This was from a TV shoe. The female backup singles were called The Blossoms. The one in the middle is Darlene Love who is in her 80s and still touring.
Carol King who co wrote this played piano and Al Kaplan played sax and the late great great session drummer Buddy Salztman played those drums he also played for the Four Seasons among other acts
Did you hear that great saxophone! Our music back then was great & involved so many musical instruments that aren't used anymore -- what a shame. And a singer had to have natural talent - no auto-tune or messing around to make a singer sound good. Great music, great fun to bounce to or slow dance to.
A super locomotive reaction 🚆! She's from North Carolina. The Loco-motion was released as the lead single from Little Eva's 1962 album: Llllloco-Motion. The song was written by Carole King and Gerry Goffin. The song was produced by Gerry Goffin. The Cookies (Dorothy Jones, Earl-Jean McCrea, Margaret Ross) sang the backing vocals. It reached #1 on the Hot 100, #1 on the R&B chart and #1 on the Cash Box 100. It also peaked at #1 in Canada, Norway, Sweden and New Zealand. The single sold one millions copies and was certified Gold. Billboard ranked the song at #7 on their end of the year Hot 100 music chart songs for 1962. This performance is from the TV show: Shindig!, on March 3, 1965. In 1988, on The Cosby Show ("How Do You Get To Carnegie Hall") Vanessa form a vocal group: The Lipsticks, and performed the song with her group. The song is an enduring example of the Dance-Song musical genre, as much of the song's lyrics are devoted to a description of the dance itself, usually performed as a type of line dance. Carole King credits Little Eva for coming up with the famous dance. "Though 'The Loco-Motion' alludes to dance movements, neither Gerry nor I had envisioned an actual dance", Carole King recalled in her 2012 memoir: A Natural Woman. "Eva had to invent one for personal appearances. Standing beside a locomotive for publicity photographs, with 'The Loco-Motion' playing on loudspeakers, Eva moved her body that day in imitation of the arm that drives a locomotive, and a dance was born". "Loco" means "crazy" in Spanish, implying that the dance was a crazy motion. The promotional photo for the single features five of the people involved posing around an actual locomotive train engine: Producers Don Kirshner and Al Nevins on the left, founders of Aldon Music, songwriters Gerry Goffin and Carole King on the right, the writers, and lead singer Little Eva, in the front with one foot up on the train like she's keeping it parked so it doesn't roll away. The photo graced the cover of Cashbox magazine. The single: "The Loco-Motion", was also the second song to reach #1 on the Billboard Pop chart by two different musical acts Little Eva (1962), Grand Funk Railroad (1974) in America. The earlier song to do this was the single: "Go Away Little Girl", with Steve Lawrence (1963) and Donny Osmond (1971). It was also written by Gerry Goffin and Carole King. The song is also especially notable for making three appearances in the Billboard Pop chart Top 3, each in a different decade: Little Eva (#1 Pop 1962), Grand Funk Railroad (#1 Pop 1974) and Kylie Minogue (#3 Pop 1988). Another bit of the conventional ☹lore around the song is that Little Eva received only $50 for recording the song: "The Loco-Motion". However, although she never owned the rights to her recordings, it seems $50 was actually her weekly salary during the years she was making records which was an increase of $15 from what Gerry Goffin and Carole King had been paying her as their nanny. In 1971, Little Eva moved to North Carolina living in obscurity on menial jobs and welfare until being rediscovered in 1988, when she put out a new album and began regularly touring on the oldies and cabaret circuit until her passing in 2003. The husband-and-wife songwriting team of Carole King and Gerry Goffin wrote the song. Little Eva was Eva Boyd, the babysitter - actually more of a nanny - being paid $35/week to watch their daughter Louise and clean the house. They were all young: Little Eva was 17, Carole King 19 and Gerry Goffin 22. One day Carole King came up with a melody that Gerry Goffin thought sounded like a locomotive, and when he saw Little Eva dancing with their daughter to the tune, he got the idea to make the song about a brand new dance: The Loco-Motion. He wrote the song lyrics and they brought Little Eva to the studio and had her record the song as a demo song, as they were hoping Dee Dee Sharp would sing it. Their studio producer Don Kirshner thought Little Eva's vocal was just fine, so they named her Little Eva and had her record the song. The only downside for Carole King and Gerry Goffin was