As you do, (ok as I do), one ploughs through the occasional LP section in charity shoppes. Mostly, "Can't sell, won't sell" volumes of Sing/max, classical boxes, Eagles LPs and TTDarby in less than pristine.
So, I see a copy of LZ's first (That's not Led Zeppelin btw), and alongside "Ma, he's making eyes at me" which seems in the current climate singularly inappropriate for a 13? year old girl (line change: "Ma, he's kissing! Meeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee"
Catch up: She appeared on Opportunity Knocks, and was 'blessed' with a way adult style singing voice. Up to then, children were 'allowed' to sing more like the St Winifreds, or takes on churchy style singing.
So anyway, there it is on the LP, "Help me make it through the night".
So, does she care if it's right or wrong? For tonight, does she need a friend? I have no idea I didn't actually buy it for gods sake!
― mark grout (mark grout), Monday, 20 November 2006 09:36 (nineteen years ago)
Bizarre to be sure...didn't anyone tell her or her management what the words meant, or didn't it matter in the Sensational World Of 1974?
And then there was that album she made for Stax...Phonogram PR people of the time were apt to give copies to DJs as punishment for failing to break a record...
I wrote 60,000 words on Lena Zavaroni for the '74 Koons thing which I never got around to finishing.
― Marcello Carlin (nostudium), Monday, 20 November 2006 10:51 (nineteen years ago)
Probably didn't matter in the Sensational World Of 1974.
Presumably, you could play the album and forget about her 14 year oldness I guess.
They did so play on her "precocious" talent at the time.
Basically "Mini-pops" wasn't the half of it.
― mark grout (mark grout), Monday, 20 November 2006 10:56 (nineteen years ago)
I know, I've read the Selected Letters of Philip Larkin.
― Marcello Carlin (nostudium), Monday, 20 November 2006 11:18 (nineteen years ago)
"And then there was that album she made for Stax..."
I think the album that Mark is talking about IS the Stax album (albeit a UK version on another label?)...I've had older people who saw her on TV tell me that Lena Z. (R.I.P.) was supposed to be the Jon Benet-Ramsey of her time, dressing like a child molester's delight. Having only seen the album cover, I was more like: what is this geeky-looking white girl doing on Stax? The label known as "Soulsville USA" must have wanted to cross over REAL bad...
― Rev. Hoodoo (Rev. Hoodoo), Monday, 20 November 2006 13:42 (nineteen years ago)
I think the album that Mark is talking about IS the Stax album (albeit a UK version on another label?)yeah, I think I saw a pic of this in Mojo's "Ten Best/Avoid" stax feature, I can confirm that.
― mark grout (mark grout), Monday, 20 November 2006 14:48 (nineteen years ago)
Just forget that she's 13. Lena's version of "Ma He's Making Eyes At Me" makes way more sense than Big Momma Thornton's but obviously the latter is much much better. You just have to forget she's a middle aged woman to make it all work.
― everything (everything), Tuesday, 21 November 2006 00:13 (nineteen years ago)
pah, Johnny Otis and Marie Adams pwn the song!
― Marcello Carlin (nostudium), Tuesday, 21 November 2006 08:25 (nineteen years ago)