THE HIT HAMMER: Bobby Vinton's "Roses Are Red (My Love)"

(The Hit Hammer is where I'm reviewing each #1 song on the Billboard Hot 100. Starting from when the chart started in 1958 and eventually working my way to the present. To see my inspiration and more information about this blog, please refer to the "Poor Little Fool" post.)

Bobby Vinton - "Roses Are Red (My Love)"

Hit Number 1: July 14, 1962

Stay at Number 1: 4 Weeks

The Billboard charts can be a pretty funny thing sometimes. The most popular song in the country for a week was a strip tease for some reason, and then the next week after, a cheesy and sappy love song was #1. These kinds of songs are complete polar opposites from one another. But it should be no surprise that this next song was by a guy who clearly had a thing for cheesy, sappy love songs. Bobby Vinton, who kind of like Elvis was in the military before his music career blossomed, had his first true hit with "Roses Are Red (My Love)", a song about two lovers graduating from high school and then going their separate ways.

Vinton first found the song in a reject pile at Epic Records. He recorded the song in a more R&B style but was then allowed to re-record it in a more slower style, with strings and a vocal choir. There's little to no doubt that that was more up Vinton's alley. But it's pretty hard to imagine this being an R&B song, based off the story it tells. It starts out with the two lovers graduating and the guy signs a little cutesy poem sort of thing next to his picture in her yearbook, "roses are red my love, violets are blue, sugar is sweet my love, but not as sweet as you". It really doesn't get much more corny than that. Then they go their separate ways, and the girl finds a new lover. Eventually she has a baby, a girl, with this other dude, and the guy writes to her that she looks a lot like her mom, and that some day, some boy will write the same thing in her yearbook, as he did to her. It's really a revolving door of a song, and even though it tells a story, it never goes anywhere.

That isn't to say there aren't some nice things about the song. It's a pretty quiet, and innocent song that no one could really bring themselves to dislike. But that doesn't mean you have to like it either. It almost tries too hard to be some dramatic, yet cute song, and as a result, it creates a song that's pretty easy to mock. Vinton will appear in this blog again.

GRADE: 5/10

JUST MISSED:

The Orlons' "The Wah Watusi" was stuck behind "Roses Are Red (My Love)" at #2 for 2 weeks. It's pretty fun and catchy, but sort of blends in with lots of other songs around this time. It's a 6.