losing their nanny: when the song became a million-seller, Little Eva was able to buy a place of her own. Gerry Goffin had actually had this song idea in the back of his mind for a couple of years, but had never found the right moment to bring it out. When he sat down to write it at last, he defended it to Carole: "This is going to sound stupid, but what the hell. Don't all the biggest fads start out that way?". The song's saxophone solo was performed by Artie Kaplan, who was also the contractor for the recording session. Artie Kaplan was a song plugger in Aldon Music's publishing department and also Aldon's Music Contractor. Among many other things, he was the one who discovered Tony Orlando while eating lunch at the diner across the street from the Brill Building. As songwriter Barry Mann's roommate, he was there to see the beginning of Mann's relationship to songwriter Cynthia Weil. Describing the sessions for this song, Artie Kaplan told Songfacts: "I contracted the 'Loco-Motion' recording session and cast the two other musicians who I thought would be right for the date, namely Buddy Saltzman on drums and Charlie Macey on guitar and bass. I played five saxophone overdubs on baritone sax and tenor sax plus the solo part on the session to fill out the feel of a larger orchestra. Carole King played piano on the date and also wrote the arrangement, while she and The Cookies - a female R&B group that recorded for Aldon Music, added their brilliant vocal backgrounds. And of course there was the wonderful vocal by Eva Boyd, all under the direction of Gerry Goffin and a most able sound engineer Ron Johnson at Dick Charles Recording studios in New York City. In those days demos were recorded in mono. Meaning that every time the musicians played a different orchestral part or the singers sang an added harmony, the engineer had to bounce the original track to a second machine while balancing the preceding part along with it. This process, known as overdubbing, was quite common in the early days among songwriters seeking inexpensive studios in which to record their songs to audition for music producers and music publishers. I only mention this bit of history because I hesitate to think of how this recording would have survived, but for the excellent work of the sound engineer Ron Johnson and the masterful job he did mixing a 'smash hit' record, overdub by overdub, and he never received a thank you for his effort. So, I'll do it now, for everyone who simply forgot. Thank you Ron Johnson for mixing 'The Loco-Motion', a piece of musical history. For without you, we would all be nothing. Much love to you, wherever you are, Artie Kaplan". When the demo of this song was completed, Artie Kaplan took it to Cameo-Parkway Records, but the record label's producer Bernie Lowe listened to the opening for all of sixty seconds before squeaking the needle off the record and saying "I didn't hear the hook", turning it down cold. Artie Kaplan just shrugged and took it back to Aldon Music. Bernie Lowe's exact facial expression, upon hearing this song come out of the radio later as a #1 hit by July of '62, is forever lost to history but we're pretty sure it must have been memorable. And that's how this song became the first single put out by the newly-formed Dimension Records, spawned from Aldon Music. The song has been featured in some films including 📽: Inland Empire (2006), There Goes My Baby (1994), Matinee (1993), Waiting For The Light (1990), The In Crowd(1988), Concrete Angels (1987), Baby Love (1983), Trading Places (1983), Heart Like A Wheel (1983), Big Wednesday (1978), Aloha Bobby And Rose (1975), Dusty And Sweets McGee (1971) and more. The song has been featured in some TV shows-TV movies including 📺: Family Guy ("The New Adventures Of Old Tom" - 2016), Call The Midwife ("Christmas Special" - 2016), The Playboy Club ("A Matter Of Simple Duplicity" - 2011), Quantum Leap ("Thou Shalt Not... - February 2, 1974" - 1989), The Cosby Show ("How Do You Get To Carnegie Hall?" - 1988), Girl Groups: The Story Of Sound (1983) and more. The song has been covered by other artists including 📻: Ritz, Grand Funk Railroad, Kylie Minogue, Carole King, The Chiffons, Ebony, Atomic Kitten, Daffi Cramer, Sylvie Vartan, Jimmy Takeuchi, Luzia, Pat Boone, The Vernons Girls, Dave Stewart and Barbara Gaskin, Dee Dee Sharpe, The Ventures, Shelley Fabares, Ike & Tina Turner, Susi Dorée, Alan Tam, Girl Authority, Clare Teal, Dea Doll, Victor Wood, Les Ambassadors, Tina Y Tesa, Lynda Carter, Frederik, The Johnstones, Amin, Franz Lambert, Peggy Gaines, Tiiti, Les Pirates, Erica Frank, Bobby Jay And The Hawks, Ringo Starr And His All-Starr Band, The Dreamlovers and more. Legacy 🛡: "The Loco-Motion" is ranked #359 on Rolling Stone's list of "The 500 Greatest Songs of All Time". In 2016, Little Eva's version of "The Loco-Motion" on Dimension Records was inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame. ****CONTINUE BELOW****
