#TBT: Little Eva - Loco-Motion

Time for another round of Throwback Thursday!

This is where we get to listen to some great music from days gone by.

Today’s music comes to us from 1962.

Wikipedia tells us this about Loco-Motion:
"The Loco-Motion" is a 1962 pop song written by American songwriters Gerry Goffin and Carole King. "The Loco-Motion" was originally written for Dee Dee Sharp, but Sharp turned the song down. The song is notable for appearing in the American Top 3 three times, each time in a different decade: in 1962 by the American pop singer Little Eva (U.S. No. 1); in 1974 by the American band Grand Funk Railroad (also U.S. No. 1); and finally in 1988 by the Australian singer Kylie Minogue (U.S. No. 3).

The song is a popular, enduring example of the dance-song genre: much of the lyric is devoted to a description of the dance itself, usually performed as a type of line dance. However, the song came before the dance.

"The Loco-Motion" was also the second song to reach No. 1 by two different musical acts in America. The earlier song to do this was "Go Away Little Girl", also written by Goffin and King. It is one of only nine songs to achieve this feat.

"The Loco-Motion" myth:

The widely believed story of how the song "The Loco-Motion" came to be is that Carole King was playing music at home and Eva Boyd was doing some chores and started dancing to it; the dance The Loco-Motion was born. However, this is not true. Eva Boyd was introduced to Goffin and King and they realized she had a good singing voice, so they had her record "The Loco-Motion". King stated this during an interview on National Public Radio (NPR) shortly after Little Eva died.

As the song came before the dance, there was no dance when the song was originally written. When the song became a smash hit, Eva Boyd ended up having to create a dance to go along with the song. King stated this in her "One to One" concert video. In live performances of the song, Little Eva can be seen doing her version of the dance.

Another bit of the conventional lore is that she had received only $50 for "The Loco-Motion". However, although she never owned the rights to her recordings, it seems $50 was actually her weekly salary during the years she was making records (an increase of $15 from what Goffin and King had been paying her as nanny). In 1971, she moved to South Carolina and lived in obscurity on menial jobs and welfare until being rediscovered in 1987. She died of cervical cancer in 2003.

Top-40 DJ Dan Ingram has been quoted as saying that he believes the original "The Loco-Motion" was recorded by King herself. Producer Pete Waterman has also stated he believes it is King singing on the recording. King can be clearly heard among the backing singers on the Little Eva recording





See you again soon! Share with me your thoughts about this theme.  If you have a favorite oldies song or artist, let me know and I’d be happy to feature them.