Review: Chad & Jeremy - I Don't Want To Lose You Baby (1965)

Tracks: 1) I Don’t Want To Lose You Baby; 2) Should I; 3) The Girl Who Sang The Blues; 4) Funny How Love Can Be; 5) The Woman In You; 6) Mr. Tambourine Man; 7) I Have Dreamed; 8) Don’t Think Twice, It’s All Right; 9) Baby Don’t Go; 10) There But For Fortune; 11) These Things You Don’t Forget.

REVIEW

Let’s hear it from Chad himself, addressing his fans from the back of the sleeve: "I am writing these notes basking in Californian sunshine, sitting by the pool at our apartment. This is the life! Far removed from the rainy London of last May where we made this album." [Cue Jill Stuart /in the background/: "What are you, nuts? You want to eliminate all of your London fans I’ve spent so much time on assembling for you?" Chad: "Hey babe, you’re the one talking! Doesn’t this back sleeve also have "Attention, Chad & Jeremy fans! Fan Club Address: Jill Stuart, Box 1409 Beverly Hills, Calif." all over it?" Jill: [gives her husband a death stare]. Chad [grumbling]: "Okay, okay..." [pause, writing:] "I really love London, too, but at this precise moment I rather go for California, too!" Jill [sighing]: "You’re such an ass, I’m never going out on stage with you again. Go sing under Judy Collins’ balcony or something if you want another stage partner."

No surprise that I Don’t Want To Lose Your Baby, Chad & Jeremy’s third album of original material in one year, did indeed appear only in the US (some Web sources list it as a UK release but this seems to be a mistake), while UK audiences were only treated to the title track as a single. By the time it came out in the fall of 1965, Chad was indeed enjoying the life in Beverly Hills, while Jeremy was back in London to act in Passion Flower Hotel, and there was much talk about the duo possibly separating for good — though, apparently, there were no such plans when they hastily laid down the basic tracks for this LP in May before contractual obligations would split them apart for nine months. Because there was no time to sit back, think, and evolve, the album is not all that stylistically different from Before And After, and tends to get overlooked by reviewers; but if you hold no expectations for the Chad & Jeremy sound to eventually «deepen and mature» — and why should you, come to think of it? — then it’s got quite a few more humble nostalgic morsels of pleasure to deliver, in addition to feeling a little more wholesome and adequate than its predecessor.

In particular, the record has no blunt attempts to «rock out» like ‘Evil-Hearted Me’; the harshest-sounding bit on the entire album is the grumbly-fuzzy arpeggiated riff that opens the duo’s cover of ‘The Girl Who Sang The Blues’, a Mann-Weil composition originally released in 1963 by the Everly Brothers — and even that one is immediately neutralized by the gentle piano counterpoint. I must confess that I like the cover more than the original, because Lor Crane’s arrangements make the song more interesting (and vocal-wise, it’s not the kind of material that lets the singers truly shine anyway, so both duos do pretty much the same job). And I do appreciate the humor of modifying the bridge section where they take the original lyrics ("I still remember that fateful night / The man with a big cigar / Walked in the club right up to her / Said ‘Hey girl I’m gonna make you a star’") and replace the last line with "Hey girl, my name is Brian Epstein" — and yes, Brian Epstein did smoke an occasional cigar, though it still might be judged as a bit of a low blow.

If anything, I am more worried here about the conscious attempt to reimagine Chad & Jeremy as a shadow of The Righteous Brothers: the title track and lead single, ‘I Don’t Want To Lose You Baby’, credited to the duo’s American artistic guide Van McCoy, is such a blatantly superficial re-write of ‘You’ve Lost That Loving Feeling’ that it would be a total embarrassment for any other artist; fortunately, Chad & Jeremy sort of had their reputation already established on the basis of shadowing their superiors, so who really cares? Well, to a certain small extent I do care, because bombastic Spectorian production and all-out operatic singing on a seabed of strings and walls of acoustic guitars is simply not something these guys were born to do. The only stylistic difference is that they still deliver the verses in a semi-whisper rather than sing them, which makes an odd contrast between the humble voices and the massive production — a contrast that evaporates by the time the chorus comes along and strongly suggests that the gentlemen go back to college, please.

