A Modern Spiritual?

[Dave W]

Myron Floren introduces Gale and Dale doing "one of the newer songs" and Lawrence Welk closes by calling it "a modern spiritual."



Ermmm....Mr. Welk, just because a song mentions "sweet Jesus" doesn't mean it's a religious number.  Guess they just didn't understand.

[uwe]

Dave, you ole garage rocker, here's something for ya:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i48BP1PUoFI&feature=related

So the US invented punk after all, I'm baffled. 

And may I comment that the object of your derision did indeed have some spiritual (the music form as opposed to just the lyrical content) or gospel overtones. They speeded it up and countrified (early Carpenters come to mind) the backing, but some of the harmonies and the phrasings wouldn't have sounded out of place in a South Carolina church if slowed down appropriately.

Whitney Houston could spiritualise it alright I guess.

[uwe]

Come to think of it: I liked the apron she wore (Gale, not Whitney), kind of Stepford Wives (the creepy original, not the watered down remake) chic.

[Barklessdog]

Very funny, maybe they are changing, its pretty plain to see.

The scariest drug user are the ones with aprons

[uwe]

Couldn't find a Stones performance of it, sorry:

[Dave W]

This certainly wasn't the first time Lawrence Welk played non-mainstream music. I just can't understand how he thought it was a spiritual in any sense. I mean, Spiro Agnew publicly denounced Brewer & Shipley, and when Nixon's "enemies list" was made public they were on it. And yet Welk must have been unaware of any controversy.