Left In Aboite: Friday Nite Retro

Thanks for joining me for another edition of Friday Nite Retro here at Left in Aboite! First up, I'd like to apologize for missing last week's entry - I was busy exploding things for several hours for the amusement of my family and neighbors. . .

I was truly surprised by the depth of the career of tonight's featured artist - I was only aware of roughly 10 years of work from. . .Harry Roger Webb. Well, YOU know him as Cliff Richard. This guy's still active today, and got his start way back in the 1950's! With his backing band,The Shadows, Richard dominated the British popular music scene in the late 1950s and early 1960s, before and during the The Beatles' first year in the charts. Over his six decade career, Richard has charted many singles, and holds the record (with Elvis Presley) as the only act to make the UK singles charts in all of its decades (1950s–2000s). According to his website, he has sold more than 250 million records. On the British charts, Richard has had more than 120 singles, albums and EPs make the top 20, more than any other artist.

In the summer 1958 Richard obtained a solo recording contract with EMI's Columbia label. Richard recorded his first single on 24 July 1958. However, producer Norrie Paramor had little faith in the band and brought in two session men, Ernie Shear and Frank Clarke, to provide lead guitar and bass. For that session, Paramor provided Richard with "Schoolboy Crush", a cover of an American record by Bobby Helms. Richard was permitted to record one of his own songs for the B-side; this was "Move It", written by his band The Drifters (Not to be confused with the American band of the same name).

There are a number of stories about why the A-side was replaced by the intended B-side. One is that Norrie Paramor's young daughter raved about the B-side; another was that influential TV producer Jack Good, who used the act for his TV show Oh Boy!, wanted the only song on his show to be "Move It". Regardless of the reason for it's choice, the single went to #2 on the UK charts. Music critics Roy Carr and Tony Tyler wrote that it was the first genuine British rock classic, followed by Johnny Kidd and the Pirates's "Shakin' All Over". John Lennon was quoted as saying that "Move It" was the first English rock record.

Move it

In his early days, Cliff Richard was marketed as the British equivalent to Elvis Presley, even adopting Presley-like dress and hairstyle. In performance he struck a pose of rock attitude, rarely smiling or looking at the audience or camera. His late 1958 and early 1959 follow-up singles, "High Class Baby", Lionel Bart's "Living Doll" were followed by "Mean Streak" which carried a rocker's sense of speed and passion. It was on "Living Doll" that the Drifters began to back Richard on record. By that time the group was obliged to change its name to "The Shadows" after legal complications with the U.S. Drifters.

The Shadows were not a typical backing group. They would become contractually separate from Richard, and the group received no royalties for records backing Richard. In 1959, The Shadows (then still the Drifters) landed an EMI recording contract of their own, for independent recordings. That year, they released three singles, two of which featured double-sided vocals and one of which had instrumental A and B sides. In 1960, they recorded and released "Apache". Reaching the top of the charts in more than one country, the single set the Shadows on a path of their own. They thereafter had several major hits, including five UK #1s. The band also continued to appear and record with Richard and wrote many of his hits. On more than one occasion, a Shadows instrumental replaced a Richard song atop the British charts.

Richard's fifth single "Living Doll" triggered a softer, more relaxed, sound. Subsequent hits, the #1s "Travellin' Light" and "I Love You" and also "A Voice in the Wilderness" and "Theme for a Dream" cemented Richard's status as a mainstream pop entertainer along with contemporaries such as Adam Faith and Billy Fury. Throughout the early sixties his hits were consistently in the top five. Typically, The Shadows closed the first half of the show with a 30-minute set of their own, then backed Richard on his show-closing 45-minute stint.

Do You Wanna Dance?

In the early days, Richard sometimes recorded without The Shadows in order to cater to other styles. Even after the Beatles' rise he continued to achieve hits, although more often with an orchestra rather than The Shadows: a revival of "It's All In The Game" and "Constantly". A session under the direction of Billy Sherrill in Nashville yielded two more top two hits: "The Minute You're Gone" and "Wind Me Up" in 1965.