Lyrics 🗒: Everybody's doin' a brand-new dance, now (Come on baby, do the Loco-motion) I know you'll get to like it if you give it a chance now (Come on baby, do the Loco-motion) My little baby sister can do it with me, It's easier than learning your A, be, see's, So come on, come on, do the Loco-motion with me. You gotta swing your hips, now. Come on, baby. Jump up. Jump back. Well, now, I think you've got the knack. Now that you can do it, let's make a chain, now. (Come on baby, do the Loco-motion) A chug-a chug-a motion like a railroad train, now. (Come on baby, do the Loco-motion) Do it nice and easy, now, don't lose control: A little bit of rhythm and a lot of soul. So come on, come on, do the Loco-motion with me. Move around the floor in a Loco-motion. (Come on baby, do the Loco-motion) Do it holding hands if you get the notion. (Come on baby, do the Loco-motion) There's never been a dance that's so easy to do. It even makes you happy when you're feeling blue, So come on, come on, do the Loco-motion with me Little Eva info 📰: Eva "Little Eva" Boyd was born in Belhaven, North Carolina, in 1943 and had twelve siblings. At the age of fifteen, she moved to the Brighton Beach section of Brooklyn, New York. As a teenager, she worked as a maid and earned extra money as a babysitter. She later moved to Coney Island to stay with her brother and his wife, who was a friend of Earl-Jean McCrea, a member of the female vocal group: The Cookies. Little Eva, who was named after her aunt "Big Eva", hence her nickname “Little Eva,” auditioned as a singer for The Cookies. The song she sang during her audition was: "Will You Love Me Tomorrow?", written by Carole King and Gerry Goffin. Little Eva, at 18 years of age, subsequently joined The Cookies as a backup vocalist on recording dates. She also recorded demo tape of the 1962 song: “Uptown”, by The Crystals, for Phil Spector. Carole King and Gerry Goffin knew Little Eva could sing and hired her as a babysitter for $35 a week for their growing family. It is often claimed that Gerry Goffin and Carole King were amused by Little Eva's particular dancing style, so they wrote the song: "The Loco-Motion", for her and had her record it as a demo song but the record was intended for Dee Dee Sharp. However, as Carole King said in an interview with NPR and in her "One To One" concert video, they knew she could sing when they met her, and it would be just a matter of time before they would have her record songs they wrote, the most successful being the single: "The Loco-Motion". Music producer Don Kirshner of Dimension Records was impressed by the song and Little Eva's voice and had the single released. The song reached #1 on the Pop and R&B charts in 1962. It sold over one million copies, and was awarded a Gold record by the RIAA. After the success of the single: "The Loco-Motion", Little Eva was stereotyped as a dance-craze singer and was given limited material to record. The same year, Gerry Goffin and Carole King wrote the song: "He Hit Me (And It Felt Like a Kiss)", for The Crystals, after discovering that Little Eva was being regularly beaten by her boyfriend. When they inquired why she tolerated such treatment, Little Eva replied without batting an eyelid said that "her boyfriend's actions were motivated by his love for her". Little Eva's follow-up single: "Keep Your Hands Off My Baby" (1962), reached #6 on the R&B chart and #12 on the Pop chart. Her third single: "Let’s Turkey Trot" (1963), peaked at #16 on the R&B chart and #20 on the Pop chart. Her debut album: Llllloco-Motion, was released in 1962 on Dimension Records. In 1963, she recorded a non-album single: :Swinging On A Star" a duet with Big Dee Irwin, and a remake of the 1944 Bing Crosby standard. The song peaked at #38 on the Pop chart and #7 on the UK Singles chart. She also recorded the song: "Makin' With The Magilla", for an episode of the 1964 Hanna-Barbera cartoon series: The Magilla Gorilla Show. In 1963, American Bandstand signed Little Eva to "Dick Clark's Caravan Of Stars" national US tour and she was set to perform for the tour's 15th show, scheduled for the night of November 22, 1963 at the Memorial Auditorium in Dallas, Texas when suddenly the Friday evening event was cancelled, moments after then US President John F Kennedy was assassinated while touring Dallas in an open car caravan. Little Eva continued to tour and record throughout the 1960s, but her commercial appeal plummeted after 1964. She eventually retired from the music industry in 1971 in order to raise her three children