Only in Melbourne: (5) Strawberry Children - Love Years Coming (1967)

Only in Melbourne: tracks that didn't chart Top 40 in their countries of origin but did better in the capital of my home state, Victoria. See also: Only in Oz.

(5) Strawberry Children - Love Years Coming
(Jimmy Webb)
USA 1967
Soul City single (USA) #758 / SCR 758
Liberty single (Australia) #LYK-189955597
Australian charts: #17 Melbourne (#50 Australia)
Released in Australia August 1967, charted September 1967.
US charts: Did not chart Top 100 Billboard or Cash Box.

Survivor of my teenage record collection pile

When I bought this single as a 17-year-old in 1967, the writer credit (J. Webb) meant nothing to me. 

A hit Jimmy Webb composition had already entered the charts here in July, The 5th Dimension's Up, Up And Away (#1 Australia, #7 USA). It carried the same clipped credit on the Australian label (J. Webb) but I didn't own that single and wouldn't have made the connection.

Songwriters can toil away for years creating famous songs for famous artists without ever becoming famous themselves. My feeling is that in September 1967, when Love Years Coming was charting in Melbourne, Jimmy Webb hadn't yet joined the group of exceptions, songwriters who become household names, but the process was well under way. 

After several months at Motown Records, he had been signed to the publishing company owned by Johnny Rivers, also owner of the Soul City label. During 1967 Jimmy Webb compositions dominated albums by The 5th Dimension (Up-Up And Away and The Magic Garden on Soul City), and by Johnny Rivers (Rewind on Imperial). In late 1966 Rivers' album Changes had included the original version of what would become a much-recorded Jimmy Webb classic, By The Time I Get To Phoenix.

In May 1968 came Richard Harris's MacArthur Park, a startling work that inevitably drew attention to its composer. It was followed by Glen Campbell's Wichita Lineman (#5 USA) in the same year then, early in 1969, Brooklyn Bridge's Worst Thing That Could Happen (#3 USA) and Campbell's Galveston (#4 USA). There are many others, and to browse further I recommend the 4-page Jimmy Webb discography by Hiroto Yanagida.

Love Years Coming, which I loved, carries the era's familiar message of peace (the lion shall lie down beside the manchild) and I took Strawberry Children to be another one of those fine American bands that were emerging after the initial shock of the British Invasion, bands like The Association, The Box Tops, The Doors ... 

Years later I had read with pleasure that Jimmy Webb was Strawberry Children. More accurately, though, this is Jimmy Webb with a studio band assembled for the session, a practice that was more widespread than we realised at the time, and certainly not confined to the first recordings of The Monkees.

The team at the Jimmy Webb Facebook page confirms that he is on lead vocals, with Hal Blaine on drums and Larry Knechtel on guitar, both from the ubiquitous LA session team now known as The Wrecking Crew. 

Don't miss the comments and photos at the Facebook page highlighting other personnel on the record including singers Endore’e Lukem, and "J.W. school friends" Glen De Lange and Mike Reilly.

There were no further Strawberry Children releases, so their only other track was the B-side, One Stands Here (J. Webb), a nicely arranged instrumental that could hold its own on a TV or film soundtrack.

---

See also Al Wilson - Do What You Gotta Do, another Only in Melbourne song written by Jimmy Webb.

Only in Melbourne: (4) Gene McDaniels - It's A Lonely Town (Lonely Without You) (1963)

Only in Melbourne: tracks that didn't chart Top 40 in their countries of origin but did better in the capital of my home state, Victoria. See also: Only in Oz.

(4) Gene McDaniels - It's A Lonely Town (Lonely Without You) 
(Doc Pomus - Mort Shuman)
USA 1963
Liberty single (USA) #55597
Liberty single (Australia) #LIB-55597
Australian charts: #10 Melbourne #58 Adelaide (#43 Australia)
US charts: #64 Billboard

ARSA's random samples of radio surveys show Lonely Town charting at half a dozen stations in the US: a #8 at KOSA Odessa TX, a #15 at WRIT Milwaukee WI... It's a familiar story: a scattering of regional chart placings, but only enough to make it a minor national hit (#64 on Billboard).

