Author: Kim Simpson

“Airplane” (1977) – The Beach Boys

“Airplane” (1977) – The Beach Boys * Written and produced by Brian Wilson * LP: Love You * Label: Brother/Reprise

The Beach Boys’ Love You record hides complexity behind a tossed off, damaged veneer: when Wilson sings on it, the group’s guiding light sounds like he’s trying not to cough, and the synth he plays gives it a low budget feel. But these are beguiling, clever songs. “Airplane,” which is about buckling into an airplane seat, chatting idly to strangers about loved ones back home, and gazing out the window at the incomprehensibilities of size and distance, is given a mopey delivery (on verses) by Mike Love on lead vocals, but you picture Brian as the lead actor. Its elegaiac feel and crafty chord changes call for a version on nylon string guitar, something like Simon and Garfunkel’s “So Long Frank Lloyd Wright.”

“Abigail Beecher” (1964) – Freddy Cannon

“Abigail Beecher” (1964) – Freddy Cannon * Written by Bob Boulanger and Richard Heard * 45: “Abigail Beecher” / “All American Girl” * LP: Freddie Cannon * Produced by Frank Slay * Label: Warner Bros.

In the style of Johnny Otis’s “Willie and the Hand Jive,” slinky voodoo guitar underscores Cannon’s raves about the high school history teacher, who knows all the dances, drives a Jaguar XK-E, and has the goods to be a rock ‘n roll singer. Such high school stomp-friendly vignettes from teenage life distinguished the man nicknamed “Boom Boom” from the other ducktailed singers all over the early sixties charts. Reached #16 on Billboard.

“Borracho de Amor” (1962) – José Manuel Calderón

“Borracho de Amor” (1962) – José Manuel Calderón * Written by José Manuel Calderón * LP: Este es Jose Manuel Calderon * Label: Zuni

The guitar-oriented “bachata” sound, an offshoot of the bolero and son genres, rose up in the Dominican Republic with José Manuel Calderón’s popular 1962 “Borracho de Amor” (“love drunk”) single. Sadly for him, the music couldn’t shake a decades-long Dominican perception of it being the soundtrack of crime, which eventually drove a disheartened Calderón off to more supportive communities in New York City, where he still makes music. To appreciate “Borracho de Amor” fully, don’t go previewing and skipping around. Just let it play so you can experience the full effect of the pause at 1:17, after which Calderón’s vocals, suddenly intoxicated with reverb, sound like voices in your head.

“Dear Prudence” (1968) – The Beatles

“Dear Prudence” (1968) – The Beatles * Written by John Lennon and Paul McCartney * LP: The Beatles * Produced by George Martin * Label: Apple

This eminently coverable John Lennon song (never released as a single) from the White Album featured a descending chord pattern and children’s rhyme melodies that flitted about like Maypole ribbons. Written during the Beatles’ celebrity-studded summer audience with the Maharishi Mahesh Yogi, it drew inspiration from Mia Farrow’s sister Prudence, a fellow student who preferred to meditate in private. On the Kinfauns Demo version of the song, you can hear Lennon wondering aloud if the Maharishi had driven her “berserk” or “insane.” She has since written an autobiography.

“African and White” (1981) – China Crisis


“African and White” (1981) – China Crisis * Written by Gary Daly, Eddie Lundon, and Dave Reilly * 45: “African and White” / “Be Suspicious” * LP: Difficult Shapes and Passive Rhythms * Produced by Jeremy Lewis * Label: Inevitable/Virgin

“African and White” was the minimalist debut single from Liverpool’s China Crisis, a group led by Gary Daly and Eddie Lundon, whose flair for electropop enchantment had few rivals during the early ’80s. Although their lyrics tended not to communicate clearly, “African and White” actually had the building blocks for a social protest message about Israel’s support of South Africa’s Apartheid. Most of the low-quality lyric repository sites have this one wrong, missing the “Israel” in the chorus. Reached #45 on the UK singles chart.

