In 1966, the songs of Neil Diamond started to draw covers far and huge. All people from Jay and the Individuals (“Sunday and Me”) to Cliff Richard (“Just Another Guy”) heard the younger New Yorker’s prowess. The identical yr, newly signed to Bang Data, distributed by Atlantic, he had his personal first hits, together with the US prime tenner “Cherry, Cherry.”
Extra success ensued, each as a author (notably of the Monkees’ multi-million-selling “I’m A Believer” and their subsequent “A Little Bit Me, A Little Bit You”) and an artist (“Girl, You’ll Be A Woman Soon,” “Kentucky Woman,” and others). Diamond wasn’t but identified in his personal identify within the UK. However his music was, courtesy additionally of such stars as Lulu, who floated his “The Boat That I Row” into the Prime 10, and Richard, who launched “I’ll Come Runnin’” as a single.
Going off Bang
However by now, the bloom was off the rose in his relationship with Bang, and he left the label. He quickly signed a brand new cope with MCA’s Uni label, resulting in the spectacular outcomes everyone knows. Bang continued to place out Diamond’s materials, together with his first non-original single, a model of Gary US Bonds’ “New Orleans.” That peaked at No.51 earlier than the discharge of a track that will grow to be an absolute worldwide anthem – not of the Nineteen Sixties, however the Eighties.
“Red, Red Wine” had been included on the singer-songwriter’s second album Simply For You, launched in the summertime of 1967. Now showing as a forty five, it was reviewed by Billboard as a “compelling, original folk-flavoured ballad.” It entered the journal’s Scorching 100 on April 13, 1968 at a reasonably promising No.73. However a second-week climb to No.62 was misleading. It remained there the next week and was by no means seen on the chart once more.
Lots extra wine
However virtually instantly, artists world wide recognised the track’s potential. British soul stalwarts Jimmy James and the Vagabonds lower the primary cowl on Pye, as a July 1968 single which reached No.36 within the British charts. Dutch artist Peter Tetteroo had successful with it in Holland in 1969; the identical yr, Jamaican singer Tony Tribe’s single reached No.46 within the UK. Within the Nineteen Seventies, renditions included these by nation artist Roy Drusky (1971) and former Checkmates chief and British favorite Emile Ford (1979).
Then in 1983, “Red, Red Wine” landed within the in-tray of British pop-reggae giants UB40, and it was by no means the identical once more. Their mild reggae model, impressed by Tribe’s, turned a part of their covers challenge Labour Of Love and powered to the highest of the UK charts. It solely reached No.34 within the States, however years later, after the band carried out it on the Nelson Mandela seventieth Birthday Live performance at Wembley Stadium, renewed US airplay (notably by Man Zapoleon on KZZP-FM in Phoenix, Arizona) prompted Virgin’s reissue and, in October 1988, it hit No.1.
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UB40 had been sincere sufficient to confess that, once they recorded “Red, Red Wine,” they didn’t affiliate it with Diamond in any respect. Lead singer Ali Campbell informed the Monetary Instances: “The funny thing about the song is we only knew it as a reggae song. We had no idea that Neil Diamond wrote it.” Added bandmate “Astro” Wilson: “Even when we saw the writing credit which said N. Diamond, we thought it was a Jamaican artist called Negus Diamond or something.”
Purchase or stream the unique “Red, Red Wine” on Neil Diamond 50.
