by Del Shannon Album: Runaway With Released: 1961 US Chart: 1 UK Chart: 1 This is about a guy whose girl leaves him, and he is left to wonder what went wrong. A lot of Shannon's songs were about broken relationships. He once said he wrote the words to this about himself because he was forever running away from relationships. and his keyboard player, Max Crook, came up with this while they were playing a club in their hometown of Battle Creek, Michigan. Crook played a keyboard called a "Musitron" on the song. Del Shannon (from 1000 UK #1 Hits by Jon Kutner and Spencer Leigh): "We were on stage and Max (Crook) hit an A minor and a G and I said, 'Max, play that again, it's a great change.'" The drummer, Dick Parker, followed them and after 15 minutes, the manager of the club shouted, 'Knock it off, play something else.'" The next day Shannon wrote some lyrics: "That night I went back to the club and I told Max to play an instrumental on his musitron for the middle part, and when he played that solo, we had 'Runaway.'"
Rip It Up/Ready Teddy byLittle Richard Album: Here's Little Richard Released: 1956 Chart: 17 UK Chart: 30 Johnny Marascalco wrote this while he was sitting in a cotton field waiting for a friend to get out of church so they could hunt rabbits. A later weekend, he heard Little Richard's "Long Tall Sally" and decided that he could write similar songs. This is about a girl who wanted sex (a "ready teddy"). Marascalco wrote this while attending a sermon. The words were married to the music the next day and Marascalco drove cross-country to the offices of Specialty Records to audition it. Producer Bumps Blackwell liked "Ready Teddy" and asked Marascalco if there were more. Marascalco said that he had a country song -- "Rip It Up" -- that he could redo. A week later, the revised "Rip It Up" floored Blackwell. He bought both songs for Little Richard and offered Marascalco a job as a staff songwriter. Bill Haley and His Comets quickly covered "Rip It Up" -- his version peaked at #30 while Little Richard's original reached #17. According to Rolling Stone's 500 Greatest Songs, "Cline was reluctant to record this ballad, which had been turned down by Brenda Lee, until producer Owen Bradley coaxed I Fall To Pieces by
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