a little uneasy about the lyrics, they're not exactly as peace and love as you might expect. I mean, calling out the instigators already feels quite accusatory, and we've got lines later on about locking up streets and houses, handing out arms and ammo, we're gonna blast our way through here. Which is a little weird, right? Last year's hippie anthems seemed to have an unfailing confidence in the revolution's eventual success. Free love was infectious, there was something almost inevitable about it, it's just that all those squares hadn't caught on yet, but they would, you got the sense, all round the world they'd get onboard. Whereas Thunderclap Newman sound much less certain. We got to get it together, they sing, and you get the sense of a "before it's too late" that they're glossing over. And if you think about it, it's hardly a surprise. The optimistic, shiny version had its moment and faded from the public eye, you can't go back to it and pretend that didn't happen. The ideas are still in vogue. But the framing has to change, and that's what we're getting here, a hippie anthem written purposely for The Summer After the Summer of Love.

And the sound's different, too, much less psychedelic and weird, not a hint of sitar, no trippy lyrics. Instead, this is just a solid soft rock song, lots of guitar. The vocals sound a little bit Bee Gees-ish (with the usual caveat that I'm bad at voices) and there's a wonderful, melancholy chromatic descending bassline that feels very Beatles-y to me, doubly so when it later gets doubled by strings and a pretty flute or possibly Mellotron set of harmonies. There's a cheesy key change, but it does at least happen early enough in the song to really settle into the new key and enjoy it. Also, halfway through there's an absolutely deranged break on a bar-room piano that sounds genuinely like whoever was playing it might have straight-up broken the poor thing, he's really hammering away there. Add in a honky sax and some clapping and a brief moment of boogie-woogie, and it's a gloriously quirky moment that somehow only makes the original melody feel more epic, when it comes back in at the end.

Break Away - The Beach Boys (6)

Ooh, another lesser Beach Boys hit! I've been increasingly convinced that I need to just sit down and listen to their back catalogue, including (or especially?) their rogue late-career albums. Because there's been some delightfully quirky stuff recently. Break Away was recorded for release ahead of new album project, Sunflower, which seems to be a rare moment where the Beach Boys were working well together, creatively. Brian's mental health was still bad, but it does sound like he was in a better place than last time we checked in with him. There were problems with the record label, and the Manson murders were a short month or two away, which would briefly make the Beach Boys into pariahs within the industry, but generally this is a point where the band seem to have been doing well for themselves. So, is this Beach Boys at their best?

Unclear, but it does sound really cool. There's a very doo-wop feel to this one, my immediate thought on hitting play was that it actually felt like a Billy Joel song, a little bit. I think it's a mix of the break-break-away and the do-doo-whaat I wanna do backing vocals, plus perhaps some of the specific melodies and chord patterns used? Whatever the case, it feels very nostalgic, like an echo of music from much earlier in the 1960s, bright and optimistic. It's not a straight-up pastiche, nobody listening to this could mistake it for an older song. But there are elements of older music that are being pulled in for effect, and I think the end result's very pretty, with a sunny cheer that's hard not to like at least a little bit.

The lyrics are also pretty optimistic, if I'm reading them right, because far as I can tell all about embracing time moving on, hence opening lines about how time will not wait for me / Time is my destiny. The Beach Boys' love seems to have left them, but now each day is filled with the love / That very same love that passed me by. It's unclear if the love they've found is because they've gotten into a new relationship and found a new love, or if something else has happened to inspire it, if they've found love in a more mystical, metaphysical way. Or if it's just a metaphor for realising that you're find being single? I'm leaning towards the metaphysical explanation, though. Whatever the case, the vagueness is probably a virtue, though, it lets the song be all things to all people as the Beach Boys sing about how I can break away from that lonely life / And I can do what I wanna do / And break away from that empty life / And my world is new. Which is pretty undeniably uplifting, as sentiments go.

I'll also say here that this track also sounds fantastic just from a sound mixing point of view. The Beach Boys have always been great at using the recording studio almost as its own instrument, but this is very clean. There's like a million harmonies going on, plus some super crisp drumming, and (if I'm not mistaken) horns, guitar, bass, a different electric guitar in the background, piano underneath it all, a vibraslap, something that might be castanets. It's a lot, but it's never overwhelming, and you can always hear the vocals perfectly.

Proud Mary - Creedence Clearwater Revival (8)

And finally, this, probably the best-known of this week's songs, but not the version that I know best, which would be Tina Turner's. Naively, perhaps, I assumed that the better-known version would be the original and this would be a cover, but no, it turns out this version's the original, written by one John Fogerty, lead singer of American roots rock band Creedence Clearwater Revival. The band weren't complete unknowns at this point, they actually played at Woodstock, but this was their big hit. It makes it big, gets covered later the same year by R&B legend Solomon Burke, and that's likely an influence on Tina recording it, a few years later.

But the notable thing's how R&B it already sounds, even in this version. CCR were from California, but drew their musical influences from the American south, especially New Orleans R&B, blues music, gospel, a bit of country and even some Cajun musical influences, on top of a healthy serving of quite old-school rock and roll. Combine this with a heavy - some might say exaggerated - southern accent, and lyrics about bayous, riverboats and poor city lives, and you've got something that feels like it crawled straight out of a Louisiana swamp. It's not trying to be "authentic" as much as just conjure up an image of a certain place, a certain social milieu. And part of that's pinching all these elements from quite disparate musical traditions, some whiter, some traditionally black, and mixing them together into something that sounds pretty good.

Because I do at the end of the day think Proud Mary sounds good, there's a reason it's been covered over the years. The opening notes, a descending third, deliberately chosen apparently to imitate Beethoven's 5th Symphony, are immediately memorable, the groove it settles into afterwards is solid and comfortable to just sit in, the vocal harmonies sound nice, the little guitar licks and drum flourishes at the ends of lines and verses fill the space well without feeling too distracting. There's even an enjoyably jangly guitar solo in the middle, John reportedly imitating the guitarist from Booker T. and the MG's. Which I can hear, now I know it. It's a pretty chill, low-key solo, though, not trying to take over the song or anything. It's good.

I will say, listening to the lyrics, I do feel a little stupid, though, because the song tells a story, and I clearly never listened to it, because I could have told you that it's a song about somebody who left a good job in the city / Workin' for the man every night and day, but I apparently stopped listening immediately after that and assumed that the song was being sung from the point of view of some proud lady called Mary. Why she was proud, I didn't know. I think I assumed she was too proud to admit she had no money, so she just kept woring hard, or something, to keep up appearances? But nope, it's a song about running away from the city on a steamboat called the Proud Mary. Hence the rollin' on a river line, which wasn't metaphorical, as I'd somehow always assumed. I cannot overstate how obvious this is, in hindsight. We get lines literally telling us about how I never saw the good side of a city / 'Til I hitched a ride on a riverboat queen. The big wheel that keep on turnin' isn't a metaphor, either, it's a steamboat. When Proud Mary keep on burnin' that's also meant to be taken as written. The people on the river who are happy to give are literal people on a literal river. In retrospect, very obvious. D'oh.

Obvious and slightly embarrassing misunderstandings aside, I did like this batch. They were pleasingly different, but all had a slightly lazy, summery feel to me, and all of them felt like they had interesting sounds and textures going on, instruments you wouldn't expect, little nods to other musical genres, lyrics that provoked at least some thought - from revolution with Thunderclap Newman, to the Beach Boys finally finding contentment, to CCR steaming their way up the Mississippi, and all of them very carefully put together. A good bunch of songs, good job record-buying public of 1969.

Living in the Past - Jethro Tull (peaked at Number 3)

Ah, Jethro Tull. Named after a 1700s agricultural entrepreneur who invented the seed drill, you already know they aren't going to be boring. They all met in Blackpool and had been a touring outfit for about two years at this point, fronted by one Ian Anderson, who'd taught himself to play the flute, and wore a big old overcoat on stage. They were sort of a blues group, sort of a rock group, sort of a jazz group, and they had had some success by this point - they were supporting Jimi Hendrix on and off, and had also toured the US with Led Zeppelin - but this was really their big breakthrough. And I'm pleased to report that it's exactly as weird as you'd expect from such an oddball band.

Most of this is just down to the time signature. Because Living in the Past's in 5/4, which gives it this wonderfully off-kilter energy. It feels a little jazzy, actually, between that and the percussion, which brings in a woodblock and shakers at times, plus there's Ian's flute. Flute's already an unusual lead instrument for pop or rock, Manfred Mann aside, but Ian's playing is also just weird, breathy, with heavy, overblown notes thrown in almost percussively, for emphasis. Sometimes he's humming as he plays, getting all these harmonics and overtones out of the instrument, or flutter-tonguing (it's a technical term, look it up, you kind of roll your tongue as you play, it sounds very cool). Point is, he has a very distinctive sound, far from the polished timbre a classically-trained flautist might have. And the result's super jazzy, I'm not in any way surprised to learn that Dave Brubeck's Take Five (another banger of a track) was a major inspiration for this.

But where Take Five was an instrumental, this has an extra layer to it, in the vocals, which in classic Jethro Tull style are delivered in quite a theatrical style, a little bluesy. And surprisingly, for a song that feels so avant-garde, they feel like quite reactionary lyrics? Or perhaps reactionary isn't the right word, but there's a nostalgia to them and a critique of the hippies that feels very contrarian and almost out of step with 1969. Which I guess is the whole point, Ian and co refusing to fit the standard late-1960s rock band mould. Instead, they remember happier times, friends from their youth, complaining that now there's revolution / But they don't know what they're fighting, and encouraging their love let us close our eyes / Outside their lives do on much faster / Oh, we won't give in / We'll keep living in the past. They refuse to jump on the bandwagon, to join the revolution for the sake of the revolution itself. And that's in some ways quite a relatable statement, honestly. The alternative vision, walking out together, hand in hand with your love, blissfully cut off from it all, is very appealing, by contrast.

Big Ship - Cliff Richard (8)

And then, it's Cliff, announcing himself with a big, portentous riff on horns. It's big, it's bombastic, it sounds like he's drafted a marching band to announce his return. I like it a lot, it's a very good hook into a song, and every time the horns come back, they just feel more dramatic. It gets even better when they start interacting with a bunch of bright, happy-go-lucky flutes. Absolutely the best part of this song, I'll hear no critique of the instrumentation here.

