"Li'l Red Riding Hood" | |
---|---|
Single by Sam the Sham and the Pharaohs | |
from the album Li'l Red Riding Hood | |
B-side | "Love Me Like Before" |
Released | June 1966 |
Genre | Garage rock |
Length | 2:35 |
Label | MGM |
Songwriter(s) | Ron Blackwell |
"Li'l Red Riding Hood" is a 1966 song performed by Sam the Sham and the Pharaohs. It was the group's second top-10 hit, reaching No. 2 on the Billboard Hot 100 in August 1966 [1] It was kept out of the No. 1 spot by both "Wild Thing" by The Troggs and "Summer in the City" by The Lovin' Spoonful. [2] Outside the US, it peaked at No. 2 on the Canadian RPM magazine charts. It was certified gold by the RIAA on August 11, 1966. [3]
The song is built around Charles Perrault's fairy tale "Little Red Riding Hood", adapted by ending before the grandmother makes her entrance. The effect, whether intentional or incidental, is to strip away the fairy tale's metaphorical device and present the relationship between the two characters without literary pretense.
The singer remarks on "what big eyes" and "what full lips" Red has, and eventually on "what a big heart" he himself has. An added element is that he says (presumably aside, to the song's audience) that he is disguised in a "sheep suit" until he can demonstrate his good intentions, but he seems to be having a hard time suppressing his wolf call in the form of a howl, in favor of the baa-ing of a sheep, at the very end of the song when Sam repeats the word "BAAHED" a few times during the song's fade. One of its signature lines is "you're ev'rything that a big bad wolf could want." The song begins with a howl, and a spoken recitation that goes: "Who's that I see walkin' in these woods?/Why it's Little Red Riding Hood."
The song whose lyrics are described just above is widely attributed to Ronald Blackwell. [4] There seems to be no controversy (although various titles are occasionally used) that one with a similar title was earlier written and recorded by the Big Bopper, and released as "Little Red Riding Hood" (i.e., with little spelled out) late in 1958 as the B-side of his second hit. [5] The searchable sites with its complete lyrics as text seem to constitute no more than a handful, [6] [7] [8] [9] but a recording, purported to be of his voice [10] and thus presumably as being authoritative as to lyrics, exists online.
Though related in concept to the later Blackwell song, these differ in:
To promote her movie Red Riding Hood , star Amanda Seyfried performed a cover of the song. [11]
It is a prominent plot element in the 1993 film Striking Distance with Bruce Willis, [12] and it is featured in the films Digging for Fire , [13] Wild Country (2005), [14] , and Wolves at the Door (2016). A cover by Laura Gibson was in a 2012 Volvo commercial for its S60T5. The song appeared in the TV show Grimm , where it was played at the beginning of the season 3 episode "Red Menace" that aired in 2014. It also appears just after the opening titles of the episode of the British soap opera Coronation Street that aired on the ITV network on October 18, 2021.
"The Three Little Pigs" is a fable about three pigs who build their houses of different materials. A Big Bad Wolf blows down the first two pigs' houses which are made of straw and sticks respectively, but is unable to destroy the third pig's house that is made of bricks. The printed versions of this fable date back to the 1840s, but the story is thought to be much older. The earliest version takes place in Dartmoor with three pixies and a fox before its best known version appears in English Fairy Tales by Joseph Jacobs in 1890, with Jacobs crediting James Halliwell-Phillipps as the source.
The Big Bad Wolf is a fictional wolf appearing in several cautionary tales, including some of Grimms' Fairy Tales. Versions of this character have appeared in numerous works, and it has become a generic archetype of a menacing predatory antagonist.
"Little Red Riding Hood" is a European fairy tale about a young girl and a sly wolf. Its origins can be traced back to several pre-17th century European folk tales. The two best known versions were written by Charles Perrault and the Brothers Grimm.
Green Jellÿ is an American comedy rock band formed in 1981. Originally named Green Jellö, the band changed its name due to legal pressure from Kraft Foods Inc., the owners of the Jell-O brand, who claimed that it was an infringement of their trademark.
Red Hot Riding Hood is an animated cartoon short subject, directed by Tex Avery and released with the movie Dr. Gillespie's Criminal Case on May 8, 1943, by Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer. In 1994, it was voted number 7 of The 50 Greatest Cartoons of all time by members of the animation field, making it the highest ranked MGM cartoon on the list. It is one of Avery's most popular cartoons, inspiring several of his own "sequel" shorts as well as influencing other cartoons and feature films for years afterward.
