My follow-up blog posts featuring instruments in rock and pop music intrinsic to our bodies highlights my second playlist using hands, this time finger snapping rather than hand-clapping, though some songs include both.
So in addition to hand clapping to keep rhythm, finger snapping has also found a place over the years in rock and pop music. It gained popularity in tunes of the ‘60s, often Motown hits such as The Temptations’ “My Girl,”
The Marvelettes’ “Too Many Fish In The Sea,” inspiring Billy Joel’s 1983 Innocent Man album release celebrating the doo-wop sound of the ‘60s with “Innocent Man” and “Longest Time”
Roger Miller’s ‘60s hit “King Of The Road”
spurred Jody Miller’s parody, offering the female side of the equation, with “Queen Of The House”
Other songs featuring prominent finger-snaps include Blind Melon’s “No Rain,” Soft Cell’s “Where Did Our Love Go,” David Bowie & Queen’s “Under Pressure,”
Wham!’s “Wake Me Up Before You Go-Go,” offering one of the best finger-snap videos
Billy Joel’s “Stiletto”, focusing on the band finger-snapping over Billy’s staccato piano playing
Celine Dion with the most beautiful cover of Roberta Flack’s classic “The First Time Ever I Saw Your Face” here without the finger snaps.
Eric Carmen’s “Make Me Lose Control,” Rickie Lee Jones’ “Chuck E’s In Love,” and Michael Jackson’s “Man In The Mirror”
and Cyndi Lauper’s “What’s Going On,”
In the early 2000s hip-hop has a sub-genre of snap music, with the likes of Souja Boy’s “Crank That,” Lil Jon’s “Snap Yo Fingers,” which provided the title for the playlist, “Jig Wit It,” and many other songs with lyrics well beyond my usual PG-13 rating.
Additionally, TV programing and musicals have occasionally featured finger snaps, perhaps the most icon being West Side Story’s “Prologue”
and “Cool.”
In the ‘90s Angelo Badalamenti provided finger snaps in the cult hit series Twin Peaks, including “Dance Of The Dream Man” and “Audrey’s Dance”
And the most famous finger snap song of my generation? Undoubtably the “Addams Family Theme.”
While only containing one finger snap, and thus not on the playlist, who can forget his more than memorable finger snap by Marry Poppins singing “A Spoonful Of Sugar”?
And I will let Marvel’s Avengers series villain Thanos, also with a single finger snap
bring us to the endgame, the playlist:
I hope that this music and my blog truly serve as a “revival: a new presentation of something old,” a springboard to return to the music of your youth, or perhaps to find artists you want to discover anew. Rediscover the passion of music in your life.
In continuing with my blog posts featuring various instruments in rock and pop music I thought I’d turn inward, focusing on instruments intrinsic to each of us, self-contained, if you will, with hands, highlighted in this blog with hand-clapping, in the next blog with finger-snapping, and rounding out with the lips and whistling in a subsequent blog post.
Some songs have stomping and clapping, such as Queen’s “We Will Rock You,” here a la Woody Harrelson & the Cheers gang, who couldn’t resist the natural rhythm of the song while hanging out at the bar.
Though the original is such a retro flashback worthy of a watch.
or the stomping and clapping in the Bay City Roller’s “Saturday Night.”
