THE GREATEST SONGS OF THE 1960s THAT NO ONE HAS EVER HEARD
469) The Boys Blue — “You Got What I Want”
I previously featured the Sorrows’ take on “Take a Heart”, a song written by Miki Dallon and first released by The Boys Blue (see #407). Well, what goes around comes around. Today I am featuring the Boys Blue’s B-side to “Take a Heart” — “You Got What I Want”, which the Sorrows also subsequently released as an A-side and was also written by Dallon. Richie Unterberger calls it a “really good track[ with] a poppy R&B raver kind of sound” (https://www.allmusic.com/album/thats-alright-mw0000600394) and an “excellent, tough R&B/pop fusion[]”. (https://www.allmusic.com/artist/the-boys-blue-mn0001385051)
Untergerger also notes that “[s]ome have believed that the [Boys Blue] was a pseudonym for, or an earlier version of, the Sorrows, because both songs were also recorded by the Sorrows. Additionally, both songs were written by Miki Dallon . . . . It turns out, though, that the Boys Blue were . . . entirely different . . . .” (https://www.allmusic.com/artist/the-boys-blue-mn0001385051) He contends that although “Take a Heart” and “You Got What I Want” “were done reasonably well by the Boys Blue, the Sorrows’ renditions are superior and definitive.” I have to partially disagree with Richie. I think the Boys Blue’s is the definitive version of “You Got What I Want.”
Who were the Blue Boys? Marc Campbell writes that:
Having more in common with the MC5 than the British Invasion groups, Coventry, England’s raw and explosive The Boys Blue shoulda been contenders. . . . Lead singer Jeff Elroy . . . had a great voice, cool moves and star power. The Boys Blue released one single in 1965: “Take Heart”/“You Got What I Want.” The record failed to become a hit and the band faded into obscurity.
https://dangerousminds.net/comments/freakbeat_classic_the_boys_blue
As to Miki Dallon, Unterberger says:
As an artist, producer, and songwriter, Miki Dallon was an interesting secondary figure of the British Invasion, albeit one whose work rarely troubled the charts (“Take a Heart,” a fair-sized U.K. hit for the Sorrows, being his most successful tune). As a singer he was only adequate, if exuberant, but as a composer he had a knack for combining some hard-edged R&B riffs with British Invasion pop-soul.
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The Boys Blue perform the song live:
Here is the Sorrows’ version:
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