The New Vaudeville Band: "Winchester Cathedral" / Dana Rollin: "Winchester Cathedral"

November 28, 1966 (2 weeks)

"Thus, for the first and only time, Canada's number one single happened to be occupied by the same song done by two different acts".

Yeah, about that...

The confident claim above from my review of previous co-number one "Concrete and Clay" by Unit 4 + 2 and Eddie Rambeau respectively is directly attributable to Wikipedia and my reliance on it. I had been aware of the former due to its use in the classic Wes Anderson film Rushmore but I had been unaware of the latter. Wikipedia's List of Number One Singles in Canada proved edifying and it lead me to believe that this unique practice of placing competing versions of the same song in the same chart position had been a one off. I hadn't seen anything to make me think otherwise and that, apparently, was good enough for me. Nevertheless, the Free Encyclopedia once again proves that it's only as reliable as its contributors allow it to be. Under the list of chart toppers for 1966, "Winchester Cathedral" is credited simply to The New Vaudeville Band. (Or it was: I just changed it)

The last time we had co-chart toppers — speaking of which, from this point forward I'm simply going to claim that it remains to be seen if it will happen again — it was a case of two reasonably even competitors who were duking it out south of the border while enjoying a unified sense of purpose up north. This time, however, there is no such similar balance in terms of prominence. The New Vaudeville Band had already had a Top 5 UK hit with "Winchester Cathedral" and they would reach the top of the Billboard Hot 100 during the first week of December. The version by Dana Rollin, however, came out at about the same time but only got as high as number seventy-one in the States. Of course, that's no guarantee the Rollin version would have performed similarly even though it's worth pointing out that it failed to appear on CHUM's Top 50 from the same time. (The New Vaudeville Band managed to make it all the way to number one on Toronto's chart with little-to-no support from its rival)

All that said, there's some evidence that Rollin managed to do a bit of the heavy lifting in her own right. According to one YouTube comment, her "Winchester Cathedral" managed to be a local chart topper in some North American markets, including Denver, Detroit, Houston, Pittsburgh and Vancouver. Another mentions that it was the more popular version in New Orleans. On a separate YouTube video — yes, there are multiple uploads of this forgotten recording — someone claims that legendary New York DJ (and noted 'fifth Beatle') Murray the K actually played this one on his radio show before ever getting hold of the New Vaudeville original. (Finally, another poster claims that "Pops had both versions of this he liked Dana's better!"; he's probably just referring to his old man but wouldn't it be something if Louis Armstrong had been a fan? Talk about a feather in your bowler's cap)

But let's get to the quality of the music. (Oh, must we?) Like a lot of the music hall that "Winchester Cathedral" harks back to, it is charming but the novelty doesn't last. The more well known recording by The New Vaudeville Band manages to wear out its welcome by the time John Carter's 'small-man-in-a-box' vocals make their belated appearance. As for Dana Rollin, it's harder to say. (Her version has the advantage of being something I'd never heard prior to the day before yesterday) I will say that her rendition does a better job merging the twenties with the sixties: while Carter's voice sounds like a parlour trick, her vocal has a graininess that makes me think I'm listening to an ancient Kate Smith record. Meanwhile, the backing combines jokey cornet solos with a surprisingly sturdy beat, as if a rock 'n' roll session band found themselves trying to do hot jazz from forty years earlier and not succeeding. Every bloody second of the Vaudeville original is spent doing an affectionate send up of a genre few cared about; the Rollin edition is more like a very flawed facsimile and that's precisely why it works better — though not by much.

Is it its quirkiness that, to quote the lyrics, brings it down or are The New Vaudeville Band and/or Dana Rollin to blame? A clue may be found in Nancy Wilson's much more straightforward big band jazz version from her 1967 album Just for Now. This is the sort of thing I'd much rather listen to: as ever, Wilson is a pleasure to the ears and the band backing her are disciplined if lacking in flash. (Only Mike Melvoin on organ really stands out) Yet as a result, it's more forgettable, a song about how an ancient place of worship isn't bringing a couple together or something. Everything that made it unique was stripped away. Thus, we're left with a work that is memorable but grating. The Vaudevilles and Rollin had to play up to its music hall roots lest it be just another pop song that few would ever bother paying attention to.

