so it's the late seventies (or maybe very early eighties) and there's a song on the radio about a cab driver ...

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... he's driving around and he gets a call to go and pick up a fare. only it's his ex. or something. anyway, he gets all upset about it to a vaguely electronic beat.

at least, that's how i remember this song, and now i want to know what it was. but despite some cunning googling, i can't find anything to match. IIRC there were lots of crackly radio voices in it: the controller telling the cabbie to get on with it, and him weeping and wailing.

i'm fairly sure it was called something like "driver number 72" or similar; i assume the song was american, but it'd have been UK radio i was listening to. beyond that, i remember nothing. my mind is going. i can feel it.

can anyone help? or is it false-memory syndrome?

― grimly fiendish (grimlord), Tuesday, 12 April 2005 21:30 (twenty years ago)

Harry Chapin, "Taxi"

― Pleasant Plains /// (Pleasant Plains ///), Tuesday, 12 April 2005 21:33 (twenty years ago)

Or maybe not.

― Pleasant Plains /// (Pleasant Plains ///), Tuesday, 12 April 2005 21:33 (twenty years ago)

definitely not. but god damn, dude, that was a swift response.

― grimly fiendish (grimlord), Tuesday, 12 April 2005 21:35 (twenty years ago)

Man, I remember this vaguely too & now you've got me trying to remember it. This is going to drive me mad all day

― Bill E (bill_e), Tuesday, 12 April 2005 22:32 (twenty years ago)

Not "Lady Cab Driver" by Prince, is it?

― Geir Hongro (GeirHong), Tuesday, 12 April 2005 22:33 (twenty years ago)

I second Prince's "Lady Cab Driver"

― Alfred Soto (Alfred Soto), Tuesday, 12 April 2005 22:52 (twenty years ago)

Uh, 'Car 67' by Driver 67? A UK hit in 1979 or so. Not exactly electronic, more resigned pub rock really, but otherwise it fits. The bloke who sang it (who probably is a mini cab driver these days) performed on TOTP inside a Cortina. He was lost and kept peering at an upside down A-Z.

― snotty moore, Wednesday, 13 April 2005 00:48 (twenty years ago)

There wasn't any dispatcher/controller voice in "Lady Cab Driver." Nor any crackly radio voices. There was some weeping and wailing, but it wasn't Prince doing it.

― ffirehorse (firehorse), Wednesday, 13 April 2005 03:20 (twenty years ago)

Snotty is right...It's Car 67 by Driver 67. I had this single as a kid and bought it again recently.. Electronic reggae with a brummie cab driver whining about having to pick up a customer who turns out to be the new lover of his ex...

quality single!

― Jack Battery-Pack (Jack Battery-Pack), Wednesday, 13 April 2005 04:52 (twenty years ago)

was it by a band called It's Immaterial? Called Driving Away From Home, or something?

― Nathan Woolls (regularfries), Wednesday, 13 April 2005 06:47 (twenty years ago)

Uh, 'Car 67' by Driver 67?

that's it! definitely. snotty and jack's descriptions are dead-on too. wow, i could have sworn it was american.

brilliant, i shall be searching it out as soon as i get a chance. thank you muchly.

― grimly fiendish (grimlord), Wednesday, 13 April 2005 08:36 (twenty years ago)

won't be able to try this today 'cos am at work (and off to see joanna newsom tonight, woo) but there seems to be a link to the clip snotty mentions here

― grimly fiendish (grimlord), Wednesday, 13 April 2005 08:39 (twenty years ago)

"Car 67" by Driver 67 was actually picked by our dear departed Queen Mother (Gawd rest her soul!) as one of her Desert Island Discs. She said it reminded her of being in a traffic jam.

― mike t-diva (mike t-diva), Wednesday, 13 April 2005 09:11 (twenty years ago)

"control, this is 67 here, I can hear you loud and I can hear you clear" *starts swaying*

― zebedee (zebedee), Wednesday, 13 April 2005 09:13 (twenty years ago)

Did Dave Lee(wak wak oops!)Travis not do a 'spoof' version of Car67 in the late 70's as well?

― JohnFoxxsJuno, Wednesday, 13 April 2005 09:29 (twenty years ago)

That was "Convoy" as done by Davina McColl, or something like...

― mark grout (mark grout), Wednesday, 13 April 2005 09:33 (twenty years ago)

There was allegedly great competition amongst the daytime Radio One DJs as to who would make "Car 67" their official Record Of The Week, because they all loved it so much etc etc etc. Well, that's what Blackburn said at any rate. WHY DO I EVEN KNOW THIS?

― mike t-diva (mike t-diva), Wednesday, 13 April 2005 10:25 (twenty years ago)

Thank you, thank you all! I can now stop going insane

― Bill E (bill_e), Wednesday, 13 April 2005 21:21 (twenty years ago)

[downloads] yep. it's definitely the song i was remembering, but ... it's not quite how i remember it. i mean. i remembered it being quite good.

ah well.

― grimly fiendish (grimlord), Saturday, 16 April 2005 15:24 (twenty years ago)

The past is a foreign country: they like funny music there.

― Alba (Alba), Saturday, 16 April 2005 16:18 (twenty years ago)

thing is, in a tangential way - too tangential to bore ppl with here - asking this question has helped me rediscover "i'll find my way home" by jon & vangelis, and reminded me to download that william orbit version of "in a landscape" by john cage. so there is a happy ending after all.

except for driver 67, probably. wonder where he is now?

― grimly fiendish (grimlord), Saturday, 16 April 2005 16:51 (twenty years ago)

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