Now I’m not a wine drinker myself, but lots of folks are celebrating the recent arrival of wine in Tennessee supermarkets. I’ve been seeing so much wine on the news, a bunch of “wine” songs have been stuck in my head. Let me get them out, and share them with you.
“Red Red Wine” by UB40″
Neil Diamond wrote and recorded this song in 1967, singing the praises of wine and its ability to make you forget about your problems, according to Songfacts. The British group UB40 recorded it reggae style in 1983, having no idea it was written by a legendary American balladeer. Five years later, a Phoenix DJ started playing it, listeners loved it, and in the summer of 1988 it went to #1 on the charts. Even though Neil Diamond gets the writing credit, it was the UB40 rap that we loved in the 80s. Neil is a great writer, but he couldn’t have come up with poetry like this: “Red red wine I love you right from the start, right from the start with all of my heart…Red red wine I’m gonna love you till I die, love you till I die and that’s no lie.” (By the way, Neil wrote and sang another wine hit in 1970″ “Cracklin Rosie”)
“Drinking Wine Spo-Dee-O-Dee” by Jerry Lee Lewis
You had to know this song came out of the south. Knoxville, Tennessee to be exact, where 25-year-old Granville “Sticks” McGhee came up with this one. He had served in the Army in World War II, and he used to fool around with his guitar, making up songs with fellow soldiers. This song was written about an alcoholic fruit drink named “spodi.” The original version was filled with profanities, so McGhee cleaned it up for his record company, and it was a # 2 hit on the Rhythm and Blues chart in 1949. Jerry Lee Lewis first recorded it in the 1950s on Sun Records, and revived it in 1973 when he was riding high on the country charts. If you’re wondering why Jerry Lee liked this song, as he would say, “Think about it.”
“Scenes From An Italian Restaurant” by Billy Joel
Billy Joel could paint a picture with a song about as well as anyone. When music videos rolled around in the 1980s, he mastered the art form. But in the 1970s, we were left to our own imaginations to picture the scenery. This was an easy one, from the opening lines: “A bottle of white, a bottle of red, perhaps a bottle of rose instead. We’ll get a table near the street, in our old familiar place, you and I, face to face.” This is from his 1977 “Stranger” album, which was so strong, it yielded four hit singles, and amazingly this was not one of them.
“Strawberry Wine” by Deana Carter
Has it really been 20 years since Deana Carter released “Strawberry Wine?” Someone told me the other day that I haven’t been including enough country hits on my “5 Great Songs” lists, so I’m happy to feature this one. When it comes to wine songs, it’s hard to top this: “Like strawberry wine and seventeen, the hot July moon saw everything, my first taste of love, oh bittersweet, the green on the vine, like strawberry wine.”
“Bottle of Wine” by the Fireballs
This song will probably not be used in any supermarket wine commercials: “Bottle of wine, fruit of the vine, when you gonna let me get sober? Let me alone, let me go home, let me go back to start over.” Not exactly the image they want to portray in 2016, right? But in 1968, this hit the top-10 with it’s raw, party-boy style. It surprises many people to learn this song was released in the Flower Power era. It sure sounds like a pre-British Invasion record. But like the best top-40 records, it should have come with a warning on the label: This one’s a serious earworm. Hear it once, it’s in your head all day. And the next day. Sort of like a hangover!
