Singles Released This Week Years Ago

 

This week shows some songs from the sixties, soul and mainly songs from the end of the seventies, where great songs were written.

1967: Dave Davis

1981: Soft Cell

1981: R.E.M.

1965: Sonny & Cher

1971: Aretha Franklin

1976: The Ramones

1965: Wilson Picket

1967: Bobbie Gentry

1970: Jimmy Cliff

1969: David Bowie

1963: The Crystals

1979: The Boomtown Rats

1979: The Flying Lizards

Singles Released This Week Years Ago

 

One more journey to some songs from my musical education.

1967: The Kinks

1981: Talking Heads

1998: Madonna

1970: The Temptations

1982: ABC

1966: Wilson Pickett

1980: Roxy Music

1969: Joe Cocker

1974: Bad Company

1987: Suzanne Vega

Hey Joe

 

58 years ago today, Jimi Hendrix recorded Hey Joe, his first single, which was to make him famous worldwide. It reached top positions in all European charts, but flopped in the United States. 

As it's one of the most covered songs, I'd like to take the opportunity to list some of them here. Willy DeVille did a very good version transporting the blues into a Tex-Mex mariachi sound.

Patti Smith chose this song in 1977 for her first EP and has almost completely alienated the song with Tom Verlaine on guitar.

Wilson Pickett has proven that Hey Joe can also work as a soul number.

There were always artists who tried to render the song in their own language. One of them was Wolle Kriwanek, an artist from my area who never rose above the status of a local great and recorded it as blues sung in Swabian in the early 1980's.

Johnny Hallyday, a French rock 'n' roll and pop artist did the same in the 70's.

Deep Purple covered this song in their very early days and have given the song a bombastic organ sound. 

I know that there are many other versions, but this will suffice for now.