Among another slew of mis-matched birthday celebrants today, including Princess Anne's 70th and Jim Dale's 85th, as well as those of Oscar Peterson, Ben Affleck, Maggie's twins Mark and Carole Thatcher, Jennifer Lawrence, Sir Walter Scott, Julia Child, hit songwriter Jimmy Webb, Melinda Gates, Ethel Barrymore, E. Nesbit, Nicolas Roeg, Debra Messing, Dame Wendy Hiller and Napoleon, I find the purveyor of a familiar one-hit-wonder (here in the UK, anyhow), Miss Patsy Gallant...
...and what a memorable hit it was, too - all together, now!
In my mind there's a face
On my lips there's a name
In my life there's no place
For the man that I love
Cause I'm livin' my life
Just to sing and be free
From L.A. to New York, from New York to L.A
From New York to L.A
I'm a star in New York, I'm a star in L.A
In my life there's no place for the man that I love
Cause I'm livin my life just to sing and be free
From LA to New York, from New York to LA
The city life of flashing lights
Busy streets and fancy cars
Booze and drugs and all the clubs
Everyone's a shining star
Was so inviting to my eyes
That I can only be surprised
By all the sounds and sights to see
I thought all this was meant for me
But was it really meant for me?
I'm a star in New York, I'm a star in L.A
In my life there's no place for the man that I love
Cause I'm livin' my life just to sing and be free
From L.A. to New York, from New York to L.A
The city lights are often blurred
By stories we've already heard
Booze and drugs now break my head
Cause all the shining stars are dead
I sometimes close my tired eyes
Look at myself, be hypnotized
Findin' a reason of lovin' you
The man I thought was meant for me
But were you really meant for me?
I'm a star in New York, I'm a star in L.A
In my life there's no place for the man that I love
Cause I'm livin' my life just to sing and be free
Can that song really be forty-three years old?!
Sob.
While I don't actually remember 1977 that well (it might have been drugs, I might have been abducted by aliens, there's no way to be really sure, is there?) I am totally positive I have never run across this little ditty before. But Miss Gallant seems to be putting it over with true sincerity. God bless.
ReplyDeleteOn checking the lady's Wikipedia entry, it says that the song got nowhere in the US outside certain nightclubs. Yet she had mega success in her native Canada. That "49th parallel" border is not just long, but wide, it would appear... Jx
DeleteThink Canadian radio is required to play a certain percentage of Canadian artists, so they don't get overwhelmed by America. So that might have helped.
ReplyDeleteCanada avoids becoming America very well. I wish we made more effort not to!
Canada repeatedly gets revenge on the US for not being Canadian, too, by invading it with the likes of Justin Bieber, Celine Dion and Bryan Adams. Jx
DeleteThere are loads of crap Canadians, mainly in America. (you forgot Pamela Anderson, Jim Carrey, Ted Cruz, Lauren Southern.)
DeleteCanadians see America, it's right there. They've seen the "vast wasteland " and work to avoid it. That's the problem. British people don't.
I can hum all those tunes listed on that album! I will give From LA to New York a miss - it wound me up something chronic when I was a kid, and probably still will.
ReplyDeleteSx
We aim to please.. :-)
DeleteAs for those Top of the Pops LPs, I could never understand the appeal of buying an album of chart hits sung by a load of session singers rather than the real thing. It's not as if such genuine compilations weren't available from K-Tel and Ronco at the time. Presumably it's because they were cheap. And had "one for the Dads" glamour models on the covers. Jx
ReplyDeleteThat track and the cover of the 'top of the pops 77' LP recaptures
happy memories of long long ago in the way only music can.
Indeed - I was fourteen that year, and you were just out on the gay scene, I believe! Jx
Delete