We had the 1965 hit 7" vynyl single Game of Love by Wayne Fontana and the Mindbenders in our house as I was growing up. Not sure where it came from. It was on the Fontana label and I remember deciding that Wayne Fontana must be the son of the obviously older owner of the record label. As it turns out, his name was Glyn G Ellis and the name was based on that of D J Fontana, Elvis Presley's drummer. The song was written by American Clint Ballard Jnr and is a pretty good pop single with some nice hooks, a repeated two line verse, two line chorus; two line verse, two line chorus; bridge structure, with a coda and all over in under two minutes. The second verse says that the game of love started long ago in the Garden of Eden/When Adam said to Eve, baby, you're for me which I was broadly willing to accept, although I was somehow conscious that baby, you're for me was very much a sixties phrase and unlikely to be a verbatim report of Adam's words to the first woman. What I liked most about the song was the very low singing of the word "Love". In my childish mind it was like a really good burp. Maturer reflection appreciates the drum sound and the bass on what is a throw away song but not bad for all that. There is more than one song with the name Game of love. A cover version of this particular song was successfully released by Tex Power in 1987. Love, of course, may appear to be a game when one is young but it is no game in fact.
