Love's Greatest Hurts

If you're the right age to have followed the procession of top 40 hits through the mid-70s or enjoy listening to classic rock, you have no doubt encountered the Nazareth rock anthem Love Hurts.

It's not much of a stretch to say that most people believe that Nazareth recorded the original or at least the only hit version of the song, an assumption that is far from the truth. In fact, In the UK, the Nazareth version of the song did not even achieve the highest chart position among the records which lamented that musical sentiment.

Humble beginnings marked the start in life for Love Hurts. It first appeared as an album cut in the 1960 section of the Way Back Machine, during a period of the rock era when albums generally consisted of a couple of hits and 8 or 10 throw away tracks. The Everly Brothers included it on an album called A Date with the Everly Brothers.

Nice harmony, but little notice.

During its second time around, Love Hurts was the B Side to a Roy Orbison No. 1 hit from 1961 called Running Scared. In Australia, the Orbison version actually received more air play than the side being promoted by Monument Records.

Then, for Love Hurts, it was 14 years of silence, moving us forward to 1975. That's when Nazareth recorded it and for most of us, theirs is the signature Love Hurts. It was Top 10 in the US and reached No. 1 in Norway and the Netherlands.

So, isn't that the end of the story? It might be, unless you happened to live in the UK at the time.

Classic rock fans remember a group called Traffic who recorded an impressive list of successful albums between the late 60s and the mid 70s. Though they didn't achieve a lot of success with the singles they released, one group member, Jim Capaldi did enjoy watching some of his 45's as they climbed the UK singles charts. One of those chart successes was Capaldi's version of Love Hurts, which reached number 4 in the UK, also in 1975. It's vocal treatment reminds me of Roy Orbison, but musically, it's unlike any of the other versions mentioned here.

Four unique interpretations of the song, each with elements that set it apart from the rest. You may well listen to all of them and decide that Nazareth's is still the best. Maybe it is, but in rock history, it does not stand alone.

'Til next time, that's another @maindogsound look back at a classic track.

Most Wanted: Louie Louie

This week's odyssey into our rock music herritage begins way back in 1955 when a song writer named Richard Berry wrote a tune called Louie Louie, a Jamaican track about a sailor returning home to his lady love. Then let's fast forward 8 years to 1963 when a band out of Portland, Oregon made the song their own and, in my not always so humble opinion, gave birth to garage rock, opening the door wide for bands like the Bobby Fuller Four, the Swinging Medallions, the McCoys and, of course, Paul Revere & the Raiders.

The Kingsmen took their Louie Louie version to No. 2 on the singles charts, where it would remain for 6 weeks. Proving that music lovers sometimes can't get enough of a good thing, Louie Louie would revisit top 40 radio yet again for another, even if less successful chart run.

Perhaps the most intriguing story surrounding this song is that it was actually considered to merit a full scale FBI investigation, due to claims that it contained obscene lyrics. Really? The FBI? Yup, it must have been a slow crime year because the Feds actually placed Louie Louie under some audio version of a microscope and gave it the most suspicious of listens.

I wonder if they played the 45 record to play on 33 rpm to try and hear the dirt the way the record buying public did. Well at least my friends and I did. So were they really and truly on a nasty words witch hunt or were they just trying to figure out all of the guitar chords.

The investigation, which was proven pointless, did a world of good when it came to record sales. So at least something worthwhile came of it.

One of the coolest things about the Louie Louie 45 is that it actually contained a flip side that was worth a listen. That was at least somewhat extraordinary, because back in the days of those little records with the big holes, side 2 was generally a throw away track. But in the case of this 45, the flip side received a lot of plays on my old mono record player.

So listen to "Haunted Castle", perhaps the lesser known of the two, but well worth checking out.