Taters, Please... And Don't Forget the Gravy

What can I say? I had a hankerin' tonight and mashed away. And, yes, I listened to these two songs back to back while making them. Let me tell you, folks, the key to a good bowl of mashed potatoes, and this goes for just about everything, is to be liberal with the butter. My rule is one stick for every five potatoes you mash. Apologies to my general practitioner. Perhaps I can tell him I at least got some exercise tonight in the form of dancing the mashed potato in the kitchen with my 13-year-old son.

Kal Mann and Bernie Lowe of Cameo-Parkway Records straight outta Philly signed local gal Dione LaRue as a back-up singer when she was just 15 years old. Her family called her "Dee," and the team of Mann and Lowe dubbed her Dee Dee Sharp. Cameo-Parkway was already well known for dance and novelty-type hits, and local act Chubby Checker had been getting the kids to bust a move... make that do "The Twist"... on Philly TV program American Bandstand. By 1962, acts like James Brown and the Contours had been making a variation on the twist called the mashed potato the latest craze. That same year, Dee Dee, with help from the songwriting team of Mann and Lowe, recorded these two top-10 smashes that made her a regular on Dick Clark's popular after-school show. You'll notice quite quickly that "Mashed Potato Time" is more or less "Please Mr. Postman" by the Marvelettes with new lyrics.

Through the years, references to the mashed potato have popped up in songs all over the place. My two faves are in "Dance This Mess Around" by the B-52's and "Do the Strand" by Roxy Music. Perhaps this is fodder for a future top 10 over at Rol's place.

"Mashed Potato Time"
"Gravy (For My Mashed Potatoes)"