working menial labor jobs and even ending up on welfare for a time as she never owned any rights to her popular songs. Although the prevailing rumor in the 1970s was that she had received only $50 for the song: "The Loco-Motion", it seems $50 was actually her weekly salary at the time she made her records which was an increase of $15 from what Gerry Goffin and Carole King had been paying her as their nanny. In 1973 the album: Swinging On A Star, a collaboration album made up of previously recorded songs by Little Eva and Big Dee Irwin was released by Astor Records. It is unlikely that Little Eva saw any money from the album's release as she did not own any of her songs but both Carole King and Gerry Goffin would have been paid song royalties from the album. Her signature song: "The Loco-Motion", remained popular as evidenced by Grand Funk Railroad's 1974 cover version which went to #1 on the Pop chart and peaked at #1 in Canada as well. Little Eva was interviewed in 1988 after the success of the Kylie Minogue recording of the song: "The Loco-Motion", Little Eva stated that she did not like the new version, however, its then-current popularity allowed her to make a comeback in show business. Little Eva released an album: Back On Track, in 1988. She also returned to performing live with other artists of her era like Bobby Vee on the cabaret and oldies circuits throughout the 1990s and early 2000s. In a 1991 Richard Nader concert, she performed the songs: "The Loco-Motion" and "Keep Your Hands Off My Baby". The concert was partially documented on videotape, albeit of marginal quality. Miscellaneous Note 🗃: The only existing footage of Little Eva performing the song: "Loco-Motion", is a small video clip from the 1960s ABC TV show: Shindig!, wherein she sang a short version of the clip along with performing the famous dance steps. She also sang the songs: "Let's Turkey Trot" and "I Want You To Be My Boy", during the same show episode. It was on of her final live performances before she retired from the music industry in 1971. Little Eva Passing 🙏🏾: Eva "Little Eva" Boyd (June 29, 1943 - April 10, 2003) Little Eva continued performing until she was diagnosed with cervical cancer in October 2001. She passed away on April 10, 2003, in Kinston, North Carolina, at the age of 59. She was laid to rest at Black Bottom Cemetery in Belhaven, North Carolina. Little Eva's gravesite was sparsely marked until July 2008, when a report by WRAL-TV of Raleigh, North Carolina, highlighted deteriorating conditions at the cemetery and efforts by the city of Belhaven to have it restored. A simple white cross had marked the site until a new gravestone was unveiled in November of that year. Little Eva's new grey gravestone has the image of a steam locomotive prominently engraved on the front and the epitaph reads: "Singing with the Angels". Little Eva Albums 📀: Llllloco-Motion (1962) Swinging On A Star w/ Big Dee Irwin (1973) Back On Track (1988) Some more good Little Eva songs 🎶: He Is The Boy, Keep Your Hands Off My Baby, Let's Turkey Trot, Uptown, I Want You To Be My Boy, Old Smokey Loco-Motion, Swinging On A Star, Mama Said, Let's Start The Party Again, What I Gotta Do (To Make You Jealous), Everything Is Beautiful About You Boy, That's My Man, Down Home, Take A Step In My Direction, Uptight, I Wish You A Merry Christmas, Makin' With The Magilla, Sharing You, Ain't Got No Home, Bend It, Just One Word Ain't Enough, Stand By Me, Run To Her, Wake Up John, I Have A Love, Another Night With The Boys, Get Him, Back On Track, I Knew Your Love, In Memory Of CJ, You Are So Beautiful, Heigh Ho, I'm Not Strong, Needing You Again, Wake Up To The Music, One More Mountain, Love X 3, Confusion, Put Your Hand In The Hand, This Feeling Is Real, Don't It Make You Wanna Dance, God Bless America, Just A Little Girl, The Trouble With Boys, Where Do I Go?, Something About You Boy, Follow The Wind, Dynamite, Some Kind Of Wonderful, Please Hurt Me, Takin' Back What I Said, Will You Love Me Tomorrow?, Mr Everything, Night After Night, Get Ready, Breaking Up Is Hard To Do, The Christmas Song and Up On The Roof. Fun Fact 🕵🏾♀: Little Eva's 1962 song: "The Loco-Motion", was originally written for R&B singer Dee Dee Sharp, but Dee Dee Sharp turned the song down. Dee Dee Sharpe ended up recording the song after it became a hit for Little Eva in 1962.
I use to dance my ass off to this song. 🎶🎶🎶🎶💃. Love this 💞💞
This was from a TV shoe. The female backup singles were called The Blossoms. The one in the middle is Darlene Love who is in her 80s and still touring.
Although I know about them and her, I wouldn't have known that. Thanks.
Another genius Carole King composition.
She was Carole King's baby sitter and she gave her this song to sing.
