Ten Years After - I'm Going Home [Live] (1968)

In late 1960, a band formed by the name of Ivan Jay and the Jaycats. As current members were exiting the band and being replaced over the course of several years, the band’s name was also changing. Before settling on the name seen above, they had been known as Ivan Jay and the Jaymen, the Jaybirds, and lastly Blues Trip, Blues Yard. Finally, in November 1966, the band settled on the name “Ten Years After,” referencing the breakout success of Elvis Presley ten years prior in 1956. The new band became the first group to get booked by an up-and-coming agency known as the Chrysalis Agency and became the house band for the Marquee Club in London. 1967 saw the band get invited to play at the Windsor Jazz Festival, in which their performance led to getting signed with Deram, a subsidiary of Decca. A few albums later and the band really broke out in 1969 after making their American debut at Woodstock on August 17th, 1969. All in all, the band released eight albums from 1967 through 1974 before creative differences split them apart. After the split in 1974, the band’s lead singer and guitarist, Alvin Lee, released a ton of solo albums. The band itself reunited numerous times over the years to perform at concerts and festivals, and also released three more albums; one in 1989, one in 2004, and most recently Evolution in 2008.

On March 6th, 2013, the band’s lead guitarist and lead singer, Alvin Lee, died from complications of a routine surgery. He was 68 years old.

This song, perhaps the band’s most notable song, was the song that propelled the group to stardom in America when they played it at Woodstock. It was actually the sixth song on their setlist, but the band had tuning problems with their guitars because of the high humidity in the air at the time. It was the only song preserved on film that the group performed. Written by Alvin Lee, the song is a dedication to the rock and roll music of the 1950s. The version of the song heard below, although live, was the single version released in 1968 and not the twelve minute Woodstock version recorded in 1969. This release was backed by the B-Side “Hear Me Calling.”



Ten Years After - I'm Going Home [Live] (1968)

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Lyrics:

Goin' home, my baby
Goin' home, my baby
Goin' home, to see my baby

My baby, how good
My baby, be good
I'm goin' home, my baby
Home to see my girl

Oh baby, baby, I'm comin’ home
Baby, baby I'm comin’ home
Tell me, mama, baby, I'm comin’ home

Gonna see my baby, see my baby fine
Gonna take my baby, wanna take my baby mine
Gonna take my woman treats me real kind

I'm goin' home, my baby
I'm goin' home to see my baby
Goin' home, my baby

I'm goin' home, to see my baby
I'm goin' home, to see my baby
Well take me back, take me where I belong

I'm goin' home, to see my baby
I'm goin' home, to see my baby
Come on, take me

I'm goin' home
I'm goin' home
I'm goin' home
Hey, home
Gonna take me back, back, back where I belong

I'm goin' home
I'm goin' home
I'm goin' home
I'm goin' home
Hey, home, where I belong

Ray Peterson - Corrina, Corrina (1960)

Ray Peterson was born in Denton, Texas 1939 and suffered from polio as a child. Managing to overcome his disease, he moved to Los Angeles, California at the age of nineteen to pursue a career in singing. After having only been there a year in 1959, Peterson released “The Wonder of You” which reached number twenty-five in the US and twenty-three in the UK. The song would later be covered by Elvis Presley. His biggest hit song came the following year, in 1960, when he released the “teenage tragedy” song titled “Tell Laura I Love Her.” Later that same year, Peterson created his own record label, Dunes Records with his manager Stan Shulman, where he hired record producer Phil Spector. He had a string of mild hits in 1961 and a couple of cooler ones in 1963 and 1964 before the British Invasion took off. After the waning of his popularity, Peterson moved to Nashville, Tennessee and became a Baptist Church minister, where he would occasionally take part in “oldies” tours that celebrated the music of the ‘50s and early ‘60s. He died from cancer in 2005 in Smyrna, Tennessee at the age of 65, leaving behind his widow and seven children.

Although this traditional song was first recorded in December 1928 by Bo Carter, the song has roots dating much farther back. Iterations of the song can be traced back to 1918 via sheet music written by Roger Graham. This particular version of the song, recorded by Peterson in 1960, was the first hit that Peterson released on his newly formed Dunes Record label. It was also his second-highest charting song, after “Tell Laura I Love Her,” reaching number nine in the US and number forty-one in the UK. Other artists to have performed the song include Big Joe Turner, Jerry Lee Lewis, Bill Haley & His Comets, Bob Dylan, and Joni Mitchell. The version by Bob Dylan was re-arranged to mix with Robert Johnson’s 1937 song “Stones in My Passaway” and released on his 1963 album The Freewheelin’ Bob Dylan.



