It’s Horrible Being In Love When You’re 19½: “Problems” by The Everly Brothers

More pensive angst for Don and Phil here; they seem to be in a similar situation to the protagonist of “Summertime Blues” – love life non-existent, poor grades at school, can’t use the car so much – and they can’t quite work out why. I note the attendant irony of a song with lyrics including “Woe is me, I should have stayed in bed” becoming a hit in a world into which Morrissey was about to be born, but the song’s central mystery is: what exactly is their problem? How do they love this girl – is it unrequited love, is she cheating on them or does she even know they exist? The song is a slower variant on “Bird Dog” with the brothers’ Bo Diddley influence made really plain by the simple effect of turning up the mixing desk fader to accentuate those 12-string scimitars. But what if it’s an answer song to “Bird Dog” – what if this is actually being sung by daydreaming Johnny, who is unlikely ever to know what love is? In Beatles-influencing terms, “Problems” would definitely be a Lennon song.

Date Record Made Number Two: 20 December 1958

Number of Weeks At Number Two: 1

Record At Number One: “To Know Him, Is To Love Him”” by The Teddy Bears

UK Chart Position: 6

Other Information: The mournful, high-pitched lead guitar motif, which the young George Harrison probably spent a weekend learning, was most likely played by Hank Garland.

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Threads Of Alligator Lizards In The Air: “Purple Rain” by Prince and The Revolution

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"watching for night, with absinthe eye cocked on the lone, late, passer-by." (Sylvia Plath, "Prospect," 1956) This story begins in 1954, before most people had really recognised anything called rock, and a pop record which is half-perfect. That record, which stayed at number one in our charts for ten weeks, was “Cara Mia” by David Whitfield with Mantovani and his Orchestra and Chorus. Now, Whitfield was never the most subtle of singers and his in-your-face bellowing is somewhat distracting – it is significant that he was the first British reality media star (not from television, because at that time Opportunity Knocks was only broadcast on Radio Luxembourg) since his climactic high C at the end of “Cara Mia” is like a display of gymnastics, or an athletic field event; can he do that triple loop or throw that javelin beyond the stadium? It proves that technical prowess can often render itself unlistenable. But the magic here lies in the extraordinary

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