By Tony Attwood
Preface:
This series is not a set of reviews of what Bob said about each song (you can, of course, buy a copy of Bob’s “Philosophy” book and see what he said), but rather it contains my own reaction to each song – written particularly since in many cases I was not familiar with the song until I saw Bob’s book. Although in this case I was (if you are with me so far).
So I’m not trying to review Bob’s book; lots of people have done that, and you can go out and buy it and read it for yourself. Rather, I am trying to offer my thoughts on the songs and recordings Bob suggested and when I can, ponder why he chose each song.
I should add that the titles of songs reviewed in my series are noted at the end of this article in alphabetical order, not in the order found in the book. That makes it easier for me, even if no one else.
Today: Saturday Night at the Movies. This was written by the husband and wife songwriting team Barry Mann and Cynthia Weil and was a hit for the Drifters in 1964. Rather perversely in the UK the song was a bigger hit second time around when re-released in 1972.
And here I want to pause and mention Cynthia Weill in particular. She died just two years ago and her name really should be more revered than I think it is (at least in the UK), as the writer not just of “Saturday Night at the Movies”, a song that personally I don’t have too much time for, but the staggeringly wonderful and beautiful, “Lay Down Your Weary Tune”.
I’ll come back to that, but Bob’s choice is “Saturday Night” so here it is.
Although it was not a number 1 hit on either side of the Atlantic, it was one of those songs that everyone seemed to know, and half of them would make an attempt at singing it, not least because the song is easy to sing, although the falsetto in the penultimate line of the verse can be a bit of a problem. But everyone can manage the chorus:
Saturday night at the moviesWho cares what picture you seeWhen you're huggin' with your babyIn the last row of the balcony?
The song was released as a 1964 single, peaking at number 18 in the United States. In the United Kingdom only made it to number 35, but it got into the charts a second time around eight years later when reissued.
“Saturday night” is in fact a classic of a regular beat that is impossible to get out of one’s head, giving us a simple picture of a couple sitting in the cinema as a way of escaping the eagle-eyed parents, two simple four-line verses and a two line chorus that appears five times in a two and a half minute track. (Actually, I didn’t time it, but it feels like two and a half minutes).
In fact, the song is the exact opposite of a Dylan song – few words, repeated chorus over and over, harmonies, and a bumpty-bump accompaniment. And it is interesting in that most people who were listening to music in those dim and distant days will still remember it because of its simplicity and easily remembered chorus line.
But what the song does, and I think this is an important point, is solidify the image of teenagers living in a world with, yet apart from, their parents. This was, after all, the time when teenagers would constantly complain that they were not understood in any way – in terms of their relationships, their music, their dress sense, their lack of devotion to tedious, meaningless jobs, their desire to serve their country or anything else. The song portrays this in a way that would not be offensive to the adults who owned the radio stations and record companies, and thus would be allowed on the strictly controlled media, which was still wary of the whole notion of “teenagers” of this general concept of individuality and being “different”.
Now it was at this point that I started a new train of thought – did every version of this song sound just the same? Working through the recordings, it certainly appeared so. I listened to around a dozen covers of the song, and each one had that same beat, same style, same approach… There was no originality.
Until I found this one. And this is not to say I like this version, but at least they do something different….
And I think in this regard, it was worth contemplating what Bob Dylan was writing at the time. At the end of 1963 he wrote The Times they are a-Changing, The Lonesome Death of Hattie Carroll, and then a song that I think surpasses both of those as an expression of what it could be like to be a teenager at this moment, Lay Down Your Weary Tune This song had as its first and last verse
Lay down your weary tune, lay downLay down the song you strumAnd rest yourself 'neath the strength of stringsNo voice can hope to hum
If you are as fascinated by this wonderful song as I am, you might possibly be interested in the article devoted just to this song, which I have just realised I wrote 14 years ago. Goodness! Incidentally, I have found that this version has a habit of disappearing from the internet and then returning. If you find this happens, do persevere, if you can. It is a song worth searching for.
Anyway, Bob chose “Saturday Night at the Movies” undoubtedly as a representation of the way in which teenagers in the 1960s were somehow or other finding their own escape from what many found to be the claustrophobic world of their “elders and betters”. But it is interesting to know what Bob was writing at the same time as this song was released.
Here are the other songs we’ve covered from this book….
- Cheaper to Keep Her
- CIA Man – the Fugs
- Detroit City
- Don’t let me be misunderstood
- Dirty Life and Times
- Detroit City
- Dirty Life and Times
- Don’t let me be misunderstood
- I’ve always been crazy
- Keep my Skillet Good and Greasy
- My Generation and Desolation Row
- Old Violin by Johnny Paycheck
- Please don’t let me be misunderstood
- Pump it up
- Strangers in the Night
- Take Me from This Garden of Evil
- There stands the glass
- Waist Deep in the Big Muddy
- Where or When
- Willy the Wandering Gypsy and Me