Because I was in Victoria at the time, listening to Melbourne radio, I've always had a false idea of its overall popularity. A #10 in Melbourne is respectable, but it was no more a national hit in Australia than it was in the US.

Gene McDaniels was a staple of pop radio in Australia in the early 60s. To stick with Melbourne as an example, he had eight Top 40 hits there, notably A Hundred Pounds Of Clay (1961, #4), Tower Of Strength (1961, #4), Chip Chip (1962, #2) and Point Of No Return (1962, #8). The pattern was similar in the other Australian capitals, and it pretty much reflected his US chart record. (In the UK, he managed to chart only once, with Tower of Strength at #49.)

For me, this is a perfect pop record. Writing, arrangement, production and performance are all immaculate: every detail counts. 

McDaniels' singing here is superb, and showcases why he was so popular down here. It's an assured, disciplined, but nuanced performance: note how his voice falters ever so slightly at the end of the line I feel like crying. 

The rest of the personnel are distinguished. You can read their biographies elsewhere, but even a selection of credits tells us a lot. 

The writers Doc Pomus and Mort Shuman (together):

A Teenager In Love (Dion & The Belmonts)

I Count The Tears (The Drifters)

Save The Last Dance For Me (The Drifters)

This Magic Moment (The Drifters)

Little Sister (Elvis Presley)

Sweets For My Sweet (The Drifters, The Searchers)

Suspicion (Elvis Presley, Terry Stafford)

Viva Las Vegas (Elvis Presley)

• See Pomus & Shuman resources at shrout.co.uk

The producer Snuff Garrett

Johnny Burnette - You're Sixteen

Gene McDaniels - A Hundred Pounds Of Clay, Tower Of Strength

Bobby Vee - Take Good Care Of My Baby, Run To Him, The Night Has A Thousand Eyes

Gary Lewis and the Playboys - This Diamond Ring, Count Me In, Everybody Loves A Clown 

• See Tom Simon's Snuff Garrett page

The arranger and conductor Ernie Freeman

Bobby Vee - The Night Has A Thousand Eyes

The Blossoms - That's When The Tears Start

Dean Martin - You're Nobody Till Somebody Loves You

Johnny Burnette - Little Boy Sad

Frank Sinatra - Strangers In The Night

Petula Clark - This Is My Song

Vikki Carr - It Must Be Him

The Vogues - Turn Around, Look At Me

• See Richie Unterberger's Ernie Freeman bio at All Music

I was surprised to discover that another Only in Melbourne track from 1963, Julie London's I'm Coming Back To You, was also produced by Snuff Garrett with arranger and conductor Ernie Freeman.

Only in Melbourne (3) Al Wilson - Do What You Gotta Do (1968)

Only in Melbourne: tracks that didn't chart Top 40 in their countries of origin but did better in the capital of my home state, Victoria. See also: Only in Oz.

3. Al Wilson - Do What You Gotta Do
(Jim Webb)
USA 1968 
Soul City single (USA) #761.
Liberty single (Australia) #LYK-2111
Liberty single  (UK) #LBF 15044
Australian charts: #12 Melbourne (Ryan), #23 Melbourne (Guest) (#38 Australia).

Do What You Gotta Do has been recorded by many, but Al Wilson's version was the one I heard on Melbourne radio in 1968, and it remains the definitive version for me.

I probably heard it on 3XY which had recently switched to a pop format. If 3XY was pushing it, that might explain why it doesn't rate so highly on the chart collated by Tom Guest, whose data is purposely weighted in favour of the highest rating Melbourne station at that time, 3UZ.

Among Al Wilson's songs, Do What You Gotta Do hasn't always been easy to find. His four Billboard Top 40 hits appear often on compilations, especially The Snake (1968, #27 USA) and Show And Tell (1973, #1 USA), the songs he is perhaps best remembered for.

Once again, a song that sounds to me as if it should have been a big worldwide hit, but even in Australia, Melbourne was apparently the only city where it made an impact. A beautiful Jim Webb composition, produced by Johnny Rivers, it has everything: smooth, wistful soul vocals by Wilson - strong but gentle, sad but collected - and a flawless arrangement, with strings and horns by Marty Paich.

