Emergency Questions #12: Teddy Picker

Huggy Bear's back, and he's giving Richard Herring a week off.

This week's Emergency Questions...

Who was your favourite Teddy Bear as a kid? What were they called? Do you still have them?

Here are some of Huggy's favourite songs to help jog your memory...

Elvis Presley - (Let Me Be Your) Teddy Bear

Red Sovine - Teddy Bear (Don't knock it till you've tried it... then, feel free to knock it.)

Oh, and if that wasn't bad enough... here's the sequel! (Even Red refused to have anything to do with this.)

Diana Williams - Teddy Bears Last Ride

Arctic Monkeys - Teddy Picker

Barbara Fairchild - Teddy Bear (Tissues at the ready!)

Apocalypse - Teddy

Alice Cooper - Look At You Over There, Ripping The Sawdust From My Teddybear

Jerry Garcia & David Grisman - Teddy Bear's Picnic

Do you still have your old teddy?

Celebrity Jukebox #80: Faron Young

I've made the argument before that certain celebrities are better known (in certain circles, at least) for the song that's named after them than for their own individual renown. I certainly discovered Faron Young through a song that took his name... though his fame (and notoriety) influenced many others, including Peanuts creator Charles Schultz who gave the name Faron to a cat in his long-running comic strip.

Iffypedia (and a number of other websites that have lifted their info straight off iffypedia) reports that: "A country song by Tex Garrison mentions Faron Young in his opening lyrics with the lines 'Got a stack of records when I was one, listened to Hank Williams and Faron Young.'" This, however, appears to be a good example of why we shouldn't believe everything we read on the interweb, since I can't find any other reference to that lyric... or the singer Tex Garrison... anywhere online. It appears to be a load of bunkum... unless you know differently.

Because country musicians love name-checking the great and good of their community, there are loads of records that do mention Faron... alongside the likes of Willie, Waylon and the rest. Here are a few examples...

Johnny Cash - Let There Be Country

Red Sovine - Freightliner Fever

Dale Watson - Nashville Rash

Tim Wilson - Acid Country

Jay Lee Webb - Tootsie's Wall

Then there's a couple than are a little more specific...

WD Miller - Barroom For A Shelter

They got a jukebox and a bar that's full of drinkers
But Faron Young's the only voice I hear
If misery loves company then why do I feel so lonely
With a broken heart as a souvenir

Summer Dean - Queen of the Clowns

The jukebox played Faron
And she started to think
If Faron Young were here
He would buy me a drink

Next, we have the Bottle Rockets, with a song all about choices...

Sometimes open sometimes closed
Sometimes young sometimes old
Sometimes begging sometimes proud

However, when they get to Faron... there doesn't appear to be any alternative.

Sometimes Faron... Faron Young.

The Bottle Rockets - Sometimes Found

But if country music isn't your thing... well, if country music isn't your thing then you're probably not reading this. Still, here's the modestly monikered One Star...

One Star - Astrolama (Faron Young Mix)

And now, the one you've all been waiting for: Paddy. But is Paddy a fan, that's the question? Well, clearly he's a country music fan, since the name "Prefab Sprout" came from mishearing the lyrics to Jackson: he really should have called his band "Peppered Sprout". But the song Faron Young isn't really about Faron. It's more about his biggest hit, Four In The Morning, and how things like that can become so ubiquitous they lose their original intent. In the song, Paddy is driving through America looking for something real, something new, something he's never experienced before... but all he finds are the clichés.

You offer infrared instead of sun
You offer bubble gum
You give me Faron Young, 
Four in the morning

Initially, Paddy had written the tune but didn't have a lyric. He asked the band's drummer, Michael Salmon, to give him a word to base the song on, and Salmon suggest "antiques". Which is why the lyric begins thus...

Antiques!
Every other sentiment's an antique
As obsolete as warships in the Baltic

Four In The Morning was a hit from 1971, yet it was still everywhere in the mid-80s... it was the first music video played on Country Music Television in 1983. So I guess it was an antique by then, and a perfect metaphor for what Paddy was saying. Perhaps Faron Young felt the same. By 1996, he felt so abandoned by the world of country music that he took his own life. 

Faron Young had the lowest chart placing of any of the singles released from Prefab Sprout's Steve McQueen album. But it's still a classic.

Postscript...

In 2016, The Blazing Zoos finally gave Four In The Morning the sequel it deserves...

It's four in the morning and I'm listening to Four In The Morning
Faron Young never sung anything quite like he sung this one
Don't string her along, Don't treat her wrong
Guilt pays you back in the end

You can see I'm past caring
Please tell me, Faron
Why am I still up at five?

The Blazing Zoos - Still Up At Five

Snapshots #247: A Top Ten Bear Songs

If you can't bear the suspense any longer... here are yesterday's bear-faced answers...

10. This drives one crazy!

"Drives one" is an anagram. The artist in question was also famous for his truck-driver-themed hits. Of which this, his only UK chart entry, is surely his worst. I mean, I like a mawkish talky CB-flavoured country tune as much as anyone, but even I have to draw the line somewhere.

