With all that has happened this past week, I contemplated skipping this week's edition, but I figured what the hell, we could all use a break from politics, politics, politics--most of all myself.
My introduction to this week's song was in the 1978 movie The Deer Hunter. For those not familiar, there's a scene where the main characters are together in a friend's bar before their last hunting trip before leaving for Vietnam and the song comes on the jukebox and you get to witness Robert DeNiro, Christopher Walken, the late John Cazale, and John Savage (among others) singing their hearts out to this week's tune. It'a fun scene, though later in the movie you realize its poignancy as it's the last time they were whole.
Frankie Valli started singing in clubs around New Jersey in 1950 and had a couple of minor hits before becoming an original member of the Four Seasons in 1960. They would have their first hit in 1962, and plenty more would follow for Valli both as a member of the Four Seasons and in his solo career. Valli began his solo career in 1967, though he has sang on and off with the Four Seasons ever since (they last toured in 2017). For his career, Valli released 11 studio LPs on his own, and 21 albums with the Four Seasons. Valli released more singles than I cared to count, and had two #1's on his own and five more with the Four Seasons. The original members of the Four Seasons were inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1990, and a Broadway musical, Jersey Boys, chronicled the lives of each member of the Four Seasons to much critical acclaim, including winning a Tony for Best Musical.
"Can't Take My Eyes Off You" was released in 1967 and was the second single from Valli's debut LP, entitled appropriately enough, Frankie Valli: Solo. It would end up reaching #2 (with a bullet!) on the Billboard Hot 100, and over the years has become somewhat of an American standard, having been covered by numerous artists.
Oddly enough, "Can't Take My Eyes Off You" is the only song by either Frankie Valli or the Four Seasons that I really like (their other hits are perfectly suitable in the odd movie scene or on an oldies station--just not songs I want to listen to again and again). But really like it I do. Opening with some soft horns, the single segues into some romantic crooning from Valli before the horns reappear, this time building and building in force until Valli begins belting out "I love you baby!" The song basically repeats itself with Valli's vocals alternating between crooner and rocker right up until the end. It's got all kinds of emaycee faves--catchy chorus, heartfelt vocals, lines repeated a plenty, and somehow never tipping over from very cool into schmaltzy. It's another great single from a decade--the 1960's--that was filled with great singles,especially for a top 40 aficionado like me.
Lyric Sheet: "You're just too good to be true/Can't take my eyes off you/You'd be like heaven to touch/I want to hold you so much..."
Enjoy:
204,000+ Dead Americans
Fuck Donald Trump,
emaycee
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