If there's anyone as good looking as Elvis Presley, it's Ricky Nelson and it wasn't his songs that attracted the American public in the beginning but his lovable antics with his family in the DC comics series called, The Adventures of Ozzie And Harriet (image), where the Nelson family, that meant his parents, brother David and the dog had their family life, sometimes fact and sometimes fiction, made into humorous episodes.
Personally, a collection was kept up to the 80s, before the comics were thrown away into the dustbin. Such a pity! Computer scanning in the 90s could have saved the beautiful and colourful images. Many Singaporean comic lovers had them too in the 50s. Anyway...
The Nelson family was also family fare on radio and TV but as he grew up, Ricky Nelson began a singing career and "became a teen idol sensation from 1957 up to 1962, where he had thirty Top-40 hits, more than any other artist at the time except Elvis Presley and Pat Boone."
"When Billboard introduced the Hot 100 Chart on August 4, 1958, Nelson's single, Poor Little Fool became the first song ever in the number one position on that chart." He also became an actor, made a few movies and appeared with Dean Martin and John Wayne.
His songs are so well-known internationally and they are perennial favourites. The songs include, Someday, Lonesome Town, Hello Mary Lou, Travellin' Man, Young World, It's Late, Stood Up, Garden Party, Dream Lover with a personal favourite, Have I Told You Lately That I Love You? Nelson was active all the way up to his death at 45 years.
Like Kyu Sakamoto (Sukiyaki), he passed away in a plane crash in 1985. Cliff Richard has only 3 favourite rock and roll idols and Ricky Nelson is one of them.
Acknowledgement:
Vinyl: EP/Imperial Record: 156; EP/IMP: 163; Decca: ED 2760.
Quotations: Wikipedia.
Original article/image: Andy Lim Collection
3 comments:
He left his fans a great legacy. A pity he left too soon.
Yes and it is a huge repertoire of his finest; he is still well respected and has a place in the Rock N Roll Hall Of Fame and a STAR on the Hollywood Walk Of Fame along Hollywood Boulevard and Vine.
September 30th 1934: Was the birthday of CAYET MANGIARACINA. As a young man he was with a pop band known as THE SPARKS. He wrote songs as well and one them was a song entitled MERRY MARY LOU. It was later to become HELLO MARY LOU. The song was recorded by BILL HALEY and THE COMETS as well as SAM COOKE. But it was RICKY NELSON who immortalized the song, which peaked at #9 on BILLBOARD 100.
CAYET gave up the bright lights and concert tours to become a Catholic Priest and is still a priest today. The royalty checks for the song are mailed direct to the SOUTHERN DOMINICAN PROVINCE Office every quarterly.
Hope you will enjoy the video as well as the song.
Have a great week ahead everyone!
Cheers!
Note: Not too long after this concert, Ricky Nelson, aged 45, together with his fiancee, Helen, and all the members of his band died in a pte plane crash on New Year's Eve 1985.
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