Tag Archives: The Lovin' Spoonful

♫ Darling Be Home Soon ♫

Posted on by under Bits 'n Pieces, History, music

Since Clive reminded me of the other song he had requested a year or more ago, I figured I better play it now before I forget again, as I seem wont to do these days!  The song is yet another by The Lovin’ Spoonful.

Lovin’ Spoonful founder John Sebastian wrote this one for Francis Ford Coppola’s 1967 movie You’re A Big Boy Now, a coming-of-age film about an awkward young man looking for love in New York City.  Sebastian was responsible for the entire soundtrack, but this song in particular was to set the tone for a lovey-dovey scene (can you tell I’m not into romance movies?)  The movie was rather a flop, but the song did slightly better, charting at #15 in the U.S.  And then, it fell by the wayside until two years later … 1969 … Woodstock, where, according to SongFacts …

After hitching a ride with the helicopter carrying The Incredible String Band’s equipment, Sebastian arrived at the Woodstock festival thinking he’d just be a spectator. But an early afternoon downpour flooded the stage and it needed to be cleared of water before Santana’s amps could be set up. Michael Lang, the concert’s producer, asked Sebastian to fill in. He took the stage in a tie-dyed white denim outfit and sang five songs, the fourth being “Darling Be Home Soon.” He recalled: “The audience didn’t identify the song with the movie, since most probably hadn’t seen it. Instead, they sort of quieted down and took it in as a love song. My job wasn’t to incite but to mellow everyone out until the stage was swept. When I finished, the applause from so many people was loud and wide, and knocked the wind out of me. The feeling was delicious.”

Zal Yanovsky, the band’s lead guitarist, hated the song. He thought it was too sappy and accused Sebastian of losing his rock edge. During one live performance, Zal can be seen clownishly mocking the frontman as he sings the heartfelt lyrics.

The song has been covered by a number of artists including Bobby Darin, Joe Cocker, The Association, Bruce Hornsby, and the British group Slade.

Darling Be Home Soon

Lovin’ Spoonful

Come
And talk of all the things we did today
Here
And laugh about our funny little ways
While we have a few minutes to breathe
Then I know that it’s time you must leave

But, darling, be home soon
I couldn’t bear to wait an extra minute if you dawdled
My darling, be home soon
It’s not just these few hours, but I’ve been waiting since I toddled
For the great relief of having you to talk to

And now
A quarter of my life is almost past
I think I’ve come to see myself at last
And I see that the time spent confused
Was the time that I spent without you
And I feel myself in bloom

So, darling, be home soon
I couldn’t bear to wait an extra minute if you dawdled
My darling, be home soon
It’s not just these few hours, but I’ve been waiting since I toddled
For the great relief of having you to talk to

So, darling
My darling, be home soon
I couldn’t bear to wait an extra minute if you dawdled
My darling, be home soon
It’s not just these few hours, but I’ve been waiting since I toddled
For the great relief of having you to talk to

Go
And beat your crazy head against the sky
Try
And see beyond the houses and your eyes
It’s okay to shoot the moon

Darling be home soon
I couldn’t bear to wait an extra minute if you dawdled
My darling, be home soon
It’s not just these few hours, but I’ve been waiting since I toddled
For the great relief of having you to talk to

Source: LyricFind

Songwriters: John Sebastian

You Baby lyrics © Carlin America Inc

♫ Rain On The Roof ♫

Posted on by under Bits 'n Pieces, History, music

A few nights ago I was looking through my music archives … I cannot remember what I was looking for or why … when I came across a comment thread on a song … I cannot remember which one now … whereby Clive had mentioned that he likes this song, and I had promised to play it for him “soon”.  Now, ‘soon’ is a relative term, so I suppose that more than a year later, relative to history, could be considered soon, but I’m pretty sure I meant to play it within a few days … and that was more than a year ago!  Sorry, Clive!  Better late than never?

While Clive may like this one, apparently SongFacts, my usual go-to source, didn’t, for they had no write up on it at all.  Wikipedia had a bit, but nothing to really fill in the gaps.  I did find a bit of information about the song on a Canadian website, however, Vancouver Pop Music.  An excerpt from the article …

Rain On The Roof is a song about a couple who are oblivious to the rain pouring down on their tin roof until they hear thunder. They’ve been absorbed in conversation while sitting in the hay. So, they may have been in a barn. Prior to that they were outside and caught up in a summer shower. Now that they’re indoors, the guy notices how soaked his girlfriend is by the rain. He remarks “the way it makes you look makes me hope it rains some more.” Of course, if a woman is wearing a t-shirt and it gets soaking wet, the t-shirt can become easy to see through to the skin. In 1966, it was an innocent remark taken by radio listeners as flattery. And with the delight they are finding in each others company, the hope for more rain will only extend their time together. Here is a snapshot of a couple who seem to have no cares in the world and nothing to do but enjoy being together.