Carol King who co wrote this played piano and Al Kaplan played sax and the late great great session drummer Buddy Salztman played those drums he also played for the Four Seasons among other acts
This takes me back to around 1974/ 1975 being by my girlfriend's house and her and her friends would be dancing to this song 😉👍
Did you hear that great saxophone! Our music back then was great & involved so many musical instruments that aren't used anymore -- what a shame. And a singer had to have natural talent - no auto-tune or messing around to make a singer sound good. Great music, great fun to bounce to or slow dance to.
We all could use more people in our lives "with a little bit of rhythm and a lot of soul."
Little sheray loves music 🎵
Carole King wrote this song along with Gerry Goffin.
Little Eva was the baby sitter for Carol King and her then husband
A super locomotive reaction 🚆! She's from North Carolina. The Loco-motion was released as the lead single from Little Eva's 1962 album: Llllloco-Motion. The song was written by Carole King and Gerry Goffin. The song was produced by Gerry Goffin. The Cookies (Dorothy Jones, Earl-Jean McCrea, Margaret Ross) sang the backing vocals. It reached #1 on the Hot 100, #1 on the R&B chart and #1 on the Cash Box 100. It also peaked at #1 in Canada, Norway, Sweden and New Zealand. The single sold one millions copies and was certified Gold. Billboard ranked the song at #7 on their end of the year Hot 100 music chart songs for 1962. This performance is from the TV show: Shindig!, on March 3, 1965. In 1988, on The Cosby Show ("How Do You Get To Carnegie Hall") Vanessa form a vocal group: The Lipsticks, and performed the song with her group.
The song is an enduring example of the Dance-Song musical genre, as much of the song's lyrics are devoted to a description of the dance itself, usually performed as a type of line dance. Carole King credits Little Eva for coming up with the famous dance. "Though 'The Loco-Motion' alludes to dance movements, neither Gerry nor I had envisioned an actual dance", Carole King recalled in her 2012 memoir: A Natural Woman. "Eva had to invent one for personal appearances. Standing beside a locomotive for publicity photographs, with 'The Loco-Motion' playing on loudspeakers, Eva moved her body that day in imitation of the arm that drives a locomotive, and a dance was born".
"Loco" means "crazy" in Spanish, implying that the dance was a crazy motion.
The promotional photo for the single features five of the people involved posing around an actual locomotive train engine: Producers Don Kirshner and Al Nevins on the left, founders of Aldon Music, songwriters Gerry Goffin and Carole King on the right, the writers, and lead singer Little Eva, in the front with one foot up on the train like she's keeping it parked so it doesn't roll away. The photo graced the cover of Cashbox magazine.
The single: "The Loco-Motion", was also the second song to reach #1 on the Billboard Pop chart by two different musical acts Little Eva (1962), Grand Funk Railroad (1974) in America. The earlier song to do this was the single: "Go Away Little Girl", with Steve Lawrence (1963) and Donny Osmond (1971). It was also written by Gerry Goffin and Carole King.
The song is also especially notable for making three appearances in the Billboard Pop chart Top 3, each in a different decade: Little Eva (#1 Pop 1962), Grand Funk Railroad (#1 Pop 1974) and Kylie Minogue (#3 Pop 1988).
Another bit of the conventional ☹lore around the song is that Little Eva received only $50 for recording the song: "The Loco-Motion". However, although she never owned the rights to her recordings, it seems $50 was actually her weekly salary during the years she was making records which was an increase of $15 from what Gerry Goffin and Carole King had been paying her as their nanny. In 1971, Little Eva moved to North Carolina living in obscurity on menial jobs and welfare until being rediscovered in 1988, when she put out a new album and began regularly touring on the oldies and cabaret circuit until her passing in 2003.
The husband-and-wife songwriting team of Carole King and Gerry Goffin wrote the song. Little Eva was Eva Boyd, the babysitter - actually more of a nanny - being paid $35/week to watch their daughter Louise and clean the house. They were all young: Little Eva was 17, Carole King 19 and Gerry Goffin 22. One day Carole King came up with a melody that Gerry Goffin thought sounded like a locomotive, and when he saw Little Eva dancing with their daughter to the tune, he got the idea to make the song about a brand new dance: The Loco-Motion. He wrote the song lyrics and they brought Little Eva to the studio and had her record the song as a demo song, as they were hoping Dee Dee Sharp would sing it. Their studio producer Don Kirshner thought Little Eva's vocal was just fine, so they named her Little Eva and had her record the song. The only downside for Carole King and Gerry Goffin was losing their nanny: when the song became a million-seller, Little Eva was able to buy a place of her own.
