One of my more peculiar recent finds was this album, Songs for Swinging Children by the
Groovy Gang.
I know…
A dozen covers of popular hits, all with a kid-friendly
bent. Don’t let the Sinatra-esque title or cover image fool you though, the
only swinging these kids get up to is in the play park. No nelson Riddle arrangements
or orchestrations, the twelve tracks included here are po-faced and perfunctory,
knocked out in a spare hour in the studio (the notes on the back of the cover
tell us that this recording session took place on June 10) by a bunch of tired
moonlighting musos who would have probably been paid around £50 each for their
trouble. It’s fairly safe to assume this was recorded in 1971: the album was
issued that year and the most recent track, the Kinks song Apeman, was not issued until November 1970.
What interests me is that the album was produced by Norman
Newell, whose career was closely associated with Columbia records, and artists
including Russ Conway, Shirley Bassey, and Cliff and the Shadows. Newell, a
songwriter as well as a producer, also acted as an A&R man for other EMI
labels, and was responsible for taking acts to Parlophone (Vince Eager) and
recording soundtrack albums for HMV.
Musical Rendezvous/Contour was a British company that
specialised in cheap reissues of old Polydor stable recordings: the Beatles Hamburg
sessions with Tony Sheridan were put out (in two different covers, both
featuring the iconic Mersey Beat newspaper) around the same time, and in turn would
become one of (if not the) first albums I ever purchased with my own money.
A side note: the album includes a cover of the Pipkins hit Gimme Dat Ding. When researching this I
was surprised to discover that the song had originally been recorded Freddie
and the Dreamers. Gimme Dat Ding was
composed for a musical, Oliver in the
Overworld, that formed part of the kid’s TV show Little Big Time, hosted by Freddie Garrity. Freddie and the
Dreamers released a soundtrack album of Oliver
in the Overworld in 1970, but it was novelty act Pipkins who scored the
international hit. Songwriter Roger Greenaway performed, as a member of the
Dreamers, on the first recording, and Greenaway was one half of Pipkins. Small
world, eh?
Anyway, here’s a taster. The aforementioned Gimme Dat Ding and the Groovy Gang’s dull
version of the Beatles’ Yellow Submarine.
Enjoy!
Download Submarine HERE
Only just found this great site. Love it. RE: "Songs For Swinging Kids". A bizarre concept - agreed. Remember the old Woolworths' Embassy label? Plus of course all of those "Top Of The Pops" LPs - which were nothing to do with TOTP of course. Quickly produced cover versions like these could never match the originals - although "G D Ding" actually comes fairly close. No - one could ever come near the Beatles' 'trippy', anthemic kitsch breeze through "Y Submarine". Agreed...this version is somewhat staid, but it is at least musically proficient.
ReplyDeleteThanks Rob... glad you're enjoying the blog! Let me know if there are any dead links you want me to fix!
DeleteWould John Sullivan have known of this record? In an episode of 'Only Fools & Horses' Rodney wins a competition and the prize is a holiday, but it's at a holiday camp and he has to join a children's organisation called The Groovy Gang!
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