Others have clapping to keep the beat, as in John Cougar’s (at the time) “Jack & Diane,”
Pharrell Williams “Happy,” Billy Joel’s “Only The Good Die Young,” Boston’s “More Than A Feeling,” Elton John’s “Bennie And The Jets,” and John Lennon’s “Give Peace A Chance”
Yet others have perfectly timed clapping for effect, Steve Miller Band’s Take The Money And Run,” the Boomtown Rats’ “I Don’t Like Mondays,” The Rembrandts “I’ll Be There For You (Theme from Friends),”
The Romantics “What I Like About You,”
or David Bowie’s “Space Oddity.” How many of us have clapped at just these right times? Even Mr. Deeds’ pilots can’t help but bring their hands together, getting in on the act:
And then there’s the phenomenon of the double clap, often two claps followed by a single clap, or some similar pattern, started by Doo-wop, Motown, and girl groups of the ‘50s, with hits such as Elvis Pressley’s “Hound Dog,” gotta love his back-up clappers 😂
or Bobby Day’s “Rockin’ Robin,” (the dancing in this video is so fun)
The Contours “Do You Love Me,”
The Isley Brothers’ “Shout,” Little Eva’s “The Locomotion,” The Marvelettes’ “Please Mr. Postman,” and The Angels “My Boyfriend’s Back.”
Or just a bit later in rock and pop think The Cars’ “My Best Friend’s Girl,” The Beatles “I Want To Hold Your Hand,” Stealers Wheels’ “Stuck In The Middle With You,” Elton John’s “Crocodile Rock,” John Mellencamp’s “Hurts So Good,” and even The The’s “This is The Day.”
And some songs mix it up, with some rhythm clapping with an occasional double clap, such as The Clash’s “Rock The Casbah,” David Bowie’s “Golden Years,” The Beatles “Eight Days A Week,” and John Lennon’s “Instant Karma!.” And Meat Loaf made us wait for his double claps until the last minute of “You Took The Words Right Out Of My Mouth.” And maybe Paradise is worth waiting for, or at least hand-clapping in Paradise, as Jimmy Buffet makes us wait for his double claps in “Cheeseburger in Paradise.”
Some songs get super-fancy and incorporate both of my hand instruments, with both claps and snaps – Queen’s “Under Pressure,” Wham’s “Wake Me Up Before You Go-Go,”
Eddie Rabbitt’s “I Love A Rainy Night,” and The Marvelettes’ “Too Many Fish In The Sea.”
And apart from Lady Gaga’s song, we’re not talking about applause. So audiences clapping in appreciation on a live album doesn’t count. But clapping along at the right time counts, as Queen’s epic “Radio Gaga” (two Gaga’s in 1 paragraph!) during the Live Aid benefit concert at Wembley Stadium in 1985, inspiring over 70,000 in attendance not to mention millions around the world to clap in unison (many cite Queen’s live performance on this date this date as the best ever in the history of rock concerts):
Some of what we hear clapping isn’t even human, and thus is truly an instrument of sorts, synthesized claps using Simmons Claptrap, heard in Prince’s “Little Red Corvette,” Kim Carnes’ “Bette Davis Eyes,” and Madonna’s “Holiday,” here in her music video which is pretty stripped down compared to her eventual progression to a global mega-star:
And some artists exhort us to clap, such as Pharell Williams in “Happy”
Because I’m happy Clap along if you feel like a room without a roof Because I’m happy Clap along if you feel like happiness is the truth Because I’m happy Clap along if you know what happiness is to you Because I’m happy Clap along if you feel like that’s what you wanna do
Or DJ Casper in “Cha Cha Slide”
Everybody clap your hands Clap clap clap clap your hands Clap clap clap clap your hands
as well at Shirley Ellis’ “The Clapping Song,” Sia in “Clap Your Hands,” The Meters in “Hand Clapping Song,” Hurricane Chris in “The Hand Clap,” and Fitz & The Tantrums’ “HandClap”
After making my list, I stumbled upon this great summary of hand-clapping in music, many songs of which are included on my playlist:
Four men in red and leather address a crowd of thousands, their arms outstretched like inverted peace signs. Disembodied, we float over the assembly of workers wearing white boilersuits as they stand in unison, mirroring the gesture of the men on stage. Closing in on the ringleaders, we catch a glimpse of someone’s hands among the crowd, poised and ready for union. Then all we hear is, ‘Radio Ga Ga!’ – clap-clap – and we can’t help but join in.
