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| THE SCAFFOLD-Liver Birds/Jelly Colored Cloud U.S. Bell 849 1969 |
Liverpool's trio The Scaffold (Paul McCartney's brother Mike, future Poet Laureate Roger McGough and John Gorman) were discussed in previous posts about some of their earlier records where we gave a little background on their four previous American singles ("Lily The Pink", "Do You Remember", "Thank U Very Much" and "Goose".
Today's subject was their fifth American 7" and also their final release of the 60's here. Curiously the sides were different than the U.K. release. "Liver Birds" (the theme to a British TV show of the same name, though a slightly different version than the actual TV theme) was on the bottom side of the inane "Gin Gan Goolie" there (Parlophone R 5812 October 1969). Issued here in December it featured "Jelly Colored Cloud" on the A-side. I've reversed them because I prefer "Liver Birds".
"Liver Birds" is an incredibly catchy number with an opening drum beat that would not sound at all out of place in the Stone Roses era and a funky throbby bass line that falls right in behind the drums making for an incredibly infectious groove. The sing-along/sing-song lyrics espouse the joys of lasses from Liverpool:
"Luton girls have lovely voices, Sheffield girls make finest cooks, Glasgow girls are good at football, Liverpool girls win out on looks", and so on!
"Jelly Colored Cloud" was a track from the previous year issued on what had then been the band's only U.S. LP "Thank U Very Much". It's an odd duck, starting out with an almost nursery rhyme like intro with a child's toy xylophone and some whistling before it totally goes off the rails with fake opera soprano voices behind the fey lead vocals. Whoever decided to make this the A-side of an American single was clearly either in possession of an extreme sense of humor or perhaps dabbling in certain substances, OR so checked out in their job that they just decided not to bother listened to what they were putting out!
Both sides are available on the compilation CD "The Scaffold at Abbey Road 1966-1971" and on streaming.
Hear "Liver Birds":
Hear "Jelly Colored Cloud":
Hear the original British theme for "Liver Birds":
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