It's April Fools Day and, as I can't beat The Observer's story about Shaun Ryder being invited to advise Cameron and Co on how to present their policies to the Working Classes, I've opted for a particularly apt song from 1956 - Frankie Lymon and The Teenagers.
I must confess that, although I obviously knew the song, I didn't know who sang it or anything about him. The track was released when Frankie Lymon was just 13 and appears to have been the highlight in his career: he broke from The Teenagers just over a year later, his solo career did not reach the same heights of success.
But it was his personal life which was really tragic: he was addicted to heroin at age 15, dishonourably discharged from the Army at 24, and married 3 times (although he disputed the legitimacy on one of those marriages). He died of a heroin overdose at just 25 despite having been "clean" for some years. Ironically, he was celebrating a new record deal.
You can read more about him here, meanwhile here he is with Why Do Fools Fall In Love?:
Enjoy,
Andrew
1 comment:
I fell for it! I read the entire Shaun Ryder article and only now, thanks to you, Andrew, has the penny been made to drop. Oh, what a silly-billy I am!
However, to reclaim some appearance of having at least modest mental faculties, I can say that when I read today's article in 'Pink News' about the Catholic Church relaxing its attitude towards gay marriage,(for civil ceremonies only), I knew straight away that it just could NOT be so - and then the date struck me. So I'm not quite the COMPLETE idiot!
Btw I recall how, when this Frankie Lymon record came out, how extraordinarily popular it was - at a time long before the word 'gay' came to have its later meaning - and long, long before Diana R. made her cover version.
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