An Oldie, 1970 Style

My perspective on what constitutes an “oldie” has changed over time. When I was 11, the Chicago “oldies” station, WIND, played songs from ten to fifteen years before. That pretty much took things back to the beginning of the Rock Era, so there was nowhere else to go. Now, if you play fifteen-year-old songs, you’re talking Nirvana. To me, that doesn’t seem like an oldie.

I got a very fresh perspective on oldies today, Friday, May 23. My Spanish students were making videos of skits they had written as a final project. One pair included a long sequence that pictures them throwing a baseball around. They chose “Peace of Mind” by Boston for the audio. I found it a perfectly rational choice.

Today, the film’s director stopped by to check on his grade, and he mentioned that he and his partner had wanted to learn the song so they could play it themselves to impress me further. The other guy couldn’t get the acoustic guitar licks down, so they just used the recording. “It’s a pretty good song,” this student said.

The way he said it made me realize he had just discovered “Peace of Mind.” That reminded me of the day my brother Jeff, listening to Aerosmith in 1988, said, “I heard they had a few hits a long time ago.” And, no kidding, someone once said in my presence, “That’s the band Paul McCartney was in before Wings.”

For the first but not last time this year, I am going to visit the summer of 1970. The song I am presenting today isn’t from the summer; it was an “oldie” by then. In 1970 parlance, that means it had spent several months out of the rotation on WLS. Its final week in the Top 40 was February 21, 1970. It had reached #10 in its ten-week chart run, but I hadn’t paid it much attention, because my mind was focused elsewhere in the weeks following my mother’s death in January.

The song, “Jingle Jangle” by the Archies (Kirshner 5002), reached my ears on a hot August evening (you expected me to say “night”), and finally it registered with me as a song I would enjoy from then on.

1970 was a year of understandable turmoil in my world. As soon as school ended, my dad sent me to visit his sister in Loogootee, Indiana, a stone’s throw from Shoals, where his parents lived. My Aunt Jenny and her husband, Uncle Eddie, lived on a farm with their three sons. I learned about chickens, piglets, electric fences, and walking behind horses without letting them know you’re there. One of the boys owned “Sugar, Sugar,” so there was good music. I was there when the radio stopped playing “Who’ll Stop the Rain” and segued into the next Creedence hit, “Up Around the Bend.”

Then it was back to Gary to visit my mom’s mom for a while. I got terribly homesick while I was there, even though Grandma made me the best breakfasts I have ever had and was marvelous company. I was still there when Father’s Day rolled around, and I didn’t hear any music at all during that stretch.

The music scene picked up for me again at the end of July and into August, when I moved about ten blocks to the home of Aunt Eileen, her husband, Uncle Jim, and my cousins Jim and Bob. The boys slept upstairs on a wide-open second-floor; Bob’s bed sat in a cubbyhole with a window that overlooked Kentucky Street. It was all very cozy.

One week in August, I’ll go into the music Bob and I heard on WLS at night. He left the radio on when the lights went out, something I had never thought of before. He developed a game in which we competed to see who could name the songs first as they came on. Though Bob is five years older than I am, I did a pretty good job of guessing the tunes. Good enough that he recalled my prowess when I visited his house seventeen years later.

Among the songs WLS played a lot that won’t be part of the blog were “The Love You Save,” “(They Long to Be) Close to You” and “Hitchin’ a Ride.” Songs I associate particularly with that time were “Ball of Confusion” and the “Overture from Tommy” by the Assembled Multitude. I won’t forget “Big Yellow Taxi” by the Neighborhood, because Bob thought they were singing “Take down a bank, put up a parking lot.”

WLS had a very tight playlist, so I can recall just two oldies playing during those after-hours radio sessions. One was “Down in the Boondocks” by Billy Joe Royal, from 1965. I had never heard it before, so I thought it was new. Of course, they didn’t play it again. The other “oldie” was “Jingle Jangle.”

