Sweet Gene Vincent
Encyclopedia
"Sweet Gene Vincent" is a song and single by Ian Dury
. Taken from his first solo album New Boots and Panties!! it was his second solo single and third solo release and is a tribute to Rock 'n' Roll singer Gene Vincent
. It was released November 1977 on the single BUY 23 Sweet Gene Vincent / You're More Than Fair and there was no picture sleeve released.
Sweet Gene Vincent remained in Ian Dury's set list for almost his entire career, even after other faster paced songs like "Plaistow Patricia" and "Blackmail Man" had been dropped because of the singer's worsening health and was played at his very last concert at the London Palladium
in February 2000. It is still in The Blockheads set in 2007.
since his early to mid teens and claims to have bought every single Vincent produced. In an interview reprinted in Sex And Drugs And Rock And Roll: The Life of Ian Dury, Dury says that he first heard of Vincent via Be-Bop-A-Lula
's inclusion in film The Girl Can't Help It
and admitted to being reduced to tears by the single as an adolescent. For his whole career Dury would talk very sentimentally, sometimes poetically about Gene Vincent.
It was Vincent's death in 1971 that was a major prompt for Dury to make Kilburn & The Highroads a serious endeavour and his stage clothes of the time often reflected Vincent's influence, notably black leather gloves. He also namechecked the singer in one of his earliest original songs "Upminster Kid", albeit under the singer's 'full' name Gene Vincent Craddock.
Curiously Dury constantly denied that identification with the singer, also crippled and forced to wear a leg brace, was in any way an attraction. He apparently hadn't even known Vincent was crippled when he first became a fan. What drew Dury's attention to the singer was his voice and his look.
Dury chose Vincent's first single, "Woman Love" as one of his 8 songs when he appeared on BBC Radio 4
's Desert Island Discs
show.
. Had it been kept in its original draft, Jankel jokes, it would have taken 15 minutes to sing.
Dury’s research and knowledge allowed a large percentage of the lyric, which tells the rough life-story of Vincent, to be made up of references and/or extracts from Vincent’s songs. For instance the Song’s opening line Blue Gene Baby is a faithful re-creation of the first line of Blue Jean Bop and the line Who, who, who slapped John? shouted as the song speeds up to its full tempo is directly lifted from Who Slapped John. Another line 'and you lay that pistol down' is a bastardisation of a lyric from Pistol Packin' Momma used to reference Vincent's partiality for waving guns around in-studio (an act that once scared The Beatles
). Be-Bop-A-Lula is also referenced at least once, as one character in the song 'Uncanny Annie' is 'the one with the flying feet', 'she's the one with the flying feet' being a line in Be-Bop-A-Lula.
Referencing Dury's interest in Vincent's look, the song contains two sections solely focussing on Vincent's typical black and white dress. Dury would constantly forget the second set Black gloves, white frost, black crepe, white lead, white sheet, black knight, jet black, dead white when singing Sweet Gene Vincent live and replace them often with totally different lyrics.
Suggs
from Madness
quoted repeatedly from the lyrics to Sweet Gene Vincent in his tribute song to Ian Dury, Oranges and Lemons, which he recorded with Jools Holland
and his Rhythm and Blues Orchestra for the Small World, Big Band Volume 1 album and also in his introduction for re-runs of On My Life a documentary about Ian Dury.
The song features Ian Dury singing in a mock-Jamaican accent (such as, for instance, the Kinks
' "Apeman
") to a reggae tune and tells the amusing story of a couple having sex as they move through the house, with foreplay beginning in the hall and the song ending with the male's ejaculation on the roof. Its lyrics are still noteworthy even by modern standards where songs are much more sexually explicit because of its unusual use of the word 'clitoris
'.
