About This Time 70 Years Ago…

It’s The Hits Of June-ish 1955!

The Hottest Hit On The Planet:

“Unchained Melody” was the theme song to a movie. A movie titled Unchained. A movie no human being has ever seen.

A prison-break movie in which the prisoner first decides not to break out of prison, then decides to break out of prison, and then, at the last critical moment, decides not to again.

Here’s the opening narration:

“This is the largest honor prison in the world. Two thousand men live here. Murderers, armed robbers, forgers, safe-crackers, petty thieves. But there are no guns to hold them, no walls, no armed guards, just a man and an idea. A man named Scudder. The idea: prisoners are people.”

Scudder was a big believer that prisoners are people. He wrote a book about it.

It’s hard to believe the studio actually believed people might actually pay money to watch it.

If Unchained’s premise seemed unpromising, then the performance of “Unchained Melody” in the movie must have seemed even less so.

It’s not that it’s sung badly. The singer, Todd Duncan, was an opera singer. One of the first Black opera singers to perform in major opera company.

Todd sings “Unchained Melody” as though it were a spiritual. But he’s lying down on the bed as he sings, so he just sounds tired.

That scene comes just after all the prisoners have gone in front of the prison board, to argue their cases for early release. Now they are waiting, to see if they are about to go home. Thinking about their loved ones, whom they might be about to see… but probably won’t. No wonder they are hungering for their loved ones’ touch. They are the lonely rivers flowing, to the sea… to the sea. To the open arms of the sea. They are the lonely rivers crying “wait for me! Wait for me!” They’ll be coming home… or will they?

It’s all rather touching, but it still feels like humble beginnings for a tune that was about to take over the world.

And HOW it took over the world!!

Plus, another one by J. Valli further down. Not to mention a British version at Number One in the UK, by Jimmy Young. Liberace also had a hit version! For a song from a movie that no-one has ever seen, that’s simply mind-blowing!!!

Let’s look at them, one by one.

First up: Les Baxter.

Les Baxter basically reimagined music.

He apparently took it seriously, studying the music of the cultures he set out to recreate. He claimed to have studied Chinese music in his teens. Sometimes he brought in real-life African drummers.

It doesn’t sound like it.

Ritual Of The Savage and Tamboo! – not to forget Ports Of Pleasure:

… they sound exactly how you would expect a man who would spend the rest of his career scoring B-grade horror movies – not to mention such classics as:

• Beach Blanket Bingo
• How To Stuff A Wild Bikini
• Dr. Goldfoot and The Bikini Machine
• The Ghost In The Invisible Bikini
• And X: The Man With The X-Ray Eyes – would imagine the music of the world to sound.

Les worked in Hollywood, and he depicted the music of the world in much the same way as Hollywood depicted its landscapes and people; so far removed from reality as to be virtually unrecognisable.

Les’ music was about as authentic as a Hollywood actor’s bad Mexican accent, but it enabled the listener to travel to exotic lands – in their minds – and meet erotic women -in their fantasies.

It all began in 1950, with Yma Sumac and her album, The Voice Of The Xtabay.

So obviously, Hollywood decided to market her as an Incan princess, directly descended from the last of the Incan emperors, naming her album after a Mayan – i.e. ancient Mexican – demoness who lures men into the forest to have sex, before turning into a snake and eating them. It became a Number One album!

Les produced, conducted, and composed The Voice Of The Xtabay, and he followed the same approach with his own albums, and most importantly, album covers. I particularly like how he added the French translation of “Ritual Of The Savage,” just in case it didn’t sound alluring enough in English. “Le Sacre Du Sauvage.” Very chic.

“Do the mysteries of native rituals intrigue you?” Les asks in liner notes. “Does the haunting beat of savage drums fascinate you? Are you captivated by the forbidden ceremonies of primitive peoples in far-off Africa or deep in the interior of the Belgian Congo?”

Since the tracks were instrumentals, they also had their own liner notes, to get you in the mood.

Whilst listening to “Quiet Village” – probably Les’ masterpiece, although you might feel that something is missing (it would take a few more years before a hotel band in Hawaii figured out what that missing something was) – try to picture the following scene: 

“The jungle grows more dense as the river boat slowly makes its way into the deep interior. A snake slithers into the water, flushing a brilliantly plumaged bird who soars into the clearing above a quiet village… deserted in the mid-day heat.”

Les’ original rendition of “Quiet Village” is a 9.

Yep, that’s exactly how I imagine far-off Africa to sound.

Naturally Les never visited Africa. Or Brazil. Or any of the other lands he dedicated albums to. “Back then,” Les has admitted “I never got further than Glendale.”

