It's Five O'Clock - Aphrodite's Child

It's Five O'Clock is the title track on a 1969 album by the Greek band Aphrodite's Child that was also issued as a single. It subsequently appeared on a 1987 album by the lead singer Demis Roussos and in German and French by an Italian singer Milva in 1981. Vangelis wrote the music and Richard Harvey the lyrics. The striking thing about the song for me is that it is able to conjure up exactly what it claims to - "It's five o'clock And I walk through the empty streets Thoughts fill my head ... It's five o'clock And I walk through the empty streets The night is my friend." This is a quality it shares with Good morning, Good morning by the Beatles - "Heading for home you start to roam then you're in town Everybody knows there's nothing doing Everything is closed it's like a ruin ... And you're on your own you're in the street ... Then you decide to take a walk by the old school." It's Five O'Clock is a simple presentation of the pessimistic and nostalgic feeling that comes over all of us from time to time and that unchecked can lead to emptiness and suicidal thoughts. Thankfully, if treacherously, this song ends positively with the words - "The night is my friend And in him I find sympathy He gives me day, gives me hope and a little dream too." The Hammond organ is both evocative and very much of its time. Three and a half minutes of genius.

Pied Piper - Bob and Marcia/Crispian St Peters

Bob and Marcia were a Jamaican vocal duo, Bob Andy and Marcia Griffiths. They had a hit with Nina Simone's Young, Gifted and Black in 1970 and followed it up the next year with Pied Piper. In both cases there are original Jamaican versions and then popular versions with added orchestration. Pied Piper was actually written by the duo The changin' times ie Steve Duboff and Artie Kornfeld. They had reached the lower end of the charts with it in 1965. British pop singer Crispian St Peters (Robin Peter Smith) had then recorded it and scored a major hit in the summer of 1966. It had also been recorded by Cher and then Rita Marley.

The song's title is, of course, from the German folklore fairy tale that was written up in poetic form by Robert Browning in the nineteenth century. Hence the flutes and whistles on the versions under review here. In the original story the town of Hamelin is over-run by rats but the city officials hire a rat-catcher to rid the place of vermin. He wears a costume that looks somewhat like a court jester and plays a magic flute, which leads all the rats away. The town then refuses to pay him, so in anger he does the same thing with the flute, this time leading away the children.

The lyrical problem here is that the Pied Piper character is trying to persuade a reluctant and nervous character that all will be well if they will follow him. And yet if they know anything about the Pied Piper story, they will continue to be cynical. The tune is so joyful, however, especially in the reggae-fied Bob and Marcia version, it is hard not to be convinced that this man is worth following.

Rhythm of the rain - The Cascades

Rain songs are a sort of subgenre in pop music all on their own. This one typically begins and ends with the sound of rain and thunder. It also tells the familiar tale of a man whose lover has left him. The rain falling reminds him 'what a fool' he has been. He rhetorically asks the rain for answers, but ultimately wishes it would 'go away' and let him cry alone. The song is employing then what Ruskin called the pathetic fallacy - a literary term for the attribution of human emotion and conduct to inanimate things found in nature. The rain is simply falling but it seems as though it is falling in sympathy. It also tries some onomatopoeia near the end (pitter patter, pitter patter) and so is a relatively sophisticated piece for a throwaway pop song.

It was first released in late 1962 but I was only aware of it in more recent years thanks to radio play. In fact, in 1999 BMI listed the song as the ninth most performed song on radio/TV in the 20th century. It had featured in the Pete Townshend film Quadrophenia in 1979.

Part of the charm of the song is its use of an unusual chiming instrument, the celesta, and the way the lyrics are clearly enunciated by the vocal group. I especially like the pronunciation of start in the line looking for a brand new start. 

Once again we are faced with a description of teenage angst that is probably describing mere obsession rather than anything deeper. One can imagine this young man's friends calling in an hour or two and he quite happily joining them for a few hoops of basketball and feeling the better for it. It is the beautiful tune and the vocal skills that keep us coming back for more.