Which, happily for us, they immediately proceed to do, and although some of the remaining songs are still a little louder than others, generally they seem content to remain within their comfort zone — friendly and unassuming folk-rock of the Beatles (you wish) / Byrds (occasionally) / Sonny & Cher (for the most part) variety. At least there are no Beatles covers, but there is a Byrds cover and a Sonny & Cher one. And, somewhat predictably, while the duo’s take on ‘Mr. Tambourine Man’ (which closely follows the Byrds’ arrangement, not Dylan’s original) feels like a bland copycat effort that only detracts from the original, their performance of ‘Baby Don’t Go’, conversely, improves on Sonny & Cher’s 1964 recording — they play it a little faster, a little tighter, a little denser, so that the original sounds like a raw demo in comparison; the only thing that’s lost in translation is the power of Cher’s young, treacly vocals that still somehow makes the original feel more serious and mature than Chad & Jeremy’s «romantic boy in the back of the classroom» delivery.

They do pay a more direct tribute to Dylan by covering ‘Don’t Think Twice, It’s All Right’ — a surprisingly belated choice, considering that the song had already been done to death and all but buried by mid-1965, and also one where they fall into the usual trap of interpreting it as a gentle and tender ballad rather than the vicious and mercyless putdown that it is (so you could say it’s really more of a Peter, Paul & Mary cover than an actual Dylan one). But if you do need a version of ‘Don’t Think Twice’ where the protagonist is more of a, let’s say, Montgomery Clift than Clint Eastwood, this one might actually do the trick. It’s nice, humble, and tasteful, anyway.

Other non-original material includes a cover of Phil Ochs’ ‘There But For Fortune’, again in a faster and (folk)-poppier arrangement than both Phil’s own performances or Joan Baez’ cover of that little singer-songwriter classic; a cover of The Ivy League’s hit ‘Funny How Love Can Be’, also slightly tightened and sped up but otherwise almost identical to the original; ‘I Have Dreamed’ from The King And I, made to sound like a Byrds song except for the annoying intrusive orchestration; and another Van McCoy composition, ‘These Things You Don’t Forget’, which at least does not attempt to rip off any more Righteous Brothers but is still just an unremarkable and superficial mid-tempo ballad.

All of this only leaves space for two originals, though one of them (‘Should I’, co-written by Chad and Jeremy) soon acquired a bit of international notoriety when it unexpectedly became a European hit for The Hep Stars (the Swedish antecedent of ABBA) later in the year. The song’s most outstanding musical feature is probably the smoothness of its melodic alternation between a gentle folk-pop melody and a (comparatively) gritty rhythm’n’blues pattern, though, unfortunately, this back-and-forth thing is only restricted to the intro and outro — I’d like to see this genre mash-up taken to further heights. Still, it’s definitely one of their best written pop songs; the Hep Stars overrode them with more in-yer-face vocals and also by expanding on the fast «rave-up» interlude, borrowing its signature for the final verse of the song, but I still think the original is more natural. The second original is ‘The Woman In You’, credited solely to Jeremy: a blues-pop ditty that feels mismatched with the guys’ personalities, as it happens pretty much every time they try to do something bluesy. Maybe the woman in the unnamed you did truly succeed in bringing out the man in Jeremy (and/or Clyde), but certainly not the kind of man necessary for such a performance, like, say, a Mick Jagger.

Clearly, with such an abundance of covers — and some of them completely superfluous, like ‘Mr. Tambourine Man’ — it is fairly obvious that the album was rushed for technical reasons; but on the whole, the selection is good, and the concept of Chad & Jeremy serving as «perfection providers» for unpolished musical ideas, be it Sonny & Cher or Phil Ochs, could even be a better one than the concept of Chad & Jeremy as second-, if not third-rate songwriters trying to imitate their betters. Once again, if you don’t set your expectations too high, this is perfectly enjoyable for all those who just can’t get enough of those serenely idealistic vibes of 1965.

• Only Solitaire reviews: Chad & Jeremy