Unfortunately, that does still leave us with Cliff's vocals. And that's quite a big but. Because, perhaps predictably, Cliff really can't live up to the monolithic pomp of the horns. It's not that he's bad - he's as smooth a singer as he ever was, easy enough to listen to - but it's not exactly an emotive delivery. If anything, this sounds like Cliff on autopilot, Cliff-by-numbers. He tries for some little bluesy moments, but it doesn't work all that well, the little moan he puts into various words is so unsexy it hurts. A clunky up-a-step key change shoehorned in late in the game doesn't do much to improve matters. And then it's the end and the whole thing runs out of steam rather abruptly, it's not the most dignified way to end a song.

And this isn't to mention the lyrics, which are pure nonsense: I do believe my eyes are tellin' me lies / I saw a ship as sure as baked apple pie / Hidin' in corners and climbin' up trees / Love is a big ship followin' me. What does that mean? Why's Cliff trying to sound all American with his baked apple pie? Is it him hiding and climbing trees? Or the ship? Both options raise some questions. And what's the metaphor about love as a ship doing? And why's it following Cliff? How's a ship even doing that? Things don't get better as the song wears on, with lines stating that some like it cool, some like it hot / D'ya see me cool like a fool with all the lovin' I got. This seems to imply that love is making Cliff cooler? Cooling him off? Which is one way to acknowledge that he's not as hot as he used to be. Probably an unintentional message, though. He's passin' the world and the world's passin' me, which sounds profound but means literally nothing. There's a potentially risqué line that comes out of nowehere as Cliff asks his lovers to make me feel good as you're shakin' me down, and then the end of the song's back to the nonsense ship metaphor, plus a section of woo-bee-doo-dah and woo-bee-doo-day scatting, like if Frank Sinatra's scooby-dooby-doo and Manfred's doh-wah-diddy-diddy had a slightly disappointing baby.

If you haven't gathered, I don't think much of the songwriting here. But it does make perfect sense, when you learn that this was a Eurovision candidate, written for Lulu but discarded in favour of Boom-Bang-a-Bang. Which is equally nonsensical, but definitely better, I think they did make the right choice. Still, that left them with a purposefully catchy, bright-sounding song that had lyrics so stupid that it didn't matter if English wasn't your first (or second or third) language. Which was too big of a score not to give it a go with somebody, even if it didn't make it to Eurovision itself. Enter Cliff, who'd done well enough with Congratulations the previous year, and you've got something that's almost guaranteed to chart. And here we are. Doesn't mean I have to be happy about it. But the song's almost too dumb for me to be really mad. If anything, I'm enjoying the idea of Cliff being stalked by a big ship. Very stupid.

In the Ghetto - Elvis Presley (2)

And then this. If it's been a while since we heard from Cliff, it's been even longer since we heard from Elvis. I knew in theory that he didhave a comeback in the late 60s. And he has actually been doing some things in recent years. But he hasn't graced the Top 10 since 1966, and 1965 before that, so it wasn't exactly like he was churning out the hits, by that point. Instead, he was busy making films. Also getting married and having a child. In among all this were various soundtrack songs and albums. But they weren't doing great. Frustrated, Elvis hatched a plan, and in 1968 got himself a TV special, hoping to use it to re-launch his career, going back to his roots as a primarily musical artist. And shockingly, for a man who hadn't performed live in seven years at this point, it worked! Elvis still had it, people were surprised and kind of heartened to learn. And the result was an album almost a year later, From Elvis in Memphis, including various hits, including at least one other huge song that we'll get to in about half a year's time. But leading the way, before we get there, we get this, a song that I surprised myself by quite liking.

It's not that I was expecting to hate it. But what's Elvis doing singing about the ghetto, I thought? Sure, he was brought up in a poor Mississippi family, had arguably had quite a "ghetto" upbringing by some metrics - but he'd been a huge rockstar for over a decade now, I had to wonder how connected he really was at this point to those roots, or whether this would be an exercise in inventing some stock character, a poor, deprived boy from the wrong side of the tracks, the sort of stereotypical, slightly self-inserty character Elvis would play in one his films. Which was exactly the sort of way of making music I thought Elvis was trying to get away from. It's either going to be cringy, over-sentimental or both, I assumed.

But this is where I may have assumed wrong, because I did find myself buying into the story of this one more than I expected to. I think in some ways this is just Elvis' delivery, which is kind of country-ish, deep and with a folksy drawl that's very appealing. He's not showboating, it's fairly understated for much of the song, pulling back from the most dramatic moments, though he's capable of bringing the power where it's needed. And so unfolds the story of a poor little baby child, born in the cold, snowy Chicago ghetto, and his mama cries / 'Cause if there's no thing that she don't need / It's another hungry mouth to feed / In the ghetto. Our protagonist grows up hungry and later angry, and rather than framing this as a thinly-veiled version of Elvis, Elvis very wisely makes it clear that he (and we) are onlookers here, inviting us to take a look at you and me / Are we too blind to see? / Do we simply turn our heads and look the other way? Unsettlingly, the answer seems to be yes, as our protagonist grows up, turns to crime, buys a gun and steals a car, tries to run, but he don't get far / And his mama cries. A crowd gathers as he dies, lying in the street, and on a cold and gray Chicago mornin' / Another little baby child is born / In the ghetto. And so the cycle begins again. It's a neat little short story, perhaps a little cliché, but powerful nonetheless.

Plus, it sounds really good. There's a very simple, plucked guitar, some very minimal bass, plus these gentle, lush orchestral flourishes on strings and flutes, haunting, ghostlike in the ghetto echoes from the gospel-style backing vocalists, some subtle horns boosting the big emotional moments, a subtle but rather military snare keeping things moving as the song fades out. All of which comes together to create something that's got a pleasing amount of variety within the track. And despite this, it manages to feel pretty light and minimal throughout - at no point do you ever really notice how densely packed this track is with different instruments and sounds, it manages to still sound pretty sparse and simple, with Elvis' voice managing to take centre stage very well. Perfect fuel for a comeback. I look forward to what else late-career Elvis has in store for us!

Huh. I find myself torn here. Cliff's easy enough, it wasn't a great song. But the other two have me stumped. Because I love me some Jethro Tull and I really love me a track in a weird time signature. It's also quite a nostalgic pick for me, my dad played a lot of Jethro Tull on car journeys and the like while I was growing up, and as I picked up the flute, I spent much longer than I probably ought to have trying to emulate Ian Anderson's weird-ass style. Also, as I've said above, Living in the Past sounds sick. But In the Ghetto did also win me over. It sounded great, I got much more invested in the tragic story of it all than I necessarily expected to, and above all that, I'm also just pleased that Elvis got this win, that he didn't just fizzle out with a string of underwhelming soundtrack hits. What to do? I think on balance, surprising even myself...

Time is Tight - Booker T. & the M.G.'s (peaked at Number 4)

Booker T. & the M.G.'s are a group I know for one song and one song only, 1962's instrumental track Green Onions. Which is a song that never once hit the UK charts, though it did hit Number 3 in the US. And that's a shame, because Green Onions is cool. You know Green Onions, even if you don't think you do. Anyway, I know nothing else by them, so I guess I kind of assumed they were a one chart hit wonder. I knew they were fairly prolific session musicians at Stax, but didn't realise they'd kept releasing their own stuff this late. But here they are, and in the UK charts - who knew?

Anyway, this one's another instrumental, and I'd say it starts pretty strong, with a simple but effective harmonised guitar giving way to a solid, steady drumbeat, and finally some Hammond organ that sounds like it was pulled straight from a quirky indie rock hit from the mid-2000s or early 2010s. Seriously, I have no clue how this specific groove hasn't been sampled to death, it feels simultaneously very vintage and also pretty fresh, and it's an instrumental, which means you've got loads of leeway to layer vocals and other stuff over the top.

Which is maybe an issue, because as the song wears on, I'm finding that it does kind of feel like a blank canvas, the (admittedly pretty good) intro to a song that's yet to really get going. Even when we pick up a sort of tune, in the guitar, it's hot got any huge hooks, it's just this very chill, laid back background kind of sound. It's easy to listen to, but I'm not exactly thrilled by Time is Tight. Which is ironic, because the title does suggest a certain urgency and excitement that I just don't think Booker and co are actually achieving here. This feels like cruising along in your car enjoying the view, taking a few shortcuts, nowhere particular to go. Time is not in any way tight in this song.

So, why was it in the charts at all? Part of the answer might lie in the 1969 film Uptight, a film that follows Tank, an unemployed former mill worker in Cleveland, Ohio, who's sucked reluctantly into gang activity following the assassination of Martin Luther King. The whole thing's an update of the 1935 film The Informer, which was set in 1922 Dublin, in the turbulence immediately following the Irish War of Independence, and the choice to adapt this as a film about the Civil Rights movements was questioned by various critics who felt that the two scenarios just didn't have all that much in common. But it doesn't look terrible, I wouldn't go out my way to watch it, but I'd give it a shot if a friend took me to see it, you know? Plus it had Ketty Lester (she of Love Letters fame) in it acting, which is a plus in my books. Also, Booker T. and the M.G.'s doing the whole soundtrack. Which is very cool, as a concept, even if this particular track doesn't do much for me.

The Tracks of My Tears - Smokey Robinson and the Miracles (9)

Motown's turn, and I will say, this is almost instantly more interesting than Time is Tight. It's got a similarly simple, gentle intro, just these guitar licks, but there's something about them, they're very pretty and memorable, I've absolutely heard them before. Throw on some equally lovely doo do doo doos, and you've got something that feels a little melancholy, a little muted. The whole thing's very gentle and soft, this is a song about being heartbroken, but it's not dramatic about it, it feels quite restrained and understated.

So when Smokey's vocals come in, it's no surprise when they're equally gentle, a high falsetto. He's got an interesting voice, too, it breaks sometimes, and you can hear the points where he has to stop for breath, all of which make Smokey sound very real, very human, as he sings about how people say I'm the life of the party / 'Cause I tell a joke or two / Although I might be laughing loud and heart / Deep inside, I'm blue. The idea is that yes, he's putting a good face on, but he's still sad about what I can only assume is a break-up, hence the chorus, full of triplets for added intensity, as Smokey entreats his ex to take a good look at my face / If you look closer it's easy to trace / The tracks of my tears.

