Songoftheday 2/8/13 - If you're blue & you don't know where to go to, why don't you go where fashion sits?...

Taco - "Puttin' On The Ritz"
from the album After Eight (1982)
Billboard Hot 100 peak: #4 (two weeks)
Weeks in the Top-40: 14

Today's Song of the Day is by the Dutch singer Taco, who was born in Indonesia 25 years after the big song he covered was made popular. After traveling the world as a youth, he was signed in the early 80s in Germany, and released his first album, After Eight, in 1982. The first single, "Puttin' On The Ritz", was an update of the classic Irving Berlin song first introduced in the 1930 movie of the same name, and performed by Harry Richman...

(Click below to see the rest of the post)


Clark Gable also did the song in the movie An Idiot's Delight in 1939...

Fred Astaire also recorded the tune, whose original lyrics mocked the poor African-Americans of Harlem who would dress up to walk the town...

Taco scuttled the orchestra for synthesizers and a grand piano, with a tap-dance break and instrumental excerpts from other Berlin numbers from the time. This original video version has kids in blackface, which was (rightfully) scrubbed for MTV...

"Puttin' On The Ritz" became a top-5 hit a full 54 years after it was written, while also climbing to the top-20 on the adult-contemporary chart and #37 on the dance chart, while his After Eight album reached #23 on the LP chart. It was his only appearance in the US pop chart, making Taco a true "one-hit-wonder".

Taco wasn't the only one who tried to put a modern spin on the song. Shiny Toy Guns also covered "Puttin' On The Ritz" (coming closer to Taco's version) in 2005..

Rufus Wainwright also performed the ditty in his Rufus Does Judy concert...

Up tomorrow: a Supreme cold.