"Three Little Pigs" is a song by American comedy rock band Green Jellÿ from their first video album, Cereal Killer (1992). Released by Zoo Entertainment in 1992 with the original band name, Green Jellö, the single was re-released on May 24, 1993, under the name Green Jellÿ due to a lawsuit for trademark infringement by the owners of Jell-O.
Little Red Riding Rabbit is a 1944 Warner Bros. Merrie Melodies cartoon, directed by Friz Freleng, and starring Bugs Bunny. It is a sendup of the "Little Red Riding Hood" story, and is the first time in which Mel Blanc receives a voice credit.
Swing Shift Cinderella is a 1945 MGM animated cartoon short subject directed by Tex Avery. The plot involves the Big Bad Wolf and Cinderella. Frank Graham voiced the wolf, and Sara Berner voiced both Cinderella and The Fairy Grandmother, with Imogene Lynn providing her singing voice.
Revolting Rhymes is a 1982 collection of Roald Dahl poems first published in 1982 originally under the title Roald Dahl's Revolting Rhymes. A parody of traditional folk tales in verse, Dahl gives a re-interpretation of six well-known fairy tales, featuring surprise endings in place of the traditional happily-ever-after finishes. The poems are illustrated by Quentin Blake. It is the shortest children's book Dahl ever wrote.
"The Wolf and the Seven Young Goats" is a fairy tale collected by the Brothers Grimm and published in Grimm's Fairy Tales. It is of Aarne-Thompson type 123.
The following is a discography for the American singer and songwriter Raven-Symoné. In 1993 she released her debut album Here's to New Dreams, which was preceded by her debut single "That's What Little Girls Are Made Of", charted at No. 68 on the US Billboard Hot 100. In 1996, Raven-Symoné signed a distribution deal with Crash Records for her second album Undeniable, which was released in May 1999. From 2003 to 2006 she released four soundtracks: The Cheetah Girls (2003) and The Cheetah Girls 2 (2006) from Disney Channel Original Movies and That's So Raven and That's So Raven Too! from Disney Channel Original Series.
Domingo "Sam" Samudio, better known by his stage name Sam the Sham, is a retired American rock and roll singer. Sam the Sham is known for his camp robe and turban and hauling his equipment in a 1952 Packard hearse with maroon velvet curtains. As the front man for the Pharaohs, he sang on several Top 40 hits in the mid-1960s, including the Billboard Hot 100 runners-up "Wooly Bully" and "Li'l Red Riding Hood".
The Little Red Riding Hood fairy tale has often been adapted, and into a wide variety of media.
Golden Book Video was a line of children/family animated and live-action videos marketed by Western Publishing, beginning in the holiday season of 1985. They featured characters and stories from Western's print publications, such as Little Golden Books, and were originally released on VHS video cassette for under $10.
The Big Bad Wolf is an animated short released on April 13, 1934, by United Artists, produced by Walt Disney and directed by Burt Gillett as part of the Silly Symphony series. Acting partly as a sequel to the wildly successful adaptation of The Three Little Pigs of the previous year, this film also acts as an adaptation of the fairy-tale Little Red Riding Hood, with the Big Bad Wolf from 1933's Three Little Pigs acting as the adversary to Little Red Riding Hood and her grandmother.
Red Riding Hood is a 1989 American/Israeli fantasy film by Golan-Globus based on the fairy tale of the same name and part of the film series Cannon Movie Tales. The taglines were: "CANNON MOVIE TALES: Lavish, feature-length new versions of the world's best-loved storybook classics!" and "Rediscover the magic".
Redux Riding Hood is a 15-minute animated short film directed by Steve Moore and produced by Disney in 1997 that received an Oscar nomination for Best Animated Short Film.
"A Little Bit Stronger" is a song written by Luke Laird, Hillary Lindsey, and Hillary Scott and recorded by American country music artist Sara Evans. It was released in September 2010 and as the first single from Evans' 2011 album Stronger. The song was also included on the soundtrack for the 2010 movie Country Strong and released as the second single from the film's soundtrack album. The song became Evans' fifth and final number one hit on the US Billboard Hot Country Songs chart in May 2011. It is also her first single to be certified Platinum by the RIAA.
Grimm!Die wirklich Wahre Geschichte von Rotkäppchen und Ihrem Wolf(The True Story of Little Red Riding Hood and Her Wolf) is a German musical, with lyrics written by Peter Lund, music by Thomas Zaufke, and choreography by Neva Howard. The musical premiered on December 7, 2014, in Graz, Austria, at the Next Liberty Youth Theater.
Revolting Rhymes is a 2016 British-South African computer animated television film based on the 1982 book of the same name written by Roald Dahl and illustrated by Quentin Blake.