My Favourite 45s of the Year: 1965 Quiz

Answer: Martha and the Vandellas

Written by the Holland-Dozier-Holland team, "Nowhere to Run" was a great dance record by Martha and the Vandellas with a driving beat, in my opinion their best-ever single. It took me some time to work out that what sounded like chains being rattled was in fact chains being rattled! Deservedly successful, it reached number eight in the US Billboard Hot 100 chart and number 26 in the UK Singles Chart.

Answer: Marvin Gaye

I love everything about this record! Written and produced by Smokey Robinson, it has a wonderful instrumental pattern that I find hard to describe - there's a downwards progression of chords with a consistent five-note piano riff on top, and combined with the handclaps and the backing vocals the whole thing just drives along. Gaye's ethereal voice floats on top of it all to make up a wonderful whole. It got to number eight in the US Billboard Hot 100 chart, but sadly didn't chart in the UK.

I don't normally like cover versions, but in the case of this particular record there are two I must draw to your attention. The first was recorded in 1980 by Japan for the album "Gentlemen Take Polaroids", in their typical electronic new wave style - it's perhaps a bit arty and very different from the original, but it's well worth a listen. It was re-mixed and released as the B-side of the 7" single of "Nightporter" in 1982 which got to number 28 in the UK Singles Chart, so at least some people got to hear it. Actually "Nightporter" is itself a great record, a wonderful homage to Erik Satie.

The second cover version is a blinder, laid down by the American all-woman group Fanny in 1972 and reaching number 85 on the US Billboard Hot 100 chart. Lead guitarist June Millington plays blistering slide guitar and the whole track rocks. There's a fabulous video on YouTube of the band performing the song live, which I can't recommend too highly - I still watch it frequently - I just love it when the slide guitar comes in, it sends shivers up my spine!

Answer: The Beach Boys

Starting with one of the best intros ever recorded, "California Girls" by the Beach Boys is a wonderful song, It was written by Brian Wilson after his first LSD trip; he later referred to it as a "hymn to youth", saying that it was his favourite Beach Boys song even though he was unhappy with the vocals. He later said that "the intro to this song is the greatest piece of music I've ever written". Brian Johnston made his recording debut with the group with this song, and the recording was pretty arduous, with Wilson requiring 44 takes before he was satisfied with the backing track. Mike Love's vocal was triple-tracked.

Upon release it reached number three in the US Billboard Hot 100 chart and number 26 in the UK Singles Chart. It has remained one of the group's most popular compositions, and was regularly used as the opening song in their concerts.

Answer: Bob Dylan

Well, where do we start with this six-minute stunning track? - perhaps by saying that in both 2004 and 2010, "Rolling Stone" magazine placed Bob Dylan's "Like a Rolling Stone" at number one in their "500 Greatest Songs of All Time" list. Upon release it got to number two in the US Billboard Hot 100 chart and to number four in the UK Singles Charts.

There have been millions of words written about this song in books and Ph.D. theses and I've no intention of duplicating them. What I will say is that back in July 1965 it came like a bolt of lightning amongst the middle-of-the-road material that was in the charts at that time (Ken Dodd, Herman's Hermits, &c). Nobody had heard anything like it before - Dylan's singing of his almost incomprehensible lyrics, Al Kooper's organ riff, Mike Bloomfield's guitar - all extraordinary. The very first gig I ever went to was Bob Dylan at the Royal Albert Hall in London in 1966, and over 50 years later I can still remember him playing this song as if it were yesterday.

Answer: The Four Tops

"I Can't Help Myself" by the Four Tops is yet another Holland-Dozier-Holland composition, again featuring the wonderful voice of Levi Stubbs. It was a very successful release for the band, reaching number one on the US Billboard Hot 100 chart; it was also the second-biggest single in the US that year (after - surprisingly- "Wooly Bully" by Sam the Sham and the Pharaohs). Gratifyingly, it was also the group's first hit single in the UK, reaching number 23 on the UK Singles Chart in July 1965 (a re-release in 1970 got to number ten).

Answer: Wilson Pickett

One of my favourite dance records in the mid-60s, Wilson Pickett's "In the Midnight Hour" opened my eyes and ears to the output of the Stax Studio in Memphis which was released on the Atlantic label. I loved the punchy horn section, along with Steve Cropper's guitar and Donald "Duck" Dunn's bass. The song has achieved iconic status, but despite that it wasn't very successful - it only got to number 21 in the US Billboard Hot 100 chart. However it stormed to number 12 in the UK Singles Chart - I bought it!

The song has been covered numerous times by such bands as Genesis, the Jam, Roxy Music and the Grateful Dead. None of them come close to matching the original.

I have one, very personal memory associated with this song. In the spring of 1971, just before my Finals at Exeter University, my girlfriend and I went to Dartington Art College to see a recital by the poet Adrian Henry. He was one of what were termed the "Liverpool Poets", along with Brian Patten and Roger McGough - their work was direct, concerned with modern society and often very funny. Henri read one poem that featured ghastly puns on the names of then Liverpool football players - I think I was the only person in the art student audience that got the jokes and laughed. He then read his poem "In the Midnight Hour", set to the rhythm of the song, which was just beautiful. Young, in love, and with my whole life ahead of me I felt that I'd never been happier.

