Songoftheday 1/12/15 - Come on and twist a little closer, now (Twist a little closer) and let me know that you're mine (Let me know you're mine) ...

"Twist And Shout" - The Beatles
from the albums Please Please Me (1963, UK) and Introducing The Beatles (1964, US)
Billboard Hot 100 peak: #2 (four weeks) [1964] and #23 (one week) [1986]
Weeks in the Top-40: 9 [1964] and 7 [1986]

Today's Song of the Day was a resurrected hit from the 60s that wasn't exactly the most remembered of the Fab Fours early hits. The Beatles' cover of "Twist And Shout", originally a hit for the Isley Brothers in 1962, came off their first album to be released in the U.S., Introducing The Beatles on the Vee-Jay record label. With a one-take vocal of John Lennon's cold-battered voice, the single originally made the runner-up spot in the US, kept from the top by none other than their own "Can't Buy Me Love". Although their profits on pop radio were light in the 80s, with a top-20 hit in 1982 for their "Beatles Movie Medley", it took a teen comedy to bring them back on to the radio and into the singles chart. With its appearance in Ferris Bueller's Day Off, "Twist And Shout" landed the Fab Four back into the top-40...


"Twist and Shout" climbed back into the pop top-40 in America in September of 1986. It would be another nine years before they would be back in that level, courtesy of the Anthology series...

(Click below to see the rest of the post)


...and here's the first hit version of the song from the Isleys, which went to the top-20 on the pop chart in 1962...

 Other artists took on the song, including the Mamas and Papas, who took it on a totally different path...

In 1989, rap group Salt-N-Pepa released their take on "Twist And Shout", which just missed the R&B top-40 at #45 but went all the way to #4 in the UK (better than any other version, including the Beatles' own)...

And five years later, reggae act Chaka Demus & Pliers scored a #1 single in England with their cover...

Up tomorrow: A crimson-topped soul singer and his band are short on funds.