If there's a hot youth fad, you can count on someone to write a song about it and CASH IN. Today I thought I would bring you three songs from the '50s and '60s, written about some of the sporty toy crazes from my consumer-oriented youth. Please to enjoy!
I recall begging one year for a fluorescent orange "Shoop Shoop Hula Hoop," but that was probably a good ten years after this 1958 song by that sunny little imp with the window-shattering voice, Teresa Brewer.
Teresa Brewer, "The Hula Hoop Song"
I thought skateboards looked SO COOL, but both times I attempted to get on one, I fell flat on my ass within seconds. A young Italian girl named Piccola Pupa inexplicably decided to sing this nursery-rhyme style tune about skateboarding. We should recall that skateboards at this time in history were pretty much just a piece of scrap wood with rollerskate wheels slapped on the bottom. I think it would be a particularly bad idea for me to try skateboarding a third time now, even with modern advances and such.
Piccola Pupa, "Skateboard" (Shindig, June 1965)
Bicycles and rollerskates were not so much a fad, of course, or new to the '60s, but having a cartoon rock band with multiple radio hits was. I am pretty sure Ron Dante ("Archie") was singing on just about every other Top 20 record from about '67-'70. Shhh. You aren't suppose to know it isn't really Archie.
The Archies, "Bicycles, Rollerskates, and You"
© Copyright 2008- Marianne Spellman