I like this, it's a simple enough way to sketch out a personality, somebody who likes joking around, who can put on a great show, as needed, but underneath it all, he's a sad clown, tears still drying on his face as he longs for his lost lover to come back. You've got to feel for him - except another part of me does suspect that Smokey's not doing himself any favours in the second verse, as he tries to convince his ex that if she sees him with another girl, seeming like I'm having fun / Although she may be cute / She's just a substitute because you're the permanent one. Smokey. Dude. C'mon. At best that makes you sound like a bit of a cad and at worst it makes it sound like you're making excuses for your questionable rebound: "oh no, I swear I don't actually like her, we were having absolutely no fun, it's not like that". Why did you go on a date with her at all, then?! Poor decision.

Yes, those will do nicely. Both songs felt quite mellow and laid-back, in a way that suited my mood today. I still don't think Time is Tight really deserved a chart place, but I can't really begrudge Booker and co the success and attention. And Smokey and the Miracles are also very good, despite some dubious romantic choices being made. I did for whatever reason come into the song expecting the similarly-themed The Tears of a Clown, also by Smokey, which I alas think is a much better song. So that was a little disappointing. But hey, we get Tears of a Clown in, like, a year, I think. So that's cool.

The Ballad of John and Yoko - The Beatles (peaked at Number 1)

Well, this sure is a song that exists, isn't it? Honestly, this isn't a Beatles song I've really thought about all that much before today. It fits, here in their timeline, following on from Get Back, since it's got a quite bluesy feel to it with a bassline that's practically 12-bar blues, plus lots of little licks on guitar and piano that feel like they come from a blues song. But it's not thrilling, musically, not by the Beatles' usual standards, that's what struck me. It's the same chords over and over, the vocals limit themselves to on one or two notes for the most part, it follows a real standard verse-chorus-verse-chorus-type structure. There's not a tonne going on, put simply.

Except it's the Beatles, so you can't chalk this up to incompetence. So why's it so basic? A bit of research tells me that this was a John Lennon passion project, recorded in a hurry. George was abroad, Ringo was making a film, so it was just John and Paul, whose relationship had gotten quite strained at this point - among other points of tension, they'd disagreed about who ought to manage Apple corps following Brian Epstein's death. So it's impressive that they managed to record this at all - and heartening to see that they could still get on well enough to make anything, I feel like the standard narrative's that they were at each other's throats from here on out until they broke up -but you can also understand why it perhaps sounds a little more limited than the band's standard stuff, just from a technical standpoint, with just two men playing all the instruments and doing the vocals.

But I think more than that, this song's also a bit sparser because more than some Beatles songs, this one really is all about the lyrics, which are about John and his new wife, renowned avant-garde artist Yoko Ono. Yoko's been on the scene for a full three years at this point, and her presence at the Beatles' recording sessions is one of the factors that received wisdom has causing tension in the group at this time. Though the fact that Paul was happy to record this song and the whole band was happy to release it does raise some questions as to how much animosity there really can have been there. But anyway, whatever the case, this was a very famous couple, and this song's the point where Yoko really becomes relevant to the music the Beatles are putting out, as this is by quite a margin the most obviously autobiographical song the Beatles have put out yet, full of references to the very real events surrounding John and Yoko's 1969 spur-of-the-moment marriage in Gibraltar (which is absolutely a thing you can still do, btw, is a thing I have recently learnt).

So, you get a description of them sailing from Southampton, failing to reach Holland and Paris - they didn't have passports, which you still needed back in the day - until Brian Epstein's old assistant discovers they can marry in Gibraltar, which they do. There follows a whirlwind tour of Europe, with references to John and Yoko's "bed-in" protest in Amsterdam, meant to promote world peace, as well as to their "bagism" concept, another stunt meant to promote tolerance and non-discrimination, to the acorns they presented at Coventry Cathedral on their return, against as a peace demo. And between this and snatches of a conversation between John and Yoko giving clothes to charity, about not taking anything with you when you're dead, you do get a really specific and to me quite endearing sense of this young couple, very much in love, creatively in step with each other, deeply and very earnestly committed to their ideals.

But the song also doesn't flinch away the press reaction to all this, with the press turning up at almost every step to hound the newlyweds, asking what they're doing in bed, and singling Yoko out in particular, leading to what must be the most biting line of the whole thing, John quoting the newspaper as it writes about how she's gone to his head / They look just like two gurus in drag. Which is mean, and John's very clear throughout that they're in this together, they present a very unified front. But somehow it's Yoko who's being demonised in the press as the woman breaking up the Beatles. Which is a narrative that will just keep rumbling on, making its misogynistic and borderline racist way into all manner of media as a stock joke. So seeing it called out here by John himself feels quite satisfying. And there's also a biting sort of irony to the same press who were so hostile suddenly welcoming the couple back with open arms once that's the prevailing media wind, sending messages saying that we wish you success / It's good to have the both of you back. Which is so hypocritical, and it feels like a real John Lennon move to call that sort of fickle fakeness out.

And in all this, I also think he does somehow manage to keep his tongue planted firmly in his cheek. This is a song that's very earnest about John and Yoko's relationship and their various ideological stances - if those two things can even be separated at this point - and it's also got some genuine bite in the way it portrays the press. But John's also not above a touch of self-parody, either, particularly in the chorus, as he complains that Christ, you know it ain't easy / You know how hard it can be / The way things are goin' / They're gonna crucify me. Which, okay, reads as pretty bitter if you take it seriously. But I read it as a bit of an exaggeration of the "woe is me, being a Beatle is hard" sentiment you've had hints of in Hard Day's Night (the song but also the film) and in various tracks since, combined perhaps with a deliberately provocative echo of the ill-thought-out "more popular than Jesus" comment that got John into such hot water with the same press just a few years back. All of which I read as a fairly self-aware dig at John's acerbic and occasionally spiky personality, as well as his impatience with the hassle that come with being very famous (even as he uses the exact same media attention to amplify his and Yoko's voices and public statements...)

All of which is to say, I do actually quite like this one. It's interesting, at least. Though I'm realising that more than almost any other Beatles song, it does just feel like a John Lennon solo effort. We've had other songs I like more to one Beatle or another. But this one's on a different level, just in terms of how detached it feels from the rest of the group. In hindsight, the band's impending break-up looks very obvious, right?

Oh Happy Day - The Edwin Hawkins Singers (2)

And then this, a complete change of pace and tone. Because Oh Happy Day is a gospel tune, a setting by choirmaster Edwin Hawkins of a 1755 hymn by one Philip Doddridge . Philip was an English Nonconformist minister and educator as well as an occasional hymnwriter, who also did a bunch of other cool stuff, a brief skim suggests quite a storied and interesting life, but the crucial text for us is 'O happy day, that fixed my choice'. It then seems to have gained a bunch of extra bits and lost some other parts, and picked up a melody from a completely different 19th-century song, and at some point along the way it reportedly became a common hymn at baptisms and confirmations on both sides of the Atlantic. So this would have been a hymn that churchgoers, at least in certain denominations and sections of the population would have really cherished, I suppose.

And you can see why, it's just a really beautiful, joyful expression of the impact knowing God has on a life. Condensing it down (there's a lot of repetition of lines for effect in Edwin's arrangement) they're singing oh happy day / When Jesus washed / He washed my sins away / He taught me how to watch, fight and pray / And live rejoicing every day. Which is simple but that's it, that's the gospel right there. What a perfect and a fitting song to sing at a baptism, with that very literal reminder of the washing going on, and all the celebration that comes with that for the whole community of fellow believers singing along.

So you've got powerful lyrics already, lyrics that would have meant a lot in context to a big old slice of the people hearing this. But even if you don't come from that context at all - because let's be real, a lot of 1960s British folks probably don't have all that much connection to church at all, let alone the sort of church that would be holding big, loud, celebratory baptisms and confirmations - I feel like gospel music does a really good job of conveying the appropriate sense of a community coming together and celebrating. The vocals are powerful and acrobatic, full of oomph, there are hands clapping, there are tonnes of apparently James Brown-inspired ad libs, including these big, melismatic runs, there's that classic gospel call-and-response between lead singer Dorothy Combs Morrison and the rest of the choir, and then there's the repetition of it, which I already mentioned, but which really serves to hammer the lyrics home, giving them a huge amount of emphasis and emotional weight.

Throw in a bossa nova-ish piano introduction and a similarly slinky set of congas, and you've got a recipe for a record that sounds fantastic. I think it also helps that the choir are really very good, wonderfully in synch, warm-sounding, and very clear, the recording's great quality. There's even a bit of stereo going on, with Dorothy in the left channel and the rest of the group in the right, which serves to further draw attention to the call-and-response of it all, the back-and-forth between singer and chorus. A great, distinctive choice for an equally distinctive hit. We don't get much straight-up gospel music in the UK charts, but I'm very glad this one snuck in.

Both of these tracks were great and I really enjoyed getting to know them better. I stand by what I said about The Ballad of John and Yoko, it's musically pretty basic, but the lyrics shine and I personally am very charmed by the picture it paints of John. Interesting to check in with how the Beatles are doing, too, if a little sad to see hints of the cracks forming that will ultimately break the band apart. And then you get Oh Happy Day, which is much simpler, but rich and very moving just in terms of how it engages the senses, drawing churchgoers and laypeople alike into this big, communal celebration. Go listen to both, is my takeaway here. But for the sake of picking the one that got its teeth into me most...

Love Me Tonight - Tom Jones (peaked at Number 9)

Hoo, boy. Okay, this one is not just a Tom Jones song, it's quite possibly the Tom-siest Jones-iest song. Imagine the platonic ideal of a Tom Jones song, and that's Love Me Tonight. The tune is suspiciously similar to the melody from Delilah, the vocals too, there's the same trumpets that Tom puts in literally everything, the percussion and beat underpinning it all's been nicked straight from It's Not Unusual. Speed the whole thing up, add in some wordless backing vocals and camp harp glissandos, and you've got Love Me Tonight. It's not without its charms, but it's a lot.

Honestly, the biggest surprise for me, given this, is that it wasn't a Tom Jones original. But perhaps I shouldn't be shocked. Because in a very late-60s "twist" it turns out that this is an Italian contest song, having debuted at the Sanremo Festival as Alla fine della strada ("At the end of the road") before being picked up by a British songwriter, Barry Mason, who also did write Delilah, to be fair. Barry "translated" the song, if you can really call it translating when you give a song completely different words, and here we are. I feel like I say it every time we get an Italian contest song, but I'm shocked just how influential of a pipeline this seems to have been, and for much longer than I'd ever have thought.

