From my website's front page series about lesser known artists who performed the original versions of Australian or NZ records.
See also: the full collection of over 30 Obscure Originators features.
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Of Hopes And Dreams And Tombstones was covered in Australia by R&B and blues influenced band The Purple Hearts.
When the song was on Australian radio and charting in Melbourne and Brisbane, listeners would have been surprised to learn that it came from a government campaign to keep US teenagers at school. In the lyrics, the singer is working three jobs a day because he quit school too early.
The Youth Opportunity Back-to-School Campaign distributed the single free to American schools and radio deejays with a formal message on the sleeve from Vice President Hubert H. Humphrey.
The title of the program is printed on the label in place of an artist credit. That should have gone to Jimmy Fraser, whose vocals, along with the harmonica-led backing, make Of Hopes And Dreams And Tombstones sound like a perfectly credible (even groovy!) rock record of the time.
Alas! Jimmy Fraser remains unknown although I have seen it suggested that this was a pseudonym. Columbia Records did reissue the track commercially as a Jimmy Fraser single, but that was the last we heard of him, at least under that name.
The song's credibility owes a lot to the composer. Joy Byers wrote Eddie Cochran’s C’mon Everybody and several songs for Elvis Presley. She often collaborated with her husband Bob Johnston, producer of Dylan’s Blonde On Blonde and Simon & Garfunkel’s early albums.
In 2002 The Purple Hearts' Australian version provided the opening track and the title of one of Alex Palao's excellent Ace Records (UK) compilations, Of Hopes & Dreams & Tombstones (Beat 'n' R&B From Down Under). For me, that just about confirms its groovy status.
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For more about the song and "Youth Opportunity Program” (Back To School), see The Purple Hearts - Of Hopes And Dreams And Tombstones.
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