Ray Peterson - Corrina, Corrina (1960)

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Lyrics:

I love Corrina,
Tell the world I do
I love Corrina
Tell the world I do
I pray every night
She'll learn to love me, too

Corrina, Corrina
Corrina, Corrina
Corrina, Corrina
I love you so

Oh, little darling
Where you been so long?
Oh, little darlin’
Where you been so long?
I ain’t had no loving
Since you been gone

Corrina, Corrina
Corrina, Corrina
Corrina, Corrina
I love you so

I left Corrina
Way across the sea, oh me
I left Corrina
Way across the sea
If you see Corrina
Send her home to me

Corrina, Corrina
Corrina, Corrina
Corrina, Corrina
I love you so

Corrina, Corrina
Corrina, Corrina
Corrina, Corrina
I love you so

Oh, darling, don't you know
I love you so?
Darling, don't you know?

The Rivingtons - Papa-Oom-Mow-Mow (1962)

Although the band name above was created in the very early 1960s, the men behind the name had been performing with one another for quite some time before that. Their lead singer, Al Frazier, had been in groups since high school. One group he was in, the Mello-Moods, is notable for containing a future member of The Platters, Paul Robi. That group fizzled when Frazier left to fight in The Korean War. When he came back, he quickly got back into the swing of things and picked up the other members of this group piece by piece with a new band name each time along the way. The Emanons (“no name” backward), The Lamplighters, The Tenderfoots, The Jacks, The Sharps, The Rebels, The Four After Fives, and The Crenshaws were all various attempts at stardom with little or no success. Finally, around early 1962, the band renamed themselves after a street in New York’s Lower East Side that two of the members had at one point lived on: Rivington Street. Finally, with their new name, The Rivingtons, the group broke out into the charts with the 1962 song heard below. They would follow it up with their 1963 hit “The Bird’s the Word,” but disappeared from the public’s eye soon after. Although they lost their record deal and had trouble getting resigned by 1967, the band continued to perform through the early ‘90s in various oldies circuits. Al Frazier passed away on November 13th, 2005.

As The Rivingtons’ first hit in their already lengthy career, this song came about when the group’s bass singer, Turner “Rocky” Wilson, began to sing the “papa-oom-mow-mow” hook while goofing off in the studio. Naturally the rest of the group loved it and they built a song around it. After being turned down for release by Capitol Records the song eventually went to Liberty Records who waited six months before releasing it because they “couldn’t figure out how to market such a nonsensical song.” Once released, however, the song was a hit and reached number forty-eight on the Billboard’s and thirty-five on the Cashbox charts. The song went on to inspire numerous artists to cover it and sample it, including The Trashmen, The Beach Boys, Jan and Dean, Kermit the Frog, and more recently Rob Zombie. The Trashmen merged the song with another Rivingtons' hit, “The Bird’s the Word,” renamed the two “Surfin’ Bird,” took the song to number four. But, heard below, is the original as created by The Rivingtons.



The Rivingtons - Papa-Oom-Mow-Mow (1962)

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Lyrics:

(Doot-doot-doot)
(Doot-doot-doot)

The funniest sound I ever heard
And I can't understand a single word
Now is he serious or is he playing?
“Oom-mow-mow” is all he's saying
Papa-oom
Papa-papa-papa-oom
(Doot-doot-doot)
(Doot-doot-doot)

I said, “Hey there partner, what's your name?”
Now don’t you dare tell me, “the same old thing”
The words you sing, I can’t figure out
But you’ve got a sound, make me stomp and shout
Papa-oom
Papa-papa-papa-oom
(Doot-doot-doot doot doot)
(Doot-doot-doot doot doot)
(Doot-doot-doot)
(Doot-doot-doot)
(Doot-doot-doot)

(Doot-doot-doot doot doot)
(Doot-doot-doot doot doot)
(Doot-doot-doot doot doot)
(Doot-doot-doot doot doot)

Now I hear this sound everywhere I go
On the records, TV, and the radio
And now it’s spread all over the land
I still can’t seem to understand
Papa-oom
Papa-papa-papa-oom
Papa-oom
(Doot doot doot)
(Doot-doot-doot)
Papa-oom
(Doot doot doot)
(Doot-doot-doot)
Papa-papa-papa-oom
(Doot doot doot)
Papa-papa-papa-oom
(Doot doot doot)
Papa-papa-papa-oom
(Doot doot doot)
Papa-papa-papa-oom
(Doot doot doot)…