Song Lyric Sunday: Talkin’ ‘Bout My G-g-g

It seems a little strange not to be crediting Nancy with the choice of theme for today’s Song Lyric Sunday, but she has taken a well-deserved retirement – for now. Jim’s post Fell Short doesn’t tell us where this idea came from, but it’s a good one: today we are playing songs that reached #2 on the charts, but never got to #1. The field for this was very wide, but I’ve decided to go for three classics from the era in which my musical taste were developed – the Swinging Sixties – and I bet you thought that at least one of these made it to #1. Not in the UK, they didn’t, and being a Brit that is of course the chart I’m using for this.

My lead song is the one in the Billboard poster above:

And as if you needed them, here are those iconic lyrics:

People try to put us d-down (talkin’ ’bout my generation)
Just because we get around (talkin’ ’bout my generation)
Things they do look awful c-c-cold (talkin’ ’bout my generation)
I hope I die before I get old (talkin’ ’bout my generation)

 

This is my generation
This is my generation, baby

 

Why don’t you all f-fade away (talkin’ ’bout my generation)
And don’t try dig what we all s-s-say (talkin’ ’bout my generation)
I’m not trying to cause a big s-s-sensation (talkin’ ’bout my generation)
I’m just talkin’ ’bout my g-g-generation (talkin’ ’bout my generation)

 

My generation
This is my generation, baby

 

Why don’t you all f-fade away (talkin’ ’bout my generation)
And don’t try d-dig what we all s-s-say (talkin’ ’bout my generation)
I’m not trying to cause a big sensation (talkin’ ’bout my generation)
I’m just talkin’ ’bout my g-generation (talkin’ ’bout my generation)

 

This is my generation
This is my generation, baby

My, my g-generation
My, my, my, my, my generation

 

People try to put us d-down (talkin’ ’bout my generation)
Just because we g-g-get around (talkin’ ’bout my generation)
Things they do look awful c-c-cold (talkin’ ’bout my generation)
Yeah, I hope I die before I get old (talkin’ ’bout my generation)

 

This is my generation
This is my generation, baby…

 

Source: Musixmatch

Songwriters: Peter Dennis Blandford Townshend

My Generation lyrics © Fabulous Music Ltd., Fabulous Music Ltd

 

My Generation was released as a UK single in October 1965, and in November in the US, and its #2 chart placing is their equal highest in the UK, along with I’m A Boy from 1966. Pete Townshend reportedly wrote the song on a train and is said to have been inspired by the Queen Mother, who is alleged to have had Townshend’s 1935 Packard hearse towed off a street in Belgravia because she was offended by the sight of it during her daily drive through the neighbourhood. I don’t know if that is true, but it’s a great story! There are also various explanations for the stuttering effect in Roger Daltrey’s vocals, the most credible of which to me is his own: that he was nervous and couldn’t hear the band over the monitors in the studio. The song was originally banned by the BBC as they thought it might offend people with a stutter, but they had to relent when it started climbing the charts. The album made #5 in the UK but didn’t chart in the US, and the single only did slightly better there, despite the poster campaign – it got to #74.

 

I was a little surprised to find that this next one only got to #2 here, as my memory of that time is that it was inescapable! But it didn’t hit the top, though it did achieve that in the US:

 

Wild Thing was written by the American songwriter Chip Taylor, who also wrote the lovely song Angel Of The Morning – quite some variation! It was first recorded by a band called The Wild Ones but didn’t chart. The Troggs released their version in April 1966 and turned it into a smash hit, and quite possibly the only one to have included an ocarina in the mix (go on, prove me wrong, I dare you!). There have been many other versions but for me this is still the definitive one. It was the opening track on the band’s debut album – From Nowhere in the UK, Wild Thing in the US – which peaked at #6 in the UK and #52 in the US. A little ironically, perhaps, for the purposes of this theme, their follow up – With A Girl Like You – did get to #1 in the UK three months later.

My third song for today is another of similar vintage, and is another cover version:

If You Gotta Go, Go Now was written by Bob Dylan, who recorded his own version in early 1965, but it was only ever released as a single in the Netherlands in January 1967, and failed to make the chart. Manfred Mann released their cover as a single in September 1965, and true to today’s theme it peaked at #2 in the UK Singles chart, though it wasn’t a hit in the US. Hearing it again takes me right back to the days when I was enjoying pop music in a massive way, and we were really spoilt for choice. I have often said that the decade in which our musical tastes developed is the one we think of as the best: for me that was the Sixties, and I don’t think that time has ever been bettered. (Discuss!) A quick footnote: another version of this song also made the UK chart in 1969, by one of my all time favourite bands: the folk rock outfit Fairport Convention, who sang it in French, along with clattering sound effects. I love that one too!

That’s it for today: three classics from a golden era for music. I’ll see you again for Tuesday Tunes. Have fun 😊