Wonderful World, Beautiful People

Last updated
"Wonderful World, Beautiful People"
Single by Jimmy Cliff
A-side "Wonderful World, Beautiful People"
B-side "Hard Road To Travel"
Written J. Cliff
ReleasedOctober 24, 1969 (1969-10-24)
Label Trojan TR 690
Composer(s) Jimmy Cliff
Producer(s) Leslie Kong
Jimmy Cliff singles chronology
"Waterfall"
(1968)		"Wonderful World, Beautiful People"
(1969)		"Vietnam"
(1970)

"Wonderful World, Beautiful People" is a single by Jimmy Cliff. Released in October 1969, it became a top-ten hit in the UK. It was a hit in other countries as well.

Contents

Background

"Wonderful World, Beautiful People" was released by Trojan Records on October 24, 1969. [1]

The song was composed by Jimmy Cliff and produced by Leslie Kong. The song is about what the world could be. Politicians Harold Wilson and Richard Nixon are mentioned in the song. [2] It was a first hit for the Trojan label. It was originally recorded in the West Indies. Jimmy Cliff wasn't satisfied with the orchestral backing so in order to get the strings right, he flew to New York in early October and spent three hours in a twelve track studio re-recording the orchestral parts. [3]

Charts

The single made its debut at no. 20 in the NME Top 30 for week ending November 1, 1969. [4] Having been in the NME Top 30 chart for four weeks, it peaked at no. 6 on the week ending November 22. [5] [6] It peaked at no. 25 in the US. [7]

Performances

The song was performed for the first time in public at the Caribbean Music Festival which was held in Wembley in 1969. [8]

Other versions

American singer Chuck Bennett recorded a version of the song in German. It was released in 1970 as "Schön Ist Die Welt". [9] It was the B-side to another Jimmy Cliff song, "Wann Wird Die Menschheit Klug?" ("Sufferin' in the Land") which was a minor hit for him in Germany. [10]

Kai Warner included the song on his 1980 album, It's Reggae Time. [11]

Amazulu had a hit in the UK with it in 1987. Their version reached No. 97 during a single week on the chart. [12]

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Cliff Richard</span> British singer (born 1940)

Sir Cliff Richard is a British singer and actor. He has total sales of over 21.5 million singles in the United Kingdom and, in 2002, was the third-top-selling artist in UK Singles Chart history, behind the Beatles and Elvis Presley.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Jimmy Cliff</span> Jamaican musician, singer and actor

James Chambers OM, known professionally as Jimmy Cliff, is a Jamaican ska, rocksteady, reggae and soul musician, multi-instrumentalist, singer, and actor. He is the only living reggae musician to hold the Order of Merit, the highest honour that can be granted by the Jamaican government for achievements in the arts and sciences.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Desmond Dekker</span> Jamaican musician (1941–2006)

Desmond Dekker was a Jamaican ska, rocksteady and reggae singer-songwriter and musician. Together with his backing group the Aces, he had one of the earliest international reggae hits with "Israelites" (1968). Other hits include "007 " (1967), "It Mek" (1969) and "You Can Get It If You Really Want" (1970).

Leslie Kong was an influential Chinese-Jamaican reggae producer.

Wonderful World or What a Wonderful World may refer to:

Trojan Records is a British record label founded by Jamaican Duke Reid in 1968. It specialises in ska, rocksteady, reggae and dub music. The label currently operates under the Sanctuary Records Group. The name Trojan comes from the Croydon-built Trojan truck that was used as Duke Reid's sound system in Jamaica. The truck had "Duke Reid - The Trojan King of Sounds" painted on the sides, and the music played by Reid became known as the Trojan Sound.

The Foundations were a British soul band who were primarily active between 1967 and 1970. The group's background was: West Indian, White British and Sri Lankan. Their 1967 debut single "Baby Now That I've Found You" reached number one in the UK and Canada, and number eleven in the US, while their 1968 single "Build Me Up Buttercup" reached number two in the UK and number three on the US Billboard Hot 100. The group was the first multi-racial group to have a number one hit in the UK in the 1960s.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">The Shadows</span> English instrumental rock group

The Shadows were an English instrumental rock group, who dominated the British popular music charts in the late 1950s and early 1960s, in the pre-Beatles era. They served as the backing band for Cliff Richard from 1958 to 1968, and have joined him for several reunion tours.

People from the Caribbean have made significant contributions to British Black music for many generations.

Amazulu were a British reggae/ska/pop band from the 1980s comprising five women and one man. They achieved success in the UK charts with four top-20 hits, the biggest being "Too Good to Be Forgotten" in 1986.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">I Can See Clearly Now</span> Song by Johnny Nash

"I Can See Clearly Now" is a song written and recorded by American singer-songwriter Johnny Nash. It was the lead single from his album, I Can See Clearly Now (1972), and achieved success in the United States and the United Kingdom when it was released in 1972, reaching number one on the US Billboard Hot 100 and Cash Box charts. It also reached number one in Canada and South Africa. The song has been covered by many artists throughout the years, including a hit version by Lee Towers that reached no. 19 in the Dutch Top 40 in 1982, and another recorded by Jimmy Cliff for the motion picture soundtrack of Cool Runnings that peaked at no. 18 on the US Billboard Hot 100 in 1993.

The Pioneers are a Jamaican reggae and soul vocal trio, whose main period of success was in the 1960s. The trio has had different line-ups, and still occasionally performs.

Audrey Hall is a Jamaican reggae singer.

<i>Wonderful Life</i> (Cliff Richard album) 1964 soundtrack album by Cliff Richard with The Shadows

Wonderful Life is a soundtrack album by Cliff Richard with The Shadows to the 1964 film Wonderful Life. It is their third film soundtrack album and Richard's eleventh album overall. The album reached number 2 in the UK Albums Chart, spending 8 weeks in the top 3 and 23 weeks on in the top 20, but was a marked decline from their previous soundtrack album Summer Holiday that had spent 14 weeks at number 1.

<i>Now Thats What I Call Reggae</i> 2012 compilation album by Various artists

Now That's What I Call Reggae or Now Reggae is a triple-disc compilation album released in the United Kingdom on 25 June 2012.

"Sunny Honey Girl" is a song by the British musical group the Pipkins. It was written by Roger Cook, Roger Greenaway, John Goodison and Tony Hiller and was released as a single only in New Zealand in August 1970, charting for one week at number 18 on the New Zealand Listener Pop-O-Meter chart. The song appeared on the Pipkins' 1970 album Gimme Dat Ding.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Big Ship (Cliff Richard song)</span> 1969 single by Cliff Richard

"Big Ship" is a song by Cliff Richard, released as a single in May 1969. It peaked at number 8 on the UK Singles Chart.

<i>This Is Reggae Music: The Golden Era 1960–1975</i> 2004 box set

This Is Reggae Music: The Golden Era 1960–1975 is a reggae retrospective anthology issued as a 4-CD box set in 2004 by Trojan Records. The anthology, which was compiled by Colin Escott and Bas Hartong, is arranged in chronological order and features tracks by various artists, starting with mento and ska from the first half of the 1960s, then progressing to the slower rhythms of rocksteady and reggae, which both emerged later in the decade, continuing into the 1970s. Several of the acts featured are Derrick Morgan, Desmond Decker & the Aces, Toots & the Maytals, Jimmy Cliff, and Bob Marley and the Wailers.

"Sufferin' in the Land" was a 1970 single for Jimmy Cliff. It made the charts in the Netherlands that year. It was also covered by several artists shortly after its release.

References

This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.