Friday, July 17, 2009

Garden Party - Luokkajuhlat


After the group Eero, Jussi & the Boys (see previous entry) temporarily split, Jussi Raittinen was building a very successful career as a solo artist in the 70's. He has always been a keen friend of country music and at the time he also recorded some country- or country flavoured albums. One of those was "Kantri & rock" in 1975. It included the track "Luokkajuhlat" (Class reunion), which tells a semi-autobiographical story of what it's like to meet your old friends when you're a celebrity. Similarly, the original song "Garden Party", written and performed by Rick Nelson (b. Eric Hilliard Nelson) tells about real-life experiences. "Garden Party" was a 1972 hit song for Rick and the Stone Canyon Band from the album of the same name. It tells of his being booed off the stage at Madison Square Garden (hence the name 'Garden Party') because he was playing his newer music instead of the 1950s-era rock that he had been successful with, and his realization that "you can't please everyone, so you've got to please yourself". There are some references in the lyrics to those who were there in the audience, for example: "Yoko brought her Walrus", referring of course to Yoko Ono and John Lennon ...

Here's the pair:

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