I don't have many more thoughts about the song, except to note that it's not quite as spicy as the title made me think it might be. There are some definite overtones, though, from lines about how I know that it's late and I really must leave you along / But you're good to hold and I feel such a long way from home, or Tom asking here in my arms you belong, how can this feeling be wrong? I'm sure that raised some eyebrows, right? Or how about the lines about how I know that our love is still new / But I promise it's gonna be true? Is Tom trying to sleep with a girl he's only just gotten to know? Is that where the song's going? Not sure it reflects great on him, if so. He sounds desperate at best, and a bit of a pushy cad, at worst. But whatever. Tom sells it with his usual panache, and it's not a super present element of the song, anyway, I guess...

Not a tonne of feelings abut this one. I guess I broadly don't mind it? If you like Tom Jones, you'll like this one. I don't think I enjoy him sufficiently for that, but as Tom Jones songs go, it's okay. Unobjectionable. You can play a good game of "Tom Jones cliché bingo", the first time you listen, which I guess is kind of amusing. And I like imagining all the grannies' eyebrows rising in unison as they try and suss out that nice Welsh man's intentions here...

Dizzy - Tommy Roe (peaked at Number 1)

Oh, hang on, I think I know this one? Not sure how, or why, but the tune's very familiar. The concept's simple, a bit of bright, bubblegum fluff from Tommy Roe, who had a string of hits back in 1962 and 1963 but hasn't done very much since. He's smitten with a girl, love at first sight, but she's got guys hanging onto her every word, keeps him running in circles, and as a result he's left dizzy, I'm so dizzy, my head is spinning / Like a whirlpool it never ends. Simple concept, but cute enough.

I also like that the song has a shtick, namely that it just keeps modulating when it hits the dizzy refrain, shifting up half a step, if I'm not mistaken. Which is great, because on top of giving the refrain a welcome boost of energy, it means you never quite get a handle on where the tune is, exactly what's going to happen next. Which is obviously completely fitting for the song. It also makes it an absolute nightmare for anybody trying to sing along, as it gradually shifts up, bit by unpredictable bit. Which I think is both mean and kind of funny.

There are other elements of this that I like, too. Most notably, the whole thing has a really solid bassline holding it all together, and there's also some funky drumming going on. They're not doing anything fancy, but when the rest of the instruments drop away you can hear just how good they sound. The strings meanwhile end up a little shrill for my tastes, but I do like how they sound for the verses, too, the little fills they do between lines, the swoopy noise they do at the end of the fills. So yeah, lots of quality backing here, courtesy of the Wrecking Crew (who also played on last week's Simon & Garfunkel hit The Boxer!)

Ragamuffin Man - Manfred Mann (8)

And now this, a fresh Manfred Mann hit, all about a "ragamuffin man", who we get a portrait of right at the start, born and raised as a rich man's son / You were always the restless one / Living high only made you low / So you packed up and hit the road. This is a story that I feel like we've heard a lot recently, from 1968's string of songs about hippies upping sticks for a romantically nomadic life, to the protagonists of Gentle on My Mind and The Boxer, both of whom also end up leaving home and leading a rootless, vagabond life. Their experiences aren't idealised in the same way as the hippies' were, though, and honestly, I think of the two approaches, it's really the latter that Manfred Mann is channelling, as they describe their protagonist hopping trains, spending nights in a hostel, comparing it to a time when life was so grand, you used to stand / Holdin' your head up high, which leads them to wonder just look at you know, I wonder how / You can be satisfied? And there's no real answer given, the song just ends on that note, which is... well, it's interesting, for sure. Another sign that the bohemian hippie dream is coming to an end?

But I don't know, perhaps that's too deep for what's at its heart a pretty standard bit of pop rock. There's very little to this one, I fear - none of the catchy nonsense that I've come to associate with Manfred Mann, no quirky flute, no folksy rowdiness. There's not even a hook to really help the song stick in your brain, or if there is, it's not doing it's job all that well. None of which makes this a bad track, it's competent enough. The band are giving it their all, the guitar and bass and drums are doing what they need to, there are a few nice touches on an organ. But it doesn't feel quite as tight as stuff like Mighty Quinn or Fox on the Run (which I had in my head for a full week after listening to it, I'm pleased to report).

And all this comes at a point where the band was in fact trying to transition away from the common perception of them as a band that puts out hit singles but whose albums didn't have all that much impact. The result was a breakup in 1969, with the members going on to form various spin-off groups, including Chapter Three (an experimental jazz-rock band), Manfred Mann's Earth Band (more of a prog-rock outfit, beloved of my dad), McGuiness Flint and the Blues Band (a rock band and a blues band, respectively). I don't know if we'll heard from many of these groups, though. Certainly, they're less mainstream than the OG Manfred Mann ever was. But I guess we shall see (don't spoiler me!)

I didn't hate either of these songs, but I don't think they're required listening in the same way that some things recently have been. Which is fine. I'm sure that the 1969 version of me would have bopped along gamely to both of these - especially Dizzy, which I already fear will be stuck in my head for a few days at least, it's irritatingly catchy - even if she didn't dash out to actually buy a copy of either.

The Boxer - Simon and Garfunkel (peaked at Number 6)

I have definitely heard this one before, but I'll confess it's not one of the Simon & Garfunkel songs I know very well. Hitting play, it sounds very typical right off the bat, though, a gentle, mellow folk rock ballad with lots of pretty guitar picking and some beautiful vocals harmonies, which I'm always a big fan of, this one sounds particularly dreamy.

And layered on on top of that, you've got lyrics that are at first poetic and a little bit melancholy, telling a story that feels simple and a bit fairytale at first, as they describe in flowing lines how I am just a poor boy / Though my story's seldom told / I have squandered my resistance / For a pocketful of mumbles. Which does get a little enigmatic towards the end, but I think the idea's clear, that this character feels like he's been cheated somehow, abandoning his principles in return not for gold - which you'd expect, from the rhyme scheme - but empty, mimbled promises, lies and jest, as the next line puts it.

The song then takes on a much more realist, observational tone, as our protagonist amd his situation is sketched out a bit more concretely. He's not some Jack and the Beanstalk figure, he's a modern man, born in New York, who's left his home and family behind, who hung around railways stations, sought out poor areas to live, scared at ever turn. He looks for low-paid work, but gets none, just a come-on from the whores on 7th Avenue / I do declare, there were times when I was so lonesome / I took some comfort there. Which has to be some of the least child friendly content we've heard yet, in this project? It's not particularly lurid or gratuitous, though, just part of a portrait of a man navigating the seamier side of life, all alone and wishing he could go home to his family as things get colder.

And finally in the last verse we switch to a third-person portrait of our narrator, who we learn is a boxer, a fighter by his trade / And he carries the reminders / Of every.glove that laid him down. This is a man who's been beaten up, literally and figuratively, carrying all that with him. And tragically, while he makes a big deal about wanting to go home, the external narrator isn't so sure, as he cries out in his anger and his shame / "I am leaving, I am leaving" / But the fighter still remains. Which is a sad but fantastic character moment, you see his stubborness, perhaps a little pride, you can infer a difficult relationship with his family, perhaps, or just the way in which inertia keeps him where he is, in New York, his longing for home never quite enough to actually bring him there.

So yeah, lots of big lyrical swings in this one. And yet, the most memorable it's maybe the connective tissue that holds the verses together, the lie-la-lie, lie-la-la-la-lie-la-lie refrain, which apparently began life as a placeholder, but worked well enough as was to leave in. It's a simple, catchy few lines, and repeating it gives it a certain weight. Plus, there's an appeal to a refrain that's all "lies" in a song about a man who feels he was sold a lie. And I also like how striking and ominous the song makes it, with these massive, crashing snare hits accenting it from the get-go, and these very overbearing strings and horns joining the party once you reach the fade-out. It's very heavy, very brooding, almost too much, but then it all drops away right at the end, and it's almost a relief when the song ends on guitar picking, back to the same vibe from the start, going nowhere at all, but going there very prettily.

My Sentimental Friend - Herman's Hermits (peaked at Number 2)

Herman's Hermits are a band I'd never really thought about before this project, but they really are 1960s stalwarts, aren't they? They pop up in, what, 1963? And here we are as the decade comes to an end, and they're still putting out the hits. They've never been one for fancier or more experimental songs, they're not breaking any fresh ground, they're pop rock cheese through and through, but I appreciate the consistency of it, you know?

So yes, this one does start real cheesy, a slow-paced ballad, lots of slushy strings, a bit of piano underpinning it all, just as sentimental as the title suggests. Everything drops out as the vocals come in, leaving you with these quite delicate piano chords as the tune jumps around. It's pretty, going to a few unexpected places but nothing too crazy, as our lead vocalist describes a dance, people partnered up all around, getting close - except over there, in the corner, is our protagonist's ex, snuggled up with somebody new...

And this is where the song does get a bit more interesting, as it picks up some energy, the singer entreating the band won't you please play a song, a sentimental song / For my sentimental friend over there / We've been so long apart, let it go to the heart / Of my sentimental friend over there. Which I like, purely because it's not entirely clear whether the motive here's romantic - play a sentimental song to win her back - or whether it's something a bit more spiteful - play a sentimental song to make her cry and realise how much of a mistake she's made. It's a fun ambiguity - even if I do think that the song's probably meant to read as romantic. Which is clearly the less interesting of the two options. Oh well.

Man of the World - Fleetwood Mac (2)

Hmmm, another early Fleetwood Mac song, and quite an obscure one, I suspect. I'd at least vaguely heard of Albatross, last time, but I've never heard of Man of the World. Which might be less Fleetwood Mac's fault, and more the fault of the record label they'd just joined, Immediate Records, which released this and then almost immediately went belly-up. It didn't even pay the band properly for the song, nor was it able to promote the song at all, their manager had to pay off radio stations to get it airplay at all.

Which sucks, because Man of the World is excellent. From the opening notes, it's just captivating to me, this very quiet, calm, sad, simple guitar tune, with chords that just scream melancholy, somehow. Then a pause, just enough to breathe, and the same tune again, but with vocals, muted and unpretentious, very stripped back. Listening to it, to me, this feels more like a 90s singer-songwriter than anything else from the 1960s, some lo-fi alt rock darling. This is Peter Green, who was a founding member of Fleetwood Mac, but left before any of the songs people actually know. And it's a huge shame, because he brings something really expressive and beautiful here. I could listen to this all day.

