Men Without Hats – Jenny Wore Black (Pop Goes the World, 1987)
Another amazing gem from Men Without Hats. This song comes to us from their amazing, possibly rock opera, if not then at least, concept album Pop Goes the World. Which details the lives of fictitious rock superstars, Jenny and Johnny, who are in the band The Human Race.
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We start off with some solid Harpsichord, bass guitar, drum, and synth horns. Also, take care to listen to the cool call and response parts.
Jenny wore black jenny wore white - WHITE! and jenny was real but almost not quite and jenny was here she was almost insideand jenny was real but jenny was frightened by the way we looked at her and jenny could see she was only a child
The choruse contains some tasteful female backing vocals, and more cool harpsichord.jenny concealed all but her smile and when she smiled we said hey HEY! you'll never see clear with tears in your face hey! you'll never see clearly anyway I said I loved you blindly, and I do we're only two strangers in ways
The next verse is the same as the last. Take note of the cool voice agumentation on the "la la la"sjenny wore black jenny wore white, WHITE! and jenny was real but almost not quite (la la la la la la) and jenny was here she was almost on time and jenny was real but jenny was frightened by the way we looked at her and jenny could see within us for a while jenny revealed all but her smile and when she smiled we said hey HEY! you'll never see clear with tears in your face hey! you'll never see clearly anyway I said I loved you blindly, and I do we're only two strangers in ways we should sayFinally we come to possibly my favorite part of this whole song. The bridge.you always caught my eyes where the dreams peter in and I can't remember wherever I've been there's still holes for my eyes where the dreams peter through all I can remember is when I was with youDoes this remind you of anything? Because to me it sounds like an allusion to the Beatles "Fixing a hole" And making musical allusions to the Beatles, is a really amazing feat, in my book. The rest of the song pretty much continues like before. Another chorus then the end. Pretty much an amazing song.
Tags: Call and response, concept album, Fixing a hole, harpsichord, musical allusion, synth horns, The Beatles