Earlier versions of the song, recorded with Kilburn & The Highroads feature different lyrics that do not keep up the 'sexual act in a location in the home' theme and replace 'clitoris' with the more crude term 'fanny' (in Britain fanny is used to mean the vagina
, rather than the backside as it is in America).
single) and was previously available as the album's second track, and is still included on its CD-reissues. It has constantly featured on Ian Dury compilations since including his first, Jukebox Dury.
on guitar. Another version has been released, recorded live after Ian Dury's death appears on The Blockhead's first release without their former lead singer Straight From The Desk - 2.
Robbie Williams
sings the song on Brand New Boots and Panties, a re-creation of New Boots and Panties!! with various other lead singers that acted as a tribute album to Ian Dury. Williams and Dury met while working for UNICEF and Williams adds and additional repetition of the song's title near his versions' close, Dury often did this live.
The backing track to Sweet Gene Vincent (that is, an instrumental version) has recently been released on Edsel Records' 2-Disc re-issue of New Boots and Panties!!.
The bit before the first chorus is sung by Andy Serkis in the ending of the Ian Dury biography Sex & Drugs & Rock & Roll
.
Ian Dury
Ian Robins Dury was an English rock and roll singer, lyricist, bandleader and actor who initially rose to fame during the late 1970s, during the punk and New Wave era of rock music...
. Taken from his first solo album New Boots and Panties!! it was his second solo single and third solo release and is a tribute to Rock 'n' Roll singer Gene Vincent
Gene Vincent
Vincent Eugene Craddock , known as Gene Vincent, was an American musician who pioneered the styles of rock and roll and rockabilly. His 1956 top ten hit with his Blue Caps, "Be-Bop-A-Lula", is considered a significant early example of rockabilly...
. It was released November 1977 on the single BUY 23 Sweet Gene Vincent / You're More Than Fair and there was no picture sleeve released.
Sweet Gene Vincent remained in Ian Dury's set list for almost his entire career, even after other faster paced songs like "Plaistow Patricia" and "Blackmail Man" had been dropped because of the singer's worsening health and was played at his very last concert at the London Palladium
London Palladium
The London Palladium is a 2,286 seat West End theatre located off Oxford Street in the City of Westminster. From the roster of stars who have played there and many televised performances, it is arguably the most famous theatre in London and the United Kingdom, especially for musical variety...
in February 2000. It is still in The Blockheads set in 2007.
Ian Dury and Gene Vincent
Ian Dury was a fan of Gene VincentGene Vincent
Vincent Eugene Craddock , known as Gene Vincent, was an American musician who pioneered the styles of rock and roll and rockabilly. His 1956 top ten hit with his Blue Caps, "Be-Bop-A-Lula", is considered a significant early example of rockabilly...
since his early to mid teens and claims to have bought every single Vincent produced. In an interview reprinted in Sex And Drugs And Rock And Roll: The Life of Ian Dury, Dury says that he first heard of Vincent via Be-Bop-A-Lula
Be-Bop-A-Lula
"Be-Bop-A-Lula" is a rockabilly song first recorded in 1956 by Gene Vincent and His Blue Caps.-Origins of the song:The writing of the song is credited to Gene Vincent and his manager, Bill "Sheriff Tex" Davis. There is evidence that the song was started in 1955, when Vincent was recuperating from...
's inclusion in film The Girl Can't Help It
The Girl Can't Help It
The Girl Can't Help It is a 1956 comedy musical film starring Jayne Mansfield, Tom Ewell, and Edmond O'Brien. It was produced and directed by Frank Tashlin, with a screenplay adapted by Tashlin and Herbert Baker from an uncredited novel Do Re Me by Garson Kanin...
and admitted to being reduced to tears by the single as an adolescent. For his whole career Dury would talk very sentimentally, sometimes poetically about Gene Vincent.
It was Vincent's death in 1971 that was a major prompt for Dury to make Kilburn & The Highroads a serious endeavour and his stage clothes of the time often reflected Vincent's influence, notably black leather gloves. He also namechecked the singer in one of his earliest original songs "Upminster Kid", albeit under the singer's 'full' name Gene Vincent Craddock.