Les also recorded TWO albums set in space!

Les’ version of “Unchained Melody” sounds nothing like anything that I described above.

It contains no savage rituals. No tribal drums. No hot alien party girls.

Now obviously, the melody is solid gold. But the strings are cheese-ball, and there’s a choir just chanting “unchain me… unchain me…” just in case you didn’t know what the song was called… which given that the song was brand new, and given that the words “unchain”, “unchained” or “melody” do not feature in it at all, would have been a valid concern at the time.

And when the song itself finally starts – “ohhhh my love, my darling…” – we find that it’s by another choir, of barbershop singers… “Unchained Melody” may be the most boring thing that Les ever did, and it’s a 4.

Next up, Al Hibbler.

I think the first time I heard of Al Hibbler was when reading Don DeLillo’s Underworld. Two characters are in a sex shop, for some reason I forget:

“Al Hibbler. That was blind.”

I have no idea what it means – nor am I altogether clear about why he would expect Al Hibbler to be playing in a sex shop, right that very moment – but I think he’s onto something.

Al Hibbler was blind. He was blind from birth.

All I know is that they once got into a fight backstage, over who was going to sing first that night, both of them shouting “I’m going to kick you in the ass!”. At which point everyone in the room burst out laughing: “How you going to find his ass?”

Al had spent much of the 1940s as the vocalist for Duke Ellington’s band, and this appears to have been the defining experience of his life.

They don’t appear to have sold much. Clearly it was time for Al to become his own man.

Al seems to have fun with “Unchained Melody.”

Elsewhere he’s just full of his own vocal tics and affectations. During the bridge he really wants you know, and more than that, to understand, that lonely rivers flow, to the sea, to the sea… it’s very important to Al that you recognise this.

“Unchained Melody” was particularly big in the Black community.

One might presume that this was because the character who sings “Unchained Melody” in the movie was Black. But for that to be the case, people would have to know that a Black man had sung it in the movie… and for people to know that, they would have to watch the movie… and, as we have established, no-one did.

One of those being by Al Hibbler, and the other being by Roy Hamilton, recorded in a rush as soon as they heard the Al version.

Roy Hamilton had been an amateur boxer. He looked the part.

Then he became a gospel singer. He looked less the part of a gospel singer, but I guess that was the point:

Then he decided to go “secular,” aka “Pop.”

This doesn’t appear to have been due to any passion for pop. Roy didn’t seem to know much pop music. When he recorded his first secular hit, “You’ll Never Walk Alone” – you may know it from Carousel, you may know it from Gerry & The Pacemakers, you may know it from Liverpool football matches – he selected that song because it was the only “secular” song he knew.

Now, surely, that can’t be literally true. Surely he knew, like, “White Christmas” and “Don’t Fence Me In”? But that’s what the legend says, and I’m just printing the legend.

Roy’s version of “Unchained Melody” is apparently the version that the Righteous Brothers had in mind when they recorded theirs, a decade later. You can tell. Roy sings his version with gravitas, almost as though he’s a preacher.  He sings it sensitive, yet manly.  

Both Al Hibbler and Roy Hamilton’s version of “Unchained Melody” are 7s. But in very different ways.

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Meanwhile, in Rat Pack Land:

Al Hibbler may have been blind, but Sammy Davis Jnr had an eye patch!

His Cadillac was backended on Route 66, and the car horn – shaped like a bullet, as was standard in all Cadillacs produced that year – poked him in the eye. Within a few months he would swap it for a glass eye. I’m not sure that was a good move. Firstly, as that YouTube thumbnail demonstrates, glass eyes are notoriously tricky to keep looking in the right direction.

Sammy Davis Jr. had to tackle a lot of challenges in his life.

Once, so the story goes, when on the golf course with Jack Benny, Sammy was asked what his handicap was, and he quipped “I’m a one-eyed Negro who’s Jewish.”

Sammy could have added that couldn’t he write much more than his name: he never personalized autographs in case he spelt the recipient’s name wrong.

Sammy could also have added that he was short. It was rare that Sammy was ever not the shortest person in any photograph (in that one with Marilyn, she’s sitting down). But he had an almost Prince-like capacity for being surrounded by beautiful women.

Indeed, Sammy’s biggest challenge was related to his love life.

Not in attracting beautiful women – as noted, Sammy had no problems with that – but in dealing with powerful racists who didn’t like the fact that he dated white women.

