In 1971 Dutch duo Mouth And MacNeal had a Number One hit in the Netherlands with “How Do You Do”.
They went on to hit No. 8 in the United States in July of the following year.
As someone has commented, Mouth And MacNeal seemed to like making videos of it, because they made a whole lot of videos of the same song!
Here is one video of Mouth And MacNeal singing (and “acting”) “How Do You Do”:
I’ll leave it at that.
Paul
The Les Humphries Singers were better known in Europe than the USA, but the one song of theirs that sticks in my mind is their 1972 hit “Mexico”.
It is actually an adaptation of the song “The Battle of New Orleans”, written by musician and school teacher Jimmy Driftwood (James Corbitt Morris) in 1936 to get his pupils interested in history, and popularised in 1959 by Johnny Horton.
There have been many versions of the original country-folk song, using the original title, but they appear to be have been mainly known in the United States.
The German-based multinational ensemble Les Humphries Singers, with their English leader Les Humphries, popularised the story, the lyrics and the melody internationally – apparently even going so far as to violate copyright when they credited the song to Humphries.
In any case, this is the only version I had ever heard until researching this just now.
I never knew the whole lyrics, just scraps of them – like “the British kept a comin” and “down the Mississipi to the Gulf of Mexico… Mexico… Mexico…”.
Definitely rousing stuff, especially when sung by a large group of people.
So here are the Les Humphries Singers singing “Mexico” in 1972:
And by way of contrast, this is Jimmy Driftwood singing the original “The Battle Of New Orleans”:
Actually, Jimmy Driftwood (sometimes Jimmie Driftwood), who wrote over 6,000 folk songs, is a pretty interesting character worth taking a closer look at – perhaps more interesting than the Les Humphries Singers…
Paul
It was the age of miniskirts and hot pants when Scottish band Middle Of The Road with lead singer Sally Carr had a string of pop hits in 1971 and 1972, including “Chirpy Chirpy Cheep Cheep”, “Tweedle Dee, Tweedle Dum”, “Soley Soley” and “Samson and Delilah”.
For some reason the lines
“Last night I heard my mama singing a song
Woke up this morning and my mama was gone”
came to mind, and the music was in my head.
I then discovered a few other songs I remember from the time were also by Middle Of The Road, so here they are…
“Chirpy Chirpy Cheep Cheep” was a number one hit in the UK in 1971, here it is on Top Of The Pops:
Later that year, “Tweedle Dee, Tweedle Dum” reached number 2 in the UK:
Also in 1971, “Soley Soley” made it to No. 5 in the UK:
In 1972 “Samson and Delilah” only got to No. 26 in the UK, but it was No. 2 in Germany and No. 1 in the Netherlands:
Watching these old clips, there’s a lot to be said for hot pants and miniskirts…
Paul
In 1973 Dobie Gray sang the most popular version of “Drift Away”, sometimes known as “Give Me The Beat, Boys”, which had originally been recorded a year earlier, and has since become a classic ending song for concerts.
He took it to Number 5 in the USA, though it didn’t enter the charts in the UK.
To be honest, I had never heard of Dobie Gray until just now (at least not consciously), but I’ve heard the song “Drift Away” probably hundreds of times!
In fact I would go so far as to say this song is an icon of modern music.
This is Dobie Gray singing “Drift Away” live on the BBC in 1974:
And here he is singing “Drift Away” nearly 20 years later, in 1992:
Give me the beat, boys, and free my soul, I wanna get lost in your rock’n’roll and drift away…
Paul