Twenty Four Hours from Tulsa

"Twenty-Four Hours from Tulsa" is a song written by Burt Bacharach and Hal David which was a hit for Gene Pitney.^[1][2] Its success in the UK enabled Pitney to become an international star. In the US, Pitney peaked at #17 on the pop chart.^[3]

Jay and the Americans covered the song on their 1963 album, At the Cafe Wha?, while Dusty Springfield covered it on her debut album A Girl Called Dusty.^[4] It was covered by Yachts in 1980 and by Claire Hamill in 1983.

International Cover Versions

Canadian duo Ian and Sylvia covered this song on their 1965 album Play One More.

Swedish singer Östen Warnerbring has made a Swedish version called "15 minuter från Eslöv" ("15 minutes from Eslöv").

French singer and composer Claude François made the French version (tells a somewhat different story, though the spirit remains the same) Maman chérie (Lit. "my dear Mum"). In it, instead of telling his 'future ex-girlfriend' that he met someone else, he impersonates a man who's lived a life full of parties, fun, and met a girl, made mistakes, and is too ashamed to have not listened to his parents' advice, and just like in the original, he concludes that he'll "never, never, go home again" (je ne pourrai jamais, jamais, rentrer chez nous).

The song is somewhat bleaker in its tone. Not without any chiasmatic mirroring My Way (Claude François being one of the co-authors of the original song Comme d'habitude) that has deeper meaning in Paul Anka's lyrics than in the original French version by Claude François and Jacques Revaux.

References in popular culture

Carter the Unstoppable Sex Machine wrote a song that appeared on their album 101 Damnations, entitled 24 Minutes from Tulse Hill as a reference to the song. The song refers to the journey time by train to Tulse Hill, from central London.

References