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Quiz #4

Quiz #4
Answers, Results & Commentary

This month we had a three-way tie with 498 points each, but two of the three correctly identified the theme, and therefore Kathy Kyrcia and Gabriella Ziegler are the "official" winners this time around. Congratulations to both of them and Julie McClelland for their top scores.


Here are the correct titles and artists with year of release and highest charting position on the Billboard Hot 100:

01. Baez, Joan - The Night They Drove Old Dixie Down (1971) <3> (or The Band)
02. Beatles, The - Tomorrow Never Knows (1966) <-->
03. Charles, Ray - I Can't Stop Loving You (1962) <1>
04. Cher - Dark Lady (1974) <1>
05. Collective Soul - The World I Know (1996) <19>
06. Collins, Phil and Marilyn Martin - Separate Lives (1985) <1>
07. Darin, Bobby - You Must Have Been A Beautiful Baby (1961) <5>
08. Doors, The - Riders On The Storm (1971) <14>
09. Earth, Wind & Fire - Got To Get You Into My Life (1978) <9>
10. First Class - Beach Baby (1974) <4>
11. Fixx, The - One Thing Leads To Another (1983) <4>
12. Four Tops - Standing In The Shadows Of Love (1966) <6>
13. Hendrix, Jimi - All Along The Watchtower (1968) <20> (or Jimi Hendrix Experience)
14. Hopkin, Mary - Those Were The Days (1968) <2>
15. Joel, Billy - Angry Young Man (1976) <-->
16. Meat Loaf - Paradise By The Dashboard Light (1978) <39>
17. Regents, The - Barbara-Ann (1961) <13>
18. Rivers, Johnny - Secret Agent Man (1966) <3>
19. Rolling Stones, The - Blue Turns To Grey (1965) <-->
20. Shirelles, The - Will You Love Me Tomorrow (1960) <1>
21. Springsteen, Bruce - Santa Claus Is Comin' To Town (1985) <-->
22. Stevens, Cat - Where Do The Children Play (1971) <-->
23. Survivor - The Search Is Over (1985) <4>
24. Wham! - The Edge Of Heaven (1986) <10>
25. Williams, Roger - Sunrise, Sunset (1967) <84> (or Roger Whittaker)

THEME:

H1. Imbruglio, Natalie - Left Of The Middle (1997) <-->
H2. Minogue, Kylie and Jason Donovan - Especially For You (1988) <-->

The three artists who are responsible for the lyrics given as hints (H1 and H2) all appeared in the Australian soap opera "Neighbors", which is also one of the most popular soaps in England. If you'd discovered that soap opera connection, and looked closely at the remaining 25 song titles that made up the body of the quiz, you would have discovered that each song title - sometimes alone - and sometimes in combination with another song in the quiz - made reference to a popular American soap. If you didn't spot them, I'll leave it to you to look them over, but you'll find "Loving" in "I Can't Stop Loving You", "Santa Barbara" in "Santa Claus Is Coming To Town" and "Barbara-Ann", and "Sunset Beach" in "Sunrise,Sunset" and "Beach Baby", just to name a few. Don't feel bad if you didn't get it - the two players who did spot the theme both reported driving themselves nuts, only to discover that the theme was right in front of their faces.

TRIVIA:

"I Can't Stop Loving You" was written on the same afternoon as another familiar country and western tune, "Oh Lonesome Me". Twenty-nine year-old Don Gibson was the songwriter. Gibson recorded both songs on December 3, 1957, but "Oh Lonesome Me" was far and away the bigger hit - it reached #7, while "Can't Stop" only made it to 81.

So how did "I Can't Stop Loving You" become the third and final number one hit of Ray Charles' career? According to the story, Charles called a producer named Sid Feller and asked to hear the greatest country songs from the last 20 years - the popular R&B artist had decided he wanted to do an album of country and western tunes - a pretty bold move for a black artist to do "southern" music in the midst of the civil rights struggle. Though his record label ABC-Paramount thought he was nuts, Charles' "Modern Sounds In Country and Western Music" album became the first gold-selling album in ABC's history, and "I Can't Stop Loving You" went all the way to the top, joining "Hit The Road Jack" and "Georgia On My Mind" as chart-toppers for Ray Charles.

But here's the kicker - in 1983, Ray Charles was one of the nominees for the Country Music Association's Horizon award - recognizing the most promising newcomer in the genre. The explanation? Charles' 1962 album (and the followup "Modern Sounds in Country and Western Music, Volume 2"), featured Charles' pop interpretation of country tunes - by 1983, he was making albums targeted specifically at the c&w market. So who was the 1983 Horizon Award winner? John Anderson, performer of the Single of the Year, "Swingin'"

It probably surprised a few of you to discover there was an alternate artist for the Beach Boys' hit "Barbara-Ann". Hopefully, you went a little bit further with your research and noted that The Regents' "Barbara-Ann" was the original version, released in 1961, four years before the Beach Boys released the song on their 1965 album "Beach Boys' Party!". Barbara-Ann was Regents' member Chuck Fassert's sister - and the song had been recorded by the Regents way back in 1958 as a demo.

The Regents weren't a surf-sound group like the Beach Boys - the group formed in the Bronx, New York, not exactly the surfboard capital of the US, even in the late 50s. The oddball trivia about The Regents' "Barbara-Ann" was that the group had broken up before the song was even released. It went to #13 for the Regents, and #2 for the Beach Boys - who dropped the hyphen between Barbara and Ann. One final note: Dean Torrence of "Jan & Dean" sang lead on the Beach Boys' version.

This one might surprise a few of you - the original recording of "Santa Claus Is Coming To Town" goes way back to 1934, when George Hall and His Orchestra recorded the Haven Gillespie/J. Fred Coots-penned tune. The song sat for two years before anyone was willing to record it - and it went on to become the 3rd-best-selling Christmas record of all time, with big hits by Perry Como, Bing Crosby and the Andrews Sisters, as well as more familiar versions by The Jackson Five and Bruce Springsteen. The only recording to ever crack the Billboard Hot 100 was a 1962 version by The 4 Seasons, hot off their 2 consecutive chart-toppers, "Sherry" and "Big Girls Don't Cry".

As a few of you noted, The Shirelles hit (#20) was originally released on Scepter as simply "Tomorrow" - I would have given points for either answer. For most purposes, if there's a "hit" version by an artist, I'm more interested in their hit version than perhaps some earlier, less popular recording. Having said that, however, I'm always interested in trivia about older versions, so I'd probably accept either answer.

You'll find "Angry Young Man" listed as "Prelude/Angry Young Man" on Billy Joel's "Turnstiles" album - that's because the lyrical song is preceded by a piano-pounding intro, the "Prelude". If this had been a charter, I would have looked to the release info for the "official" title, but I'll take either "Prelude/Angry Young Man" or simply "Angry Young Man" for this lyric.

You probably all recognized "Sunrise, Sunset", but had trouble identifying the only artist who charted with it. The song is from "Fiddler On The Roof", and is associated with Zero Mostel and Topol, the performers best known for the role of Tevye, but neither fit alphabetically in the quiz. Only Roger Whittaker charted with Sunrise, Sunset - #84 in 1967. That would have made it hard to find in Whitburn, but some players reported resulting to clever strategies to ferret out the Whittaker version. Way to go!

Listed below are the points for each player: