1964 #1s

163. ‘Diane’, by The Bachelors

/ UK #1s blog / 16 Comments

Ladies and Gentlemen! ‘Diane’, by The Bachelors, is the UK’s one hundred and sixty-third number one single… Nope. Me neither.

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Diane, by The Bachelors (their 1st and only #1)

1 week, from 20th – 27th February 1964

It’s been a good long while since we arrived at a chart-topper that I’d never, ever heard before. Yodeller par excellence Frank Ifield’s version of ‘Confessin’ was probably the last. But even before pressing play, I can kind of predict what we’re heading for here. ‘Diane’, by ‘The Bachelors’ doesn’t, to me, scream rock ‘n’ roll abandon.

And yup, the intro has a strong whiff of barbershop quartet: Smile for me-e-e-e…. My Diane… Close harmonies, and long drawn out notes. But no sooner has this opener swooped to a close than in comes a lilting country rhythm. I’m in heaven, When I see you smile, Smile for me, My Diane… It’s a song about a woman, called Diane, and how much a boy loves her. She lights the road home. No matter where he roams etc. etc. (Has there ever been a non-country and western song featuring the word ‘roam? I don’t think so…)

The Beat-invasion may have had a strong chokehold on the charts at this time, but other songs could still poke through. This had a solitary week at the top, and I have the feeling that that was because there was little in the way of competition – a default #1 because, well, something has to be number one. It’s cute, and pleasant enough, but…

I’m not too sure what to make of it. Maybe it’s insignificant enough for me to simply make nothing of it. It’s a country-ish, barbershop-ish (I do like the ah-oh-oh-ohs!) little ditty that I have to admit I was singing along to by the fourth listen. Actually, I’ve just realised that I’m also getting hints of Cliff – in both the swaying guitars last heard in ‘Summer Holiday’ and the band’s name (Bachelors, get it?)

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Who exactly were these Bachelors? Well, they were Irish, which makes them the very first Irish act to top the British charts, preceding U2 and Boyzone, and the other Irish chart-dominators of the eighties and nineties. So that’s something. There were three of them – Conleth, Declan and John, and they made a decent mid-sixties career out of re-interpreting old tunes from the 1920s and ‘30s in a vaguely Beat-ish way. ‘Diane’ was originally written as the theme song to a 1927 silent movie, for example. Slim Whitman, Jim Reeves and Vic Damone all did their own versions at one time or another. The lads also scored hits with covers of songs like ‘I Believe’ and ‘Hello Dolly!’ While other Beat groups were looking forward; The Bachelor-boys were looking back.

Nothing dates this song, though, as much as the ending. Back in the dark and distant Pre-Rock days almost every song ended with a huge, soaring climax that had been signposted a mile off. And The Bachelors here do their best to recapture those halcyon days. The song slows down, the singer revs up and… Smile for meeeeeee, My… Di….AAAAAAANE! We finish all misty-eyed for the days of Al Martino and David Whitfield.

I don’t begrudge this song its week on top of the charts; but at the same time I’m not terribly sad that we won’t be hearing from The Bachelors ever again. Interestingly, not only does this record give us our first Irish #1, it also sees the name Diane (or variants thereof) sprint into the lead as the name featured in the most chart-topping singles. With two. This, and Paul Anka’s ‘Diana’. We’ve also had a Joe, a Rose Marie, a Hernando, a Josephine, a Mary, a Cathy, a Laura, a Johnny and a Michael, all on one chart-topper each. Not something I ever thought I’d keep an eye on but, now that I have done, it’s kind of fascinating. Which name will be the winner? And who’d have thought that a Josephine would have topped the charts before, say, a Sue or a Jenny?

162. ‘Needles and Pins’, by The Searchers

/ UK #1s blog / 12 Comments

The Searchers return for a second run at the top. And if their first #1 – ‘Sweets For My Sweet’ – was a cute little slice of Beat-pop; then this is next-level stuff entirely. This baby is a classic!

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Needles and Pins, by The Searchers (their 2nd of three #1s)

3 weeks, from 30th January – 20th February 1964

We start with a simple, chiming riff. In my previous post on The Searchers, I mentioned that they had a sound slightly removed from frenetic Merseybeat – a bit more sedate, a bit more melancholic – a sound that wouldn’t sound out of place on Indie records of the 1980s. Well, that sound is back here.

Lyrically, too, this is a more complex record than the likes of ‘Do You Love Me’ and other such pub-singalongs. And no, ‘Needles and Pins’ doesn’t refer to waking up with a dead arm; it’s about the feeling you get when you see a lost love. One that did you wrong. I saw her today, I saw her face, It was a face I loved, And I knew, I had to run awa-y…

It’s also a song about bruised pride… Because of all my pride, The tears I gotta hide… and a song with an air of revenge about it: Let her go ahead, And take his love instead, And one day she will see, Just how to say please, And get down on her knees, Yeah that’s how it begins, She’ll feel those needles and pins, Hurtin’, Hurtin’… This is one grown-up love song. It’s like the sophisticated older brother of discs like our last chart-topper, ‘Glad All Over’, looking down his nose at his younger siblings’ silly little songs.