Curiously Dury constantly denied that identification with the singer, also crippled and forced to wear a leg brace, was in any way an attraction. He apparently hadn't even known Vincent was crippled when he first became a fan. What drew Dury's attention to the singer was his voice and his look.
Dury chose Vincent's first single, "Woman Love" as one of his 8 songs when he appeared on BBC Radio 4
BBC Radio 4
BBC Radio 4 is a British domestic radio station, operated and owned by the BBC, that broadcasts a wide variety of spoken-word programmes, including news, drama, comedy, science and history. It replaced the BBC Home Service in 1967. The station controller is currently Gwyneth Williams, and the...
's 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...
show.
Lyrics
Ian Dury spent six weeks researching his lyric and read two biographies of Gene Vincent before finishing it and handing it to the song's co-writer, Chas JankelChas Jankel
Charles Jeremy Jankel professionally known as Chaz Jankel, is a musician best known as the keyboard player and guitarist with Ian Dury and the Blockheads...
. Had it been kept in its original draft, Jankel jokes, it would have taken 15 minutes to sing.
Dury’s research and knowledge allowed a large percentage of the lyric, which tells the rough life-story of Vincent, to be made up of references and/or extracts from Vincent’s songs. For instance the Song’s opening line Blue Gene Baby is a faithful re-creation of the first line of Blue Jean Bop and the line Who, who, who slapped John? shouted as the song speeds up to its full tempo is directly lifted from Who Slapped John. Another line 'and you lay that pistol down' is a bastardisation of a lyric from Pistol Packin' Momma used to reference Vincent's partiality for waving guns around in-studio (an act that once scared The Beatles
The Beatles
The Beatles were an English rock band, active throughout the 1960s and one of the most commercially successful and critically acclaimed acts in the history of popular music. Formed in Liverpool, by 1962 the group consisted of John Lennon , Paul McCartney , George Harrison and Ringo Starr...
). Be-Bop-A-Lula is also referenced at least once, as one character in the song 'Uncanny Annie' is 'the one with the flying feet', 'she's the one with the flying feet' being a line in Be-Bop-A-Lula.
Referencing Dury's interest in Vincent's look, the song contains two sections solely focussing on Vincent's typical black and white dress. Dury would constantly forget the second set Black gloves, white frost, black crepe, white lead, white sheet, black knight, jet black, dead white when singing Sweet Gene Vincent live and replace them often with totally different lyrics.
Suggs
Suggs (singer)
Graham McPherson , better known as Suggs, is an English singer, actor, former radio DJ, TV personality, and most famous as the frontman of the band Madness.-Early life:...
from Madness
Madness (band)
In 1979, the band recorded the Lee Thompson composition "The Prince". The song, like the band's name, paid homage to their idol, Prince Buster. The song was released through 2 Tone Records, the label of The Specials founder Jerry Dammers. The song was a surprise hit, peaking in the UK music charts...
quoted repeatedly from the lyrics to Sweet Gene Vincent in his tribute song to Ian Dury, Oranges and Lemons, which he recorded with Jools Holland
Jools Holland
Julian Miles "Jools" Holland OBE, DL is an English pianist, bandleader, singer, composer, and television presenter. He was a founder of the band Squeeze and his work has involved him with many artists including Sting, Eric Clapton, George Harrison, The Who, David Gilmour and Bono.Holland is a...
and his Rhythm and Blues Orchestra for the Small World, Big Band Volume 1 album and also in his introduction for re-runs of On My Life a documentary about Ian Dury.
B-side
Sweet Gene Vincent's b-side "You're More Than Fair" was written some years before its eventual release while Ian Dury was a member of his pub-rock band Kilburn & The Highroads where it was a live favourite and was frequently in their set. And as of 2008 still appears in The Blockheads’ set.The song features Ian Dury singing in a mock-Jamaican accent (such as, for instance, the Kinks
The Kinks
The Kinks were an English rock band formed in Muswell Hill, North London, by brothers Ray and Dave Davies in 1964. Categorised in the United States as a British Invasion band, The Kinks are recognised as one of the most important and influential rock acts of the era. Their music was influenced by a...