I remembered that song well, but it hadn’t given me as much joy as “Sugar, Sugar.” On that August evening, though, I recognized it from the first guitar chord, and I heard the song for the “second first” time. I could see that it had the same upbeat attitude as “The Love You Save,” a song I adored. My friends and I were amazed that a local group, the Jackson Five, had become so big. At this time, I was staying 19 blocks from the Jacksons’ former Gary home. Now, hearing “Jingle Jangle” from the perspective of having heard “ABC” and “The Love You Save” all spring and summer, I found merit in its cheeriness.

That one summer play as an “oldie” affected me enough that I bought the single when I got home later in August. I can see from looking at the label that, on one occasion in 1970 or 1971, I did another of my record censuses in which I wrote numbers on the labels so I could tell how many 45s I had. I may have alphabetized the records by this time, because “Jingle Jangle” was single number 3.

The song is a Barry/Kim composition, whereas the flip, “Justine,” is credited solely to Jeff Barry. Jeff is listed on the record as producer, with Don Kirshner as production supervisor. Donnie Kirshner’s career is pretty well-known, but maybe not to everyone: He was a key figure in the Brill Building heyday of the early 1960s, and his connections made him a natural choice to develop music for the Monkees. He brought Jeff Barry on board for that project, then they both moved on to create the Archies. He developed Don Kirshner’s Rock Concert for late-night TV around 1973, and he signed the band Kansas to his Kirshner label.

The recording was unusual for an Archies record. Ron Dante says the tune was originally meant to feature Toni Wine as the lead vocalist, so the track was recorded in her range. She sings the intro in her “Veronica” voice, but thereafter her voice comes to the fore only in counterpoint in the choruses.

What Ron did to get around the key difficulties was sing the verses in a whispery falsetto. By contrast, Jeff Barry used his deepest bass to sing “Oh, come on” in the bridge. Andy Kim is in there on the choruses, along with any number of his and Jeff’s usual suspects. I don’t have an exact list of who sang on “Jingle Jangle.”

Whenever I hear the song now, it transports me to my cousins’ bedroom in the Glen Park section of Gary. It’s dark, my cousin Bob has fallen asleep, and I am processing the changes in my world while the music flows through me. I have never been one (perhaps because I predate the video era) to like a song just because it’s paired with a great video. But sometimes my mind creates its own videos, and those images can put a decent song over the hump into the “essential” category. The decision by WLS to slip “Jingle Jangle” back onto the airwaves for one last play made all the difference for that song’s legacy in my memories.

After “Sugar, Sugar” and “Jingle Jangle,” I know some cynicism remains about the validity of cartoon bands. To counteract the sweetness of those two songs, I want to include the most serious of the Archies tunes. “A Summer Prayer for Peace” was not released in the United States, but it hit #1 in South Africa. Ron and Jeff went into the studio alone and put it together. With summer approaching in the Northern Hemisphere, save in Minnesota and perhaps Winnipeg, I’d like to repost this “oldie” that I used in a February essay. As I said then, you have to update the population numbers, but everything else is far too relevant.

Next week I will be celebrating the birthday of a jazz saxophonist you probably don’t know. He takes us back to the early caithiseach 45s after these past two weeks of Barry/Kim music. I’ll see you Wednesday!

Archies, Jingle Jangle

Archies, A Summer Prayer for Peace

It Never Got Better Than This

I love many kinds of music, and many songs that have nothing in common with each other. To be honest, the reactions of my easy-listening friends and my head-banger friends to music that doesn’t suit them disappoints me a bit. I don’t understand how people can develop such a rut that they can’t skip to another groove.

I am going to discuss a song that nearly everyone, regardless of age, level of musical sophistication, self-perceived musical superiority or affiliation with Rolling Stone can sing from memory. Everyone knows this song because there has never been a better pop song.

The song is “Sugar, Sugar” by the Archies (Calendar 1008).

Any Major Dude, whom I respect as a champion of spectacular music, has not included this song in the Perfect Pop series on his blog. Maybe he won’t. But I can make a case, both technical and personal, for “Sugar, Sugar” as the definition of popular music, perhaps even populist music. From its misunderstood origins to its effect on the careers of its writers, the song has earned smirks from writers who could not stop humming it. I’m going to get militant as I tell you why a memorable pop song is not by nature a pop song to be avoided.