I wish I had the musical vocabulary to describe the chord structures and the key and whatever it is that gives this record its ‘mood’. Whatever it is that makes this song so good. But then again, if I could dissect it and pinpoint it’s genius maybe it would lose some of its magic. It’s a sad-sounding song about a sad-sounding break-up; and it’s superb. By the final verse, it’s reached a bit of a crescendo. Two voices – the lead singer (Mike Pender) and a high-pitched back-up which just adds to the emotion. Oh, needles and pins… And those drum-fills. Oh those drum-fills.

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I’ve been kind of surprised, listening to them all in a row, how cheesy (for want of a better word) these early Beat #1s have been. Musically they’ve been a huge step forward but, in lyrical terms, records like ‘From Me to You’, ‘Bad to Me’, and ‘I Like It’ haven’t moved on much from the 1950s.

‘Needles and Pins’ is different. Though I was shocked to find out that it is actually a cover. It’s a song I’ve loved for a long time and have assumed for years was a Searcher’s original. But no. It’s a Jack Nitzsche and Sonny Bono song, originally recorded by Jackie DeShannon in 1963. I feel betrayed… I really do. This – and I realise that this is a bold statement to make – is the first pop song I ever loved. I must have been maybe seven, and it was on a sixties mix-tape (which I’m sure I’ve mentioned before) in our family car. It would be playing on a Sunday evening as we drove home from dinners at my grandparents, along dark roads under orange streetlights. A melancholy scene for a melancholy song.

Actually, that’s another thing that has surprised me – just how many of these early Beat chart-toppers were covers. Since Gerry & The Pacemakers kicked the movement off in April ’63, I make this six covers out of eleven (I’m counting ‘You’ll Never Walk Alone’ in this, though it isn’t your average Beat-pop number). I just assumed these boys with guitars were all writing their own songs. How wrong I was!

Anyway, the ‘Needles and Pins’ story doesn’t end with The Searchers. It’s classic status is confirmed by the fact it’s been covered by The Ramones and Tom Petty. It’s a song so good that it might just give you needles and pins! (Though I’ve always said ‘pins and needles’ – I guess that didn’t scan quite as well…)

Follow along with my Spotify playlist:

161. ‘Glad All Over’, by The Dave Clark Five

/ UK #1s blog / 11 Comments

And so we launch head-first into 1964. Suddenly we are in the mid-sixties! Doesn’t time fly! And kicking off the new year are some newbies at the top of the UK singles charts: The Dave Clark Five.

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Glad All Over, by The Dave Clark Five (their 1st and only #1)

2 weeks, from 16th – 30th January 1964

Interestingly, none of the acts that topped the charts in 1963 were one-offs. Every single one of them had hit #1 previously, or would go on to hit #1 again. But the very first chart-topping act of 1964 are… drum roll… one #1 wonders!

Anyway, this a barnstorming way to start off. We get a thumping, grinding drum-beat designed to blow away any lingering new year hangovers, which is quickly joined by a bass and a stabbing saxophone. Then the singer (Mike Smith, not Dave Clark) jumps in: You say that you love me, All of the time, You say that you need me, You’ll always be mine…

The beat then morphs into an insistent, irresistible galloping-horse rhythm that will last for the whole song. And then comes a chorus that pretty much everyone knows: And I’m feelin’… Glad all over…Yes, I’m a-… Glad all over…!

It’s an non-stop sledgehammer of a song, with large swathes of call-and-response and a key-change that is pointless trying to resist. Other girls may try to take me away… (you can just pictures the girl’s eyes rolling at this point)… But you know, It’s by your side, I will stay… It’s a fun disc. File it under ‘unsophisticated’. This and The Tremeloes’ ‘Do You Love Me’ from a few posts ago would make a great drunken-1am-singalong double-header.

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Like ‘You’ll Never Walk Alone’, this is also a huge football, and rugby, crowd song – the call and response bits work perfectly – and is usually played after a home-team scores (Crystal Palace started it when ‘Glad All Over’ was still in the charts and lots of other teams followed suit). It was last seen in the UK charts a couple of years ago when Glasgow Rangers fans did a mass-download campaign. In fact, I’d have to say that this is just the latest in a run of chart-toppers that have entered the public consciousness like few previous #1s have. From ‘Sweets For My Sweet’ through ‘Do You Love Me’, plus the recent Beatles chart-toppers… I’ll bet most people on the streets could sing a line or two from all of these songs, even today. Just goes to show how much the music from this era lingers on.

Since we’ll never hear from them again on this countdown – just who were The Dave Clark Five? Well, you’ll be shocked to discover that there were five of them, and that they were ‘led’ by one Dave Clark, who also drummed on all their hits. They were from Tottenham, in North London, and were at the vanguard of the ‘Tottenham Sound’ -which I’m not sure sounded any different to the Mersey-sound, or any other variety of Beat-band sound, but hey – they were representing. As I mentioned, this was their one and only #1; but they scored Top 10s throughout the sixties before splitting up in 1970.

There you have it then. 1964 is off and running with a boisterous pop number. I don’t go in for previews very often in these posts, but I have to mention here that ’64 is going to be a stellar year for chart-topping singles. One of the very best… if not the best… years in terms of #1 quality. Over the course of the next twenty-two hits we’ll hear some classics, meet some legends, and have a generally pretty ‘groovy’ time (that’s how people talked back in the sixties…)