Mary's Place

I was reading Jeff Meshel's blog in which he traces the travels of one element of a song recorded by Major Lance in 1963.

It's called "Monkey Time" and it was written by Curtis Mayfield.

Jeff didn't mention Bruce Springsteen's "Mary's Place" which is in large part a cover of Major Lance's "Monkey Time".

Here's Major Lance on YouTube. And here's Bruce: http://bit.ly/16Sqiqv

I saw him do it Toronto in 2003 and it was great.

It starts out with him shouting "Are you ready?". That comes from Monkey Time and it was copied at the start of Barbara Mason's "Yes, I'm Ready" in 1965. It's on YouTube here.

"Yes, I'm ready" can also be heard in the intro to Laura Nyro's Luckie in 1968. It's on YouTube here.

Laura covered Monkey Time in 1971. On YouTube here. Her reedy voice doesn't compares to the Major's.

And the refrain of "Mary's Place" comes from the title of a Sam Cooke song, "Meet Me At Mary's Place" which is on YouTube here.

By coincidence, on the same album as her version of Mickey's Monkey Laura Nyro has a song called It's Gonna Take A Miracle.

And on the same album as Mary's Place which is a cover of Monkey Time, the Boss has a song called Counting On A Miracle.

And on that same album, "The Rising", he also has a song called "Land of Hope and Dreams" which includes People Get Ready which is also by Curtis Mayfield.

Do I sound like a conspiracy theorist? Yeah, kind of. They would make good sourcers.