It was first recorded by Johnny Rivers himself, on his album Rewind (1967), and other musicians clearly appreciated the composition. Larry's Rebels had a #6 hit version in New Zealand in 1968, and at my page about the song I also list 1968 versions by Nina Simone, Bobby Vee, Clarence Carter, Paul Anka, and Ronnie Milsap, as well as later versions by B.J. Thomas (1970), Roberta Flack (1970), Tom Jones (1971) and Linda Ronstadt (1993). A version by The Four Tops charted #11 in the UK in 1969.

See also Strawberry Children - Love Years Coming, another Only in Melbourne song written by Jimmy Webb.

Chart positions from Gavin Ryan's Melbourne chart book, and Tom Guest's Thirty Years of Hits 1960-1990: Melbourne Top 40 Research. 

Only in Melbourne (2) Julie London - I'm Coming Back To You (1963)

Only in Melbourne: tracks that didn't chart Top 40 in their countries of origin but did better in the capital of my home state, Victoria. See also: Only in Oz.

2. Julie London - I'm Coming Back To You
(Arthur Kent - Ed Warren)
USA 1963
Liberty single #55605
Also on album The Wonderful World of Julie London
Australian charts: #34 Melbourne (#72 Australia)

Only in Melbourne, Victoria but (as a search of ARSA reveals) also in Bakersfield CA plus who knows what other US cities, towns and hamlets?

Even then, this hardly tore up the charts. Melbourne chart statisticians Gavin Ryan and Tom Guest agree on this one: Gavin has it at #34, Tom at #36. The KAFY chart posted to ARSA snapshots it at #27 in Bakersfield.

Probably because I grew up listening to those very Melbourne radio stations that nudged it into the local Top 40, I'm Coming Back To You has always been the song I associate with Julie London: not her famous hit Cry Me A River (1955, #9 USA, #22 UK, later reworked to good effect by Joe Cocker), and not Desifinado, her single that charted elsewhere in Australia (1962: #38 Sydney, #10 Brisbane).

Julie London's territory was always the adult-oriented album rather than the pop single: Cry Me A River was her only national Top 40 hit in the US, but she was a steady earner for Liberty Records with her LPs. She is also remembered for her acting, notably as Nurse Dixie McCall in Emergency (1972-1976), created by her ex-husband Jack Webb.

The opening "do-doo-doo-doo do-do do-do" from the girls' chorus [Listen] signals that the easy-going I'm Coming Back To You is more in a pop vein than much of Julie London's material, which tended towards sultry nightclub jazz.

The names of the producer and arranger-conductor here, Snuff Garrett and Ernie Freeman, are familiar credits on numerous pop records (including some by Johnny O'Keefe), and it shows. This is 1963, on the cusp of the British Invasion, and this style of nicely crafted pop production would just about sound dated within a year or so. The B-side is When Snowflakes Fall in The Summer,written by Brill Building greats Barry Mann and Cynthia Weil. 

(Another Only in Melbourne track from 1963, Al Wilson's Do What You Gotta Do, was also produced by Snuff Garrett with arranger and conductor Ernie Freeman.)

Arthur Kent and Ed Warren, the writers of I'm Coming Back To You, also wrote Take Good Care Of Her, the 1961 hit by Adam Wade (#7 USA), also recorded by Elvis Presley and Johnny Mathis, among others.

Arthur Kent wrote at least two well-known songs with Sylvia Dee: The End Of The World, Skeeter Davis's hit (1963, #2 USA), and Bring Me Sunshine, familiar to British comedy fans as the theme song of Eric Morecambe & Ernie Wise, but also recorded by numerous artists from The Mills Brothers to Willie Nelson.

By the way, a search at the US Copyright Office confirms that Arthur Kent's co-writer on I'm Coming Back To You was indeed Ed Warren. Some sources - including All Music Guide - have wrongly assumed that the Warren in the writer credit belongs to the more prolific and famous Diane Warren, born 1956, who would have been about 7 years old at the time of I'm Coming Back To You.

Chart positions from Gavin Ryan's Australian chart books, with a glance at Tom Guest's Thirty Years of Hits 1960-1990: Melbourne Top 40 Research.

