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“Summer in the City: The Lovin' Spoonful Hit That Brought Jackhammers and Beetle Horns to Pop”
The only song of the Beat era that uses a VW Beetle horn and a jackhammer is probably the song by the Lovin' Spoonful , which entered the BRAVO Musicbox on September 12, 1966, stayed there for eleven weeks and reached number four.
On the same evening that the Beatles appeared on the Ed Sullivan Show for the first time, John Sebastian and Zalman Yanowski, who would later become founders of the Lovin' Spoonful , met for the first time. At the house of Cass Elliott , who later became famous with the Mamas & Papas , they watched the show together and then played music for a few hours themselves. Cass Elliott then took turns approaching each of them and telling them that each wanted to make music with the other. John and Zal were accepted into the Mugwumps , which already included Cass and Denny Doherty, a musician who would later become Mamas & Papas musician.
Because John consistently incorporated blues licks into the Mugwumps' songs, he was soon fired by his manager for being counterproductive. When the Mugwumps followed the path of many bands to musical nirvana six months later, John Sebastian and Zal Yanovsky reunited and formed the Lovin' Spoonful with Steve Boone and Joe Butler . The idea for the band name came from a song by Mississippi John Hurt . One line in his song " Coffee Blues " goes: " I wanna see my baby 'bout a lovin' spoonful, my lovin' spoonful ."
When "Summer in the City" reached number one on the US Billboard charts on August 13, 1966, it was already the Lovin' Spoonful 's fifth hit. The two direct predecessors, "Daydream" and "Do You Believe in Magic," had each peaked at number two.
Zal Yanowsky explained the songs' success as follows ( BRAVO 25 from 1966 ): "Simplicity, that's the whole secret. They all work with electronic effects. Whether it's the Supremes, the Righteous Brothers, or the Rolling Stones, they have a lot of machine music behind them. Over time, it must sound monotonous. And then we came along and sang and played very plainly and simply – that made people sit up and take notice."
With "Summer In The City," however, they deviate from this simplicity. In contrast to its predecessors, the song sounds almost rock-like, with powerful drums and staccato keyboards. John Sebastian's brother Mark came up with the idea for the song. He had written a poem about hot New York summer nights, which are only bearable if you find a girl to go dancing with at night. John tweaked the lyrics a bit, and bassist Steve Boone came up with a piano melody that didn't seem to fit anywhere else. Here it was perfect, and the song was finished. John Sebastian later compared the song to George Gershwin's "An American in Paris."
Even though the Lovin' Spoonful no longer appear on BRAVO Musicbox , they still have five more chart entries in the US. However, they never again reach their greatest success.
