Shoes (Reparata song)
Encyclopedia
"Shoes" is a 1975 single by Reparata
Reparata and the Delrons
Reparata and the Delrons were an American girl group popular during the 1960s, best known for their recordings of "Whenever A Teenager Cries" and "Captain of Your Ship".-Girl group heyday:...

.

The record is sometimes incorrectly called "Shoes (Johnny and Louise)".

Music and lyrics

The track was originally recorded by Felix Harp, a band from Trafford and Level Green, Pennsylvania, and released as a single "She Didn't Forget Her Shoes (Johnny and Louise)" in 1973 for Lou Guarino's NAMI label (single # NAMI 2011), produced by Guarino himself.

Guarino was co-producer of Reparata's recording, which used the same Felix Harp backing track and was renamed "Shoes" when it was released in 1975.

"Shoes" was unlike anything else in the charts at that time, and is not in any definable genre. Described by one critic as a "bizarre wedding song", the lyric tells the story of Johnny and Louise's wedding day, and the contributions of various relatives and friends to the wedding. The song is not about shoes, although it does include the line "Mother didn't give her abuse / she didn't forget her shoes". A family wedding is an unusual subject for a pop song, although not unique: the 10,000 Maniacs
10,000 Maniacs
10,000 Maniacs is a United States-based alternative rock band, which formed in 1981 and continues to be active with various line-ups.-1981–1993:...

' song "My Sister Rose" on their "In My Tribe
In My Tribe
In My Tribe is an album by American alternative rock band 10,000 Maniacs. It was their second major-label album and their first to achieve large-scale success. John Lombardo, Natalie Merchant's songwriting partner on previous albums, left the band in 1986...

" album has a similar subject and similar bittersweet mood.

"Shoes" has what one commentator calls "a Middle Eastern feel". The recording uses a harpsichord
Harpsichord
A harpsichord is a musical instrument played by means of a keyboard. It produces sound by plucking a string when a key is pressed.In the narrow sense, "harpsichord" designates only the large wing-shaped instruments in which the strings are perpendicular to the keyboard...

, bazouki ("Tom brings his band / bazouki in his hand") and tambourine
Tambourine
The tambourine or marine is a musical instrument of the percussion family consisting of a frame, often of wood or plastic, with pairs of small metal jingles, called "zils". Classically the term tambourine denotes an instrument with a drumhead, though some variants may not have a head at all....

 and some vocal shouts and cheers to create the atmosphere of a Greek or Middle Eastern wedding celebration. At the same time, the song also features an electric guitar solo and children's backing vocals, and has been described as "disco
Disco
Disco is a genre of dance music. Disco acts charted high during the mid-1970s, and the genre's popularity peaked during the late 1970s. It had its roots in clubs that catered to African American, gay, psychedelic, and other communities in New York City and Philadelphia during the late 1960s and...

ish". This mixture of styles creates an "absurdly catchy" and unique record, which has been variously described as "Spooky bazouki" and as sounding like it was written by [maverick US pop and rock group] Sparks
Sparks (band)
Sparks is an American rock and pop band formed in Los Angeles in 1968 by brothers Ron and Russell Mael , initially under the name Halfnelson...

.

The happy and celebratory lyrics of "Shoes" are undercut by Reparata's understated vocal delivery. She sings in a much lower register than she had used on previous recordings as lead singer of the Reparata and the Delrons
Reparata and the Delrons
Reparata and the Delrons were an American girl group popular during the 1960s, best known for their recordings of "Whenever A Teenager Cries" and "Captain of Your Ship".-Girl group heyday:...

, and some listeners have believed they were listening to a male vocal. This ambiguity of the singer's gender adds to the strange mood of the record.

Summarising the sound and mood of "Shoes", one blogger comments that

"... despite the surface bonhomie, the music's thrust is slightly threatening and more than slightly unreal, particularly in the middle section when the beat cuts out to let through an ethereal cloud of dishevelled angel choirs ... [While] Reparata's voice strolls as serenely as Carole Bayer Sager
Carole Bayer Sager
Carole Bayer Sager is an American lyricist, songwriter, singer, and painter.-Introduction:Born in New York City, Sager graduated from New York University, where she majored in English, dramatic arts and speech...

's, [it] cannot dispel the feeling that something isn't quite right with the scenario".

Reparata

Mary Aiese O'Leary had adopted her confirmation name Reparata as her stage name when she was lead singer of the 1960s girl group
Girl group
A girl group is a popular music act featuring several young female singers who generally harmonise together.Girl groups emerged in the late 1950s as groups of young singers teamed up with behind-the-scenes songwriters and music producers to create hit singles, often featuring glossy production...

 Reparata and the Delrons
Reparata and the Delrons
Reparata and the Delrons were an American girl group popular during the 1960s, best known for their recordings of "Whenever A Teenager Cries" and "Captain of Your Ship".-Girl group heyday:...

. O'Leary had left the group in 1969, after which bandmate Lorraine Mazzola took over lead vocals, and called herself Reparata Mazzola. After the group disbanded in 1973, Mazzola continued to use the name Reparata Mazzola professionally as one of Lady Flash
Lady Flash
Lady Flash was an American trio of singers whose members were Reparata Mazzola, Monica Pege and Debra Byrd. They were the featured backup group for Barry Manilow from 1974-1979 and released one hit of their own, 1976's "Street Singin'". The tune, which was written and arranged by Manilow, reached...