Further reading: Biographies of Julie London and Ernie Freeman at All Music Guide. Tom Simon's Snuff Garrett page. Review of The Wonderful World of Julie London by Greg Adams at AMG.

Only in Melbourne (1) Susan Christie - I Love Onions (1966)

Only in Melbourne: tracks that didn't chart Top 40 in their countries of origin but did better in the capital of my home state, Victoria. See also: Only in Oz.

1. Susan Christie - I Love Onions
(Donald Cochrane - John Hill)
USA 1966
Columbia single (USA) #43595
CBS single (Australia) #BA-221298
Australian charts: #24 Melbourne (#46 Australia)

This is one of those songs that is remembered as a hit, and it might have been in some neighbourhoods, but it was never a "hit" in the sense of making the Top 40 in the States, for example. I remember it because I was listening to Top 40 radio from Melbourne, the only major Australian city where it charted. Even then, it looms larger in my memory than #24.

Perhaps its reputation has something to do with its later appearance on collections of novelty songs, and it really is a novelty, with cute, screwy lyrics delivered in a breathy flapper's voice (or do I hear Marilyn Monroe?), backed by kazoo and tent show band. In the States, I Love Onions also became better known through the children's TV show Captain Kangaroo, which apparently gave it a good run.

In New Zealand the song became known through a popular local version by Sandy Edmonds (1967): see my feature on Sandy's version over at my website.

There was a fair bit of this droll retro stuff around in the 60s. For some reason the jazz era was seen as a source of hilarity by some of the post-war generation, and there was a familiar line of ironic approximations of trad jazz, jugbands, Tin Pan Alley crooners and dancehall spruikers, a line that stretched at least from the Temperance Seven (You're Driving me Crazy, #1 UK 1961) to the New Vaudeville Band (Winchester Cathedral, #4 UK 1966) and beyond. Oh look: there was The Eggplant That Ate Chicago by Dr West's Medicine Show (1966), and Hello Hello by Sopwith Camel (#26 USA 1967).

You know the sort of thing I mean: slightly old fashioned music with its tongue in its cheek, and I usually adored it.

I don't know that there was ever a satisfying name for this tendency, but it was pervasive enough to be found in the Beatles' Sergeant Pepper - visually as much as musically - and in the op shop side of Swinging London fashions. The Beatles had quite a line of their own in retro schtick: the spoken intros to Honey Pie ("Now she's hit the bigtime...") and Magical Mystery Tour ("Roll up, roll up, step right this way.."), and whole songs like Your Mother Should Know and When I'm 64.

The 60s throwbacks were really a selective parody of the past, as if Rudy Vallee with a megaphone were the only singer from the old days. Anyone who actually explored the music of the pre-war years would have found a rich popular culture that easily matched the 60s for its innovation and influence. In the 60s we were entertained by a comic book version of the real 20s and 30s, lots of fun but a bit sloppy with its references.

About Susan Christie not a lot seems to be known.*  (Some sources repeat the theory that she is the sister of Lou Christie, but I'm pretty sure that's not true. Their biographies don't seem to overlap, apart from both being from Pittsburgh. Lou's real surname is Sacco, in case that's a clue.) She recorded a then-unreleased album around 1960-70, Paint A Lady, produced by John Hill who back in '66 had produced and co-written I Love Onions. Although Paint A Lady has now been released, Susan Christie has retained a low profile, as in no profile.

You can listen to I Love Onions at YouTube and someone has posted Yesterday Where's My Mind? a 9-minute track from Paint A Lady.

- - -

* UPDATE 2021 By now, much more information about Susan Christie can be found online. See, for example, Bruce Eder's biography of Susan Christie at AllMusic. There is a good Wikipedia page about her, and Spotify has her 1969/70 album Paint A Lady (unreleased at the time) as well as a 2018 collection of her singles. Bruce Eder tells us that Christie is from Philadelphia, she had been in a folk ensemble called The Highlanders, and she attended Boston's Berklee College of Music. He also concedes that "she has been something of a mystery, as to her fate and career". The lyrics are easily found online.

Chart positions from Gavin Ryan's Australian chart books.