Cher has finally earned a nomination into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, and it’s a well-deserved nod. Let’s set aside for a moment her decades-spanning solo career. Go back to the ’60s, and you’ll realize that Sonny & Cher churned out an impressive string of hits, including “The Beat Goes On.”
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It’s a song that was very much of the time in terms of some of its references. And yet, “The Beat Goes On” also made some salient points that are still extremely relevant today. Let’s take a look back at the making and the meaning of this 1967 smash.
Beyond “Babe”
Sonny Bono was making his living as a producer/writer/artist in the burgeoning Southern California rock scene in the early ’60s when he met a teenage Cherilyn Sarkisian and helped her get backup singing gigs. The pair soon struck up both a romantic relationship and professional partnership, one that peaked with the meteoric rise of their 1965 single “I Got You Babe.”
As successful as “I Got You Babe” was, it still gave off the vibe of a novelty song, and many wondered if the pair had anything more substantial up their sleeve. They continued to score solid hits in 1965 and ’66, but there was nothing too meaty in the bunch. That all changed when Bono wrote a song that would appear on the duo’s 1967 album In Case You’re in Love.
The pair recorded it at Gold Star Studios in Hollywood with a who’s who of the finest Wrecking Crew session men and women on hand. Among the luminaries who played on the track: Mac Rebennack, aka New Orleans music legend Dr. John; drummer Jim Gordon, perhaps the premier session drummer of the era whose life took an awful turn in later years, and Mike Post, who would go on to be the composer of massively successful TV theme songs like Hill Street Blues and The Rockford Files.
But none was more important to that particular session than bassist Carol Kaye. She came up with the bounding bassline that gave the song its unique rhythmic feel. Bono, with his Dylanesque whine, and Cher, with her potent bellows, traded off vocal lines amidst the chirping organs and swanky horns in memorable fashion. It was the ideal setting for Bono’s subtly piercing lyrics to inhabit.
What is “The Beat Goes On” About?
“The Beat Goes On” stands as a piece of sly pop commentary about how surface elements of the culture change while some aspects of life remain constant. Certain fads get left on the ash heap of history, such as the Charleston dance and the corner grocery store. In their place are supermarkets, ever-faster cars, miniskirts, and, in the song’s most dated line: Electrically they keep a baseball score. (Imagine what they’d think if they saw a Jumbotron in 1967!)
Bono manages to subvert expectations with the lines about what hasn’t changed, and likely never will. Some of it is benign, such as the ever-present flirtations of youth. Yet there are also examples of permanence that we wish would fade as easily as a trendy dance step. And men still keep on marching off to war, Bono intones, while Cher belts out in a nod to income inequality, Bum still cries, “Hey buddy, have you got a dime?“
Sonny & Cher’s “The Beat Goes On” therefore manages to be a relic of sorts and yet somehow timeless. And it’s by no means a novelty, but instead an intelligent piece of pop music played by masters of the craft and sung by two artists whose vocal and personal chemistry proved inimitably beguiling.
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Photo by CA/Redferns
