Dreaming of Gloria Gaynor: Sammy Davis Jr.'s "I've Gotta Be Me" vs. Frank Sinatra's "My Way"

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I heard "I've Gotta Be Me" in the car today, along with the story of how Sinatra and Martin urged Davis to record something contemporary, so he could get onto the pop charts. I guess Sinatra approved of the result--he released "My Way" a few months later. (I initially thought both came out in '68, but "My Way" is '69.)

What do they have to do with Gloria Gaynor? Nothing--but I wonder if they're the template for a certain kind of pop song, the survivor song, that Greil Marcus would make fun of down the road. (Not Gaynor specifically, whose survivor song is probably the best of them.) There's a strong element of old-guy self-pity attached to both the Davis and Sinatra songs. The only time I ever really liked "My Way" was when Don and Peggy danced to it late in Mad Men's run--much prefer "I've Gotta Be Me."

Poll Results

Option	Votes
"I've Gotta Be Me," Sammy Davis Jr. (1968)	3
"My Way," Frank Sinatra (1969)	1

― clemenza, Monday, 10 February 2025 19:45 (three months ago)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1qkiSKpssHc

― clemenza, Monday, 10 February 2025 19:48 (three months ago)

(The Mad Men scene--only watchable on YouTube.)

― clemenza, Monday, 10 February 2025 19:48 (three months ago)

I have somewhere a "Pop Commentary" column from a late '69 Life magazine denouncing the trend of MOR Pop singers popularizing what they called the "Self-Love Song"--as in odes to the singer's own greatness, not onanism--with these two cited as main offenders alongside the Dean Martin version of "I Take A Lot Of Pride In Who I Am" (which might be my favorite of the three).

― Okay, heteros are cutting edge this year, too. (C. Grisso/McCain), Monday, 10 February 2025 22:06 (three months ago)

I meant to check if Martin had a comparable song--don't know that one.

― clemenza, Monday, 10 February 2025 22:47 (three months ago)

It's a Merle Haggard cover, from when Dino was mostly covering Country songs.

Here he is duetting it with Ann-Margret

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cdvT2tAGRrk

― Okay, heteros are cutting edge this year, too. (C. Grisso/McCain), Monday, 10 February 2025 23:10 (three months ago)

Found the Life review: https://books.google.com/books?rview=1&lr=&id=21AEAAAAMBAJ&q=sinatra#v=snippet&q=sinatra&f=false

― Okay, heteros are cutting edge this year, too. (C. Grisso/McCain), Tuesday, 11 February 2025 00:48 (three months ago)

I'll always associate "I've Gotta Be Me" with the Far Side cartoon of the penguin belting it out

― Josefa, Tuesday, 11 February 2025 13:39 (three months ago)

Also off the car radio yesterday, I heard the new-wave young-guy version of self-pity circa 1978: "But you'll be sorry when I'm dead/And all this guilt will be on your head."

― clemenza, Tuesday, 11 February 2025 14:29 (three months ago)

I think there's a good book waiting to be written by the right person--maybe it already has been--about all the '50s sub-Sinatras hanging on by their fingernails through the latter half of the '60s. They're all over the lower reaches of the weekly Billboard Top 100 charts (my recollection from making birthday-related CDs for friends): Jack Jones, Vic Damone, Andy Williams, etc. You could include Sinatra himself or omit him, as his 1960s have obviously been chronicled already.

― clemenza, Tuesday, 11 February 2025 16:47 (three months ago)

Yeah I’ve been watching old episodes of Hollywood Palace (1964-1970) on YouTube and that type of singer pops up all the time. You could still have a big hit in that style in ‘67 but by ‘73 it was hard to even place an album in the Top 200.

― Josefa, Tuesday, 11 February 2025 17:44 (three months ago)

Engelbert Humperdinck was huge from '67-69; he almost functioned as the "new" continuation of this tradition.

― clemenza, Tuesday, 11 February 2025 18:44 (three months ago)

Automatic thread bump. This poll is closing tomorrow.

― System, Sunday, 16 February 2025 00:01 (three months ago)

I love Frank

I respect Sammy

I don’t like either of these songs

― Josefa, Sunday, 16 February 2025 01:29 (three months ago)

Automatic thread bump. This poll's results are now in.

― System, Monday, 17 February 2025 00:01 (three months ago)

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