Clapping is a catchy human impulse. Some babies pick it up when they’re as young as six months old. As a custom, applause may be as ancient and pervasive as humanity itself. So, unsurprisingly, clapping is fundamental to many musical genres, such as the ‘palmas’ Flamenco style in Spain, the ‘keplok’ clapping of Javanese gamelan, and the Arabic folk art of ‘kaff’.
Compared to these intricate beats, the standard 4/4 rhythm of western pop music is relatively simple (if you’ve ever seen an Anglo uncle dance at a wedding, you’ll know why). Hand-claps in pop and rock songs are similarly humble, typically accentuating or replacing the snare drum on the second and fourth beats. This reliability – even predictability – means it’s all the more exciting when a flashy frontperson or intrepid producer goes rogue …
‘All we hear is, ‘Radio Ga Ga!’’ Clap-clap.
‘Hey, Dirty. Baby, I got your money,’ clap-clap.
‘Golden years, gooold, whop, whop, whop,’ [one, two, three] clap-clap.
The ultimate pop music power move, a double clap is the aural equivalent of using two exclamation points back-to-back!! It can be called upon to open a song (‘Shake Appeal’ by serial offenders The Stooges); ramp up a big finale (Meat Loaf’s ‘You Took the Words Right Out of My Mouth’); or bookend a tune with a sonic signifier of camaraderie (The Cars’ ‘My Best Friend’s Girl’). In every case, it’s an auditory call-to-arms that rallies concert goers and loungeroom groovers to clap along if, to paraphrase Pharrell, that’s what they want to do.
Hand claps are essential to gospel rhythms and, thus, single claps can be heard backing the drums on seminal 1950s rock ‘n’ roll songs like Big Mama Thornton’s ‘Hound Dog’ and Joe Turner’s ‘Shake, Rattle and Roll’. At the same time, Bo Diddley started flexing the syncopated clap, a-clap, a-clap, a-clap-clap rhythm with which his name would become synonymous. Although his self-titled debut single featured neither single nor double claps, its Afro-Cuban beat set the pace for entertainers like Eddie Cochran, whose 1958 single ‘Summertime Blues’ was an early proponent of the double clap in mainstream pop.
In the 1960s, girl groups and solo starlets began using double claps to evoke the schoolyard sassiness that bubbles in The Angels’ ‘My Boyfriend’s Back’, as well as dance-songs like Little Eva’s ‘The Loco-Motion’ and Shirley Ellis’ ‘The Clapping Song’. The latter, with its pat-a-cake-style instructions, seems deliberately designed to infantilise its 36-year-old singer. Surprising, then, that it only took a few years for the double clap to come of age, thanks to its virulent use in 1970s soul, funk and R&B jams.
From the speculative history of Boney M’s ‘Rasputin’ to the barometric fantasy of ‘It’s Raining Men’ by The Weather Girls, double claps – when performed and recorded by real, live musicians – infused disco’s synthesiser hits with the primal slap of humanity. The snappy flourishes of Kool & the Gang’s ‘Ladies’ Night’ are a dry yet fanciful siren’s call. Meanwhile, the hand claps in George Benson’s ‘Give Me the Night’ reverberate with such fervour that they were surely recorded in a cavernous, abandoned roller-rink. Either way, it’s party time, and everyone’s invited.
On the message boards of prince.org – an independent, fan-operated website dedicated to discussing the purple one, may he rest in power – there’s a thread called ‘Songs with double clap eg. ‘Forget Me Nots’ Patrice Rushen’. The responses suggest a keen, if niche, interest in this subject, as do the user-generated Spotify playlists ‘Double Clap!’, ‘Double Clap songs’, ‘The Double Clap Playlist’ and ‘Sunshine & Double Claps’. However, in each instance, many of the suggested titles don’t truly include claps in the strict, corporeal sense.
