Clodagh Rodgers
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Clodagh Rodgers (born 5 March 1947, Ballymena) is a singer from Northern Ireland, probably best known for her hit "Jack in the Box".
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[edit] Career
Clodagh Rodgers signed for Decca records in 1961, at the age of 14. She made four singles before moving to Columbia in 1965, where she was known as "Cloda Rogers", the name under which she made the 1966 single Stormy Weather/Lonely Room.[1] Although none of the singles she released for Decca or Columbia made the UK charts, Clodagh did succeed in becoming a regular face on British TV and appeared in the musical films Just For Fun and It's All Over Town. She also appeared in various song festivals, finishing third in the European Song Cup competition in Greece, singing Powder Your Face With Sunshine.
Her career changed dramatically when she married John Morris, who became her manager. She signed a three single deal with RCA records in 1968, with the first two singles failing. Producer Kenny Young heard one of these and realized Clodagh had the wrong material. Taking her under his creative wing and together with Morris' management, Clodagh shot to fame in 1969 with two Top 5 chart hits – Come Back And Shake Me, and Goodnight Midnight, which resulted in her being the best selling female singles artist of that year. She also won the award for "The Best Legs" in British showbusiness and insured her voice for one million pounds. The further single releases Biljo, Everybody Go Home, The Party's Over and Lady Love Bug, continued her chart success in the next few years. Many of her songs around this time were written and produced by the American songwriter, Kenny Young. In 1970 Rodgers recorded a single called "Give Me Just a Little More Time" with Young which enjoyed moderate success. The duo called themselves Moonshine for this release.
[edit] Eurovision
With Morris guiding her career, Clodagh became a major household name and TV star, even if the hits didn't quite match her profile. In 1970 she was asked to represent the UK in the 1971 Eurovision Song Contest in Dublin. According to John Kennedy O'Connor's The Eurovision Song Contest – The Official History, part of the reasoning behind the BBC's invitation was their concern over what reaction the UK entrant would get on the stage from the Irish public. Clodagh received death threats from the I.R.A. as a result of her appearing for the UK.[2]
Heralded by two separate front cover features on the BBC listing's magazine The Radio Times, Clodagh appeared as the resident guest on It's Cliff Richard, a prime-time variety show hosted by Cliff Richard on BBC1 from January 1971, performing one shortlisted song a week for six weeks, followed by a performance of all six on week seven and a repeat of the six songs immediately after. Viewers would normally have been asked to send in postcard votes for their favourites, but owing to a postal strike, regional juries decided the winner, with Jack In The Box, written by John Worsley and David Myers, being named the winner the following week. The song that placed fourth in the UK selection, Another Time, Another Place, later became a hit for Engelbert Humperdinck.
For the first time in the Eurovision Song Contest, broadcasters were required to prepare a 'preview' video of the song for broadcast in all the participating Eurovision countries, helping promote the songs before the big night. In Dublin, Clodagh finished in fourth place, behind Monaco, Spain and Germany. It was the first time since 1966 that the UK had not placed first or second. The single became Clodagh's third and last UK Top 10 success reaching number 4.
Incidentally, at Eurovision, Clodagh's sister Lavinia Rodgers was one of her four backing singers. In 1982, Lavinia and brother Lewis Rodgers attempted to represent the UK in the contest as part of the group Good Looks. They failed to come through the UK heat. It is also rumoured that Clodagh teamed up with Thin Lizzy frontman Phil Lynott to record a duet which was submitted for the UK competition. The concept was shelved with Lynott's untimely death.
[edit] Post-Eurovision career
Despite only one more chart single, "Lady Love Bug" at Christmas 1971, Clodagh continued to be a major TV star in the UK, guesting on many shows, appearing in cabaret and becoming the face of "Bisto" in a series of UK TV ads. On Irish TV, The Clodagh Rodgers Show won an award at the Golden Rose TV festival in Montreux, and Clodagh starred in many other shows, including Seaside Special for the BBC Television (she hosted the first ever show from Great Yarmouth), The Morecambe and Wise Show and The Two Ronnies.
Clodagh also made a mark with her impressions of fellow artists such as Cilla Black, and often worked with Mike Yarwood, Des O'Connor, Tommy Cooper, Bob Monkhouse and Dickie Henderson in variety.
Clodagh was a regular performer in UK resort "Summer Seasons" sharing the bill with Mike and Bernie Winters amongst others. This success was mirrored on stage, where she has starred in London's West End in her own show at the Talk of the Town (breaking Sammy Davis, Jr.'s box office record); in Cinderella at the London Palladium (again breaking box office records); and in two musicals (to date). These were Pump Boys and Dinettes at the Piccadilly and Albery Theatres, and Blood Brothers at the Phoenix Theatre. She also appeared in the UK tour of Blood Brothers between 1995–1998. She says she would like to do more musicals.
Her stage career could have been more successful had she not been fired from a musical starring Tommy Steele in 1972 which damaged her theatrical reputation. Steele dismissed Clodagh from the show during rehearsals, accusing her of trying to build up her part and subsequently other stage work dried up. Despite this setback, Clodagh continued with TV work through to the late 1970's and when signed to Polydor records in 1976, it seemed her recording career would re-ignite, but despite saturation airplay and many TV appearances to promote the song, the 1977 single Save Me failed to chart. The track was covered in the US by Louise Mandrell in 1983, who took it to number six on the country charts. (Save Me was also covered by the South African all-girl band Clout in 1977.)
