One of the most-popular songs of the 1970s, and certainly one of the best known songs to ever be popularized by a motion picture, celebrates 50 years of being a chart topping sensation this year.
Composed by the legendary duo of Burt Bacharach and Hal David, Raindrops Keep Fallin’ On My Head was ubiquitous across many radio platforms throughout 1970 and continues to get airplay on oldies stations, as well as showing up in movies, TV shows, and other forms of media, well into the 21st century.
It was an integral part of the massively successful western, Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, which starred another legendary duo, actors Paul Newman and Robert Redford as the titular characters, with Raindrops appearing in one of the film’s most iconic parts, the ‘bicycle’ scene.
Another major part of the appeal of the song was the mellifluous and playful interpretation of the composition by Texan singer B.J. Thomas, already a household name on the American music scene, who rose to bona fide superstar status after recording Raindrops Keep Fallin’ On My Head.
Thomas was already a known quantity as a successful vocalist, having had a smash hit with the single Hooked on a Feeling, composed by Mark James, and released in 1968, which helped him land the opportunity to work with the legendary composing duo of Bacharach and David on what would become Raindrops Keep Fallin’ On My Head.
“I had a lot of help from a friend of mine by the name of Steve Tyrell. We grew up together and he was working for Scepter Records, so he had a lot to do with bringing me to their attention. So, I was with Scepter and Mr. Bacharach and Hal David were heavily involved with that record label since they did virtually all of the music for Dionne Warwick, who was Scepter Records’ main artist. I just had Hooked On A Feeling and when they were in a position where they needed a singer for this song for the movie Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, they knew it wasn’t a song for a female singer, so they were looking and I was in their mind because of Hooked On A Feeling,” said Thomas.
“When they recorded other people besides Dionne, they wanted to record with people who were selling records and it just so happened that I was having a really good run and selling a lot of records at that time with the label that they were involved in. I kind of was at the right spot at the right time, so they gave me a shot. I had actually been working with Mr. Bacharach for a little bit before Raindrops. I was recording in Memphis, Tennessee and I moved to New York City with my wife Gloria. We had just gotten married and we moved to New York because Florence Greenberg, the owner of Scepter Records asked me to move there because she thought she could work it out where I could get a session with Burt Bacharach and Hal David.
“I moved up there and we were working on various songs and going over material trying to find the right song for me at that time too, so everything kind of worked in my favour. I got the gig doing Raindrops and the flew out to California to rehearse with Mr. Bacharach.”
Here’s where the story almost takes one of those momentous, make or break turns. Excited to be able to record with the legendary Bacharach, Thomas was doubly anxious because he was also not feeling 100 per cent heading into the studio.
“I actually had an acute case of laryngitis when I got out there. I had been doing three weeks of one nighters in the Midwest and when I got out to California, my throat was shot. I went to the doctor and he said, ‘don’t even speak for two weeks.’ Well, I said, ‘man, I’ve got this pretty important session.’ So, it was very iffy. I was worried that I may show up and not be able to sing and they would fire me on the spot,” he said.
“There was no doubt that I was going to show up. So, I did, and I sang the song as best I could and as it turned out, Mr. Bacharach really liked the way it sounded; it had a rough kind of sound to it, which he thought was the way it should sound for the movie. It ended up working out beautifully, and for the movie, of course, it won a couple of Academy Awards [it won on its own for Best Original Song and was part of the Best Original Score Oscar].
“We recut the song six weeks later for the single version that we released, and my voice was better that time. So, it all worked perfectly. Listen, Jim, there’s hardly any fact or any circumstance involving Raindrops that wasn’t a situation that didn’t work out perfectly. There’s something about that song that had the blessing of the universe I guess, because it worked out so well.”
The single version was released to radio in the fall of 1969 but failed to make a splash. Only when the movie came out and was a smash, that radio programmers changed their tune and embraced the song, turning it into a massive hit. It was actually the first number one song of the 1970s, and the fourth biggest single of all of 1970. It also shot to the top of the Canadian singles charts, as well as those of Norway and South Africa. As an interesting side note, Thomas’s first single, a cover of I’m So Lonesome I Could Cry, released in 1966 went to number 8 in the U.S., but actually made it to number two in Canada. Hooked On A Feeling also charted higher in Canada, reached number three while peaking at number five in the U.S.
