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I'm a Believer

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"I'm a Believer"
Song
B-side"(I'm Not Your) Steppin' Stone"
The Monkees - "I'm a Believer"
16 seconds (of 2:47)
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"I'm a Believer" is a song composed by Neil Diamond and recorded by The Monkees in 1966 with the lead vocals by Micky Dolenz. The single, produced by Jeff Barry, hit the number one spot on the U.S. Billboard Hot 100 chart for the week ending December 31, 1966 and remained there for seven weeks,[2] becoming the last No. 1 hit of 1966 and the biggest-selling record for all of 1967. Billboard ranked the record as the No. 5 song for 1967.[3] Because of 1,051,280 advance orders, it went gold within two days of release. It is one of the fewer than forty all-time singles to have sold 10 million (or more) physical copies worldwide.

The song was No. 1 in the UK Singles Chart for four weeks in January and February 1967.[4]

History

Neil Diamond had already recorded this song before it was covered by The Monkees, and it still sometimes appears in his live concerts. A revised recording by Neil Diamond, featuring additional lyrics, appears on the album September Morn, while his original recording appeared on the 1967 album Just for You. Neil Diamond also suggested it to The Fifth Estate who recorded it as a 1967 album cut to follow up their hit "Ding-Dong! The Witch Is Dead". The Monkees' recording kept the novelty hit "Snoopy Vs. The Red Baron", by The Royal Guardsmen, at number two for four weeks, from reaching the Hot 100's summit.

The song was originally used in the home video version of the Coen brothers' 1984 film Blood Simple, but after licensing issues were resolved, was replaced in the 2001 director's cut by the song used in the theatrical version: Four Tops' "It's the Same Old Song".[5]

Recording

Session guitarist Al Gorgoni (who later played on "The Sound of Silence" and "Brown Eyed Girl") had worked on Diamond's "Cherry, Cherry" and also contributed to this song. Other personnel on the record include Sal Ditroia on guitar, Dick Romoff on bass, Artie Butler on organ, Jeff Barry on piano and tambourine, and Buddy Saltzman on drums.

In 2008, the song ranked No. 1 on Dallas station KLUV 98.7FM's Top 500 Memorial Day Countdown, as voted on by the listeners.[citation needed] The song is listed at No. 48 on Billboard's All Time Top 100.[2]

Other versions

British singer-songwriter Robert Wyatt had a Top 30 hit in the UK in September/October 1974 (it reached #29 in the UK charts) with a version featuring Fred Frith on violin, Andy Summers (later of The Police) on guitar, and drums by Nick Mason of Pink Floyd, who also produced the recording. It was Wyatt's first recording after the June 1973 accident that left him a paraplegic.

In 1995, British comedians Vic Reeves and Bob Mortimer teamed up with the band EMF for a version which reached No. 3 on the UK Singles Chart. Reeves & Mortimer's insertion of an "Oi!" after the first line of each verse has since become a regular feature of cover versions of the song.

This song was also covered by Smash Mouth and Eddie Murphy in 2001, as part of the soundtrack to the movie Shrek (the band also released the song on its self-titled album). Eddie Murphy, portraying the character "Donkey", also performed a rendition of the song in the film. The song was chosen for its opening line, "I thought love was only true in fairy tales," which matched the fairy tale theme of the film. Subsequently, the song was played as exit music for the Broadway musical adaptation of the film, for comic effect. A year into the show's run, it was inserted into its finale.

A nod to the version by Reeves & Mortimer with EMF is included in Shrek; though the "Oi!" does not appear in any album version of Smash Mouth's cover, it is inserted into the song when it is played in the film's finale, shouted by Snow White's Seven Dwarfs. A different cover, by Weezer, appears in Shrek Forever After.

In 2010, Neil Diamond recorded a stripped down, slow tempo version of the song on his Dreams album, and Paije Richardson performed an I'm a Believer/Hey Ya! mash-up on series seven of The X Factor. In 2012, the group Emblem3 performed an uptempo version on The X Factor to mixed reviews from the judges.

Selected list of recorded versions

References

  1. ^ a b c Rice, Jo (1982). The Guinness Book of 500 Number One Hits (1st ed.). Enfield, Middlesex: Guinness Superlatives Ltd. p. 106. ISBN 0-85112-250-7.
  2. ^ a b "The Billboard Hot 100 All-Time Top Songs". Billboard. Retrieved 6 March 2012.
  3. ^ Billboard Year-End Hot 100 singles of 1967
  4. ^ Roberts, David (2006). British Hit Singles & Albums (19th ed.). London: Guinness World Records Limited. p. 200. ISBN 1-904994-10-5.
  5. ^ Beckett, david (March 27, 2013). "Blood Simple - Director's Cut (2013) DVD". Film 365.
  6. ^ "Smash Mouth - Chart History". Billboard.com. Retrieved 19 October 2014.
Preceded by Billboard Hot 100 number one single
December 31, 1966 (seven weeks) 		Succeeded by
Preceded by UK number one single
19 January 1967 (four weeks) 		Succeeded by
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