That said, I do think I'd end up pretty depressed if I listened to this all day. Peter and the rest of the band have gone on record to say that while they didn't realise it at the time, Peter really wasn't doing well when he wrote this. And, like, yeah. You don't need to be a psychologist to conclude that the singer here's not in a great place. Shall I tell you about my life, he sings, they say I'm a man of the world / I've flown across every tide / I've seen lots of pretty girls. He's seen everything, is doing well for himself, on paper.

But he sounds tired, as he admits that I guess I've got everything I need / I wouldn't ask for more / And there's no one I'd rather be / But I just wish that I'd never been born. Oof. And as if to underscore this huge emotional swing, he suddenly leaps up into a different register, wailing that final line over this huge, grungy, distorted guitar chord, something ugly and rough and totally unlike the steady, delicate picking you've had until then. It's so visceral, I love it.

And then he pulls it back, like he can't let all that emotion loose for long, can't let is slip. We get a guitar solo, delicate and beautiful, the woozy, surf guitars from Albatross making a return, and by the time the vocals come back, the disaffected mask is firmly back in place, and it's two more verses of just the saddest, most understated lines you've ever heard, as Peter longs for a relationship, but less for the sake of the relationship itself, and more to distract from his own self-hatred, as he admits that I need a good woman / To make me feel like a good man should / I don't say I'm a good man / Oh, but I would be, if I could. Which is so very raw, and so very messed up. Somebody get this man some therapy, stat.

If the music was any less stripped-back, this would feel self-indulgent, self-pitying even. But it's so muted, Peter's giving absolutely nothing as he retreats back into the performatively detached, stoic shell, as he concludes with brutal honestly that I could tell you about my life / And keep you amused, I'm sure / About all the times I've cried / And how I don't want to be sad anymore / And how I wish I was in love. It's so simple, so pretty and so devastatingly inconclusive.

(And because I can't just leave it there, I will say on a slightly happier note that Peter Green actually wrote this song a full year and half before it was eventually released, and while he continued to have some quite serious mental health problems, he did also go on record to say that he had no intention of ever performing this one live, since it reflected a past version of him - the feelings and thoughts expressed simply didn't reflect where he was at any more. Which is a very welcome glimmer of hope, and lets me come away from this one not feeling totally hopeless).

Behind a Painted Smile - The Isley Brothers (5)

You know, going into this week, looking at the song titles, I thought that this would be the sad song. But nope, compared to Man of the World, Behind a Painted Smile's sunshine and rainbows. Or it isn't, but while it is in theory a song of heartbreak, there's a strong undercurrent of anger to it that gives it a bit more snap, a bit more bite, a bit more life. The Isley brothers have had their hearts broken, sure, but they're not depressed about it like Peter was. They're sad, but in a proud, stubborn way, suffering, but determined not to let their ex see how bad it is.

All of which is comes together in a proper Motown fashion, after a deceptively classical-sounding start, pretty flutes and delicate piano lulling you into a more sentimental mood only for the song to practically slap you in the face thirty seconds in with these gunshot drums and a funky, driving guitar line that cuts right the way through the rest of it all, setting you up irresistably for some proper R&B vocals, the Isley brothers and their backing vocalists giving it their all as they unfold their tale of woe, singing about how whenever you're near, I hide my tears behind a painted smile. That's it, that's the song.

It's good, very catchy and danceable, but I'm not entirely sure they stick the landing - I'm bopping along until the last perhaps thirty seconds, which is when the Isleys suddenly decide to jump up into their respective falsetto registers, in a move that's unfortunately just a little too camp for me to take it seriously. I'm on board up to then, as they sing about how they don't want their ex's pity, how they don't need their sympathy. But the final my life is a masquerade lines? I just can't take them seriously. The song also modulates, I think, which doesn't help, there's something a little incongruous about how bright and major everything suddenly sounds. And then instead of doing anything with that, the song just ends very abruptly with this aggressive, ramping-up drum fill that sounds like it's building to something and then just ... doesn't. All of which are certainly choices, but not necessarily good ones.

My Way - Frank Sinatra (5)

Finally, this. You know this song. It's iconic. It's a karaoke classic. It's also a bit of a funeral cliché. But it's also kind of weird, I've always found it to be a little bit unsettling. A bit of context first, though. Because My Way wasn't originally written for Frank at all, but rather for a French artist Claude François, who recorded it as Comme d'habitude ("As usual"). And tune aside, it was a completely different song, all about a relationship becoming routine and getting stale. Which is kind of the opposite sentiment to what the song ended up becoming in the hands of none other than ... David Bowie? Wait, really?

Well, no. David Bowie did try his hand at adapting the lyrics. But his version, a song he called Even a Fool Learns to Love, got shelved (and later became some of the basis for Life on Mars, which is kind of wild). Comme d'habitude then gets picked up by our old friend Paul Anka, who loves the tune and is desperate to get the rights to it for himself. While writing the song, he ends up at dinner with Frank Sinatra and a bunch of Mob types (Frank Sinatra being as sketchy as they come) and learns that Frank's thinking about quitting the singing business. And listening to this old legend talking, surrounded by his cronies, Paul starts working on the song, and the end result's this, a song that makes a lot of sense if you think about it as basically a character piece sung by some aging gangster.

It starts slow, stately, eloquent and very melodramatic, as Frank sings about how now the end is near / And so I face the final curtain. Arriving at the end of this life, he's bowing out, facing judgment - whether from his peers or from some higher power's never quite clear - and he's clear that he feels he has nothing to apologise for, claiming that my friend, I'll say it clear / I'll state my case, of which I'm certain. He's done everything, been everywhere, travelled each and every highway / And more, much more than this / I did it my way.

That's the core of the song. There's a little more to it, as he admits that he has regrets - but even then, he doesn't have many, and considers that generally he did what he felt he had to, that he made those choices himself, and is proud of them. The result's an ode to rugged individualism, and the power of individual choices and decisions. Frank has tasted all of life, the good and the bad, and looking back, he's proud, to the point of building his identity upon it, ending even more bombastically, if such a thing is possible, asking what is a man, what has he got? / If not himself, then he has naught / To say the things he truly feels / And not the words of one who knees / The record shows I took the blows / And did it my way!

Except... there's something kind of grotesque about this, right? It's way too much, the more I listen, the more unpleasant I find it, morally. At best, it comes off as denial, Frank seeing death looming and trying desperately to convince himself that his choices were fine, that sure, he made mistakes, but that he's a good person deep down, that if he owns the mistakes, revels in them, then he can't be held accountable for them, can't really be blamed. He did it his way, you can't criticise or judge somebody for that, he was just living his truth, being his most authentic self. And so the wheels come off, as personal authenticity, doing things your way, becomes the yardstick for moral conduct, in a way that's so very unsustainable and stressful and frankly dangerous, and all the more dangerous for how seductive a worldview it is, at first.

Ugh. Emotional rollercoaster, like I said. I feel like this week put me through the ringer, with a range of complicated emotional tones. We got "sad and pathetic but also pleasingly spiteful and spiky", we got "hugely depressing but also so very beautiful", we got "sad again, but definitely angry and also a bit camp" and then we got "epic, but morally repugnant to me in a deep and almost certainly unintentional way". All worth giving a listen to, even if I really can't stand My Way. But one stood out to me, musically, emotionally, the story behind it, all of it just really powerful. And so...

Cupid - Johnny Nash (peaked at Number 6)

First up, we've got Cupid. Which is a Sam Cooke original, that actually charted back in 1961. I remember liking the original - looking back through the archives, it seems like I found it pretty cute. And in hindsight, that tracks. There were some slightly daft gimmicks going on, including these whooshing noises that were meant to mimic Cupid's arrows flying, straight to my lover's heart for me / No, nobody else but me. But for the most part, it was just a straightforwardly sweet love song, sung by Sam Cooke, who I think could sing just about anything and I'd be charmed. He's got a wonderfully smooth, warm voice, very listenable, exactly the sort of voice that ought to be singing such a sweet, nothing-y song.

So, what does Johnny add? Well, his version's a completely different genre, that's the main difference. Where Sam's version of Cupid was a soul number, Johnny's is reggae, albeit reggae with some rather American-sounding soul vocals layered over the top, in case we'd forgotten that Johnny Nash is not, in fact, Jamaican. All of which is... well, it's fine. I don't hate this, it's very chill and relaxed, and competently enough translated. There's none of the social commentary or bite of something like, say, Desmond Dekker's Israelites, but there's room within reggae for both, I guess. Not every song needs to be making a statement.

If you're getting a hint of dissatisfaction, you wouldn't be wrong, though. Because there's something very middle-of-the-road and unremarkable about this one. It's slow and steady, and the vibe, instrumentation and dynamics don't change all that much throughout the song, nor does it really take you on any kind of journey, emotionally. Johnny's looking for love at the start, and by the end he's still at it, begging Cupid to take pity on him. The lead vocals are a pale and unimaginative imitation of Sam, while the backing vocals seem to have been provided by the same wishy-washey ghost-choir that they were in the similarly echoey You Got Soul. Which was a song that at least had the good grace to be bad in an interesting way. This one's just straight-up dull.

Harlem Shuffle - Bob & Earl (7)

This, on the other hand, grabs your attention from the get-go, with that big, bombastic fanfare, horns a fifth apart just blasting two notes, timpani rolling gently underneath. This is the part of this track that I really know, and it's not because I actually know the song, it's because it got sampled, famously, for the opening to the 1992 hit Jump Around. Which is a song I definitely know, for reasons I'm not entirely sure of. I'm not otherwise much of a listener of 90s hip-hop. But as soon as this one started I was like "huh, yeah, I know this". And I can see why it got sampled, because it is a really distinctive, memorable way to open a song. It's literally two notes, super simple, but there's so much confidence and brashness to it, it sets the tone really well for what's to follow.

Because the rest of the song does also have a certain swagger. It's much less bombastic, more of a shimmy than a strut, but the drama of it's still there, from the echoing claps to the booming timpani accentuating the end of every line, two notes a step apart, over and over like clockwork. The horns take a backseat, but they're still there, too, much deeper, popping up and fitting themselves round the vocals, with these cool little licks and fills between the lines. All of which sets up a groove that Bob and Early are content to just ride out to the end of the song, keeping it going and building it up incrementally - not a huge build, but there are some extra little yeahs and ohs and other ad libs thrown in towards the end - until it just fades out, no big ending, just the sense of a party that ain't stopping any time soon.

