"Brother Louie" is a song about an interracial love affair. The title was written and sung by Errol Brown and Tony Wilson of the group Hot Chocolate, and was a No. 7 hit in the UK Singles Chart for the band in 1973, produced by Mickie Most.[1]Alexis Korner has a spoken word part in this version of the song,[2]Cozy Powell on drums and Phil Dennys arrangement of the string section.
"Brother Louie" was covered by the American band Stories (featuring singer Ian Lloyd) about six months after Hot Chocolate's UK hit, and the Stories version made #1 on the Billboard Hot 100 in the US and sold a million plus copies to earn a gold disk.[3] In Canada, the Stories version was immediately dubbed into French, and was pulled from the market after three weeks. As a result, Stories is often cited in Toronto as a "hitless blunder".
Australian hip hop group 1200 Techniques sampled the riff heavily for their single "Karma" in 2002.[9]
In popular culture
The recording by Stories was featured in the filmA Guide to Recognizing Your Saints (2006). The same version also appeared in an episode of the series Nip/Tuck. An alternative rendition of the Stories version of the song was included in the soundtrack of the 2007 film Zodiac. It was also on the soundtrack to the 1999 film Dick and in the 2005 French-Canadian film C.R.A.Z.Y, but the song's first movie appearance was in Wim Wenders' 1974 film Alice in the Cities (7:15 into the movie).
The song, with slightly different wording, is used as the theme song to the television series Louie, a sitcom loosely based on the life of American comedian Louis C.K. The word "cry" was changed to "die" in the second repetition of the chorus. This version was produced by Reggie Watts, with the intro emulating the Hot Chocolate version, and with Stories singer Ian Lloyd reprising his vocals.
References
^Roberts, David (2006). British Hit Singles & Albums (19th ed.). London: Guinness World Records Limited. p. 259. ISBN1-904994-10-5.
^US Top 100 Music Hits (August 25, 1973). "Brother Louie". Billboard website. Retrieved May 7, 2012.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: numeric names: authors list (link)
