Tommy Roe: "Sweet Pea"

August 1, 1966 (1 week)

The late spring and first part of the summer had been a bit of a boom period for number ones on the RPM Top 100. Every chart topper from The Vogues' "Magic Town" up to The Beatles' "Paperback Writer" had been above average at minimum. You'd have to go all the way back to the first week of April in find the last dud, Peter and Gordon's horrendous "Woman". But ever since the Fab Four's twelfth number one (and counting), the quality had dipped considerably. While The Cyrkle's "Red Rubber Ball" didn't bother me too much, it also failed to thrill me and it ended up getting ranked right in the middle of the pack. Subsequent Canadian chart toppers, Crispian St. Peters' "The Pied Piper" and Tommy James and the Shondells' "Hanky Panky" weren't even up to The Cyrkle's modest standards.

Like The Cyrkle and the Shondells, Tommy Roe came from the United States. I had recently been praising American acts for attempting to rise to answer the challenge presented by The Beatles but there were many who weren't up to it. Roe had been a hit maker in North America well before the British Invasion and now he was returning to the top spot on the Canadian charts for the first time in nearly four years but you'd never know it listening to the results. If anything, Roe sounds like he has regressed somewhat on the creative end. And this is from a guy whose previous chart topper I slammed for his "slight" songwriting with "all-too-obvious rhymes" as well as being "tiresome and trite". While some of these same traits apply to "Sweet Pea", he did so while making an even worse pop hit.

When comparing "Sweet Pea" to "Sheila", there is one thing the former has going for it: every second of that moronic chorus stays with you. I have a dreadful feeling that "oh, sweet pea, come on and dance with me..." is going to be coming back to me for years to come. It serves me bloody right since I was so keen to point out the last time how thoroughly unmemorable his last effort was.

Otherwise, "Sweet Pea" is pitiful. Aside from an ever-present high-pitched organ, there's nothing to suggest Roe had been absorbing the best of what was on offer in '66. Perhaps the likes of Herman's Hermits and Peter and Gordon had been far more influential on him than The Beatles and Bob Dylan but more likely is that he was just doing what Tommy Roe did best: writing irritating earworms in his very 'awe shucks' manner which ought to have died out by the mid-sixties but kept coming back. While the masters were all thriving, there was still a place for the pop stars no one needed but who just wouldn't go the hell away. Just wait and see how he does with the Woodstock crowd.

Score: 3