“I said no - go ahead (mine had been released years earlier and was a big hit in many countries).
“Yes, Bjorn Skifs kindly called me to say he wanted to cover my version and did I mind?” Jonathan King recently recalled online. Ooga chaka: Which brings us to a singer named Bjorn Skifs and his band, Blue Swede, or Blåblus, as they were known in their homeland. Lately, he writes on his website, “I’ve had so many E-mail requests asking about the Ooga Chagga chant that I’m devoting a chapter to the explanation in my new book.”Ĥ. He characterized the ooga chagga intro to his “Hooked on a Feeling” much more accurately in his 2009 autobiography, 65 My Life So Far: “Six guys grunting like gorillas.” Credited to the Piglets - three female session singers in their 30s or 40s whom King instructed to sing like 15-year-olds - “Johnny Reggae” at least sounded marginally connected to the genre in the title. That may have been because he cut the track on the same night as a novelty song called “ Johnny Reggae,” which went on to become a sizable hit in the U.K. Ooga chagga: That’s how Jonathan King renders the chant, which, if you remember, he says he came up with in his pursuit of a “reggae rhythm.” And, in a case of closing the circle, his duet partner on that version is singer/actress Sara Niemietz, who first performed the song onstage with Thomas when she was 4.ģ. “I said, ‘How big is this? I don’t know, but I’d buy it.’”Īs for Thomas, he re-recorded the song last year on an unplugged-styled album called The Living Room Sessions. It’s a hit,” is what he recalls telling record executives, in an interview with. Given that the song was written for a woman he went on to marry (and to whom he’s still married), how did James react when first heard those ooga-chakas? “This is a fun record and it’s well-made. Thomas in 1968, “ Hooked on a Feeling” featured a distinctive sitar opening and made the top 5. Pre-ooga: The original, non-ooga “Hooked on a Feeling” was written by Mark James, best known for penning “ Suspicious Minds.” He even recorded his own version of that song, which Elvis Presley covered in almost identical fashion. Their version graced 1972’s Rockin’ (where it was mistakenly credited to Curley Herdman, a Virginia fiddler who did write a song called “Running Bear,” but it was a totally different song, and this is probably too much information, isn’t it?) On their version, the chant more closely resembles “egga hooga,” at least before it all dissolves into (even more) gibberish at the end.Ģ. b) Egga hooga: One of the better covers of “Running Bear” was done by The Guess Who. Just wanted different instruments to make a reggae rhythm and decided on male voices.” (Reggae? More on that later.)ġ. I put this claim to King this week on an online message board on his website, and he was quick to reply.
Many sites, including the comprehensive, acknowledge that the Blue Swede version is actually a copy, and go on to state a variation of this sentence: “The first use of the chant in this song, however, was in the 1971 version by the English singer and pop mogul Jonathan King, who added the ‘Oooonga Chackas,’ which were based on the chant in Johnny Preston’s 1959 hit ‘Running Bear.’ ” Whether the “oomba oogas” in “Running Bear” were really the model for the Blue Swede hit is a matter of contention. While Preston handles the vocals, the chanting is done by Richardson and country legend George Jones. Richardson, better known as the Big Bopper.
a) Oomba ooga: Often cited as the original inspiration for the Blue Swede version, the “oomba ooga” chant plays a memorable part in “ Running Bear,” a 1959 hit sung by Johnny Preston and written by J.P. Here, then, a look at the origins of “ooga chaka” and what has turned into the song of the summer that no one saw coming:ġ. 1 album in both Canada and the U.S., on both Billboard and iTunes. These days, it’s the unforgettably goofy intro to a 40-year-old recording that’s been revived by a blockbuster movie, Guardians of the Galaxy, and its ’70s-laden soundtrack, a.k.a. It sounds like the kind of thing you vaguely remember hearing in your parents’ recreation room in the middle of some retroactively insensitive cartoon:
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