YouTube
Well, this is a relief after the last one. Not that it'd be at all impossible to be annoyed by this track, and I'm pretty sure I did at the time, but at this distance it's more charming. An archetypal summer European hit, 'Mambo No 5' had already made its mark before the UK release in August, so much so that an import version made its way into the Top 40, exceptional for the time. Mind you, the fortnight for which it topped the UK chart can hardly compare to the 20-week stay it managed in France.
The premise is an underwhelming one - a Perez Prado instrumental with added lyrics and some now very Nineties-sounding production (check the squelchy intro). Its greatest strength is probably the gusto with which Bega delivers the words. It probably also helped that the catchy melody and the list of names in the lyric lent themselves perfectly to parody - including of course the version by Bob The Builder which itself arrives on a later Now album. It's little surprise, though, that this wasn't to be the start of a glorious career for him in Britain - the (almost indistinguishable) follow-up 'I Got A Girl' fell short of the Top 50 when it was apologetically released in December.
Available on: Mambo Mambo: The Best of Lou Bega
No comments:
Post a Comment