2) Freddy Martin & The Martian Men: "Venus"
3) Dack's: "Pink Shoe Laces"
4) Eddie Fisher: "A Fool Such as I" / "I Need Your Love Tonight"
5) New York Rangers: "It Doesn't Matter Anymore"
6) Conn Smythe: "Please Mr. Son"
7) Charlie Brown: "Smoke Gets in Your Auditorium"
8) The Rams: "It's Late" / "New Be Anyone Else but Ewe"
9) Spade Cooley: "Guitar Boogie Shovel"
10) Newsweek Magazine: "It's Just a Matter of TIME"
This is the CHUM MISS PARADE CHART for the first week of April, 1959. You know a good April Fool's gag when sixty-five years after the fact there's still some sad fool out there who was briefly convinced that the crusty old owner of the Toronto Maple Leafs had a single in on the charts. And to think I was just about to look up Conn Smythe's "Please Mr. Son" on YouTube when it hit me. Oh, those cads who used to work at radio stations!
There's some funny stuff on this "chart". At number two there's former chart topper "Venus" but this time by Freddy Martin & The Martian Men. (Too bad they were at least a decade early to know about Freddie Mercury) "It Doesn't Matter Anymore", the number one a week earlier by Buddy Holly, had now been done by the New York Rangers, a club that had recently missed the playoffs by one measly point to the Toronto Maple Leafs. Talk about rubbing it in. Finally, "It's Just a Matter of TIME" by Newsweek Magazine? You silly, silly people!
Coming in at the top of the charts is "Come Softly to Me" by Board of Broadcast Governors The Fleetwoods. (Perhaps this one is an inside joke) A better one would have been to credit it to "The GLadstones" or "The HUdsons" or "The OXfords" or whichever two-letter prefix they happened to use for the telephone exchange name of CHUM's then-headquarters on Yonge Street. This was how Gary Troxel, Gretchen Christopher and Barbra Ellis came up with the name of their group: the letters 'FL' commenced the Olympia, Washington phone numbers which came to be known as 'FLeetwood'.
It's sort of fitting to be discussing letter prefixes on phone numbers since they're a big throwback much like The Fleetwoods themselves. Perhaps it was hailing from the Pacific Northwest that did it but it's as if they emerged with next to no connection to anything else in music at the time. The city's once-flourishing jazz scene, which included Tacoma native Bing Crosby, bottomed out in the post-War era and legendary names like Jimi Hendrix and Kurt Cobain were either far too young or not even yet born. Someone, anyone, had to fill the void. Three recent high school grads from nearby Olympia managed to do just that.
In addition to being from a musical backwater, the other thing that makes The Fleetwoods seem like such an isolated project is the fact that they were largely self-sufficient. Lifelong friends Christopher and Ellis had begun composing "Come Softly to Me" before they even met trumpet-player-turned-singer Troxel at their school. The song would eventually become something of a hit locally but it would take them the better part of half a year to get it recorded properly. At this point it was a cappella (with the modest rhythm "section" of a set of keys being shaken). The recording was then sent to a studio in Los Angeles where, amazingly, they decided not to mess it up. All that was added was the strumming of an acoustic guitar since that was all that was needed — imagine that.
The results aren't exactly what you'd call a thrill ride. In fact, modern ears are likely to be underwhelmed at first. ("Is that it?" was my reaction the first time I heard it) But it pays to give it a few plays before passing judgement. The simplicity of it may seem quaint but it's also its biggest strength. The lines of "Dum-dum, dum-doo-dum, dooby-doo" attach themselves to listeners which can be damn-near impossible to shake — but it's the sort of earworm that you're glad to have. Its stay is brief so you'll never get tired of it. In short, a nice pop song that you can probably live without though why you would choose not to have it around from time to time is beyond me. A great first effort from Board of Broadcast Governors The Fleetwoods but what could they do next?
Score: 7
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