In the 1980s, chart toppers like Madonna’s ‘Holiday’, The Clash’s ‘Rock the Casbah’, and Kim Carnes’ ‘Bette Davis Eyes’ featured digital double claps created on nifty units like the Simmons’ Claptrap. Moreover, care of the era’s predilection for electronic drum machines and gated reverb, double snare hits are often misremembered as double claps, especially when performers flagrantly clapped along in the accompanying music videos. See: Prince in ‘Little Red Corvette’, Hall & Oates in ‘Private Eyes’.
Synthesised and recorded double claps persisted into the nineties, staple to all manner of hip-hop tracks, from the visceral ‘Got Your Money’ by Ol’ Dirty Bastard ft. Kelis, to Will Smith’s fantastically plastic ‘Men in Black’ theme (itself a corporate rework of the aforementioned Patrice Rushen song).
Double claps have pepped up other film and TV themes, too. In 1983, a carefree double clap welcomed folks to Fraggle Rock. Twenty years later, The Dandy Warhols’ break-up banger ‘We Used to Be Friends’ called to attention viewers tuning into teen noir fixture Veronica Mars. Double claps drive the titular tune in That Thing You Do!(1996), evoking a sense of saccharine nostalgia by riffing on The Beatles’ ‘I Want to Hold Your Hand’ – its two sets of two claps later echoed in the Friends theme ‘I’ll Be There for You’ by The Rembrandts.
In line with the millennial embrace of irony, pastiche and meta humour, UK party people Electric Spivs dropped a 2014 ditty called ‘Double Handclap’. Taking a page from Ian Dury & the Blockheads’ slice-of-Cockney-life playbook, the track’s narrator – a sound technician at a circus – tells a rotund wrestler that the key to staying in shape is simply to practice the hallowed double handclap. While this advice is questionable at best, it joins Sia’s ‘Clap Your Hands’, The Meters’ ‘Hand Clapping Song’, and Hurricane Chris’ ‘The Hand Clap’ (which features a rare and precious use of the elusive octuple clap) as a pop song that extols the modest pleasure of slapping your palms together for percussive charm.
A paean to pop trends and cultural memory, Queen’s chart-topping single ‘Radio Ga Ga’ is fuelled by an iconic clap-along hook. Viewers watching the music video today may be surprised to see that singer Freddie Mercury only incites the crowd to clap during the first chorus, but not on subsequent rounds – notable, since the impulse now feels inseparable from the song. When Queen performed it at Live Aid in 1985, some 72,000 people joined in, perhaps resulting in the largest ever en-masse double clap. In fact, crowd shots reveal that many of the London punters didn’t want (or couldn’t tell when) to stop.
Double claps didn’t feed the world that day, and they’ve likely had their finest hour, but they’re powerful and unpredictable contagions, all the same. Someone has to love them.
John Fogerty’s “Centerfield” – such a good old-timers baseball video
George Benson’s “Give Me The Night”
Norman Greenbaum’s “Spirit In The Sky” – great image of a bunch of ‘70s hippies clapping on a hill.
Outkast “Hey Ya!”
Have to include my girl Shania given I just saw her in Vegas last week, here with “Any Man Of Mine”
Also saw Carrie in Vegas sing “Good Girl”:
Even some hand-claps in Tay-Tay’s “Shake It Off”
And perhaps the song that started it all in terms of clapping in popular music, from the school playgrounds of America, “Miss Mary Mack”
The blog finishes with a tribute to my living briefly in Spain with a few Flamenco songs. While obviously not rock or pop, the almost droning rhythmic clapping along with the intricately beautiful melodies of Spanish acoustic guitar are a hallmark of this genre of music. You can’t find more clapping in song than in Spanish Flamenco.
So on to the playlist. I hope it gets you up out of your seat and clapping 👏!
I hope that this music and my blog truly serve as a “revival: a new presentation of something old,” a springboard to return to the music of your youth, or perhaps to find artists you want to discover anew. Rediscover the passion of music in your life.