In the summer of 1966, The Lovin’ Spoonful had an international #1 hit called “Summer In The City”. This was their only #1 hit in the USA. In Vancouver the band charted two more songs to #1 with “Rain On The Roof” and “Darling Be Home Soon”.

Other than that site, I cannot find much information about the song, as it wasn’t one of the Lovin’ Spoonful’s biggest hits, at least not here in the U.S. where Summer in the City was their only song to reach #1.

Rain on the Roof

The Lovin’ Spoonful

You and me and rain on the roof
Caught up in a summer shower
Dryin’ while it soaks the flowers
Maybe we’ll be caught for hours
Waitin’ out the sun

You and me we’re gabbin’ away
Dreamin’ conversation, sittin’ in the hay
Honey, how long was I laughin’ in the rain with you?
‘Cause I didn’t feel a drop
‘Til the thunder brought us to

You and me underneath a roof of tin
Pretty comfy feelin’, how the rain ain’t leakin’ in
We can sit and dry just as long as it can pour
‘Cause the way it makes you look
Makes me hope it rains some more

You and me and rain on the roof
Caught up in a summer shower
Dryin’ while it soaks the flowers
Maybe we’ll be caught for hours
Waitin’ out the sun

Source: Musixmatch

Songwriters: John Benson Sebastian / John Sebastian

Rain On The Roof (Previously Unreleased Instrumental) lyrics © Trio Music Company

♫ Summer In The City ♫ (Redux)

Posted on by under Bits 'n Pieces, History, music

I know, I know … I seem to be playing a lot of summer-themed songs of late, but then … it IS summer, and only for about another month, so I figured I should get them in now.  I mean, it wouldn’t make much sense for me to be playing In The Good Old Summertime when there’s snow on the ground in January, would it?  So, chill out with a nice cold glass of tea or whatever your beverage of choice is and listen to some summer music!

The song was a collaboration between John Sebastian, The Lovin Spoonful’s bassist Steve Boone, and the frontman’s brother (and non-group member) Mark Sebastian. Mark was 15 years old when he wrote a poem that John used as the basis for the song – John especially liked the part that went, “But at night there’s a different world.”

Says John …

“That song that came from an idea my brother Mike had. He had this great chorus, and the release was so big. I had to create some kind of tension at the front end to make it even bigger. That’s where that jagged piano part comes from.”

Boone came up with the middle eight, which John thought sounded like the Gershwin composition “An American in Paris,” where the orchestra implies the sound of traffic and city noises. This gave him the idea of incorporating car horns and other city ambiance into the track.

The band was rather particular about the traffic sounds. Instead of just using what was available on the sound effects records in the studio, they found an old-school radio engineer – a guy who used to create the soundscapes for shows, so if a guy was riding a horse, you’d hear the hooves hitting the ground and the wind whistling by. This guy, whom John Sebastian referred to as a “hilarious old Jewish sound man,” came in with a huge library of street sounds, which the band went through for hours. They wanted the scene to build, so it starts softly (the horn at the beginning comes from a Volkswagen Beetle), and grows to a gridlock nightmare. To close the scene, they used a pneumatic hammer pounding away at the pavement.

This song hit #1 in the U.S. and Canada, and #8 in the UK which is really rather odd, when you consider that in the UK they don’t even know what summer is!

Summer in the City
The Lovin’ Spoonful

Hot town, summer in the city
Back of my neck getting dirty and gritty
Been down, isn’t it a pity
Doesn’t seem to be a shadow in the city

All around, people looking half dead
Walking on the sidewalk, hotter than a match head

But at night it’s a different world
Go out and find a girl
Come-on come-on and dance all night
Despite the heat it’ll be alright

And babe, don’t you know it’s a pity
That the days can’t be like the nights
In the summer, in the city
In the summer, in the city

Cool town, evening in the city
Dressing so fine and looking so pretty
Cool cat, looking for a kitty
Gonna look in every corner of the city
Till I’m wheezing like a bus stop
Running up the stairs, gonna meet you on the rooftop

But at night it’s a different world
Go out and find a girl
Come-on come-on and dance all night
Despite the heat it’ll be alright

And babe, don’t you know it’s a pity
That the days can’t be like the nights
In the summer, in the city
In the summer, in the city

Hot town, summer in the city
Back of my neck getting dirty and gritty
Been down, isn’t it a pity
Doesn’t seem to be a shadow in the city

All around, people looking half dead
Walking on the sidewalk, hotter than a match head

But at night it’s a different world
Go out and find a girl
Come-on come-on and dance all night
Despite the heat it’ll be alright

And babe, don’t you know it’s a pity
That the days can’t be like the nights
In the summer, in the city
In the summer, in the city