Cliff Richard and The Shadows never achieved hit status in the United States. In 1960 they toured the U.S. and were well-received; however, lackluster support and distribution from the record company proved costly, and the chance was lost. The band appeared on The Ed Sullivan Show, which was crucial for The Beatles', but these performances did not help them gain success in North America.

As with the other existing rock acts in Britain, Richard's career was affected by the sudden advent of The Beatles and the Mersey sound in 1963 and 1964. However, his popularity was established enough to allow him to weather the storm and continue to have hits in the charts throughout the 1960s, albeit not at the level that he had enjoyed before. Nor did doors open to him in the U.S. market; he was not considered part of the British Invasion, despite four Hot 100 hits, and the U.S. public had little awareness of him.

In 1976 the decision was made to repackage Cliff Richard as a "rock" artist. That year he produced the landmark album I'm Nearly Famous, which included the successful but controversial guitar-driven track Devil Woman (Richard's first true hit in the United States) and the ballad Miss You Nights. Richard's fans were excited about this revival of a performer who had been a part of British rock from its early days. Many music names such as Jimmy Page, Eric Clapton, and Elton John were seen sporting I'm Nearly Famous badges, pleased that their boyhood idol was getting back into the heavier rock in which he had begun his career.

Devil Woman

In 1979, Richard teamed up with the producer Bruce Welch for the pop hit single We Don't Talk Anymore, which hit #1 in the UK and #7 in the U.S. The record gave Richard the distinction of becoming the first act to reach the Hot 100 in the 1980s who had also reached the Hot 100 in each of the three previous decades. The song was quickly added onto the end of his latest album Rock 'n' Roll Juvenile. It was his first time at the top of the UK singles chart in over ten years, and the song would become his biggest-selling single ever. The accompanying music video was the sixth to appear on American cable channel MTV when it debuted Aug. 1, 1981.

We Don't Talk Anymore

At long last he had some extended success in the United States following Devil Woman: the follow-up, Dreaming, also reached the top ten, peaking at #10. His 1980 duet Suddenly with Olivia Newton-John was a Top 20 hit in America.

Dreaming

Suddenly

A personal favorite of mine from 1982. Do you recall this cover?

Daddy's Home

Chart accomplishments

Cliff Richard has scored fourteen No.1 singles in the UK, more than any other artist other than Elvis Presley, The Beatles, and Westlife.
As a performer, Cliff Richard has scored the most top 10 hits on the UK singles charts (69), the most top 20 hits (96) and the most top 40 hits (124). (Double A-sides count as two hits; Richard has charted two double A-sides in the top ten, and five double A-sides in the top forty.)
Based solely on data used to compile the Official UK Singles Charts, Richard has sold more singles in the UK than any other act, with sales exceeding twenty million copies. Interestingly enough, he has scored only one million-selling single: "The Young Ones". This does not reflect his total sales as the data used to compile the charts in the early part of his career was only partial. Sales from his 1950s singles would be significantly understated in this figure.
Cliff Richard has had top ten hits in each of the last six decades.
Cliff Richard is the only act in the UK to score a No.1 single in each of the first five decades since the inception of the UK Singles chart in 1952. His chart peak in the 2000s is No.2. The following list shows the number of chart toppers Richard has achieved in each decade.
- 1950s - 2: "Living Doll", "Travellin' Light"
- 1960s - 7: "Please Don't Tease", "I Love You", "The Young Ones", "The Next Time / Bachelor Boy", "Summer Holiday", "The Minute You're Gone", "Congratulations"
- 1970s - 1: "We Don't Talk Anymore"
- 1980s - 2: "Living Doll", "Mistletoe and Wine"
- 1990s - 2: "Saviour's Day", "Millennium Prayer"