Which makes perfect sense given the lyrics, which are all about dancing, dancing, dancing the night away. Like various other songs we've seen - Sam Cooke's Twistin' the Night Away is probably my favourite example, but Let's Twist Again also works - this means that the song ends up referencing a bunch of other popular dances, from the improbably named Monkey Shine, to the Limbo, to the Slide, to the Pony. Looking at the list, the Limbo feels like the odd one out, as an actual dance that people still do. To me, the limbo has always just been a thing that I knew existed, I don't think I ever thought about when exactly it became a thing. But it turns out the limbo was popularised in the US and Europe in the late 1950s, having previously been danced at wakes in Tobago, of all places. Which I guess does make it part of that whole era of fad dances. Unlike the Harlem Shuffle, which ironically was invented by Bob and Earl, rather than growing organically out of a pre-existing dance. No clue if it then gained a dance. You'd think it would. But I can't find any record of one existing. Which I guess means you're free to dance to this any way you like.

No secret which of these songs I liked best. Neither song felt like it really "went" anywhere, both just set up a groove and stayed there. But of the two grooves, one was exciting and fun and felt cool, enough so that it will go on to be quoted and sampled and played around with almost three decades later. Whereas the other was just a less interesting reggae cover of an original that I liked fine, but wasn't exactly raving about.

Get Back - The Beatles with Billy Preston (peaked at Number 1)

It helps that this one's a banger. I knew it for years before I ever realised it was a Beatles track, and in retrospect, I think that's maybe because it does sound quite different to their usual fare. Perhaps that's down to the addition of Billy Preston, a mostly R&B and funk artist from the US who plays keys on this one. But then, Billy had been around for a while at this point. A friend of the Beatles from their 1962 Hamburg days, he almost joined the band early doors, and stayed associated with them in the years since. He was about for many of the Get Back album's sessions and later ended up playing as a session musician on a few tracks on Abbey Road, too. The only reason he gets the extra credit here is because his keyboard part's particularly prominent, to the point where the Beatles only thought it fair to credit him properly.

So, Billy's not the reason this track sounds different. But he sure contributes, delivering up something very stylish and bluesy. Add in a chugging bassline and some nasal, wailing, occasionally snarling vocals from Paul, a bit of back and forth between John and George on lead and rhythm guitar respectively, a steady shuffling bit of drumming from Ringo, and you've got the recipe for a pretty cool blues rocker, something hard, heavy and driving, straight out of the rock and roll days. To my ears it's always sounded properly American, just from the sound of it, the voice that Paul's putting on.

And then there are the lyrics, which are also notionally quite American, all about two protagonists, Jojo and Loretta. What's actually going on with them is quite mysterious. We learn that Jojo was a man who thought he was a loner, but he knew it couldn't last. He apparently left his home in Tucson, Arizona, for California at some point for pastures new. Loretta, meanwhile, has something entirely different going on, as we learn that sweet Loretta Martin thought she was a woman, but she was another man / All the girls around her said she's got it coming, but she gets it while she can. From a modern perspective, it would be real easy to try and reach for some sort of trans reading of this one. But honestly, I have no idea if that was on the Beatles' radar. Whatever the case, both Jojo and Loretta are clearly crossed some sort of line, left one life behind for another. And the reaction here is the Beatles encouraging them, in the chorus and in a series of spoken ad-libs, to get back to where you once belonged, and to go home.

Which, on the one hand, could be read straight as the Beatles literally telling them that. But Paul's also gone on record saying that the song was inspired by Enoch Powell's infamously racist Rivers of Blood speech, which was given by the then Shadow Secretary for Defence in opposition to the Race Relations Bill, which sought to make it illegal to refuse housing, employment or services to somebody on a racial basis. Enoch was against the bill, and more broadly against the rising rates of immigration to the UK from the various Commonwealth nations, and he would surely also be pro telling people to get back home. So it also makes sense that this song could be read ironically, the Beatles parroting racists' words back at them, but with the twist that it's at least implied that Loretta and Jojo can't go back, don't really belong in their old lives any more. It's where they "once" belonged, not where they actually fit now.

Or perhaps I'm reading too much into what's best read as just a jam sesh, the Beatles playing about with words and sounds and turns of phrase in the same way they always have done, without it needing to necessarily have any deeper meaning. There are a bunch of moments on this one where you can kind of hear Paul laughing through what he's singing, which would kind of support this interpretation, that this is just the Beatles mucking around and having fun. If you get the album version, you even get a few moments of John and Paul's studio chatter, doing a silly take, fiddling around with their guitars, laughing at each other. So you know. Perhaps it's an anti-racist statement. But perhaps it's also just four lads (and their American friend) having a lark. I do feel like with the Beatles it is often both.

Come Back and Shake Me - Clodagh Rodgers (3)

Is there a less showbiz name than "Clodagh Rodgers" ? I love it, but it really doesn't sound "glam" in the way that you'd expect from a stage name nowadays, it definitely doesn't roll off the tongue, and it's not entirely clear how you pronounce it unless you know some Clodaghs. But there you go. Clodagh was despite this a bit of a household name, by 1969. Two years from now she'll even go on to represent the UK at Eurovision.

Which feels about right, she's got a very Eurovision vibe. By which I mean, she's a peddler of the finest cheese. From the opening moments of this one, there's a camp bubbliness, Clodagh entreating her love to come back and shake me, take me in your arms / Squeeze me, please me, baby, baby / Shake me, make me yours again / Hug me, bug me, be my friend. Which is fun. There's a slight cheekiness to it, an innuendo. But it's all very innocently done, it's not like there's anything downright filthy going on, and it's pulled off in such a bright, bouncy way that it's hard to really object.

I do then like what happens in the verse, as we cut away from the full, pop-perfect, polished chorus to something that's... well, I can't really describe it all that well, except that the audio quality changes entirely, as we hit the verse and it's Clodagh and a bass guitar, plus some light percussion, singing about how my sleeves are all torn, my buttons are loose / My makeup's starting to fade away. She's been a mess since her lover left, is the idea. And as if to underscore her loneliness, all of the backing singers have faded away, leaving us with Clodagh singing all alone in almost a whispery voice, very breathy. It's clear, but like she's singing right up close to the microphone, her voice flattened and compressed slightly.

Factor in Clodagh's deadpan, detached delivery, and the dreaminess of the do-do-doo backing vocals once they come back in, plus the catchy, monosyllabic punchiness of the shake me, take me / squeeze me, please me verbiage, and this song actually reminds me of nothing more than Lovefool by the Cardigans, a song I do really like, with its similarly flat, love me, love me, say that you love me. It's a sound that I didn't expect to hear at all back in 1969. But there you go. Kind of makes you wonder if a cover of Come Back and Shake Me might have been a hit, had some 90s indie pop darlings stumbled across it and decided to give it a whirl...

I fully expected Clodagh to be a bit of a throwaway track, this week, so I was pleasantly surprised by how good Come Back and Shake Me sounded. I do also really now want to hear what a 90s power pop version might sound like, I suspect it would slap. And then you've got the Beatles, with what I still think's a very atypical track for them, but one that's just dripping in fun, quotable lines and memorable turns of phrase that might be meaningless, but sure are catchy anyway.

The Windmills of Your Mind - Noel Harrison (peaked at Number 8)

I know this one from Dusty Springfield's fantastically slinky, understated version. Her version's sparse, brooding, kind of detached for the very first verse, then picks up an almost bossa nova guitar, it's very stylish, very sexy, building to a smoulder as Dusty gets increasingly intense about it. I like it a lot, and I think as a consequence I didn't get off on the right foot with Noel's version, which starts off a bit more heavily orchestrated, a bit more traditional in some ways. And so I wrote it off, on my first listen.

But I think the more I've listened to this one, the more I've come to appreciate it for what it is. It was written for a film, and I think knowing that helps. Because the instruments do add a lot of drama from the word go, in a very filmic way. The song was commissioned for 1968's The Thomas Crown Affair, and plays over the opening credits, but also over a scene where our protagonist Thomas flies his beloved glider, a break from the tension of planning a heist.

And you get a sense of the uneasiness of that, even just in the sound of it, the way the track opens to these uneasy, shifting strings and flutes, fluttering like a glider in the wind. The horns that then cut in are dark, brooding, like dark clouds on the horizon, and the piano that accompanies it plays this series of ascending arpeggios, the chords slipping and shifting in very unstable, unpredictable ways, like a shiftier Moonlight Sonata. And then Thomas finds his groove, and the drums bring in a slinkier, jazzier feel, something a bit more determined, like Thomas is gearing up, preparing psychologically for what lies ahead. But by the end, he's uncertain again, the jazziness giving way to something slower, less decisive. It's a great, ambivalent place to land, even without any lyrics, you can feel Thomas' nerves thrumming away anxiously.

And then, adding a whole layer on top of that, you get these wonderfully poetic lyrics. I mean, just take the opening verse, which is one long sentence, describing Thomas' thoughts going round, like a circle in a spiral, like a wheel within a wheel / Never ending or beginning on an ever-spinning reel / Like a snowball down a mountain, or a carnival balloon / Like a carousel that's turning, running rings around the moon / Like a clock whose hands are sweeping past the minutes of its face / And the world is like an apple whirling silently in space. That's a massive quote right there, but it's worth taking in the sheer volume of stuff you can unpack from it, images of things turning, spiralling, ticking away, a mind that keeps going in circles, never getting anywhere, just continuing on, borne on by the endless march of time, all of it leading to that surreal image of the apple in space, the world reduced down to something so absurdly small and distant as you fly over, disconnected from it as it spins on and on.

And that's the opening verse. The rest of the song's just as rich, jumping from image after image without settling on any one metaphor, perhaps showing just how restless our protagonist's supposed to be feeling. And in among it all, little hints at a more romantic tension, too, words jangling in Thomas' head, summer giving way to autumn and winter, lovers' footprints in the sand washed away, fragmented memories, all perhaps reflecting a relationship that's run its course, a love that our hero isn't sure he'll ever get back. And so, ironically, his brain's stuck statically circling, while time keeps ticking inexorably on, bearing him up, up and away from a past he clearly wishes to return to, like a glider on a thermal.

Okay, I need to stop, I'm getting self-indulgent. But if ever there was a song that invited you to wax poetical, it's this one. And while I do still dearly love Dusty's version, I think this one, with Noel Harrison's simple, sad vocals, and with its lush, evocative instrumentation, is much better placed to actually invite you into the song, opening up this very unsettled, restless, almost existential headspace, Thomas Crown ruminating on the nature of time and change and memory and the past vs. the present vs. the future and whether you can change anything or if it's all just wheels in wheels in wheels. The song won an Oscar for Best Original Song, and I think rightly so, it's fabulous.