Still, modern music fans and critics are obsessed with everything being 'influential' nowadays and in that regard you've got to hand it to The New Vaudeville Band. While Paul McCartney's dad had been the leader of a jazz band and would've been all too familiar with the genre and George Harrison had been a fan of the legendary George Formby and John Lennon appreciated anything absurd, the presence of groups like the NVB would've affirmed in The Beatles a commitment to start playing around with music hall for much of the year ahead (and, to some extent, beyond). I know they aren't regarded as deeply influential the way Frank Zappa and Ravi Shankar are but I think they played a part in Sgt Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band. For that matter, the scant number of British acts who've dabbled in music hall since — Ian Dury and the Blockheads, Madness, Blur — have a similar (minor) dept to the Vaudevilles. This doesn't make "Winchester Cathedral" any easier to listen to listen to but I feel I ought to say something positive at this point. I may not hate it but that's about as encouraging as I can be.

Annoying as it is, the average person probably has no idea how infuriating it must be to be a verger at the actual Winchester Cathedral in the county of Hampshire. Not a day must pass in which obnoxious American tourists are heard whistling, humming or even singing the lyrics as they tour one of Britain's most historic places of worship. It's bad enough that early Anglo-Saxon kings such as Edmund Ironside and Cnut are overlooked in favour of the post-Norman rulers but to have their main resting place be the stuff of music hall farce robs them of whatever dignity they had left. Did they spend their lives pillaging and plundering for this? (The Cathedral's administrators seem to have decided to steer into the skid by having their choir sing on a re-recorded version. If you can't beat 'em, etc., etc.)

Finally, a word on Dana Rollin, who I had no idea about until two days ago. Come to that, I still don't know much about her. There's a suggestion - again, from one of the YouTube clips - that she was just sixteen at the time she recorded this which means she'd still only be around seventy-five years old now. Her discography is pretty minimal but her "Winchester Cathedral" did end up on a 2007 on a randomly compiled pop-rock CD from France. Otherwise, she is a ghost. Thus, for the first and only time, Canada's number one single happened to be occupied by an individual who doesn't have their own Wikipedia page. (I'll be eating those words before long, won't I?)

The New Vaudeville Band Score: 4

Dana Rollin Score: 5

~~~~~

Hey! Where's...

This feature hasn't been used much of late but I felt it worth while on this occasion since "Winchester Cathedral" wasn't just sort-of-catchy-but-also-mildly-irritating but it also blocked The Beach Boys' "Good Vibrations" from its rightful place at number one. (At least on the Hot  100 it had the good graces down south to get out of the way of Brian Wilson's masterpiece for a week before returning right back to the top) This isn't anywhere near as big of a pop injustice as it was back in 1960 when the ghastly Anita Bryant and her shitty single "Paper Roses" took the top spot from The Everly Brothers' masterful "Cathy's Clown" but it's worth bringing up all the same. We're now on the dawn of 1967 when the rock album as an artistic statement was reaching its apogee and, consequently, when the singles charts began to appear more as a refuge for bubblegum pop and novelty songs that weren't cut out for the LP market. Some of the finest singles of the year wouldn't come close to the top of the hit parade but at least the albums they were associated with garnered plenty of critical acclaim and were feted by generations of similarly unsuccessful power pop bands. Sorry, I just found myself in the middle of a rant...what was I talking about again? Oh yeah, where The Beach Boys! "Good Vibrations" is great, right? I mean, I prefer "Sail on, Sailor" myself but it's hard to argue with just about the only decent song off of the Smiley Smile album. Damn, I feel another rant coming on...I'd better just close out here. See you next time!