Written in 1934, Rodgers and Hammerstein's 'Blue Moon' has become a much covered standard (Elvis had cut a bleached to the bone version at Sun that was a desolate howl to the moon looking down at him), though it's fair to say that none sound anything like the makeover The Marcels gave it.A Pennsylvanian doo-wop act, The Marcels made a career out of putting American standards through the wringer ('Summertime' and 'You Are My Sunshine' would get similar treatment), yet none were quite so radical as the bass voiced "bomp-baba-bomp dip-da-dip" that opens this onetime ballad. The basic still melody lurks behind it, but it's buried in a 100mph avalanche of voices that change the "And then there suddenly appeared before me, the only one my arms will ever hold" into a teenage celebration of togetherness that claims the song back from the adult sophistication peddled elsewhere. It's a neat subversion of expectation, but bottom line for me is that 'Blue Moon' by The Marcels is more a song to be admired than enjoyed. I admire it's inventiveness, it's audacity and its in your face joie de vivre, but at heart I like my 'Blue Moon' to be blue and to not give off as much light as the sun.
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