Everly Brothers

Certain Songs #432: The Everly Brothers – “Wake Up Little Susie”

January 26, 2016 by Jim Connelly

Album: The Everly Brothers
1957

Not so different than “Bye Bye Love” in a lot of respects — written by Felice and Bordeaux Bryant; opening with a super cool acoustic riff — “Wake Up Little Susie” zips right past those surface similarities almost instantly.

The timeless tale of a couple of high school students who fell asleep during a drive-in movie and now are in deep shit because of it, “Wake Up Little Susie” just drips with fear and worry from the very start.

Certain Songs #431: The Everly Brothers – “Bye Bye Love”

January 25, 2016 by Jim Connelly

Album: The Everly Brothers
Year: 1957

What a cool opening this song has: that acoustic guitar, played almost indifferently for a couple of measures, until Phil & Don Everly lead with their strength: the rough beauty of their voices singing in harmony.

The key, of course, is not just that their voices sound great together, but that they also just slightly rub each other wrong, like each one is double-dog-daring the other to slide his voice just wrong enough to fuck the whole thing up.