Dusty Springfield

The great pop vocalist Dusty Springfield was another member of the British Invasion (note to history buffs: I'm NOT talking about martial music from the War of 1812! ) I don't know if she actually came to America in the mid-sixties but she invaded the place anyway via radio and records.

I was a little young for the actual invasion. The one thing about that period I remember, not shockingly, was the Beatles. I picked up on the Beatles as a kid from a network cartoon series they were featured in. (The Beatles themselves didn't provide the voices for this show, naturally, but the songs were genuine. ) A lot of the "Sgt. Pepper/Revolver" Beatles tunes I didn't get into as a pre-teen; I wasn't ready for that stuff yet. The first major pop female vocal that I dug when it was new was Nancy Sinatra's "These Boots Are Made for Walking", around 1965. I can still remember being in the back seat of my parents brown Ford Mustang and feeling that song send me into a state of bliss.

Somehow I went the next ten years and then some and Dusty Springfield didn't register with me.

I didn't get into other performers until the "Brit Invasion" had long crested and disco and funk were upon us (i.e., the dreaded Seventies.) There was a lot of great music in the 1970's, but most of it came in the first few years of that decade: Don McLean's "American Pie", for me, was THE song of that decade. There was also Elton John's "Crocodile Rock", Curtis Mayfield's "Superfly", Arlo Guthrie's "City of New Orleans", Paul McCartney's "Live and Let Die" and "Band on the Run", Al Green's "So in Love With You", et al. Also great instrumentals like Issac Hayes "Theme from Shaft", Eumir Deodato's "2001: A Space Odyssey", the Apollo 100's "Joy". It was a good time for being exposed to pop music.

I remember seeing Dusty do "Wishin and Hopin" for the first time in 1975, on a late night TV documentary about events from the year 1965. (Both those years seem absurdly distant now, don't they?) She had something--she was pretty, of course, but that voice had some soul in it. It didn't take me long to go out and get a recording of "Wishin' and Hoping". Some might call the lyrics "chick material" but the heck with that. I started looking for her music and discovered she did the great song, "The Look of Love", in that dreadful all-star movie "Casino Royale" (1967). (That film was a guilty pleasure of mine for years until one day I watched it and the pleasure stopped and only the guilt remained.) That must have been the first song by Dusty I ever heard, since I'd seen that epic before my mid-teens. But for some reason I thought the tune was done in the film by the equally great Dionne Warwick!

Then I heard her do "I Only Want to Be With You" somewhere along the line. And that sealed the deal. I also heard "Son of a Peacher Man", "You Don't Have to Say You Love Me," and many other tunes that showed her amazing range from blues to soul to country music.

If you haven't seen or heard Dusty in a while, please take a couple minutes to see her performing this song on the You Tube link.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MczZzJ-jy5c

I kept up an interest in her and was happy she recorded in the 1980's with The Pet Shop Boys on one of that group's outstanding hits, "What Have I Done to Deserve This?". Her career continued from that revival point until her death from cancer in 1999, just short of her 60th Birthday. Even the Queen of England broke protocol to say she was saddened by her death.

But this soulful, beautiful balladeer lives on, thanks to the music and the hearts of her fans. Count me in with the other millions of them.