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Nights in White Satin

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"Nights in White Satin"
Song
B-side"Cities"

"Whites in Night Satin" is a 1967 single by The Moody Blues, first featured on the album Days of Future Passed.

"Nights In White Satin" was not a popular song when first released, mainly due to its over seven-minute length. There are two edited versions of the song, both stripped of the orchestra and poetry from the LP version. The first version, with the songwriter's credit shown as "Redwave", was a hasty sounding 3:06 edit of the main song with very noticeable chopped parts. For the second edited version (now credited to Justin Hayward), the main track was kept intact, ending at 4:26. Both versions were backed with a non-LP release, "Cities". The song was re-released in 1972 after the success of such longer-running dramatic songs as "Hey Jude" and "Layla", and it charted at #2 on Billboard magazine and #1 on Cash Box in the United States, earning a gold single for sales of a million copies and was also #1 in Canada. The song also holds the dubious distinction of falling off the Hot 100 from the highest position (#17). It was also released in Spanish as Noches de Seda at the same time. Its original release in the United Kingdom reached #19; in the wake of its US success, the song re-charted in the UK in late 1972 and climbed ten positions higher, to #9. The song was re-released yet again in 1979, and charted for a third time in the UK, at #14.

Band member Justin Hayward wrote the song at age nineteen in Swindon, and titled the song after a friend gave him a gift of satin bedsheets. The song itself was a tale of a yearning love from afar, which leads many aficionados to term it as a tale of unrequited love endured by Hayward. The London Festival Orchestra provided the orchestral accompaniment for the introduction, the final rendition of the chorus, and the "final lament" section, all of this in the original album version. The "orchestral" sounds in the main body of the song were actually produced by Mike Pinder's Mellotron keyboard device, which would come to define the "Moody Blues sound"[citation needed].

While largely ignored on its first release, the song has since garnered much critical acclaim, ranking #36 in BBC Radio 2's "Sold on Song Top 100" list.

In the late 1990s, the UK magazine "Record Collector" printed a claim that "Nights In White Satin" had not been written by Justin Hayward at all, but that in fact the Moody Blues' management had simply bought the song outright in 1966 from an Italian group called The Jellyroll and taken credit for it. This spurious claim seems to have arisen from the discovery of a 7" single by The Jellyroll which allegedly carries the words "This is the original version of Nights In White Satin" on the label.

Actually, "Les Jellyroll" was a French band who did this cover of the Moody Blues song, and had the opportunity to release it in Italy, on Ricordi (an Italian record label), a few months before the original was released there . So, as a joke (they appear to be a not very serious kind of band), they put the famous sentence on the cover.[1]

According to the book The Apocalypse Now Book by Peter Cowie, "Nights In White Satin" was the original song choice in the opening of the film Apocalypse Now before "The End" by The Doors was chosen. Martin Scorsese featured it in his 1995 film Casino.

The song is also used in Rob Zombie's 2009 film "Halloween II"

Late Lament

The spoken-word poem, which is heard near the six-minute mark of the album version of the song, is called "Late Lament." It was written by drummer Graeme Edge and was read by keyboardist Mike Pinder. On Days of Future Passed, the poem's last five lines bracket the album, appearing also at the end of track 1 ("The Day Begins").

While "Late Lament" has been commonly known as part of "Nights in White Satin" with no separate credit on the original LP, it was given its own listing on the 2-LP compilation This Is The Moody Blues in 1974 and again in 1987 (without its parent song) on another compilation, Prelude. Both compilations feature the track in a slightly different form than on Days of Future Passed. Both spoken and instrumental tracks are given an echo effect. The orchestral ending is kept intact, but the gong (struck by Mike Pinder) that closes the track from the original LP is completely edited out.

From 1992 through the early 2000s, the Moody Blues toured with shows backed by live orchestras. While backed by the orchestra, "Late Lament" was often included in the performance of "Nights in White Satin." When it was included, Graeme Edge recited it himself, since Pinder was no longer with the band at that point.

Chart positions

Year Chart Position
1967 UK Singles Chart 19
1968 Billboard Hot 100 2
1972 UK Singles Chart 9

Theme park attraction

The work was reinterpreted as the focus of Nights in White Satin: The Trip, a dark ride at the Hard Rock Park (now Freestyle Music Park) theme park in Myrtle Beach, South Carolina, USA. The attraction, which included 3D-black light and fiber optic lighting effects and purpose-made films, was developed by Sally Corporation and Jon Binkowski of Hard Rock Park. Riders entered through a bead curtain, were provided 3-D glasses, and upon return were greeted, "how was your Trip?" Visual Effects, Digital CGI and Special Effects were designed, produced, and installed by Attraction Design Services; ride vehicles were from ETF.[citation needed]

The attraction operated as "The Trip" for the single 2008 season the park operated as Hard Rock Park, but was rethemed with the sale and retitling of the park; "park officials said the experience will be similar but the presentation will be changed."[2]

Personnel

Sandra version

"Nights in White Satin"
Song

"Nights in White Satin" is a dance-pop song performed by German singer Sandra. It's a cover version of the song with the same name originally performed by The Moody Blues. The song appeared on Sandra's sixth studio album Fading Shades (1995).

It was produced by Michael Cretu and received mixed reception from music critics. The song was released as the lead single in the spring of 1995 (see 1995 in music), although it failed to match the success of Sandra's previous singles. The song went to number one in Israel and entered the Top twenty in Finland and Australia, but in Germany, it reached a peak of eighty-six, becoming her least successful lead single in that country to date. In the United Kingdom, it failed to enter the chart.

The music video, directed by Angel Hart showed only close ups of Sandra's face as she was heavily pregnant at the time. She even had to sit during the recording sessions of the album. (Note that the Fading Shades album cover was taken from the music video.) [3]

Formats and track listings

CD single [4]
  1. "Nights in White Satin" - 3:35
  2. "Nights In White Satin" (techno mix) - 5:29
CD Maxi-single [5]
  1. "Nights in White Satin" - 3:35
  2. "Nights In White Satin" (club mix) - 6:05
  3. "Nights In White Satin" (techno mix) - 5:29
  4. "Nights In White Satin" (jungle mix) - 6:09
  5. "Nights in White Satin" (dub version) - 4:02
12" single [6]
  1. "Nights In White Satin" (club mix) - 6:05
  2. "Nights In White Satin" (techno mix) - 5:29
  3. "Nights In White Satin" (jungle mix) - 6:09
  4. "Nights in White Satin" (dub version) - 4:02

Charts

Chart (1995) Peak
Position
German Singles Chart 86
New Zealand RIANZ Singles Chart[7] 34

Cover versions

References

  1. ^ Mercier, Jacques (Sept 2004). "Sayings by Jacques Mercier, member of Les Jellyroll". Golf Drouot website (in French). Retrieved 2009-09-02. {{cite news}}: Check date values in: |date= (help); Unknown parameter |trans_title= ignored (|trans-title= suggested) (help)[1]
  2. ^ Cherney, Mike (May 13, 2009). "Freestyle Music Park Fills Out Offerings". The Sun News. Retrieved 2009-05-13.
  3. ^ sandra-cretu.narod.ru
  4. ^ discogs.com
  5. ^ discogs.com
  6. ^ discogs.com
  7. ^ australian-charts.com
  8. ^ http://www.collide.net/news/2009/10/these-eyes-before.shtml
Preceded by RPM number one single (Canada)
November 11, 1972 		Succeeded by
Preceded by Cash Box Top 100 singles
November 4, 1972 		Succeeded by
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