Gerry Goffin had actually had this song idea in the back of his mind for a couple of years, but had never found the right moment to bring it out. When he sat down to write it at last, he defended it to Carole: "This is going to sound stupid, but what the hell. Don't all the biggest fads start out that way?".
The song's saxophone solo was performed by Artie Kaplan, who was also the contractor for the recording session. Artie Kaplan was a song plugger in Aldon Music's publishing department and also Aldon's Music Contractor. Among many other things, he was the one who discovered Tony Orlando while eating lunch at the diner across the street from the Brill Building. As songwriter Barry Mann's roommate, he was there to see the beginning of Mann's relationship to songwriter Cynthia Weil.
Describing the sessions for this song, Artie Kaplan told Songfacts: "I contracted the 'Loco-Motion' recording session and cast the two other musicians who I thought would be right for the date, namely Buddy Saltzman on drums and Charlie Macey on guitar and bass. I played five saxophone overdubs on baritone sax and tenor sax plus the solo part on the session to fill out the feel of a larger orchestra. Carole King played piano on the date and also wrote the arrangement, while she and The Cookies - a female R&B group that recorded for Aldon Music, added their brilliant vocal backgrounds. And of course there was the wonderful vocal by Eva Boyd, all under the direction of Gerry Goffin and a most able sound engineer Ron Johnson at Dick Charles Recording studios in New York City.
In those days demos were recorded in mono. Meaning that every time the musicians played a different orchestral part or the singers sang an added harmony, the engineer had to bounce the original track to a second machine while balancing the preceding part along with it. This process, known as overdubbing, was quite common in the early days among songwriters seeking inexpensive studios in which to record their songs to audition for music producers and music publishers.
I only mention this bit of history because I hesitate to think of how this recording would have survived, but for the excellent work of the sound engineer Ron Johnson and the masterful job he did mixing a 'smash hit' record, overdub by overdub, and he never received a thank you for his effort.
So, I'll do it now, for everyone who simply forgot. Thank you Ron Johnson for mixing 'The Loco-Motion', a piece of musical history. For without you, we would all be nothing.
Much love to you, wherever you are, Artie Kaplan".
When the demo of this song was completed, Artie Kaplan took it to Cameo-Parkway Records, but the record label's producer Bernie Lowe listened to the opening for all of sixty seconds before squeaking the needle off the record and saying "I didn't hear the hook", turning it down cold. Artie Kaplan just shrugged and took it back to Aldon Music. Bernie Lowe's exact facial expression, upon hearing this song come out of the radio later as a #1 hit by July of '62, is forever lost to history but we're pretty sure it must have been memorable. And that's how this song became the first single put out by the newly-formed Dimension Records, spawned from Aldon Music.
The song has been featured in some films including 📽: Inland Empire (2006), There Goes My Baby (1994), Matinee (1993), Waiting For The Light (1990), The In Crowd(1988), Concrete Angels (1987), Baby Love (1983), Trading Places (1983), Heart Like A Wheel (1983), Big Wednesday (1978), Aloha Bobby And Rose (1975), Dusty And Sweets McGee (1971) and more.
The song has been featured in some TV shows-TV movies including 📺: Family Guy ("The New Adventures Of Old Tom" - 2016), Call The Midwife ("Christmas Special" - 2016), The Playboy Club ("A Matter Of Simple Duplicity" - 2011), Quantum Leap ("Thou Shalt Not... - February 2, 1974" - 1989), The Cosby Show ("How Do You Get To Carnegie Hall?" - 1988), Girl Groups: The Story Of Sound (1983) and more.
The song has been covered by other artists including 📻: Ritz, Grand Funk Railroad, Kylie Minogue, Carole King, The Chiffons, Ebony, Atomic Kitten, Daffi Cramer, Sylvie Vartan, Jimmy Takeuchi, Luzia, Pat Boone, The Vernons Girls, Dave Stewart and Barbara Gaskin, Dee Dee Sharpe, The Ventures, Shelley Fabares, Ike & Tina Turner, Susi Dorée, Alan Tam, Girl Authority, Clare Teal, Dea Doll, Victor Wood, Les Ambassadors, Tina Y Tesa, Lynda Carter, Frederik, The Johnstones, Amin, Franz Lambert, Peggy Gaines, Tiiti, Les Pirates, Erica Frank, Bobby Jay And The Hawks, Ringo Starr And His All-Starr Band, The Dreamlovers and more.
