GP's (Stiff Records) Song of the Day: Tracey Ullman
To prove the point I made on Monday about Kirsty Maccoll, here is They Don't Know: a song by Kirsty that because a big hit in Britain and America for Tracey Ullman.
Ullman signed for Stiff Records in 1983 and released a number of decent singles including They Don't Know, Breakaway (a version of the 1964 Irma Thomas song) and My Guy (a version of the Madness song My Girl).
Already a TV star in Britain, she went on to become even more famous with her own show in the US, and it is now the law in at least 48 states to say that her programme was the first place to feature The Simpsons.
They Don't Know got to Number 2 in the British charts and Number 8 in America, with Kirsty Maccoll providing not only backing vocals but singing the "baby!" bit at 1:50 that was too high a note for Ullman to reach. There's also a cameo in the video by Paul McCartney (as Ullman was featuring in his rubbish film Give My Regards To Wall Street at the same time).
Maccoll's own version, recorded in 1979, garnered loads of radio airplay but a strike at her distributors prevented the single from being shipped and promoted properly, so it was never released (until it appeared on a Greatest Hits collection in 1995), which is sadly typical of her bad luck.
(Tracey Ullman also recorded a version of Maccoll's Terry, in fact using the same backing track. It got to Number 82 in the charts for Maccoll and Number 81 for Ullman!)
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As much as I love Kristie, she can't touch Tracey's versions. Tracey gave new life to them, and made them iconic classics.
I'm not surprised that the songs had no chance of getting recognition with Kristie's voice on them. They were too slow and needed a faster beat. Tracey was perfect!
The "baby". I had always heard that they combined Tracey and Kristie's voice together to make the note. I've never heard Kristie hit a note that high either. Sounds more like studio trickery. Kristie acting as backing vocals on the tracks is amazing!
Didn't Kristie also write, "You Caught Me Out"?
I loved "My Guy". Hell, I loved her entire album, "You Broke My Heart In 17 Places".
Thank god she stayed in television as the medium would never have been the same without her. She literally launched the whole original programming for cable in America, on HBO in the late 90s. Gary Shandling had a show, which ironically began on Fox as the same time as her 80s show. Both went into cable. Tracey put them up on the map and the rest is history.
It's sad that Britain doesn't get to see more of Tracey's shows. She's already got another hit series on in America now.
Sadly, we won't be getting another new song from either Tracey or Kristie.
RIP.
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