In the same year, Thomas released a solo album of the same title on the Scepter Records label." Read more at Wikipedia. The follow-up single, "Mama", peaked at No. The single sold over one million copies and was awarded a gold disc. It featured a hit cover of the Hank Williams song "I'm So Lonesome I Could Cry". Thomas and The Triumphs released the album I'm So Lonesome I Could Cry (Pacemaker Records). "Billy Joe Thomas (born August 7, 1942) is an American singer widely known for his hit songs of the 1960s and 1970s, which appeared on the pop, country, and Christian music charts, and included recordings of the Mark James song "Hooked on a Feeling" (1968) and the Burt Bacharach and Hal David song "Raindrops Keep Fallin' on My Head" (1969). You might remember the host of this show from way back when. This one was performed on a show by the name of Good Night America. It is an oldie from back in 1974, but it is a good one. and so I thought I would bring this singer to you as part of my Music Interlude for today. A few decades later, they would become unstoppable.As I was perusing music this afternoon, I came across a singer who I had all but forgotten, BJ Thomas. Swedes had discovered their power to raid our pop-radio stations like viking berserkers. No ooga-chakas.) But the damage had been done. The band would land exactly one more American top-10 hit, a version of the Association’s 1967 tune “ Never My Love” that peaked at #7 later in 1974. Blue Swede took a half-decent American pop song, one that would’ve probably otherwise been forgotten by now, and turned it into a fucking wrecking ball, the kind of thing that drunk yahoos in karaoke bars are going to be gang-shouting for as long as there are drunk yahoos and karaoke bars.īlue Swede were not built to last. Skifs howls over all of it with Tom Jones levels of brio, making B. Everything about their arrangement seems scientifically calibrated to stick with you: the blaring horn riff, the high-cheese guitar line, the perfectly timed drum hits during the “IIIIIIII’m” of the chorus. Blue Swede’s version of “Hooked On A Feeling” cranks up the catchiness of the original further than it should be allowed to go. (In any case, Blue Swede took out even the most harmless drug references, turning “I’ll just stay addicted and hope I can endure” into the even-more-meaningless “I just stay a victim, if I can for sure.”) And yet that chant just bulldozes its way into your skull and stays there forever.Īnd it’s not just the ooga-chakas. The ooga-chakas mean nothing, and they don’t have anything to do with the whole love-as-drug metaphor. With their version of “Hooked On A Feeling,” Blue Swede took that dinky fake war chant from the Jonathan King version and weaponized it, transforming it into a loud-as-hell brain-destroyer. (“Blue Suede.” I know.)Ĭredit the ooga-chakas - or, if you prefer, blame the ooga-chakas. So it got an American release, and Blåblus got an English-language stupid-pun name. (Blue Swede’s arrangement was supposedly based on “ Do You Like Worms?,” an unfinished and widely bootlegged Beach Boys song, but the only real similarity I hear is in the deeper chanting.) Blue Swede recorded their version, and it became a big Scandinavian hit. Skifs, who’d started out in the excellently named Swedish rock band Slam Creepers, started Blue Swede as a cover band called Blåblus, which is some kind of Swedish pun involving the word “blues.” That same year, they recorded their big, ridiculous version of “Hooked On A Feeling.” Blåblus had started covering the Jonathan King version of “Hooked On A Feeling” live. Thomas 69,480 listeners 16 Greatest Hits B.J. Featuring the sound of the electric Si read more Replace video Featured On 20 Greatest Hits B.J. Blue Swede started in 1974, as a vehicle for the Swedish pop singer Björn Skifs. Lyrics That you're in love with me 'Hooked on a Feeling' is a 1969 pop song written by Mark James originally performed by B. Blue Swede weren’t even a band when the Jonathan King version of “Hooked On A Feeling” came out.
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