A lot of people seemed pissed off that Sammy Davis Jr was dating Kim Novak. One of those people was Hollywood mogul Harry Cohn, who was so upset that Kim was dating a Black man that he had a heart attack. He also sent some hitmen out to kidnap Sammy, and give him an ultimatum… to marry a Black woman within two days. Such was Sammy’s animal magnetism – and cheque book – that he managed to pull off this seemingly impossible stunt. and immediately got married to a dancer named Loray White. 

I could go on… about how Sammy campaigned for JFK but was then uninvited to the Inauguration Ball – and after he’d already bought a new suit especially for the occasion!

Some say that JFK begged Frank Sinatra to beg Sammy not to get married before the 1960 Presidential Election. I’m not saying those rumours are correct but it’s a fact they got married one week after.

But that was all in the future, once Sammy had gotten famous.

How did Sammy become famous?

with a tap-dancer from Cuba for a mother– or Puerto Rico as Sammy insisted at the time, not wanting to add an association with the Cuban Missile Crisis to all of his woes – and a vaudeville father, Sammy Davis Sr., with whom he travelled America as part of a vaudeville trio.

That trio was called the Will Mastin Trio; Will being the other member, and a friend of Sammy’s father.

Sammy specialized in doing impressions. He had been doing on-stage impressions since he was two and a half. Three years old at the latest.

He was also said to do a good Perry Como, Bing Crosby, Johnny Ray, Frankie Laine, and of course Frank Sinatra. His Jerry Lewis was said to be better than Jerry Lewis’ Jerry Lewis, and, looking at the clip above, it’s certainly as annoying. Sammy doesn’t even have to introduce it, it’s so spot on…

With the possible exception of “Mr Bojangles” a decade and a half later:

“Something’s Gotta Give” was his signature hit. I’m just going to pretend here that “The Candy Man” never happened.

For anyone out there still dreaming of writing the Great American Novel, don’t bother. It’s already been done. It’s a song. And it’s “Mr Bojangles.” That bit where the dog up and dies, it just up and dies, it gets me right here. After 50 or so years, I still grieve.

“Something’s Gotta Give” on the other hand, Sammy had to share with… oh great… the McGuire Sisters again, who, I think we can all agree, were neither irresistible forces nor immovable objects.

Not to mention Fred Astaire, who sung it in the movie it was written for: Daddy Long Legs:

A movie that some people saw, but not a lot. Fred Astaire – by now in his 50s, but still impressively nimble – falls in love with an 18-year-old French orphan, and – unbeknownst to her – pays for her education.

Which just goes to show: you can pay for someone’s education, but you can’t buy brains.

Also, ew!

Also, it’s a pity there weren’t a lot of feminist-think pieces back then, because they would have had a field day!

Listening to Sammy’s version, you could be forgiven for thinking that he is playing the role of both irresistible force and immovable object. Also, implacable; not enough songs feature the word “implacable.”

By the time he was six or seven, he was already been promoted as “The World’s Greatest Juvenile Entertainer.”

“Something’s Gotta Give” is an 8.

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Meanwhile in Rock’n’Roll Land:

They called him “The Fat Man.”  

Hell, he called himself “The Fat Man.”

It was the name of his debut single, way back in 1950. I guess he figured it was best to get it out of the way. It was what everyone was thinking anyway. Also, it was in his stage name. There was no ignoring it.

Fats pounds the piano keys and makes a bunch of wah-wah sounds – presumedly pretending to be a trumpet – and sings a handful of lyrics:

“They call, they call me the fat man
‘Cause I weigh two hundred pounds”

Most sources say that Fats weighed 225 pounds, so 200 is close enough… I mean, obviously that figure fluctuated throughout his life.

“All the girls they love me
‘Cause I know my way around”

Is that last line another fat pun? I’m not sure. Probably.

Fats – birth name Antoine Dominique Domino Jr. (keeping the naming-your-kids-after-yourself family tradition, Fats would have 8 children, all of them, including Antoine III, starting with the letter A, and seven of them, until they ran out of names, starting with “An”) – was given that stage-name at the beginning of his career in the late 40s.

It wasn’t exactly an original name:

Fats Domino was always happy. It was basically his defining feature, other than being fat.

He’s even cheery when singing “Ain’t That A Shame”, despite it nominally being a break-up song, one that points the finger, and names names, listing the litany of terrible things that you did to Fats.

• You made Fats cry when you said goodbye
• His tears fell like rain
• You’re the one to blame.

I don’t believe it. Tears have never fallen like rain from Fats’ eyes. Fats is extremely insistent that you made him cry – he mentions it multiple times – but repetition doesn’t make it any more believable.

Fats was born, and grew up in New Orleans, in the Ninth Ward.

Fats was such a New Orleanian that he’d never left the town before he became famous.