Goodbye - Mary Hopkin (peaked at Number 2)

Following on from her previous hit, the dark, Slavic-inspired folk of Those Were the Days, we've got something a bit lighter, this time, its production once again overseen by none other than Paul McCartney. It's still very folksy, but there's something much brighter and jauntier about this one, it fairly trips along. There's a bit of accordion, there's ukulele, there's percussion that's just Paul McCartney slapping his knees in rhythm. It feels informal, very DIY, but there's still clearly been a lot of care taken with it, it doesn't feel messy at all.

And Mary's voice, fits perfectly, she's got this very clear, sweet voice that I think suits this song well. There's an indie folk quirkiness to the delivery, but at the end of it she also does sound her age. Which you can't really say about Those Were The Days, with its "oh, to be young again" nostalgic affectations, which sound very strange when sung by an 18-year-old. Add in some strings halfway through, and you end with something that sounds very dreamy and ethereal, with a very innocent, pleasant whimsy to it.

I also like the lyrics, which are sentimental, but not overly sappy, and vague enough that you can project any number of scenarios onto them. Mary is leaving, you see. Where, or why, we don't know, but we do know that despite some regrets, she still wants to leave in good time, entreating her love please don't wake me up too late, tomorrow comes / And I will not be late / Late today when it becomes tomorrow / I will leave to go away. She reminisces fondly about the songs she and her love have enjoyed together, asks him to leave flowers by her door as he waits for her, and looks forward to the day he'll call her back to him, singing about how far away my lover sings a lonely song / And calls me to his side / When a song of lonely love invites me on / I must go to his side. And so it's a goodbye, but a bittersweet one at worst, with the hope of a reunion to come. Which is kind of lovely, in its own way.

Pinball Wizard - The Who (4)

And then we hit Pinball Wizard, a track I definitely have heard plenty. It's from the Who's 1969 album Tommy, which was one of the earliest rock operas, an attempt at telling a story across one epic rock album. This was something the Who had already been playing around with a bit, but hadn't ever quite managed to make stick. But they were aging out of the "teen rockers" bracket and wanted to do new, different things, so they kept trying, with Pete Townshend eventually drafting a story that was frankly kind of bizarre, about a kid called Tommy traumatized into going deaf, dumb and blind, but developing a rich inner life, having various unpleasant sexual experiences, tripping on LSD, discovering that he's some sort of pinball prodigy, and eventually overcoming his trauma to found a religious movement-cum-holiday camp, where his followers eventually turn on him and abandon him, and he's left just kind of reflecting on it all.

Given all that, this song has no right to work as well as it does. But here we are. I guess however bizarre it is, the story's just kind of irresistible. It's a classic underdog story, told from the perspective of an outsider who's pretty experienced at pinball, and who's amazed by Tommy's skills: from Soho down to Brighton, I must have played them all / But I ain't seen nothin' like him in any amusement hall / That deaf, dumb and blind kid sure plays a mean pinball. Most of the rest of the song's just them speculating about how Tommy does it, pointing out his supple wrist, his lack of distractions, his keen sense of smell. And right at the end, a tiny glimpse forward to his future career as a religious leader, with lines about how disciples lead him in, and he just does the rest. Which is fun, that little bit of foreshadowing setting up the idea that there's something more to Tommy, that he's not just going to stop at dominating at pinball.

That all said, I think the song mostly works not because the story's all that good. No, I do think it mostly works at the end of the day because it sounds great, this is a song that could easily be played off as a silly novelty, but the Who take it deadly seriously, and it's all the better for it. There's a drama and an intensity baked in from the start, with a simple, Spanish-sounding intro on acoustic guitar suddenly cut through by power chords on electric guitar, echoing and distorted, steadily emphasising each bar until we hit the chorus, at which point there's suddenly this propulsive drumming, there are tight pop harmonies, there are layers on layers of guitar, each bringing something slightly different to the texture of it all. All of which, taken together, sounds fabulous, and make for a hook-driven toe-tapper of a song that's so catchy you can kind of forget how patently ridiculous everything else about it is.

I Can Hear Music - The Beach Boys (10)

And finally, this, a Beach Boys song that I'd never heard of before hitting play, from an album, 20/20, that I'd also never heard of. And there might be a reason for this, because it's a slightly random, scrappy album, mostly being made up of outtakes that didn't make it into previous albums, plus a few deliberately odd experiments and at least one B-side inspired by a song by Charles Manson. Yes, that Charles Manson. The Beach Boys were somewhat tangentially mixed up in that whole scene, it sounds like it was a whole mess. Brian Wilson was also absent at this point, having checked himself into a psychiatric hospital to get help with his deteriorating mental health. Other bands would at this point have called it quits. But Dennis and Carl Wilson looked at the scraps they still had lying around and decided that yes, this would work fine as an album. And by all accounts it is a fine album, albeit a little hit and miss, thematically.

And in among all this, you get I Can Hear Music, which isn't actually a Beach Boys original. No, I Can Hear Music was originally a Ronettes song from back in 1966. As you might expect, then, it's classic girl group pop, bright and sugary and uncomplicatedly romantic, all about how everything fades away when you're with your lover: I never had a love of my own / Maybe that's why when we're all alone / I can hear music, I can hear music / The sound of the city, baby, seems to disappear. I like this. It's cute, okay? And it's also very Phil Spector, which the Beach Boys naturally lean into, there's lots of instruments and texture, with echoey percussion and chimes and tambourine and gentle oooh vocals.

All of which, at this point in 1969, feels pretty nostalgic. Add in an a cappella break near the end, with tumbling harmonies and hand-claps, and your Beach Boys bingo card is complete. Compared to Let's Do It Again, which felt like it was deconstructing the whole "sunny surf song" thing, this is a much more conventional, comfortable song, very easy to listen to and just sink in, like a warm snuggly jumper. And there's nothing wrong with that. If anything, with the Beach Boys going through such a rocky, unsettled patch, you can see the appeal of going back to basics, revisiting the roots and doing a solid, good version of something you know you can do well.

Hmmmm. I finished up this listen-through feeling super chilled out and calm, and I have to assume that's the Beach Boys' doing. It almost makes me want to sit down and listen to 20/20. I really enjoyed Let's Do It Again, which was the album's lead single, after all. And I Can Hear Music was super pretty and cozy, very pleasant to listen to. No shade on the Who, because Pinball Wizard was also great. But I needed something a bit more restful today, and the Beach Boys provided. As did Mary, to be fair. But c'mon. The Beach Boys' harmonies can't be surpassed.

Israelites - Desmond Dekker and the Aces (peaked at Number 1)

Well this is something different. I feel like we've been seeing more and more Caribbean-tinged music creeping into the charts, with a solid back-and-forth establishing itself between US soul and R&B labels, local Jamaican labels and groups based in the UK with members from the West Indies. But this is the most obviously out there about it. Far from Johnny Nash's smooth, slightly country-ish vocals, or the Equals' driving beats, this is proper reggae, undeniable and unapologetic, for the very first time. And it got to Number 1!

The most striking thing's probably the vocals, which are in Jamaican Patois. You get a full earful of it right at the start, as Desmond opens: get up in the morning, slaving for bread sir / So that every mouth can be fed / Poor me Israelites, a-ah. To a modern ear, a bit more used to various Caribbean accents, especially in music, it doesn't seem crazy hard to understand, but at the time, the song was notorious among American and British audiences who struggled to understand the lyrics, or misheard them. I can't relate, personally, I feel like it's pretty clear, albeit with some definitely non-standard grammar.

Whatever. The song got to Number 1, and while that could just be novelty value, I think there's also a lot here that's also pretty likable, if you can get past the intelligibility of it all. It's a song about being poor, and the pressures of having no money. Desmond's getting up early, slaving away, my wife and my kids, they pack up and a-leave me. He's ragegd, shirt them a-tear up, trousers is gone / I don't want to end up like Bonnie and Clyde. But there's a hopefulness to it too, a line in the middle about how after a storm there must be a calm. And the reference to Israelites is also a tiny touch of optimism, a reference to various Rastafarian beliefs linking Rastafari believers to the twelves tribes of ancient Israel, with God rescuing them from slavery and providing them with a place to live. Which is obviously an enticing prospect to a poor Jamaican worker slaving for bread. I don't know, I just think there's depth, and it's a depth that feels very culturally specific in a kind of interesting way.

And on top of all that, it also just sounds good. The opening lines are sang slow and almost a cappella over a Jailhouse Rock-esque twanging guitar, but the pace quickly picks up and you've got that classic reggae beat, bouncy, rhythmic bass on the downbeat, choppy, staccato guitar on the offbeat. The extra vocalists (the Aces, presumably) who join on the poor me Israelites refrain give the whole thing a very communal, call-and-response feel, and almost make it feel like some kind of work song. Which feels relevant to the song's content. It's Desmond's song, but you get a sense of all of these people in the same boat, and the fellowship between them. And the whole thing's light, it fairly zips along, it doesn't outstay its welcome. All of which makes for a very easy listen, a breath of fresh air that sounds like nothing else around it.

In the Bad Bad Old Days (Before You Loved Me) - The Foundations (8)

This, on the other hand, is as standard as they come. Which isn't a bad thing at all. I generally do like the vibes that the Foundations bring, and this is no exception. This is a slick, high-energy bit of soul pop, everybody's giving it a fair bit of oomph, and the result's something that's hard to dislike. It also sounds shockingly American, I have to remind myself every single time that the Foundations are British, because this sounds almost exactly like a Temptations hit, or even a Four Tops hit, if you added some flute in. But nope, it sounds super Motown, but this one didn't even chart in the US. It got to Number 23 in Canada, but that's as close as it ever got.

Which is a shame, it's fun. There's a solid cheesiness to it, between the slightly overbearing strings and the backing vocals with their slightly silly doo-doo-doooos and their breathy love me girls, but it's a cheesiness that's hard to really hold against the track, which is otherwise solidly competent. The brass is snappy, the bass is hidden away underneath it all but surprisingly excellent, the drums just don't let up, keeping you tapping your feet. And the lead vocals are delivered with a very respectable amount of gusto and energy. By the time you hit the ending, with its key change leading into a fade-out, I defy you not to basically be convinced.

