Still remembering the late Bobby Hart, who passed away last week, today’s classic song of the day is “Come a Little Bit Closer” by Jay and the Americans. Released during the fall of 1964, this single peaked at #3 on the Billboard Hot 100.
“Come a Little Bit Closer” was written by Bobby Hart and his longtime partner Tommy Boyce, along with Wes Farrell. It was Boyce and Hart’s first top ten hit, and the highest-charting single for Jay and the Americans. This one’s a story song, set in “a little café just the other side of the border,” where the protagonist meets an attractive young lady who happens to belong to “bad man, José.” Things go as you’d expect from there:
So we started to dance
In my arms, she felt so inviting
And I just couldn’t resist
Just one little kiss, so exciting
Then I heard the guitar player say
“Vamoose, José’s on his way!”
And I knew, yes I knew I should run
But then I heard her say
Come a little bit closer
You’re my kind of man
So big and so strong
Come a little bit closer
I’m so alone
And the night is so long
Fortunately for all concerned, when José arrives, the protagonist realizes that discretion is the better part of valor, drops his drink, and vamooses out the window. Good for him.
Here’s what group member Kenny Vance remembers about recording the song:
“‘Come A Little Bit Closer’ was recorded in the last probably five minutes of a session where we were trying to record something else that we spent the whole session on. In those days, a session ran three hours, I think the musicians got $65 for a three-hour session. They didn’t want to go overtime, and they had recorded this one song and they needed a flip side, and they just said, Okay, boom, let’s do it. And we recorded it, and that’s it. There it is. It just captured that. Willie Bobo played timbales and Johnny Rodriguez played conga drums, Gary Chester played drums. ‘Come A Little Bit Closer’ was written by Tommy Boyce and Bobby Hart, and I think that Jerry Leiber re-wrote the last verse and he never got credit for that. But as I recall, that’s how it went down.”
Not sure about Jerry Leiber’s contribution, as there’s no record of him being involved with this one, but you never know. Leiber and Stoller did “discover” Jay and the Americans and produced several of their hits, including “Only in America,” so it’s possible.
Which brings us to today’s daily bonus video of the day, Jay and the Americans lip-synching “Come a Little Bit Closer” on some television program in 1964. Love the matching jackets and turtlenecks.
