Intro: 'Optimistic Voices' from The Wizard Of Oz (1939) / Tim Curry - I Do The Rock (1979)
15My intro to "I Do The Rock" by Tim Curry is a (slightly) extended mix of "Optimistic Voices" by The MGM Orchestra with The Debutantes & The Rhythmettes. According to Wikipedia:
"Optimistic Voices" is the name of both a song and the choir singing it, from the 1939 film classic The Wizard of Oz. The music is by Herbert Stothart & Harold Arlen and the lyrics are by E.Y. Harburg. It is heard on the soundtrack when the group is saved from a sleeping spell in a poppy field as they approach the Emerald City. The song is a bouncy number sung by an off-screen female chorus.
My slightly bizarre "Optimistic Voices" prelude is quickly followed by "I Do The Rock" by Tim Curry, a track from Tim Curry's 1979 LP entitled Fearless. Although it did not chart very high in the US, it was a popular song played at clubs and also on FM radio. It reached #91 on Billboard but fared slightly better on Cash Box at #85 on December 8,
1979. Despite the single's poor performance, the album itself sold quite well, Curry already a very popular figure in the 70's since his starring role in The Rocky Horror
Picture Show.
My presentation of "I Do The Rock," like the intro, is offbeat, extrapolating from some of the ideas in the intro, with the intention of matching the visual material to the beat and rhythm of the music in an entertaining fashion. Tim Curry appears in sections, as do John Lennon & Yoko Ono briefly, and Rod Stewart, Robert Palmer, and The Undeads (from
the De Palma film, Phantom Of The Paradise), among others, more extensively.