Answer: The Who

The Who sprang from the Mod movement of West London in 1964, and wishing to be identified with this sub-culture they re-named themselves "The High Numbers" to record "Zoot Suit" b/w "I'm the Face". This single failed to chart, so they changed the band's name back to The Who and played a lot of gigs at various Mod clubs. Guitarist Pete Townsend had written "I Can't Explain", very much based on the Kink's "You Really Got Me", and this became their first release in January 1965. Constant exposure on the pirate radio stations pushed it to number eight in the UK Singles Chart, although it only to got to number 93 in the US Billboard Hot 100 chart. I loved this record for its energy and for the fact that it had two guitar solos!

Surprisingly the Who have never had a UK number one single (although their next release in 1965, "My Generation", got to number two), and their chart success in the US has been muted with only one top ten single to their name. Album sales, however, have been massive!

For real trivia fans - the Ivy League provided backing vocals on "I Can't Explain" and legendary rock guitarist Jimmy Page played fuzz guitar on the B-side, "Bald Headed Woman".

Answer: Marianne Faithfull

Marianne Faithfull took the first steps on her career path as a folk singer in early 1964, singing in London clubs and coffee shops. One night she found herself at a Rolling Stones launch party and was spotted by their manager, Andrew Loog Oldham. Jagger, Richards and Oldham found a song for her, "As Tears Go By", and helped by her pleasant voice, her attractive looks and her association with the Stones, this got to number nine in the UK Singles Chart and to number 22 in the US Billboard Hot 100 chart. I didn't like it myself - it was a bit too baroque and I didn't care for the oboe line - but the next single "Come and Stay with Me" was much more to my taste. Featuring a harpsichord, great acoustic guitar lines and an excellent bass line under her vocals it really hit me - I loved it, even though it was very short! It got to number four in the UK Singles Chart and to number 26 in the US Billboard Hot 100 chart.

Faithfull became part of the Stones' social group, embarking on a relationship with Jagger that also involved a lot of drugs and (reportedly) Mars Bars. This more-or-less destroyed her career, and after her break-up with him she was in a dreadful state: a heroin addict living on the streets of Soho. Even her voice was destroyed by illness. Remarkably, however, in 1979 she revived her career with the album "Broken English" and she has been active ever since.

A fact for trivia fans - Marianne Faithfull's maternal great-great uncle was Leopold von Sacher-Masoch, whose novel "Venus in Furs" gave rise to the word "masochism".

I referred earlier to her "attractive looks" - let's face it, she was drop-dead gorgeous!

Answer: The Rolling Stones

The world's ultimate riff is that in "(I Can't Get No) Satisfaction" by the Rolling Stones: it hit the music scene like an extinction-level asteroid - once heard, never forgotten! The legend goes that Keith Richards dreamt the riff before waking up and recording it on a little cassette player, and the fuzz guitar sound was originally included merely to indicate where Richards envisaged a horn section being placed.

Themed around sex and ennui, the song's lyrics were deemed controversial at the time resulting in it being censored; the BBC at first refused to play the record - sufficient to guarantee it being a major hit (cf "Relax", &c.). It got to number one in about 11 countries including the UK and the US, although it was eventually knocked off the number one spot in the US Billboard Hot 100 chart by Herman's Hermits' recording of the classic pop anthem, "I'm Henry the Eighth, I Am" - sic transit gloria mundi. "Rolling Stone" magazine placed it at number two in their "500 Greatest Songs of All Time" list in 2004, and Jagger stated that "it was the song that really made the Rolling Stones, changed us from just another band into a huge, monster band".

Two cover versions are noteworthy. Firstly, Otis Redding's recording in 1965 used a horn section as originally conceived by Keith Richards; it got to number 31 in the US Billboard Hot 100 chart. The best cover version, however, was that recorded by Devo in 1978 which got to number 41 in the UK Singles Chart - a really quirky arrangement!

Answer: The Byrds

The jangly, 12-string Rickenbacker guitar sound of this record immediately identifies it as the Byrds' cover version of Bob Dylan's "Mr Tambourine Man". It can be viewed as the very first example of "folk rock", and it had a tremendous influence on bands like the Lovin' Spoonful, Love, Simon & Garfunkel, Fairport Convention and even the Beatles (check out "Nowhere Man" and "If I Needed Someone"). It reached number one in both the US Billboard Hot 100 chart and the UK Singles Chart. A terrific record, even though it rather shredded Dylan's original lyrics.

Surprisingly, guitarist Roger McGuinn was the only member of the band to play on the recording - all other instruments were played by various members of the long-standing group of LA session musicians known as the Wrecking Crew. However McGuinn, Gene Clarke and David Crosby did provide the vocals.

Having your debut single reach number one in both the UK and the US was a great achievement, but the Byrds went on to even greater things!