Legacy 🛡:
"The Loco-Motion" is ranked #359 on Rolling Stone's list of "The 500 Greatest Songs of All Time".
In 2016, Little Eva's version of "The Loco-Motion" on Dimension Records was inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame.
****CONTINUE BELOW****
Lyrics 🗒:
Everybody's doin' a brand-new dance, now
(Come on baby, do the Loco-motion)
I know you'll get to like it if you give it a chance now
(Come on baby, do the Loco-motion)
My little baby sister can do it with me,
It's easier than learning your A, be, see's,
So come on, come on, do the Loco-motion with me.
You gotta swing your hips, now. Come on, baby.
Jump up. Jump back. Well, now, I think you've got the knack.
Now that you can do it, let's make a chain, now.
(Come on baby, do the Loco-motion)
A chug-a chug-a motion like a railroad train, now.
(Come on baby, do the Loco-motion)
Do it nice and easy, now, don't lose control:
A little bit of rhythm and a lot of soul.
So come on, come on, do the Loco-motion with me.
Move around the floor in a Loco-motion.
(Come on baby, do the Loco-motion)
Do it holding hands if you get the notion.
(Come on baby, do the Loco-motion)
There's never been a dance that's so easy to do.
It even makes you happy when you're feeling blue,
So come on, come on, do the Loco-motion with me
Little Eva info 📰:
Eva "Little Eva" Boyd was born in Belhaven, North Carolina, in 1943 and had twelve siblings. At the age of fifteen, she moved to the Brighton Beach section of Brooklyn, New York. As a teenager, she worked as a maid and earned extra money as a babysitter. She later moved to Coney Island to stay with her brother and his wife, who was a friend of Earl-Jean McCrea, a member of the female vocal group: The Cookies. Little Eva, who was named after her aunt "Big Eva", hence her nickname “Little Eva,” auditioned as a singer for The Cookies. The song she sang during her audition was: "Will You Love Me Tomorrow?", written by Carole King and Gerry Goffin.
Little Eva, at 18 years of age, subsequently joined The Cookies as a backup vocalist on recording dates. She also recorded demo tape of the 1962 song: “Uptown”, by The Crystals, for Phil Spector. Carole King and Gerry Goffin knew Little Eva could sing and hired her as a babysitter for $35 a week for their growing family. It is often claimed that Gerry Goffin and Carole King were amused by Little Eva's particular dancing style, so they wrote the song: "The Loco-Motion", for her and had her record it as a demo song but the record was intended for Dee Dee Sharp.
However, as Carole King said in an interview with NPR and in her "One To One" concert video, they knew she could sing when they met her, and it would be just a matter of time before they would have her record songs they wrote, the most successful being the single: "The Loco-Motion". Music producer Don Kirshner of Dimension Records was impressed by the song and Little Eva's voice and had the single released. The song reached #1 on the Pop and R&B charts in 1962. It sold over one million copies, and was awarded a Gold record by the RIAA. After the success of the single: "The Loco-Motion", Little Eva was stereotyped as a dance-craze singer and was given limited material to record.
The same year, Gerry Goffin and Carole King wrote the song: "He Hit Me (And It Felt Like a Kiss)", for The Crystals, after discovering that Little Eva was being regularly beaten by her boyfriend. When they inquired why she tolerated such treatment, Little Eva replied without batting an eyelid said that "her boyfriend's actions were motivated by his love for her".
Little Eva's follow-up single: "Keep Your Hands Off My Baby" (1962), reached #6 on the R&B chart and #12 on the Pop chart. Her third single: "Let’s Turkey Trot" (1963), peaked at #16 on the R&B chart and #20 on the Pop chart. Her debut album: Llllloco-Motion, was released in 1962 on Dimension Records.
In 1963, she recorded a non-album single: :Swinging On A Star" a duet with Big Dee Irwin, and a remake of the 1944 Bing Crosby standard. The song peaked at #38 on the Pop chart and #7 on the UK Singles chart. She also recorded the song: "Makin' With The Magilla", for an episode of the 1964 Hanna-Barbera cartoon series: The Magilla Gorilla Show.
In 1963, American Bandstand signed Little Eva to "Dick Clark's Caravan Of Stars" national US tour and she was set to perform for the tour's 15th show, scheduled for the night of November 22, 1963 at the Memorial Auditorium in Dallas, Texas when suddenly the Friday evening event was cancelled, moments after then US President John F Kennedy was assassinated while touring Dallas in an open car caravan.
