| "Be-Bop-a-Lula" | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
 | ||||
| Single byGene Vincent and His Blue Caps | ||||
| B-side | "Woman Love" | |||
| Released | May 22, 1956 | |||
| Recorded | Bradley Studios, Nashville, Tennessee[1] | |||
| Genre | Rockabilly | |||
| Length | 2:34 | |||
| Label | Capitol | |||
| Songwriter(s) | Gene Vincent, Donald Graves, Bill "Sheriff Tex" Davis | |||
| Gene Vincent and His Blue Caps singles chronology | ||||
| ||||
| Official audio | ||||
| "Be-Bop-a-Lula" onYouTube | ||||
"Be-Bop-a-Lula" is arockabilly song first recorded in 1956 byGene Vincent and His Blue Caps.
Richie Unterberger ofAllMusic said the track "epitomized rockabilly at its prime in 1956 with its sharp guitar breaks, spare snare drums, fluttering echo, and Vincent's breathless, sexy vocals".[2]
The phrase "Be-Bop-a-Lula" is similar to "Be-Baba-Leba", the title of a No. 3R&B chart hit forHelen Humes in 1945, which became a bigger hit when recorded byLionel Hampton as "Hey! Ba-Ba-Re-Bop". This phrase, or something very similar, was widely used in jazz circles in the 1940s, giving its name to thebebop style, and possibly being ultimately derived from the shout of "Arriba! Arriba!" used by Latin American bandleaders to encourage band members.[3]
The writing of the song is credited to Gene Vincent and his manager, Bill "Sheriff Tex" Davis. Evidently[4] the song originated in 1955, when Vincent was recuperating from a motorcycle accident at theUS Naval Hospital in Portsmouth, Virginia. There, he met Donald Graves, who supposedly wrote the words to the song while Vincent wrote the tune. The song came to the attention of Davis, who allegedly bought out Graves' rights to the song for some $50 (sources vary as to the exact amount), and had himself credited as the lyric writer. Davis claimed that he wrote the song with Gene Vincent after listening to the song "Don't Bring Lulu". Vincent himself sometimes claimed that he wrote the words inspired by the comic strip, "Little Lulu": "I come in dead drunk and stumble over the bed. And me and Don Graves were looking at this bloody book; it was calledLittle Lulu. And I said, "Hell, man, it's 'Be-Bop-a-Lulu.' And he said, 'Yeah, man, swinging.' And we wrote this song."[5]
In early 1956, Gene Vincent performed the song on a radio show inNorfolk, Virginia, and recorded ademo version which was passed toCapitol Records, who were looking for a young singer to rivalElvis Presley. Capitol invited Vincent to record the song and it was recorded at theBradley Studios inNashville, Tennessee on May 4, 1956.Cliff Gallup (lead guitar),"Wee" Willie Williams (rhythm guitar), "Jumpin'" Jack Neal (string bass), and Dickie "Be Bop" Harrell (drums) comprised the band.[6] When the song was being recorded, Harrell screamed twice in the background, he said because he wanted to be sure his mother could hear it was him on the record.
Now this is the first record I ever bought when I was a kid, and I saved up my pocket money for months, and then I took the bus down-town to the record shop, and I remember going into the back of the shop and listening to the record and loving it. It was just very early days of rock’n’roll, so it was just such a thrill, and then I got back on the bus, went home and played it endlessly, and these memories, of Gene Vincent and the Blue Caps singingBe-Bop-A-Lula will stay with me forever.
–Paul McCartney, 2020[7]
The song was released in June 1956 on Capitol Records' single F3450, and immediately sold well. The song was successful on three American singles charts: it peaked at No. 7 on the USBillboard pop music chart, No. 8 on theR&B chart,[8] and also made the top ten on theC&W Best Seller chart peaking at No. 5.[9] In the UK, it peaked at No. 16 in August 1956.[10] In April 1957, the record company announced that over 2 million copies had been sold to date.[citation needed]
The original demo for the song, probably recorded at radio station WCMS, has never been located and is presumed lost.[citation needed] The song drew comparisons to Presley[11] and is listed as No. 103 onRolling Stone's500 Greatest Songs of All Time.[12]
Steve Allen mocked the lyrics to the song by reading them in a pseudo-serious tone accompanied by light piano background music in a September 1957 broadcast ofThe Steve Allen Show.[13][14]
Vincent recorded a new version of the song in 1963 which appeared on the flip-side of the single "The King of Fools".[15]
Vincent is featured singing the song in the movieThe Girl Can't Help It which was released in December 1956.
In 1999, the 1956 recording of the song onCapitol Records was inducted into theGrammy Hall of Fame.[16]
"Be-Bop-a-Lula" has been covered by numerous and varied artists.The Everly Brothers released a version only two years after Vincent's, on their 1958self-titled debut album,[17] and they included it as part of the setlist at their Royal Albert Hall reunion concert in 1983.[18] English rock bandThe Drifters covered the song forCliff Richard and the group’s own debut album,Cliff, in 1959.[19] Vincent's rockabilly colleagueJerry Lee Lewis recorded it for the 1971 albumMonsters,[20] andCarl Perkins offered his own take in 1996 on the albumThe Man & The Legend.[21]
The Beatles played the song regularly duringtheir early years,[22] and a raucous live version (complete with guest vocals by Fred Fascher) can be heard onLive! at the Star-Club in Hamburg, Germany; 1962.[23][24][25]John Lennon later recorded the song for his 1975 albumRock 'n' Roll,[26] and it was used as the B-side for theApple single release of "Ya Ya" in Germany later that year.[27]Paul McCartney performed an acoustic version on the 1991 live albumUnplugged (The Official Bootleg).[28]
Vincent's original version of the song is featured in the soundtracks of several films includingThe Girl Can't Help It (1956),[29] in which Vincent and several other early rock 'n' roll stars appeared in cameo performances, as well asThe Delinquents (1989),[30]Wild At Heart (1990),[31] andPleasantville (1998).[32]
In the late 1960s and early 1970s,George Harrison played a psychedelicStratocaster called "Rocky", which bore on its face the one-word slogan "Bebopalula".[33] The song is name-checked in the opening ofDire Straits' 1985 hit "Walk of Life" as one of the great "oldies, goldies".[34]
Italian DJ and TV personality Red Ronnie (a.k.a. Gabriele Anzaloni) named his first and long-running TV show after the song, also using Vincent's performance in the filmThe Girl Can't Help It as the signature tune of the show (accompanied by cartoonistBonvi'sSturmtruppen-inspired animations).
The song features in the soundtrack of Jack Smith's infamous avant-garde film,Flaming Creatures (1963).
A cover version of the song by Chris Cawte appears in the animated filmPlanet 51.
John Lennon, a great admirer of the song, mentioned it in the final interview he recorded on December 8, 1980, noting, "If the oldies but goldies come on (the radio), it’s one of my favorites, if I hear "Be-Bop-a-Lula", I can hear it over and over again. Every time it comes on I switch up the thing, and I have the record still.”[35]
Spinvis, a Dutch one-man music project, released his seventh albumBe-Bop-a-Lula on April 7, 2023, named after this song. The album-opening songTingeltangel Hersenpan also mentions Be-Bop-a-Lula in the pre-chorus.[36]