' "Apeman
Apeman (song)
"Apeman" is a song by the British rock band The Kinks. It was written by Ray Davies and appears on the album Lola versus Powerman and the Moneygoround, Part One. It is 3:54 in length.-Themes:...
") to a reggae tune and tells the amusing story of a couple having sex as they move through the house, with foreplay beginning in the hall and the song ending with the male's ejaculation on the roof. Its lyrics are still noteworthy even by modern standards where songs are much more sexually explicit because of its unusual use of the word 'clitoris
Clitoris
The clitoris is a sexual organ that is present only in female mammals. In humans, the visible button-like portion is located near the anterior junction of the labia minora, above the opening of the urethra and vagina. Unlike the penis, which is homologous to the clitoris, the clitoris does not...
'.
Earlier versions of the song, recorded with Kilburn & The Highroads feature different lyrics that do not keep up the 'sexual act in a location in the home' theme and replace 'clitoris' with the more crude term 'fanny' (in Britain fanny is used to mean the vagina
Vagina
The vagina is a fibromuscular tubular tract leading from the uterus to the exterior of the body in female placental mammals and marsupials, or to the cloaca in female birds, monotremes, and some reptiles. Female insects and other invertebrates also have a vagina, which is the terminal part of the...
, rather than the backside as it is in America).
Re-releases
Sweet Gene Vincent was the first and only single to be released from Ian Dury's solo debut New Boots and Panties!! (although the album's opening track "Wake Up And Make Love With Me" was included on the What A WasteWhat a Waste
What a Waste is a song and single by Ian Dury and the Blockheads, originally released on the Stiff Records single BUY 27 "What a Waste" / "Wake Up and Make Love with Me"...
single) and was previously available as the album's second track, and is still included on its CD-reissues. It has constantly featured on Ian Dury compilations since including his first, Jukebox Dury.
Versions
A live version of the song can be found on Dury's Warts 'N' Audience album, it is preceded by a short introduction by Dury in the form of him singing another song and Dury shouting 'Oi oi! to the crowd. It features a totally different verse replacing the second set of 'black/white' lyrics and Wilko JohnsonWilko Johnson
Wilko Johnson is an English guitarist and songwriter, particularly associated with the UK rhythm and blues band Dr. Feelgood in the 1970s.-Career:...
on guitar. Another version has been released, recorded live after Ian Dury's death appears on The Blockhead's first release without their former lead singer Straight From The Desk - 2.
Robbie Williams
Robbie Williams
Robert Peter "Robbie" Williams is an English singer-songwriter, vocal coach and occasional actor. He is a member of the pop group Take That. Williams rose to fame in the band's first run in the early- to mid-1990s. After many disagreements with the management and certain group members, Williams...
sings the song on Brand New Boots and Panties, a re-creation of New Boots and Panties!! with various other lead singers that acted as a tribute album to Ian Dury. Williams and Dury met while working for UNICEF and Williams adds and additional repetition of the song's title near his versions' close, Dury often did this live.
The backing track to Sweet Gene Vincent (that is, an instrumental version) has recently been released on Edsel Records' 2-Disc re-issue of New Boots and Panties!!.
The bit before the first chorus is sung by Andy Serkis in the ending of the Ian Dury biography Sex & Drugs & Rock & Roll
Sex & Drugs & Rock & Roll (film)
Sex & Drugs & Rock & Roll is a 2010 biopic of Ian Dury, starring Andy Serkis as Dury. The film follows Dury's rise to fame and documents his personal battle with the disability caused by having contracted polio during childhood. The effect that his disability and his lifestyle have upon his...
.
Sources
- Sex And Drugs And Rock And Roll: The Life Of Ian Dury by Richard Balls, first published 2000, Omnibus Press
- Ian Dury & The Blockheads: Song By Song by Jim Drury, first published 2003, Sanctuary Publishing.