, Barry Manilow
Barry Manilow
Barry Manilow is an American singer-songwriter, musician, arranger, producer, conductor, and performer, best known for such recordings as "Could It Be Magic", "Mandy", "Can't Smile Without You", and "Copacabana ."...

's back-up singers.

On the release of "Shoes", Mazzola launched a lawsuit for sole use of the name Reparata, after an ad ran in Billboard
Billboard (magazine)
Billboard is a weekly American magazine devoted to the music industry, and is one of the oldest trade magazines in the world. It maintains several internationally recognized music charts that track the most popular songs and albums in various categories on a weekly basis...

 magazine claiming that Manilow's back-up singer was "the real Reparata". In a 2005 radio interview, O'Leary explained that this seriously affected the success of "Shoes" because the single had to be pulled from sale during the case: "When the record came out, being done by Reparata, the record was squashed because, quote unquote, Reparata was with Barry Manilow. Believe me, it's a whole big megillah
Megillah
Megillah may refer to:Bible:*The Scroll of Esther , read on the Jewish holiday of Purim.*Megillat AntiochusRabbinic literature:*Tractate Megillah in the Talmud....

...".

O'Leary won the case when Mazzola did not show up at the hearing, but Mazzola continued to legitimately use the name after legally changing her given name from Lorraine to Reparata.

Despite the record being removed from sale, "Shoes" did manage to have some success, especially in South Africa, where it reached #6 in January 1976. "Shoes" was on the playlist of BBC Radio 1
BBC Radio 1
BBC Radio 1 is a British national radio station operated by the British Broadcasting Corporation which also broadcasts internationally, specialising in current popular music and chart hits throughout the day. Radio 1 provides alternative genres after 7:00pm including electronic dance, hip hop, rock...

 and reached #43 in the UK in October 1975. In the US it reached #92 on the Hot 100. "Shoes" was featured on the 1976 Polydor compilation Super Disco.

Reparata did not have any further chart hits after "Shoes". Mary Aiese O'Leary concentrated mostly on her career as a school teacher in Brooklyn
Brooklyn
Brooklyn is the most populous of New York City's five boroughs, with nearly 2.6 million residents, and the second-largest in area. Since 1896, Brooklyn has had the same boundaries as Kings County, which is now the most populous county in New York State and the second-most densely populated...

, although she did reform Reparata and the Delrons
Reparata and the Delrons
Reparata and the Delrons were an American girl group popular during the 1960s, best known for their recordings of "Whenever A Teenager Cries" and "Captain of Your Ship".-Girl group heyday:...

 in 1978 for performances on the nostalgia circuit and at private events in the New York
New York
New York is a state in the Northeastern region of the United States. It is the nation's third most populous state. New York is bordered by New Jersey and Pennsylvania to the south, and by Connecticut, Massachusetts and Vermont to the east...

 and New England
New England
New England is a region in the northeastern corner of the United States consisting of the six states of Maine, New Hampshire, Vermont, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, and Connecticut...

 areas. She retired from both teaching and performing in the early 2000s, and now a grandmother in her 60s, she lives in Neponsit, Queens
Neponsit, Queens
Neponsit is a small affluent neighborhood located on the western half of the Rockaway Peninsula, the southernmost area of the borough of Queens. The area starts at 142nd Street and ends at 149th Street. It borders the neighborhood of Belle Harbor to the east and Jacob Riis Park on the west. Jamaica...

.

"A forgotten classic"

"Shoes" is included on most Reparata and the Delrons compilations, despite being a solo single that was recorded a decade or more later than most of the group's other material. Comments about the record on various websites and blogs show that it is something of a lost classic: people from a range of countries comment that they have not heard it in 30 years or more, but remember it fondly..

In an interview with the NME
NME
The New Musical Express is a popular music publication in the United Kingdom, published weekly since March 1952. It started as a music newspaper, and gradually moved toward a magazine format during the 1980s, changing from newsprint in 1998. It was the first British paper to include a singles...

 in 1989, the singer Morrissey
Morrissey
Steven Patrick Morrissey , known as Morrissey, is an English singer and lyricist. He rose to prominence in the 1980s as the lyricist and vocalist of the alternative rock band The Smiths. The band was highly successful in the United Kingdom but broke up in 1987, and Morrissey began a solo career,...

 listed "Shoes" as one of his 14 favourite "Singles to be Cremated With". "Shoes" was the most recent record on Morrissey's list by some five years, with all the others dating from between 1959 and 1970. However when Morrissey appeared on the Desert Island Discs
Desert Island Discs
Desert Island Discs is a BBC Radio 4 programme first broadcast on 29 January 1942. It is the second longest-running radio programme , and is the longest-running factual programme in the history of radio...

radio programme twenty years later and chose his eight favourite records, neither "Shoes" nor any of his 1989 favourites were included.

External links

The source of this article is wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.  The text of this article is licensed under the GFDL.
 
x
OK