Author: Kim Simpson

“Mustapha Dance” (1982) – The Clash * Written by the Clash * 12″ single: “Rock the Casbah” / “Mustapha Dance” * Produced by Mick Jones * Label: Epic

The odd musical singularity of the Clash’s “Rock the Casbah” seems to be one of those happy accidents. As drummer Topper Headon tells it, he had been tinkering around with a keyboard riff in the studio that ended up percolating throughout the hit recording. This was not the traditional Clash songwriting process, but the band had nonetheless ridden with it, after which Joe Strummer topped off Topper’s track with his own Middle Eastern word sauce. Their decision to give the mostly-instrumental dance version its own title invites the listener to approach it as a different entity and to take note of otherwise obscured wonders like Paul Simonon’s jounced-up bass line. A version by Paul Azzuba of a song called “Ya Mustapha” had perhaps gotten into Strummer’s lexicon when it reached #23 in early sixties Britain. Both sides of the “Rock the Casbah” 12-inch single credit Clash guitarist Mick Jones as the producer, while the Combat Rock LP says “mixed by Glyn Johns, made by the Clash.”

“Got to Be There (Stripped Mix)” (2009) – Michael Jackson * Written by Elliot Willensky * LP: The Stripped Mixes * Produced by Tom Rowland and Jeff Moskow with Harry Weinger and Doug Schwartz * Label: Motown

After Michael Jackson’s death in June 2009, State Farm ran a commercial featuring a new, understated mix of the Jackson 5’s “I’ll Be There” that focused on the voices and acoustic guitar. Demand prompted not only a new jingle single, but a full album of “stripped mixes” of early vintage Michael Jackson tracks. The collection’s jewel is “Got to Be There” because it rescues the 1971 #4 hit outright, scrapping the double-tracked vocal that made the shrill sharp IV in “beside me” such an uncomfortable listen. The lone vocal track now allows listeners to marvel in Michael’s delivery.

“Red, Green, Yellow and Blue” (1968) – Dickey Lee * Written by Dickey Lee * 45: “Red, Green, Yellow and Blue” / “Run Right Back” * String Arrangements by Charles Chalmers * Produced by Rivertown Productions * Label: Atco * Billboard: #107

Dickey Lee made out well during the early ’60s death rock craze. In the ’62 hit single “Patches,” one girlfriend ends up dead in the ditch, while in the following year’s “Laurie,” another one has passed on long before Dickey even meets her (it’s a musical version of the sweater-on-a-gravestone urban legend). By 1968 he was still dabbling in tragedy. “Red, Green, Yellow and Blue,” which just missed Billboard‘s Hot 100, captures a presumably Brylcreemed and becardiganed Dickey leaping frantically around town over the news that his girlfriend’s gone to San Francisco, land of colorful pills. “You’re halfway up your rainbow, girl, by now,” he yelps, while Charles Chalmers’ orchestration gives it all the moody atmosphere those earlier records only yearned for. (The record captures Chalmers’s string arranging career at an early stage. He’d go on to do arrangements with James Mitchell for all of Al Green’s albums from 1969 to 1973 and much more.)

“Da Ya Think I’m Sexy” (1978) – Rod Stewart * Written by Rod Stewart and Carmine Appice * 45: “Da Ya Think I’m Sexy” / “Scarred and Scared” * LP: Blondes Have More Fun * Produced by Tom Dowd * Label: Warner Bros.

With “Da Ya Think I’m Sexy,” Rod Stewart materialized as a fully-committed creature of mass appeal, becoming a paridigmatic music biz example of one who surrenders all hip credibility to do so. Although the chart-topping song rode the disco bandwagon with abandon, another aural aspect qualified it as classic late-seventies time capsule fodder: the opening five notes in its main synthesizer riff sounded like a reshuffling of the alien tones from Close Encounters of the Third Kind. This association had preteens hooked – if only subconsciously – the moment they heard those notes streaming through their transistors. The popularity of “Da Ya Think I’m Sexy” eventually brought attention to its chorus’s similarity to a song called “Taj Mahal” by Jorge Ben – a Brazilian radio hit Stewart admitted to having heard in Rio de Janeiro. A reroute of “Sexy’s” profits to UNICEF averted a legal mess. In his autobiography, though, Stewart admitted to intentionally mimicking the string arrangement in Bobby Womack’s “If You Want My Love (Put Something Down on It)” (1975) for his opening synthesizer riff, knowing that arrangements couldn’t be copyrighted.

“Epistle to Dippy” (1967) – Donovan * Written by Donovan Leitch * 45: “Epistle to Dippy” / “Preachin’ Love” * Produced by Mickie Most * Label: Epic

If the term “hippy dippy” has a theme song, this 1967 Donovan single is it. That’s not an insult—fun factors abound in the arrangement, with its harpsichord and bassoon, while Donovan’s enunciation drifts into made-up language territory. The song’s high chart position (#20 in Billboard) indicates Mr. Leitch knew exactly what he was doing. A few years later, “Epistle to Dippy” would open up the 1969 Donovan’s Greatest Hits album, although the studio version of “Preachin’ Love,” the flipside, languished in out-of-print vinyl prison until the digital reissue era.

“Buttons and Bows” (1948) – Dinah Shore with her Happy Valley Boys * Written by Jay Livingston and Ray Evans * 78: “Buttons and Bows” / “Daddy-O (I’m Gonna Teach You Some Blues)” * Label: Columbia

This catalyst for deep baby boomer nostalgia, with its child-friendly lyrics comparing the apparel of cowboys to city girls, first appeared in the 1948 film The Paleface. In a performance that nabbed the song an Academy Award, Bob Hope sang it to Jane Russell in a covered wagon while squeezing a concertina. On record, Dinah Shore gave it a female perspective and struck gold. Although writers Livingston and Evans had softened the more stereotypically Native American effects they intended to give it, “Buttons and Bows” still retains certain cinematic Indian sound signals, with its chant-like melody over minimum chord changes.

“Across the Street” (1964) – Lenny O’Henry * Written by Bob Crewe, Charlie Calello, and Valmond J. Harris, Jr. * 45: “Across the Street” / “Saturday Angel” * Produced by Bob Crewe * Arranged by Charlie Calello * Label: Atco

Lenny O’Henry (the stage name for Daniel Cannon) sings about a party across the street he’s not invited to, but you imagine everyone there dancing to the irresistible song he’s singing. That gives it a surreal aspect; so does the gurgling organ solo you won’t ever forget. Co-written and produced by Bob Crewe for Atco, the record didn’t chart any higher than #98, but it’s now one of those songs alternately categorized according to audiences that later embraced it, so consider it either Carolina Beach or (British) Northern Soul, origins be damned.