Wednesday, March 3, 2010

Brandy - Mandy - Leena


This is the song about Brandy (aka Mandy) who was re-christened (by lyricist Vexi Salmi) to "Leena" in the Finnish version. It was done by a singer named Aaron (real name Aaro Laukkonen). He has made a long career in pop business, but has never really broken through. That's kind of shame, because he has voice talent, as you can hear in this song from the year 1975 from his album "Miten ois?". The song song was also versioned by Kai Hyttinen in the same year (I present it here, if I got hold of it). The original lady was "Brandy" by name and a American singer-songwriter Scott English co-wrote and sung the song in 1971, and it was a minor hit in UK (perhaps due to his sirname ;-)) climbing to number 12 in UK Charts. But the worldwide fame for the song came when Barry Manilow recorded in 1974 as a slow tempo ballad. In the three years between English's 1971 recording and Manilow's, Looking Glass had a hit song with "Brandy (You're a Fine Girl)" in 1972. Therefore, to avoid confusion, Manilow changed the title to "Mandy". It turned out to be Barry's first hit.

Here's the triplet:

No comments: