Sad to learn that Lulu has passed. I always liked "Hee Haw", and Lulu was a great cast member. She also made her mark in music with her strong voice.
https://www.thatericalper.com/2025/04/24/5-things-you-didnt-know-about-lulu-roman/

I didn't hear about her passing until several weeks after, and I'm a little surprised that there was so little coverage. In the early 60's she recorded several country hits with George Jones, but she may be best remembered for recording one of the all-time weepers, "No Charge", in 1974.

I just read that Brenton Wood passed away on January 3. I don't know much about him other than his hit "Gimme Little Sign", which I really liked and hit the Top 10 in Toronto in September of '67, alongside The Boxtops "The Letter" and The Ugly Ducklings' "Gaslight".

The most surprising cover of 'One Toke' was on the ultra-square Lawrence Welk show. The champagne music master and his producers missed the song's content big time.


 

"Get Dancin'" by Disco Tex & The Sex-o-lettes.

The main voice of the Moodies, Justin Hayward, released a solid single in 2022 called 'Living For Love'. I saw him in concert the following year at a relatively small venue, where he performed all the hits and gave the back stories about some of the songs. He and his band were spot on vocally and musically.

Lorne's post about there being two incarnations of the band got me digging a bit. I really liked the vocalist on "United We Stand", Sunny Leslie, and her sister Sue Glover was also in the line-up. Sunny went on to be a backing vocalist of some note, particularly on Joe Cocker's "With a Little Help From My Friends" (although she went by her birth name Sunny Wheetman). She also had a single and solo album in 1974 called "Doctor's Orders", which didn't do much; Carol Douglas scored a hit with the single Stateside. In 2008, The Brotherhood of Man's debut album "United We Stand" was re-released with several bonus non-album singles and a few tracks released by the duo Sue & Sunny, after they split from the BOM. I downloaded the album and it's far too saccharine for my taste, but the singles by Sue & Sunny are good, as they have more of an R&B vibe.

One other obscure example came to my mind. A couple of years back a buddy of mine produced a Pennsylvania reunion concert for the The Buoys, who were a one-hit wonder with the song "Timothy". Three of the four original members performed. The other may have been eaten.

Lorne wrote:

Roman wrote:

Re: The Rinky Dinks, I take it these aren't the same Rinky Dinks that backed Johnny Bower on "Honky The Christmas Goose". I thought that was a pretty clever name for his back-up group.

It was, and it's entirely possible that those involved with the record didn't know of the use of this name for the Darin record as it never made the CHUM chart (CHUM played Buddy Holly's cover of "Early In The Morning" instead). Interestingly, in 1959 a different Rinky Dinks group did make the CHUM chart with "Catch A Little Moonbeam", but that record only got to #43 in a two-week run and so I doubt they would have known of that one either. And so what this also means is that of the three Rinky Dinks records, Bower's was actually the most successful in Toronto.

But Johnny still hasn't cracked Spotify, although some guy named Edward Tobin is there with a cover of Honky.
 

I never noticed it before, but the opening guitar licks to both songs are quite similar.

According to Tom Jones' autobiography "Over The Top & Back", their feud had nothing to do with chart competition or Engelbert flirting with Tom's girlfriend. They were both managed by Gordon Mills, who successfully launched their careers, and when Engelbert split from Mills in the 70's, Jones considered this to be a betrayal and he and Engelbert fell out as friends.

"Time" is one of rock's classics, and The Chambers Brothers were the first predominantly Black band to go psychedelic.  One thing I found curious is that the author of the piece said the song was a 1967 single, but I remember it hitting the charts in Toronto in the latter part of '68. I guess we were a little slow on the uptake.

I'd call them overdubs. For example, Phil Spector overdubbed strings onto The Beatles' "Long & Winding Road" (which songwriter Paul McCartney hated).

Here's a link to the album and its tracks. Limelight and Terry's Theme are not on this record.https://www.discogs.com/pt_BR/release/15340039-The-Tony-Mansell-Singers-Sing-Charles-Chaplin-Favourites

Based on his comments, I'm guessing Burton covers Lightfoot's "Beautiful". Many years ago I saw him at Massey Hall doing an amazing impression of Lightfoot singing Rod Stewart. https://drive.google.com/file/d/1VVMcxNHblB04bNqzS5gKqj5pwghufDrs/view?usp=sharing