I start with the genesis of the song. Ronnie Dante says that Jeff Barry had encouraged Andy Kim to come up with something for the Archies to record. Andy got the idea for the first bit and presented it to Jeff over the phone. They developed the tune together, with Jeff providing the keyboard hook and some lyrics I’ll get to shortly.

Other writers and producers had created bubblegum music. “Yummy, Yummy, Yummy” and “Chewy, Chewy” come to mind. Are they perfect pop songs? No. Why do I say “Sugar, Sugar” reaches that level?

Jeff Barry aimed a lot of his 1960s songs at young teens. In this respect, he was considerably ahead of his peers in understanding the intellectual power, and the purchasing power, of that demographic. Whereas the Ohio Express songs seek to combine a catchy melody with inane lyrics, Jeff’s songs were vibrant enough to energize the young and vital enough to impress music historians. It’s no accident that “Have I ever told you how good it feels to hold you” has been honored by the Library of Congress, while “I got love in my tummy and I feel like lovin’ you” has not.

The difference is that Jeff did not try to capitalize on the innocence of youth; he celebrated it. He still does. If you lament that children are now singing “Shawty need a refund, needa bring that nigga back/Just like a refund, I make her bring that ass back,” you are not alone, and it’s not age that makes one sad about where lyrics have gone.

When Jeff was asked by Don Kirshner to write for the Archies, Jeff did so with a goal of bridging the gap between kiddie pop and adult pop. Jeff risked his stature as a serious producer/writer when he took on this task. He and Andy Kim succeeded with “Sugar, Sugar,” above all other Archies tunes. Andy got it started, and Jeff knew this was a keeper.

The risk paid off commercially, but the intelligentsia, in the throes of psychedelia and Beatlemania, among other –ias, branded Jeff as a simplistic writer. A number of years later, one critic of this ilk asked Jeff why he didn’t write for adults. Jeff replied that recently he had heard a line by Rod McKuen: “I just can’t believe the loveliness of loving you.” The critic replied that Jeff should have written lines like that.

“Fuck you,” Jeff replied. “I wrote that. It’s from ‘Sugar, Sugar.’”

That is part of why “Sugar, Sugar” is a perfect pop song. It’s not about laughing all the way to the bank, like High School Musical 2. It’s about making music that neither shuts out kids nor sends their parents screaming from the room. Compare “Pour a little sugar on me, honey” with “Pour some sugar on me,” and tell me that the lyric Def Leppard echoed is really more adult than the Archies original.

The “Sugar, Sugar” recording session shows another level of sophistication that people tend not to hear. For the first fifteen or so unnumbered takes, Jeff couldn’t get his drummer, Gary Chester (born Cesario Gurciullo, 1924-1987), to match what Jeff was feeling for the song. Unlike the session for Andy Kim’s “Baby, I Love You,” Jeff persevered. He wound up standing in front of his drummer, swaying to the beat in his head to keep the tempo surprisingly slow. Jeff had no use for the frenetic pace of a kiddie tune here.

As the end of the second chorus approaches, Ron Dante sings “You are my candy, girl, and you got me . . . wanting you.” After “me,” he sucks in his breath, the way people do when someone attractive walks by. I asked whose idea that was, and Ron said it was Jeff’s. It is such a subtle touch that kids would never hear it, yet adults know what it implies. No need to say what “wanting you” means; the lyric stays kid-friendly and the breathing provides the subtext. I didn’t hear it as a kid, but I hear it now, every time, and I nod in approval of the tactic.

Did that mean Jeff controlled the song too much? Ron Dante himself came up with the “Whoa-oh-oh” part that leads out of the second verse. At that point the song crosses into soul music; counterpoint shouts of “honey” crop up, and after Toni Wine sings the low “Betty” version of “I’m gonna make your life so sweet,” she belts the high, Aretha-like “Veronica” version of the same phrase. She told me she crafted that pair of singing personalities.

