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The Days of Pearly Spencer
03.15.2010
07:16 pm
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For whatever reasons—my 45 RPM picture sleeve has a woman on it—I have long assumed that Irish singer David McWilliam’s sad song about a homeless person about to die, 1967’s The Days of Pearly Spencer, was about a woman or a drag queen. The lines “Pearly where’s your milk white skin? What’s that stubble on your chin?” I always took to mean a drag queen not being able to groom herself properly and I thought this image—the 5 o’clock shadow—added an extra poignancy to the song. Not true. Apparently the song is about a elderly homeless man McWilliams befriended in the 60s.

I think you’ll agree that the song is memorable. The arrangements and orchestration were done by the famous arranger Mike Leander, who had earlier worked with Phil Spector and the Rolling Stones. The chorus is either sung through a megaphone or a telephone, and the effect is striking.

McWilliams, who died young at the age of 56 never had a hit with the song, which nevertheless became well known via dozens of easy listening cover versions, a psychedelic version done by the French group Vietnam Veterans and of course, the famous Marc Almond hit of the 90s, which added a final, more uplifting verse. (In Almond’s version, Pearly is looking back at a life lived in the street after getting off the street).

McWilliams looks a lot like Matt Damon, doesn’t he?
 

 

Posted by Richard Metzger
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03.15.2010
07:16 pm
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