Little Eva continued to tour and record throughout the 1960s, but her commercial appeal plummeted after 1964. She eventually retired from the music industry in 1971 in order to raise her three children working menial labor jobs and even ending up on welfare for a time as she never owned any rights to her popular songs. Although the prevailing rumor in the 1970s was that she had received only $50 for the song: "The Loco-Motion", it seems $50 was actually her weekly salary at the time she made her records which was an increase of $15 from what Gerry Goffin and Carole King had been paying her as their nanny.
In 1973 the album: Swinging On A Star, a collaboration album made up of previously recorded songs by Little Eva and Big Dee Irwin was released by Astor Records. It is unlikely that Little Eva saw any money from the album's release as she did not own any of her songs but both Carole King and Gerry Goffin would have been paid song royalties from the album. Her signature song: "The Loco-Motion", remained popular as evidenced by Grand Funk Railroad's 1974 cover version which went to #1 on the Pop chart and peaked at #1 in Canada as well.
Little Eva was interviewed in 1988 after the success of the Kylie Minogue recording of the song: "The Loco-Motion", Little Eva stated that she did not like the new version, however, its then-current popularity allowed her to make a comeback in show business. Little Eva released an album: Back On Track, in 1988. She also returned to performing live with other artists of her era like Bobby Vee on the cabaret and oldies circuits throughout the 1990s and early 2000s.
In a 1991 Richard Nader concert, she performed the songs: "The Loco-Motion" and "Keep Your Hands Off My Baby". The concert was partially documented on videotape, albeit of marginal quality.
Miscellaneous Note 🗃:
The only existing footage of Little Eva performing the song: "Loco-Motion", is a small video clip from the 1960s ABC TV show: Shindig!, wherein she sang a short version of the clip along with performing the famous dance steps. She also sang the songs: "Let's Turkey Trot" and "I Want You To Be My Boy", during the same show episode. It was on of her final live performances before she retired from the music industry in 1971.
Little Eva Passing 🙏🏾:
Eva "Little Eva" Boyd (June 29, 1943 - April 10, 2003)
Little Eva continued performing until she was diagnosed with cervical cancer in October 2001. She passed away on April 10, 2003, in Kinston, North Carolina, at the age of 59. She was laid to rest at Black Bottom Cemetery in Belhaven, North Carolina. Little Eva's gravesite was sparsely marked until July 2008, when a report by WRAL-TV of Raleigh, North Carolina, highlighted deteriorating conditions at the cemetery and efforts by the city of Belhaven to have it restored. A simple white cross had marked the site until a new gravestone was unveiled in November of that year. Little Eva's new grey gravestone has the image of a steam locomotive prominently engraved on the front and the epitaph reads: "Singing with the Angels".
Little Eva Albums 📀:
Llllloco-Motion (1962)
Swinging On A Star w/ Big Dee Irwin (1973)
Back On Track (1988)
Some more good Little Eva songs 🎶: He Is The Boy, Keep Your Hands Off My Baby, Let's Turkey Trot, Uptown, I Want You To Be My Boy, Old Smokey Loco-Motion, Swinging On A Star, Mama Said, Let's Start The Party Again, What I Gotta Do (To Make You Jealous), Everything Is Beautiful About You Boy, That's My Man, Down Home, Take A Step In My Direction, Uptight, I Wish You A Merry Christmas, Makin' With The Magilla, Sharing You, Ain't Got No Home, Bend It, Just One Word Ain't Enough, Stand By Me, Run To Her, Wake Up John, I Have A Love, Another Night With The Boys, Get Him, Back On Track, I Knew Your Love, In Memory Of CJ, You Are So Beautiful, Heigh Ho, I'm Not Strong, Needing You Again, Wake Up To The Music, One More Mountain, Love X 3, Confusion, Put Your Hand In The Hand, This Feeling Is Real, Don't It Make You Wanna Dance, God Bless America, Just A Little Girl, The Trouble With Boys, Where Do I Go?, Something About You Boy, Follow The Wind, Dynamite, Some Kind Of Wonderful, Please Hurt Me, Takin' Back What I Said, Will You Love Me Tomorrow?, Mr Everything, Night After Night, Get Ready, Breaking Up Is Hard To Do, The Christmas Song and Up On The Roof.
Fun Fact 🕵🏾♀: Little Eva's 1962 song: "The Loco-Motion", was originally written for R&B singer Dee Dee Sharp, but Dee Dee Sharp turned the song down. Dee Dee Sharpe ended up recording the song after it became a hit for Little Eva in 1962.
❤❤❤
🥀🌹🌷
👍