Source: LyricFind
Songwriters: John Sebastian / Mark Sebastian / Steve Boone
Summer in the City lyrics © Round Hill Music Big Loud Songs, BMG Rights Management, Carlin America Inc

♫ Do You Believe In Magic? ♫

Posted on by under music

Last night, I played Creeque Alley by The Mamas and The Papas, and part of the music trivia for that song was the fact that it referenced a number of other musicians and groups from that period (1960s).  Two of the people mentioned were John Sebastian and Zal Yanovsky, two members of the group The Lovin’ Spoonful.  In a comment, our friend Clive from across the pond subtly hinted that perhaps that was an indication that I should play a song by The Lovin’ Spoonful sometime soon.  So, here it is sometime soon!  My first inclination was to play Summer in the City, even though it’s so cold here tonight that I have the heat on!  But alas, I just played that one a few months ago — the only Lovin’ Spoonful song I’ve played, as it happens.  So then I was torn between Do You Believe in Magic?, Did You Ever Have to Make Up Your Mind, and You Didn’t Have to be so Nice.  Magic won out, but feel free to tell me your favourite!

The song was written by band member John Sebastian and released in 1965.  It charted at #3 in Canada, #9 in the U.S., and nowhere else that I can find!

Sebastian and Yanovsky were in a group called The Mugwumps, and made a name for themselves playing clubs in Greenwich Village. When the other Mugwumps – Mama Cass Elliot and Denny Doherty – moved to California and formed The Mamas And The Papas, they formed the band and Sebastian began focusing on songwriting. The Lovin’ Spoonful started playing electric instruments to get away from the folk music sound and attract a younger contemporary rock audience.

The Lovin’ Spoonful played regularly at a famous club called The Night Owl Cafe. Said Sebastian:

“We were playing pretty steadily for the local people from Greenwich Village who were part of the jazz scene or part of the kind of downtown ‘in crowd.’ They were ‘finger poppers,’ guys who played chess, ‘beatniks.’ But there was this one particular night as we were playing, I looked out in the audience and saw this beautiful 16-year-old girl just dancing the night away. And I remember Zal and I just elbowed each other the entire night because to us that young girl symbolized the fact that our audience was changing, that maybe they had finally found us. I wrote ‘Do You Believe In Magic’ the next day.”

Turning down an offer from Phil Spector because they didn’t want to “be swallowed up under his name,” The Lovin’ Spoonful signed to a new record label called Kama Sutra. This was the first song they recorded for the label, and it was the first of a string of hits for the group.

Sadly, the group’s fame ‘n fortune was to be short-lived.  The beginning of the end was when Zal Yanovsky was arrested for possession of marijuana in San Francisco and and pressured by police to name his supplier. He was a Canadian citizen and feared that he would be deported and barred from re-entering the U.S., so he complied. The incident resulted in a public backlash from the counterculture against the band, with a full-page ad in the Los Angeles Free Press (according to music critic Ralph Gleason) “urging people not to buy Spoonful records and not to attend their concerts …”

Although Yanovsky went on to release a solo single and album, his musical career was severely harmed.  The same month, May 1967, John Sebastian also left the group.  Although they had a couple of moderate hits after that, the band never fully recovered and in early 1969, they split up.

This song has been featured on the soundtracks of a number of movies, and is a popular song in ads, having been featured in ads for Mercedes Benz, McDonald’s, Burger King, Kohl’s, Dash Detergent and the Trump Casino.  (That last one maybe makes me like the song a bit less, but I’ll get over it)

Do You Believe in Magic
The Lovin’ Spoonful

Do you believe in magic in a young girl’s heart?
How the music can free her whenever it starts
And it’s magic if the music is groovy
It makes you feel happy like an old-time movie
I’ll tell you about the magic, and it’ll free your soul
But it’s like trying to tell a stranger ’bout a rock ‘n’ roll

If you believe in magic don’t bother to choose
If it’s jug band music or rhythm and blues
Just go and listen it’ll start with a smile
That won’t wipe off your face no matter how hard you try
Your feet start tapping, and you can’t seem to find
How you got there, so just blow your mind

If you believe in magic come along with me
We’ll dance until morning till there’s just you and me
And maybe if the music is right
I’ll meet you tomorrow sorta late at night
And we’ll go dancing baby, then you’ll see
How the magic’s in the music, and the music’s in me

Yeah, do you believe in magic
Yeah, believe in the magic of the young girl’s soul
Believe in the magic of a rock ‘n’ roll
Believe in the magic that can set you free
Ahh, talking ’bout the magic

Do you believe in magic?
(Do you believe like I believe?) Do you believe, believer?
(Do you believe like I believe?) Do you believe in magic?
(Do you believe like I believe?) Do you believe in magic?

Source: Musixmatch
Songwriters: John Sebastian
Do You Believe in Magic lyrics © Trio Music Company, Alley Music Corp.