American Pie has a colorful background story
American singer-songwriter and guitarist Don McLean released the song American Pie in 1971 and here are some interesting facts about this.
Many music lovers have already known that McLean was inspired to write this song by the tragic plane crash that killed musicians Buddy Holly, Ritchie Valens, and J.P. Richardson. This explains the famous line in the song: “The day the music died.”
For the longest time, this track was the longest song to top the US Billboard. Music charts are measures of songs’ popularity. American Pie, which is 8 minutes and 36 seconds long, got the title longest song on Billboard. However, it was ousted by pop star Taylor Swift when she released the 10-minute version of her song All Too Well, based on the article in SK Pop.
When this song was released, the public’s interest in Buddy Holly skyrocketed. This brought disappointment to Don McLean because people had become more interested in knowing more about one of the inspirations of this song than in the song itself. For him, there was a lot about the song that people missed out.
The song featured a final background chorus. This was made possible by great singers at that time, such as Pete Seeger, James Taylor, Carly Simon, and Livingston Taylor.
These singers were referred to as the “West Forty-Fourth Street Rhythm and Noise Choir” in the official credits. This information was not released to the public but eventually, producer Ed Freeman made this claim.
The first major song cover of American Pie was done by Brady Bunch in 1972, and this was a failure. “Worst of all, though, was our extraordinarily awful rendition of ‘American Pie.’ Ouch!” actor Barry Williams wrote in his autobiography.
Another classic song with an amazing story behind is Bridge Over Troubled Water by Simon & Garfunkel.