 #4 in 1981 though... those of you who were old enough to be buying records in that year, I blame you. I was only 9, so nobody can blame me.

Red Sovine - Teddy Bear

Also, it's hard not to listen to that all the way through without wondering if Operation Yewtree were forced to investigate...

9. Half a sugar creates desire.

Tate & Lyle make sugar. Half of that is Lyle... and you'll love it!

Now this is how to write a country song about bears! What a tune!

Lyle Lovett - Bears

8. Goodbye Lucille touched the button to get things going. 

Goodbye Lucille is a song about Johnny, Johnny, Johnny...

If you pushed that button, you probably pressed 'on'.

Johnny Preston - Running Bear

7. Hard rock from Scottish cow and Fab Mum.

A Scottish cow is an Aberdeen Angus.

A Fab Mum would be Julia Lennon.

 A hard rock is a stone.

Angus & Julia Stone - Grizzly Bear

6. In sleep, initially.

In sleep, you can find the initials EP.

Elvis Presley - (Let Me Be Your) Teddy Bear

Not my favourite Elvis song by any stretch, but it's still a damn sight better than Red Sovine's Teddy Bear.

5. Going to Hell.

The Damned - Edward The Bear

4. Found in horrid Elvis song.

HorRID Elvis song.

Ride - Polar Bear

3. German cane.

Same as a Gerry reed.

Jerry Reed - The Preacher & The Bear

2. Thorny Jam Fetish.

Anagram!

Father John Misty - I Love You, Honeybear

1. The cost of a partridge is fixed.

In this shop, the Alan Price is set.

The Alan Price Set - Simon Smith & His Amazing Dancing Bear

(Written by Randy Newman, but Alan made it his own.)

I expect you back here next Saturday morning, with marmalade sandwiches... or you'll get a hard stare.

Snapshots #193: A Top Ten Ghost Story Songs

Yesterday's title photo featured Michael Keaton, who played The Ghost With The Most, Beetlejuice.

Today it's the turn of Bruce Willis who... well, spoilers, obviously. Although much as I like The Sixth Sense (and most M. Knight Shyamalan movies), that was one twist I spotted very early on. Which was a bit of a disappointment.

Still, here we go... a bit tougher than usual, though you cracked the link eventually.

A TOP TEN GHOST STORY SONGS

10. Elton Johny???

An irresistible anagram that.

John Leyton - Johnny, Remember Me

When the mist's a-rising

And the rain is falling

And the wind is blowing cold across the moor

I hear the voice of my darlin'

The girl I loved and lost a year ago

9. It's life, Superman, but not as we know it.

I may have used the combination of James T. (Jim) Kirk and Christopher 'Superman' Reeves before. After 193 of these things, a repeated clue every now and then is unavoidable...

Jim Reeves - Old Tige

A ghost dog!

8. Divine caramel.

Godly and Crème caramel.

Godley & Creme - Under Your Thumb

Then she rose up out of nowhere

and her hair was full of steam

and she stuck her head out the window

and screamed and screamed, she screamed!

7. Drinking average fortified wine is the norm.

The convention is for a fair port.

It appears these guys know quite a few ghost stories, but the one I chose was...

Fairport Convention - She Moves Through The Fair

I dreamt it last night

That my dead love came in

So softly she moved

That her feet made no din

Then she came close beside me

And this she did say

"It will not be long love

Till our wedding day"

6. A bow tie for Hazlewood.

A dicky bow for Lee Hazlewood?

Dicky Lee - Laurie (Strange Things Happen)

He did also do a version of Tell Laura I Love Her... but it's not as spine-tingling as the tune above! Wait for the twist, if you've never heard it before...

5. Potter, the man in...

Harry Potter, the chap in...

Harry Chapin - Corey's Coming

That's my favourite ghost story on this list.

4. Sounds like Smith & McLennan might be behind the JFK assassination.

Will Smith & Grant McLennan... it's a Will and Grant conspiracy!

The Willard Grant Conspiracy - The Ghost of the Girl in the Well

I did also consider The Beautiful South - Woman In The Wall, but they've featured here a lot lately.

3. Who's this? Ask Beth U.

A simple enough anagram and a photo of one of Kate's first pub performances.

Kate Bush - Wuthering Heights

Heathcliff, it's me, I'm Cathy

I've come home, I'm so cold

Let me in your window

Heathcliff, it's me, I'm Cathy

I've come home, I'm so cold

Let me in your window

Although we could have also had...

Kate Bush - Hammer Horror

Who calls me from the other side

Of the street?

And who taps me on the shoulder?

I turn around, but you're gone

2. Where Peter Gabriel gets his Merlot.

From a Red (So) Vine, of course!

Red Sovine - Phantom 309

(Also covered by Tom Waits.)

And that was the track which inspired this...

1. Stingy award for this bloke.

"Stingy award" was an anagram for...

Stan Ridgway - Camouflage

Until next week... don't have nightmares, do sleep well.