In 1978, Clodagh teamed with Terry Wogan on the ITV game show 3, 2, 1 in the programme's first Christmas Special Celebrity edition and the pair became the first ever 'contestants' to end up with the infamous 'Dustbin' rather than a prize for charity! She split from her manager and husband not long after the birth of their son and opted for motherhood over performing, although she did release two singles on the Precision label in 1980. One of these tracks was My Simple Heart, which was placed on the B-Side. Shortly after its release, The Three Degrees released their version of the song and took it into the UK top ten. Similarly, Clodagh had released Stand By Your Man as the B-Side of her 1971 single Lady Love Bug. This was later a number one hit single for Tammy Wynette in 1975.
[edit] Later years
Her second husband, guitarist Ian Sorbie died in 1995, not long after their Taunton based restaurant business collapsed, leaving them bankrupt.
In 1996, the first of two CD retrospectives were issued, bringing Clodagh back into the limelight once more. In 1998, she made a rare TV appearance with other former Eurovision artists, performing comedian John Shuttleworth's Eurovision parody Pigeon's In Flight on BBC2, just before the 1998 contest was staged in Birmingham. In 1999, Mint Royale issued a track Shake Me which sampled Clodagh's original recording of Come Back And Shake Me. The track was featured in the UK TV production Queer As Folk. More recently, Clodagh played a recurring character in the ITV continuing drama series, The Bill.
[edit] Discography [3]
[edit] Singles
- 1962 Believe Me I'm No Fool / End Of The Line (Decca F11534)
- 1963 Sometime Kind Of Love / I See More Of Him (Decca F11607)
- 1963 To Give My Love To You / I Only Live To Love You (Decca F11667)
- 1964 Mister Heartache / Time (Decca F11812)
- 1965 Wanting You / Johnny Come Home (Columbia DB7468)
- 1966 Every Day Is Just The Same / You'll Come A Running (Columbia DB7926)
- 1966 Stormy Weather / Lonely Room (Columbia DB8038)
- 1968 Room Full Of Roses / Play The Drama To The End (RCA 1684)
- 1968 Rhythm Of Love / River Of Tears (RCA 1748)
- 1969 Come Back And Shake Me / I Am A Fantasy (RCA 1792) #3
- 1969 Goodnight Midnight / Together (RCA 1852) #4
- 1969 Biljo / Spider (RCA 1891) #22
- 1970 Everybody Go Home The Party's Over / Joseph I'm Calling You (RCA 1930) #47
- 1970 Tangerines Tangerines / Wolf (RCA 1966)
- 1971 Jack In The Box / Someone To Love Me (RCA 16066) #4
(Also released as a 33 1/3 RPM Maxi Single with 3 tracks: Jack In The Box / Someone To Love Me / The Wind of Change)
- 1971 Lady Love Bug / Stand By Your Man (RCA 2117) #28
- 1972 It's Different Now / Take Me Home (RCA 2192)
- 1972 You Are My Music / One Day (RCA 2298)
- 1973 Carolina Days / Loving You (RCA 2355)
- 1973 That’s The Way I’ve Always Heard It Should Be / ?? (RCA 5248)
- 1974 Get It Together / Take Me Home (RCA 5008)
- 1974 Saturday Sunday / Love Is (PYE 7N 45387)
- 1977 Save Me / Sleepyhead (Polydor 2058804)
- 1977 Put It Back Together / Lay Me Down (Polydor 2058887)
- 1977 Incident At The Roxy / ?? (Polydor 2058864)
- 1977 Loving Cup / Morning Comes Quickly (Polydor 2058934)
- 1978 Love Is Deep Inside Of Me / Candlelight (Polydor 2058997)
- 1980 I Can't Afford That Feeling Anymore / My Simple Heart (Precision 109)
- 1980 Person To Person / My Simple Heart (Precision 119)
- 1999 Shake Me (Mint Royale ft. Clodagh Rodgers) (FHCD010)
[edit] Album
- 1969 Clodagh Rodgers - (RCA SF8033) - Number 27 - UK Albums Chart
- 1969 Midnight Clodagh - (RCA SF8071)
- 1971 Rodgers And Heart - (RCA Victor SF8180)
- 1971 Clodagh Rodgers (Compilation) - (RCA Camden CDS1094)
- 1972 It's Different Now - (RCA SF8271)
- 1973 You Are My Music - (RCA SF8394)
- 1973 Come Back And Shake Me (Compilation) - (RCA International 1434)
- 1977 Save Me - (Polydor Super 2383473)
- 1996 You Are My Music - The Best Of Clodagh Rodgers (Compilation CD) - (BMG Camden BM830)
- 1997 The Masters (Compilation CD) - (Eagle EACD076)
[edit] References
- ^ Sleeve notes, Backcomb 'n' Beat: Dream Babes Volume Three (RPM CD, 2001)
- ^ The Eurovision Song Contest - The Official History. O'Connor, John Kennedy. Carlton Books UK ISBN 978-1-84442-944-3
- ^ Roberts, David (2006). British Hit Singles & Albums, 19th, London: Guinness World Records Limited, p. 467. ISBN 1-904994-10-5.
