Golden Oldies Polished for Chart Action

12/06/2003 2:15 PM, Reuters
Michael Paoletta

Everything old is new again.

For nine weeks, beginning in the Billboard for the week of Oct. 4, remixes of Elvis Presley 's "Rubberneckin"' and the Rolling Stones' "Sympathy for the Devil" claimed the top two spots on the Billboard Hot Dance Singles Sales chart. The lengthy run ended in the Dec. 6 issue, when "Sympathy" dropped one slot to No. 3. In this issue, "Rubberneckin' " remains in pole position, with "Sympathy" at No. 4.

For the week of Oct. 4, "Sympathy" also debuted at No. 1 on the Hot 100 Singles Sales chart. In the process, it bumped "Rubberneckin'," which debuted in the pole position the previous week, to No. 2.

In an interesting juxtaposition, Hilary Duff 's "So Yesterday" was No. 3 on the same chart.

So yesterday, indeed. The original versions of both "Rubberneckin"' and "Sympathy" date back to 1968.

"We are bringing what was cool and hip yesterday into the here and now," says Joe DiMuro, executive VP of BMG Strategic Marketing Group. "This is a great way to reach a new, younger audience -- without alienating your core audience."

In addition to the Paul Oakenfold restructurings of "Rubberneckin'," BMG enjoyed similar success last year with the Junkie XL remixes of Presley's "A Little Less Conversation."

While these remixes receive minimal radio airplay, they are embraced by Madison Avenue. This was the case with "Rubberneckin"' and "Conversation," which were licensed for use in Toyota and Nike TV ads, respectively.

"A commercial has a million times more impact than club play does on remixes like these," notes Brian Chin, a former Billboard dance columnist who now consults in A&R research for Atlantic and in reissues for Sony/Legacy and other labels.

BMG and ABKCO, which issued the Rolling Stones remixes, are not alone in their quests to uncover those heritage recordings that are potentially ripe for the remixing. Universal Music Enterprises (UME) and Verve Music Group, among other companies, are revisiting their catalogs, too.

"We're not releasing these remixes instead of, but in addition to," says Jeff Moskow, VP of product management and consumer marketing at UME. "It is our way of showing that these tracks are still relevant today."

Early next year, UME will issue Diana Ross & the Supremes' "The #1's," which includes a bonus track: the Almighty remix of "You Keep Me Hangin' On." (The U.K.'s Almighty production outfit has also been tapped to remix "Love Child" for a future release.)

Also being considered for 2004 -- the 45th anniversary of Motown -- is a "Motown Remixed" project.

Moskow and others interviewed agree that the remixes being done today do not exploit the original recordings. If anything, "much respect to the original is shown," he says.

Being respectful of what came before was essential to the greenlighting of "Verve Remixed" and "Verve Remixed 2," acknowledges Verve Music Group A&R director Dahlia Ambach Caplin, who co-produced both collections with Jason Olaine.

"We can't just let producers do whatever they want to the original recording," she says. "We must consider the concept and the idea behind each song's original intent."

To illustrate, she points to Billie Holiday 's "Strange Fruit," which was remixed by Tricky. "That track could have only been remixed by Tricky."

Similarly, Almighty's Martyn Norris mentions words like substance, emotion and musicianship when talking about "You Keep Me Hangin' On."

"These elements had to be retained in the remix -- but with a DJ's approach," Norris says. So, in addition to contemporary house drums, Norris used the Funk Brothers' original bassline, the signature "news-flash" guitar riff ("of course, panned hard left to right") and Benny Benjamin's explosive drum pickups.

This is what Almighty does, he says. "We bring the song, in its entirety, to the clubs, while maintaining the original integrity."

This was key for a group like the Rolling Stones, which personally requested the remixes for "Sympathy," ABKCO senior VP Jody Klein says. "Since the track was originally a club record, we brought in producers who could add insight."

Earlier this year, Mind Train/Twisted/the Right Stuff did the same thing with Yoko Ono 's early-'80s underground dance hit, "Walking on Thin Ice." Remixes of the track reached the summit of the Hot Dance Club Play chart and peaked at No. 25 on the Hot 100 Singles Sales chart.

More recently, in the U.K., restructurings of Elton John 's 26-year-old "Are You Ready for Love" topped the U.K. pop and airplay charts.

Throughout, one thing remains certain: Most of these original records were created in a pre-video era. So, a song had to stand on its own -- without the help of a visual component.

"Because they didn't have stimulating visuals accompanying the song, artists had to work harder to make records that kept listeners interested," Mind Train managing director and longtime Ono collaborator Rob Stevens says.

"The writing and production process was different then," he adds. "Different -- yet very much long-lasting. Timeless."

Reuters/Billboard