And when he did become famous, and had to go on tour, he went into hiding at his cousin’s place to try and get out of it. He may also have not wanted to tour because he was – and I realize this may sound weird, given his constantly beaming face:

The main reason that Fats never seemed to want to leave New Orleans is that he knew couldn’t find a decent jambalaya anywhere else. Some say that was the reason he didn’t go to his Rock’n’Roll Hall Of Fame Induction, was because he knew he wouldn’t be able to find a decent gumbo in all of Cleveland.

That’s how New Orleans-Fats Domino was. When Fats recorded “Jambalaya (On The Bayou)” you could tell that he meant every word. “Jambalaya and a crawfish pie and file gumbo”… oh yeah.

Ever since jazz had sprung from New Orleans in the late 1910s with Louis Armstrong, and King Oliver and The Original Dixieland Jazz Band, the city had a reputation for being an inexhaustible supply of new Black sounds.

So it’s no surprise that, in the early 50s, when pop music needed to be saved from silly ballads and sillier novelty songs:

Particularly since New Orleans now had a secret weapon. New Orleans had “the backbeat.”

And, as I’m sure you know, if you got a backbeat, you can’t lose it. New Orleans had “the backbeat” in its pocket ever since Wynonie Harris’ “Good Rockin’ Tonight” in 1947, a record which is basically nothing BUT backbeat.

The master of “the backbeat” was Earl Palmer.

His lively jazz drumming was on most of Fats’ early hits, including – and even especially – “The Fat Man.” It may not be Earl on “Ain’t That A Shame”, but not to worry:

By this time Earl was going national. With hits that included most of Little Richard’s big records, a bunch of Sam Cooke records, Eddie Cochrane, Ritchie Valens, “Purple People Eater”, before ultimately joining the Wrecking Crew and playing on absolutely everybody’s hits. 

Earl may also have been the first to use the word “funky”, at least in relation to describing music.

You want to know the “funky” origin story?

So, there was this guy in New Orleans called Drag Nasty, who was always drunk, and he smelt like it. He was one of those people you could smell before you saw them. So one day, during a recording session, Earl tells the band “Think about Drag Nasty, how funky and dirty he stinks and smells. Think about playing the music just like that.”

And thus, funk was born.

Fats Domino may have been a charming young lad with a glint in his eye, and an ability to make folks happy, but he couldn’t write hit songs for shit.

For that he needed hit song writer, producer, and A&R man: Dave Bartholomew.

Dave was the one who came up “The Fat Man.” Also “Lawdy Miss Clawdy” for Lloyd Price… with Fats on the piano, in case you couldn’t tell… and “I Hear You Knocking” for Smiley Lewis, which was racing up the charts – the R&B charts anyway – at about the same time as “Ain’t That A Shame.”

And Dave wrote “Ain’t That A Shame.” You could tell.

You could always tell a Dave Bartholomew production. They all had a thundering piano, Fats pounding along in a manner that manages to be at once frantic and easy-going, dirty honking saxophones playing cheeky little hooks, a backbeat that you simply cannot lose… except of course for those bits where it stops for an accusatory “bom bom.”

“Ain’t That A Shame” sounds like a party record – certainly more than it sounds like a break-up anthem – from the very first note.

One weird thing about “Ain’t That A Shame:” it was officially titled “Ain’t It A Shame”, despite Fats never using that word-combination, not even once.

There’s a theory that there was a mix-up because Lloyd Price had recently released a song with that title. Don’t you be fooled, though. It’s a very different song. Even if it does have the same New Orleans boogie-woogie blues sound.

Pat Boone got it right.

I know. That feels wrong to say.

It’s not often that I agree with Pat Boone, but when he recorded “Ain’t It A Shame,” and it went to Number One even though it’s a complete and utter embarrassment, the cheesiest cover ever recorded, and a crime against music:

Legend has it though that Pat was pushing to change the title to “Isn’t That A Shame”, in order to appeal to people who don’t consider “ain’t” to be a real word. That’s even more ridiculous. So maybe I do disagree with Pat Boone. Good. Disagreeing with Pat Boone is what I’m used to. The world makes sense again.

When rock’n’roll blew up a few months later, Fats – by now arguably the biggest boogie-woogie star in the land – would get caught up in that categorization.

People would describe Fats Domino as rock’n’roll. Fats would disagree, because musicians always do that.

But whether or not Fats himself was rock’n’roll, his records certainly were. They had that backbeat!

I mean, look at Fats Domino. Does he look dangerous to you?

He’s nothing but a big smiling face! A ray of sunshine!

The only thing he might be a danger to is a big bowl of gumbo!

“Ain’t That A Shame” is a 9.

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