Great Drinking Songs (20)

Exhaustive histories of popular songs are a blog speciality of my friend JES, and I couldn't possibly hope to emulate the thoroughness of his superb What's In A Song? series. So, instead I'll just rely on Wikipedia, which tells us....

"Those Were the Days a song is credited to Gene Raskin, who put English lyrics to the Russian gypsy song Dorogoi dlinnoyu (Дорогой длинною, lit. By the long road) written by Boris Fomin (1900-1948) with words by the poet Konstantin Podrevskii [of whom, it would seem, nothing else is known - Froog]. . It deals with reminiscence upon youth and romantic idealism. The first known recording of the song was by Alexander Vertinsky in the 1920s. The song is best remembered for Mary Hopkin's 1968 recording, which was a top-ten hit in both the U.S. and the U.K."

(In fact, it made No. 1 in the UK, and on the 'Adult Contemporary' chart in the US, although it stuck at No. 2 on the 'Billboard Hot 100'.)

1968?! Christ - I was three years old! I think this is the first song I can remember hearing on the radio. It was a HUGE hit that summer (well, I fancy I remember it from the summer - the background to sunshiney south coast holidays with my German grandmother in Brixham). Hmm, it seems the single's official release date was 30th August, but I suppose it would have been getting extensive airplay for at least a week or two prior to that.

I don't have any conscious recollection of seeing the sweet-voiced and extremely pretty Mary Hopkin back then, but I imagine I probably must have done; pop music TV shows and primitive 'videos' (like the first one below) were just starting to become popular then. She might have been responsible for embedding in my psyche a deep-seated and unsuspected weakness for 'the Scandinavian look' (I am, in general, rather blonde-averse - but there are rare exceptions who disprove the rule quite powerfully!).

Here's the lovely Mary way back in 1968 (black & white, of course; and with karaoke subtitles, just in case you don't know the words):

There's another vintage version by her on YouTube here, with an extensive note on what's been happening in her career more recently. I hadn't realised that she was so young when she got her big break, only just turning 18. It'll be her 60th birthday in a couple of months, so I expect we can look forward to lots more nostalgic re-releases of her best-loved songs. And here's a live performance (no video) from Osaka in 1970. I've also just learned that she did a version in French (known as Le Temps des Fleurs) - which has a very different feel to it, sexy as hell. What is it about the French (language)??!! Gosh, she released versions in Italian, Spanish, and German as well. (So did Sandie Shaw, and Matt Monro. I'm beginning to think I might have to have a follow-up post just on the Spanish recordings of this.) Not that I'm any expert or anything, but to me her French and Spanish pronunciation sound pretty damned good - quite the polished linguist!

Of course, since Mary, this song has been covered by everyone and his dog. There is, for example, this quite nice instrumental version by Vietnamese(?) guitarist Sonphumai and a violinist friend (ah, the wonders of YouTube!). And then, according to your taste, you can take your pick from.... Dolly Parton (no video, stills only), Bonnie Tyler (live TV performance, very good... I sometimes used to wonder in the 70s, when Mary Hopkin disappeared, if the poor girl hadn't had some terrible problems with throat nodules and then reinvented herself as Bonnie Tyler: same age, same look, same Welshness), Sandie Shaw (her version came out shortly after Mary's and failed to take off), or Engelbert Humperdinck (who in fact first recorded this the year before Mary, but never released it as a single - a much fuller arrangement, with horns), or.... well, I could have sworn I'd heard a good rock version of this somewhere, but there's nothing on YouTube. (On further reflection, I think it was a band that opened for The Pogues at one of their Wembley Arena shows in the 80s, but I can't now remember their name.) Well, there is this somewhat anodyne version by Europop duo Bad Boys Blue (just to show that I try to cater for every taste); actually, this is one of those songs that's so good it's almost impossible to do a really bad version of it. Then there's this version by an unidentified Chinese hamonica quartet, and this by Greek bouzouki master Johnny Sporos. And finally, to prove that I really do cater for every taste, here's another very sweet instrumental... by a German ukulele enthusiast (no, really, check this out - very good).

But the pick of the crop is surely this, the Leningrad Cowboys ripping it up live (in Moscow, I assume; or maybe Helsinki - no details posted with the clip) backed by the whole vast wonderfulness of the Red Army Choir (well, more accurately The Alexandrov Ensemble - and yes, it is Helsinki, from a 1993 concert film by Aki Kaurismäki called Total Balalaika Show):

I think this is probably the greatest Drinking Song of them all. There's something about those lilting melodies of Eastern European folk music - on the surface rousingly jaunty, yet underpinned by a painful wistfulness. There's something about the balalaika too; that instrument works like a cheesegrater on the heart. There aren't many songs that can be either triumphantly happy or devastatingly melancholic, according to your mood. There are even fewer that can manage to be both at the same time. This is one of them. And the additional overlay of nostalgia for lost childhood - this is the first pop song I can remember - makes this an emotional frag-grenade for me. So what if it isn't Irish? I can't think of a better raucous, maudlin, misty-eyed singalong for St Patrick's Day.

So here, as a final offering, to get us all in the mood for the revelries later in the day, is a live performance by Liam Clancy (last survivor of the marvellous Clancy Brothers, who passed on just at the end of last year), who opens by reminiscing about his acquaintance with Gene Raskin, who wrote the new English lyrics for the song, and had been a regular drinking companion in Manhattan's famous White Horse Tavern in the early 1960s.

Have a great day, everyone. And remember: Drink Irresponsibly.


[There's a short clip of the original Russian folk song here. There's also this rendition by Belgian super-crooner Helmut Lotti. And if you hang out in Beijing's sleazy Russian quarter, you might recognise this - a breathy, Latino-pop version by the indecently sexy Dessy Dobreva (who is, it seems, Bulgarian, but enjoys a huge following across the whole of Eastern Europe - and Canada too).

Most of the Leningrad Cowboys' Total Balalaika! concert appears to be available on YouTube - check some of it out. However, Wikipedia informs me that the show featured a massed balalaika version of Stairway To Heaven which was not included on the CD or DVD - now there's a rarity I'd like to track down!

The most intriguing nugget of information in the rather spare Wikipedia bio of lyricist Gene Raskin is that he presented this 1960s short film in praise of New York's urban design, How To Live In A City (which definitely deserves a post all of its own).

I think this must surely set a new record for my most cross-linked post: well over 30 references and 3 embeds! Because of the crappiness of my Net connection, and the particularly slow and glitchy downloads I'm suffering from YouTube, and the fact that Internet Explorer inexplicably crashed on me 3 or 4 times while I was preparing this.... well, instead of an hour or so, it took me the best part of five hours! But I think it was well worth it. I hope you will too.

And it's not like I had anything else to do. It's been snowing like the clappers all day. (This post was 'pre-cooked' on Sunday 14th.)]