Now, with a pretty good track ready for release, it was up to the kids to buy it once they heard it, right? Ron Dante said that, after two very kid-oriented singles, this third Archies release met with radio resistance simply because of the artist name. At last someone played it, and the listener response was so intense that the song could not be denied airplay. The result was a single that entered the Top 40 on August 16, 1969, spent four weeks at #1 starting September 20, and logged 22 weeks in the Hot 100. “Sugar, Sugar” was the RIAA Record of the Year for 1969. That consumer-driven success is what makes me call it a populist song as well as a popular one.

I have given you bio information on Jeff Barry and Andy Kim before, but I owe you Ron Dante and Toni Wine. Ron Dante, born Carmine Granito in 1945, sang the Archies hits, as well as “Tracy” by the Cuff Links. He also sang (but not the lead) on “Leader of the Laundromat” by the Detergents, a parody of “Leader of the Pack.” Everyone involved with the parody knew it would be subjected to a lawsuit for royalties by the writers of the original hit, among whom was Jeff Barry.

Ron Dante moved on from the Archies to production work for all of Barry Manilow’s records through about 1981. He sang background on “Mandy” and a number of other hits. He still performs regularly.

Toni Wine, born in 1947, wrote “A Groovy Kind of Love” when she was about 18, and she wrote “Candida” for Tony Orlando after she left the Archies. She and Robin Grean sang the backing vocals on “Candida” and “Knock Three Times”; don’t let Joel Whitburn fool you on this one. Ellie Greenwich didn’t participate in the Dawn recordings, but you can hear her on the Archies songs. Toni tours with Tony Orlando now.

While I’m at it, I should note that Gary Chester played drums on “My Boyfriend’s Back,” “Brown Eyed Girl” and “Bad, Bad Leroy Brown” as just the tip of his session-work iceberg.

And now it gets personal. As soon as “Sugar, Sugar” leapt onto WLS in August, 1969, I fell in love with it, along with the rest of the country. At home, I was the daytime caregiver for a very sick mother, and this song kept up my spirits. This one, and “Honky Tonk Women,” of all things.

I didn’t ask anyone to take me to the store to buy the 45, but I didn’t have to. I got a copy of it on the back of a cereal box. Four Archies tunes were featured on a cereal; I believe it was Sugar Crisp. I bought the cereal, hoping to get the right record (the songs weren’t named; you had to play them to know what you had), and on the third try, I had my song.

By 1969, though, my stereo tonearm had been snapped in two by rambunctious siblings, and finally the wires pulled loose. I bought a little record player from a neighbor for a dollar. Its drawback was that it played only 33 1/3 rpm records. So I played my Archies cereal box record at LP speed and imagined that it was playing faster. It was better than nothing. I would still have asked for the actual vinyl single, but it seemed sacrilegious to own such a cheery 45 when I was walking my mom to the toilet every couple of hours. I didn’t turn off the radio, though.

And yet, Mom rallied in late 1969. On November 12, she and I were watching the Glen Campbell Goodtime Hour, sitting together on the sofa, when Glen and the Lennon Sisters started singing “Sugar, Sugar.” My mom started swaying to the music, but I thought it was a ridiculous performance. If you wanted sacrilege, there it was. I snapped, “They should sing their own songs.”

My mom looked at me, her mouth open in shock, and I stomped off to my room. Fifty-nine days later, she died. And, you know, sometimes you can’t go back and apologize for screwing up a perfectly decent evening. She never asked me about it, and though I tried to make myself explain what had been going through my mind, I never could. That’s too bad, because she would have gotten it, after all those years of nurturing my musical tastes.

The day she died, “Don’t Cry Daddy” by Elvis Presley was #11, heading for #6. “Sugar, Sugar” had slipped out of the Hot 100 on December 20. That was a huge and unwelcome change in the radio landscape for me, but I still had my cereal box cutout, and I still played it at LP speed. Sometimes you have to make do with what you have left.

Saturday I’ll look at another Archies song, one that is evocative for different reasons. Thanks for reading. See you then.

Archies--Sugar, Sugar