#1 for weeks of April 7 and 14th, 1962.
In this day and age, there are way too many times when an actor/actress ends up fleshing out and becoming a pop star or starting an ill-advised music career. Nearly all of the time this turns out to be a disaster. Even back in the 1960's, there were TV stars who would take this fame bubble and carry it over into the recording studio. Case in point, Shelly Fabares.
This song is the epitome of the "Safe" pop culture time period from about 1959 til January 1964. Shelley Fabares was one of the leads on The Donna Reed Show which existed in roughly that time frame. I should mention though that both the show and Shelly's big hit single are not parts of music/pop culture I'm generally familiar with. So this review will certainly be from an outsider's perspective.
Lyrically, the song comes across as lyrically formulaic as your average 1960's teen idol pop song, although this time it is sung from the opposite point of view. This style of music never appealed to me due to its rather cookie cutter songwriting formula. It's all too naive and dated in the innocent early 1960's.
So needless to say I'm not a big fan of this song. It's just too innocent and cutesy sounding for my taste. While I can admit that Shelley was a good singer and has a pleasant singing voice, the song is extremely dated sounding with those angelic backing vocals and lightweight arrangement. Actually, the song is called "Johnny Angel" so maybe I should give them some credit on matching a song title with its music...
Final Verdict - "Johnny Angel" is musically and lyrically very lightweight. I can see why it was a hit in that time period but today, it hasn't aged well. If lighter pop music is your style, you'll appreciate Shelly's vocal performance. Otherwise, I'd pass on this one.
Coming Up Next - "Good Luck Charm" by Elvis.
Until Next Time - I'm Dr. Rock, reviewing forgotten songs just for you.
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