Today’s classic 1970 song of the day, and the fourth of four featuring the vocal stylings of session ace Tony Burrows, is “Gimme Dat Ding” by a fake band called the Pipkins. This song, released in May of 1970, peaked at #9 on the Billboard Hot 100 and #6 in the UK.
“Gimme Dat Ding” was a novelty song written by Albert Hammond (the guy who had an earlier hit with “It Never Rains in Southern California“) and Mike Hazelwood. It was written for a British children’s television show called Little Big Time, which happened to be hosted by Freddie and the Dreamers, a group that was big during the early years of the British Invasion. The show was about a boy (played by Freddie) seeking the parts to fix a broken grandfather clock named Oliver. “Gimme Dat Ding” was sung by a talking metronome who’d been expelled from the machine kingdom called the Overworld by the Clockwork King. It seems that a once-evil machine called the Undercog had stolen the “ding” from the metronome, and the song was about the metronome trying to get his “ding” back—hence the lyrics and the title, “Gimme Dat Ding.”
Knowing that, the otherwise-nonsense lyrics now make sense:
A-ooh, what good’s a metronome without a bell for ringing?
How fast can anybody ever tell he swinging?
How can you tell the rhythm written on a bar?
How can you ever hope to know just where you are?Ah, gimme dat, gimme dat, gimme, gimme, gimme dat
Gimme dat ding, gimme dat, gimme, gimme dat
The Pipkins were just two guys, Tony Burrows and his mate (and fellow Brotherhood of Manner) Roger Greenaway. That’s Mr. Burrows singing the Arte Johnson-like old man part and Mr. Greenaway doing the slightly crazed higher part. Hey, it was a kids’ show.
Obviously, Tony Burrows and Roger Greenaway were very busy individuals in the British music scene in 1970; that’s four singles charting at about the same time for Mr. Burrows (“Love Grows (Where My Rosemary Goes),” “My Baby Loves Lovin’,” “United We Stand,” and “Gimme Dat Ding”) and three (all the same except for “Love Grows”) with Mr. Greenaway. Those guys knew how to make a hit.
And here’s your daily bonus video of day, a short documentary/interview with Freddie Garrity about Little Big Time and the show’s ongoing Oliver in the Overworld segment. It includes several clips from the show, which appears to be very, very hallucinogenic.