“The song came out in October 1969 and nobody would play it, not one radio station would play it, they just resisted, and I don’t know exactly why. One radio station in New York City said, well B.J. is singing a wrong note in the verse, so we’re not going to play the song. There were all kinds of strange reasons. Of course, when the movie came out, it was such a big movie and people loved it so much, it kicked off the song, and we never heard another negative thing about it. And of course, it’s sold around 15 million copies by now. It was just a beautiful experience,” he said, adding that he had a sense while in the midst of recording Raindrops that it was a special song.
“Especially when you’re recording something, you always hope that it’s going to be a successful song, but I tell you, when I first heard Raindrops, I knew without a shadow of a doubt that this thing was going to be huge. I was already on a good run and had name recognition and success, plus this was Burt Bacharach and Hal David writing the song, and the movie had Paul Newman and Robert Redford – I knew it was a great movie, and I knew the song fit it so well.”
Bacharach and David’s composition kind of revolutionized the concept of adding original songs into movies that weren’t necessarily derived directly from the plot but were there for atmosphere and to elicit emotion. Raindrops, according to Thomas, did receive some mild criticism at the time for this approach.
“Burt Bacharach and Hal David kind of created that movie song thing. They weren’t depending on the movie so much. The lyrics didn’t have to be about the movie, they could put a unique, beautiful song within the confines of a movie, that maybe went against the grain a little bit. But it worked beautifully, and I think they pretty much created that whole genre of movie songs, it was one of the first that kind of spelled out that approach,” Thomas said.
“A lot of people said Raindrops didn’t make any sense in the movie, but it really did. There’re the guys in a chase and then they’re at the hideout out in the country and they’ve got a chance to ride a bicycle and feel free. I though it was brilliant, a stroke of genius on their part. Of course, most of the things they wrote and composed became classic pieces of music anyways. Mr. Bacharach was a guy that I was in awe of and over they years I’ve appreciated more and more that I had the chance to do a lot of music with he and Hal.”
Working closely with Bacharach in the studio, Thomas realized that he may have to adapt his style and process a little bit to what Bacharach and David had written on the page.
“I recognized when I first started working with him that his songs were very different and that I was going to have to really learn these songs inside and out. When we started working on Raindrops I said, ‘Burt, can I do my thing on this song?’ Sometimes I would kind of do some little vocal things, always trying to make sure they felt authentic. I recognized that his composition was so perfectly done and kind of quirky in a way, that I was going to have to learn it down to the last detail,” he said.
“Burt told me to sing it exactly as he wrote it, but if there was a place where I could do my own thing, to go ahead and do it. When we were actually laying down the vocal tracks the second time for the actual single, the only space I felt where I could do something was on that very last word, the ‘me’ part. So, I kind of did my own thing there, but otherwise it was very important to do his music exactly as he had written it. After all, this wasn’t some song written in a backroom somewhere on a napkin by two guys smoking pot. This is a song that was written by one of the most brilliant composers of all time.
“And it’s the same thing with the lyrics by Mr. David, who is on of the greatest writers of all time, and I instinctively knew that it was very important to do what the had written. I think that song connected in a really human way too, because of the way they wrote it. Raindrops fall on everybody, but as long as you’re free, it’s all good.”
As embedded as it was in the pop culture of the early 1970s, the song has continued to remain a fixture, appearing in films such as Forrest Gump, Spider Man 2 (2004), Spy-Hard, The In-Laws, Clerks II, as well as TV shows such as Top Gear, The Simpsons, Family Guy, Arrested Development and Grey’s Anatomy among others. In 2014 it was inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame.
Thomas continues to perform to this day. After Raindrops Keep Fallin’ On My Head, he continued to do well as a recording artist, hitting the top of the Adult Contemporary Charts with I Just Can’t Help Believing and Rock & Roll Lullaby in 1971, before his second massive number one sensation, (Hey Won’t You Play) Another Somebody Done Somebody Wrong Song in 1975. Thomas also topped the country charts a number of times in 1980s.
For more information, visit https://bjthomas.com.
- Jim Barber is a veteran award-winning journalist and author based in Napanee, ON, who has been writing about music and musicians for a quarter of a century. Besides his journalistic endeavours, he now works as a communications and marketing specialist. Contact him at jimbarberwritingservices@gmail.com.
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