On top of that, I think Joey Young, who's now the group's lead vocalist, is also very endearing here, spinning a story of a man who was very lonely and sad before his love came into his life. She then appeared to end his misery, and bursting with gratitude, he's keen to repay her by trying his hardest to do well to pay it all back to her: one day I'm gonna make it, girl, I'm tellin' you / I'm really gonna make it to the top / And nothing in this world is gonna make me stop / You sure put a magic spell on me / I'm nothing like the man I used to be. You can debate if this is a healthy level of expectations to put on yourself, long-term, in real-life. But I think in the context of this song it's sweet. Joey's love has turned his life around, now he's determined to do well for her sake. What a good lad.

Part of me wanted to like the Foundations less than I did. Then I could contrast them to the welcome change of pace that Desmon represented, could make a point of how stale Motown is starting to get. But I can't, In the Bad Bad Days (Before You Loved Me) is a solid bop that was simply not possible to dislike. It's a little cheesy, that's the worst I can say about it. But in th grand scheme of things, I will say, I don't think it's essential listening. Whereas I really do think Israelites brought something new to the table, a much more authentically Jamaican sound and a much more authentically Jamaican than we've necessarily heard before, or at least that we've heard much recently. Very enjoyable, I do hope we hear more from Desmond soon.

Sorry Suzanne - The Hollies (peaked at Number 3)

I really like the opening chords on this one, just two descending runs of notes, the second a semitone up from the first, simple enough, but the effect's lovely, even on whatever horribly beaten-up piano they've dragged out of storage for it. The vocals that come in right afterwards are equally gorgeous, with some pretty, kind of Beatles-ish harmonies. The Hollies' vocals are always a treat, but these are particularly easy on the ears.

All the better to play the role of a particularly pathetic deadbeat boyfriend, grovelling for forgiveness, and effusively so. I can't make it if you leave me, they plead, I'm sorry Suzanne, believe me / I was wrong / And I knew I was all along / Forgive me / I still love you more than ever. Yikes. What I'm getting from this is that they messed up messed up. And they're not finished, because the Hollies are determined to do this thing properly, solemnly admitting that they can't justify the tears they caused, promising that they regret what they did, confessing that they knew it was wrong even at the time, admitting they don't even know why they did it, begging her to take them back, promising things will be different if she does.

It's almost too much, except it sounds fabulous, which goes a lot of the way to warm me to this one. There's nothing super fancy going on, but I enjoy the guitar work, the subtle vibes that come in over the chorus to give it a little more intensity, the natty little squalling guitar solo near the end, the piano that comes back in quietly near the end in the background. There's a lot to like, basically, the song feels laid-back but like it's still trying, and the result's a very competent, likable bit of pop rock.

Games People Play - Joe South (6)

I knew this wouldn't be the Alan Parsons Project song, but somehow I still expected it. More fool me. Joe South, who I don't think I'd heard of before hitting play, was an American singer-songwriter who'd already had quite a long career as a session musician by the point he recorded this, the song that would go on to be his biggest hit, it sounds like. He's got a voice for country music, deep, with a proper southern accent. But this tracks' only kind of a country rock track, there's some folksier elements to it, too, plus a rather baroque string quartet at points, and even hints of what I think's a sitar in the background, so that's a fun snapshot of music in the late 1960s right there.

Also a fun snapshot of the late 1960s' social climate are the lyrics. Because this is a protest song, all about people's hypocrisy and falseness. That much is clear from the opening salvo, as Joe sings about the games people play now / Every night and every day now / Never meaning' what they say now / And never sayin' what they mean. But the examples he then goes on to give are interesting, because sure, he starts out in the context of a romantic relationship that seems to have broken down, but by the end of the song you've got conventionally religious folks, people walkin' up to you singin' glory hallelujah / And they try to sock it to ya in the name of the Lord, but you've also got people shilling a much more 1960s sort of alternative spirituality, people who're gonna teach you how to meditate, read your horoscope, cheat your faith. Which is kind of interesting, it sounds like there's a healthy skepticism there towards the hippie movement and especially its spiritual "gurus" who promised big, but at best didn't always deliver and at worse were actively trying to start some sort of cult.

Anyway, the whole song's a bit of a jam, after that point. There's a cut-off swear as Joe singing about how you don't give a da-dada-daa-da-da, but past that all just kind of fades away into this slightly messy, chaotic mix of electric sitar and strings and thrown-in ad libs and la-da-dada-daa-da-da vocals. There's something very easy-going about it, for all that Joe's got an axe to grind. The vibe's very down-to-earth, very chill, like a casual sing-along with a bunch of friends. That might just be Joe harmonizing with himself, but I like it anyway.

Boom Bang-a-Bang - Lulu (2)

I don't have high expectations for any song with a completely nonsense title, and while I do on principle rather like Lulu, her last hit was I'm a Tiger, which was pretty dire. So I wasn't feeling great about this one, and the opening bars, a comical bit of bassoon and a vaguely European-sounding schlager beat didn't do much to warm me to it either. Schlager is something I can do without at the best of times, so the idea of Lulu courting the European audience with a cheesy schlager hit was something I wasn't exactly stoked about.

The lyrics didn't help either, as they're very cutesy and Lulu's putting her most coy voice on, which isn't something I typically enjoy all that much. Come closer, come closer and listen, she croons, the beat of my heart keeps on missin' / I notice it most when we're kisisn' / Come closer and love me tonight, that's right / Come closer and cuddle me tight. Ugh. Sugary-twee and something about the word "cuddle" used seriously in a song also really upsets me. I will grant that the song's melody is good, though, soaring off into the stratosphere pleasingly as Lulu describes how her heart goes boom bang-a-bang boom bang-a-bang when you are near / Boom bang-a-bang boom bang-a-bang loud in my ear. The vocals are also less objectionable for this bit, to the point where I can very nearly imagine myself enjoying the song.

Plenty of other people did, apparently. Because this was a Eurovision hit, chosen at a national competition. Lulu had already been picked by the BBC, the competition was to see what song she'd perform, which is an interesting way to do it. I guess it at least guarantees that whatever get performed is a confirmed crowd-pleaser. Because this did please the crowds, enough that it won the contest! I will say, this is maybe not as impressive a feat as it sounds, since Lulu actually came joint first with three other acts (there being no tie-breaker rule yet) out of only 16 total entries. Still, from a 2026 perspective, with the UK sitting firmly in the perpetual nul points zone, a win's nothing to sniff at. And I like Lulu, she's very plucky, so whatever. I'm glad she did well for her sake.

Get Ready - The Temptations (10)

Is this this week's only actually cool hit? From the get go, this one's snappy, and it stays very up-tempo and energetic through it's whole run, with some muscular Motown horns, driving drums, robust vocals, shrill, trembling strings, and these little edgy piano notes peeking through. Get Ready feels stylish and slick, like it knows what it's doing.

The vocals are sung at falsetto pitch, and are sweet and gentle, but Eddie Kendricks, the singer for this track, isn't shy at all, he radiates confidence, every bit the smooth mover, buttering his lover up and telling her that I never met a girl who makes me feel the way that you do - you're alright! - whenever I'm asked who makes my dreams real, I say that you do - you're outta sight! I love the call-and-response bits here, they're so cute and fun, the Temptations butting in just to hype up this mystery lady. I even like the fee-fi-fo-fum, look out baby 'cause here I come hook. It's something that could sound kind of goofy, but somehow it works in context, coming off playful rather than childish or gimmicky.

Also, there's a sax solo! It's been ages since we've had much saxophone, so I enjoyed it when we got a proper sax break later on in the track, a session musician just wailing away on a couple of notes, really going for it. My only complaint is that it didn't do all that much, and wasn't all that long. More sax would not have gone amiss here. But it was a nice moment, while it lasted, a bit of extra colour for a track that was already plenty colourful.

Like I said in the intro, this was a gratifyingly miscellaneous batch of songs, and all four of them had their own merits, none of these was a complete write off. Lulu came close, but she did win Eurovision, and I didn't hate it as much as I hated Puppet on a String or Congratulations, so it's progress. The Hollies are reliably pretty good. And I didn't hate Joe South's odd mix of country rock and psychedelic hippie folk, either. But like I said in their entry, the Temptations are the only one of these acts that can be properly described as cool. And for that...

You've Lost That Lovin' Feelin' - The Righteous Brothers (peaked at Number 10, previously Number 1)

I think the way to go here is to re-listen, then to go back to my original 1965 thoughts and see if I reckon they hold up, however many years down the line. Perhaps four more years of music will have changed my opinion on the Righteous Brothers?

Or not so much. Because I remember quite liking them, and looking back at my thoughts from 1965, I can't really disagree with anything I said. It's a big, dramatic song, with Bill Medley's slow, deep vocals standing out in a slowed-down, soupy way. It's also very Phil Spector. I'm realising, listening to this, how much I miss that massive Phil Spector sound, all the orchestral instruments, the big backing choruses, the echoing drums and cowbell and tambourine, the sheer amount of texture everything had. We've not lost it entirely, I feel like it's kind of morphed into the classic Motown mix of horns and tambourine and hand-claps and snappy backing vocals. But it's different now, I miss the days when you'd get random bassoon or church bells just to add that extra something something.

I will also say that the song's length - a whole four minutes - feels much less radical in 1969 than it did back in 1965. We've graduated onto seven-minute songs in some notable cases, four feels like nothing compared to a Hey Jude or a MacArthur Park. Admittedly, those were songs that have multiple distinct parts, which YLTLF doesn't have. But still, it doesn't at any point feel like it drags, it's very listenable. Bill and Bobby's vocals are fantastic, raw where they need to be, smooth and restrained where they need to be. I don't know if it's something to do with the recording technique, but it sounds like there's more than just the two of them at points, too, it's a very full. rich sound when you hit that big old chorus and they start harmonising with each other.

Final, miscellaneous observation: the chords in the background throughout the baby, baby bridge, with the chimes, sound almost exactly like the chords from Grease's Summer Lovin'. Once you hear it, you can't unhear it, sadly. Very unfortunate.

Looking back, it looks like this was paired up with the Kinks' Tired of Waiting for You, and that is a song that I like a lot, so I stand by my decision to name it as my favourite and not YLTLF, back then. But at the same time, I'm glad the Righteous Brothers are getting another shot at it, four years later. Because if there's any song that deserves to make it into my playlist of "favourite songs of the bunch" it's this one. Holds up, for sure. And as a fun bit of trivia, it's also the only song to have made it into the UK Top 10 not twice but three times. So we are actually due to re-listen again, but in 1990. Which will be an impressive feat indeed, if this blog gets there.