On 12 Jul 2005 23:30:27 -0700, " wrote:

1958? No problem
1968? A lot of that is tough to remember.

Did The Jamies ever have another hit?

This song, relying heavily on a single word for most of the lyrics
reminds me a bit of the funny story behind the group "Steam." Seems
some bored studio musicians decided, as a joke, to whip out a quick
song based primarily on a long string of nonsense lyrics and somebody
immediately dreamed up "Na, na,na, na, na, na, na, na, hey, hey, hey,
goodbye." They made the goofy record without any thought that it would
turn into anything except a private joke and then all went separate
ways. Some executive at Mercury Records came across the demo tape and
released it to Top 40 stations across the country. The record exec had
to make up a name for the band, so he called it "Steam." The song "Kiss
Him Goodbye" became a huge hit (people still recognize it instantly, 36
years later). Where the story gets just a bit strange is where concert
promoters began booking Steam into live appearances- and there really
wasn't an actual group! Mercury Records assembled several groups in
different regions of the country, had them rehearse "Kiss Him Goodbye",
and put them all on the road simultaneously back in '69. Steam appeared
as an opening act for concerts in cities thousands of miles apart on
the same weekends. You can get away with that with a brand new group
that nobody every heard of before a blockbuster single.

Must be a way to make some dough combining the two, let's see:

Sum sum sum sum, sum sum sum sum, hey hey hey, er time..... Nah, I
guess I won't quit my present gig. :-)

Thank you for that interesting bit of trivia. The song to which you refer was a
favorite in Vietnam!

--
John H.
On the 'PocoLoco' out of Deale, MD