“Little Miss Sad” (1965) – The Five Empressions

“Little Miss Sad” (1965) – The Five Empressions * Written by Dick Addrisi and Don Addrisi * 45: “Little Miss Sad” / “Hey Lover” * Label: Freeport

From Benton Harbor, Michigan, this thumping, not-sad-but-happy cover of a 1964 non-charting Addrisi Brothers A-side climbed to #74 in Billboard the following year. Radio station WLS in nearby Chicago had spun the small-label track enough to blast it into the over-achievement zone. The Five Emprees (originally the Five Empressions on the single’s first pressing until Curtis Mayfield’s established trio said “ahem”) probably needed a larger label to take them to the next step, but a few more effervescent recordings like this one also wouldn’t have hurt. Later pressings of “Little Miss Sad” credited to the Five Emprees were re-recordings with added horns.

“Academy Fight Song” (1980) – Mission of Burma

“Academy Fight Song” (1980) – Mission of Burma * Written by Clint Conley * 45: “Academy Fight Song” / “Max Ernst” * Producer: Richard W. Harte * Label: Ace of Hearts

With its own title as a clincher, this opening salvo from the much-loved Boston post-punk trio might be the ultimate college rock song, thanks to its adaptability as an angry expression toward either a dean or a slum lord who acts like one. The loaded phrase “asking jerky questions” could, in fact, serve as a post-punk/college rock motto, especially when voiced by a band so noted for herky-jerky tempos. But the background vocals near the end elevate the song to its own mystical space.

“All Day and All of the Night” (1964) – The Kinks


“All Day and All of the Night” (1964) – The Kinks * Written by Ray Davies * 45: “All Day and All of the Night” / “I Gotta Move” * Produced by Shel Talmy * Label: Pye (UK)/Reprise (US)

Top Ten broken-bottle mod rock that, along with “You Really Got Me,” presents the Kinks as potentially more primal than anything the greasers (their first audience’s cultural rivals) listened to. This one did have deceptively sophisticated chord changes, though, giving many once-confident garage combos pause. By the late sixties the Kinks had matured into English gentlemen, for whom the line “the only time I feel alright is by your side” actually did seem believable. The song reappeared as a self-referential musical motif in the band’s 1981 FM rock hit “Destroyer,” which would chart higher (#3) than its source (#7).

“Shout Shout (Knock Yourself Out)” (1962) – Ernie Maresca

“Shout! Shout! (Knock Yourself Out)” (1962) – Ernie Maresca * Written by Ernie Maresca and Thomas Bogdarny * 45: “Shout! Shout! (Knock Yourself Out)” / “Crying Like a Baby Over You” * LP: Shout Shout! (Knock Yourself Out) * Produced by Marv Holtzman * Label: Seville

Ernie Maresca, a songwriter from the Bronx, is the man who gave Dion and the Belmonts such chutzpah credentials as “Runaround Sue,” “The Wanderer,” “Lovers Who Wander,” and “Donna the Prima Donna,” among others. They were simple songs, but they swaggered like the early ’60s New York City streets of your imagination. Maresca was no singer (side B contains the evidence), so he shouted his way to Billboard‘s #6 slot, making sure to say “play another song like ‘Runaround Sue'” in this sock-hop stomper. Do you hear the Dave Clark Five emerging from this big sound?

“Abba Zabba” (1966) – Captain Beefheart and His Magic Band


“Abba Zabba” (1966) – Captain Beefheart and His Magic Band * Written by Don Van Vliet * LP: Safe as Milk * Produced by Bob Krasnow and Richard Perry * Label: Buddah

“Abba Zabba” foretells the hypnotic, jungle-chant quality Beefheart would bring to his future catalog. But its vocal patter also brings to mind eighties celebrity reports locating Beefheart as a Jack Nicholson-style regular at Los Angeles Lakers games, where he presumably classified the rhythms of bouncing basketballs as a distinct musical genre. So the late Beefheart resembled the old one; he “jumped in a circle,” like the farmer in his “Floppy Boot Song.”