“Go Ahead And Cry”
by Sky Saxon and The Soul Rockers
1963 song
Sky Saxon has a new voice on his 1964 song "Go Ahead And Cry": he isn’t yet psychedelic or insane but he cuts loose on this tune, really going for it and letting his voice fill the empty space. It helps that musically "Go Ahead And Cry" is mixed to be on the quiet side, with subtle instrumentation and a chorus of “wah wah” girls keeping things uncluttered so he can do his thing. The song is credited to Sky Saxon and The Soul Rockers, a great band name that is also the first public airing of Richard Marsh’s famed moniker.
Every one of Sky’s six pre-Seeds releases shows how he was developing towards something, even if he wasn’t sure what it was yet. Not only is "Go Ahead And Cry" and its flip side, a remake of his "They Say", admirable for the persistence they showed (the 7″ would be the fifth flop out of five tries) but he is plainly getting more comfortable with music and learning how to make it soar. It’s only when Sky falls silent during a middle section that it becomes clear how hard the band is working: furious guitar strumming and lively piano are buried deep in the mix but add to the urgency.
"Go Ahead And Cry" appeared on both the 1982 rarities LP Bad Part Of Town and the similar 1983 album New Fruit From Old Seeds. It also shows up on 2003’s Sky Saxon Presents "A Starlight Date With Richard Marsh" but squashed by noise reduction. All of these LPs used copies of the 45 as their sources.
Sky Saxon himself, by now a mercurial drug-crazed cosmonaut, got hold of a copy of the Bad Part Of Town LP himself and, in 1987, needle-dropped that needle-drop for his own new LP Takes & Glories. Onto this generations-from-the-original copy of "Go Ahead And Cry" he added new overdubs (!), calling the twisted result "Statue Of Stone" (after a line in the lyrics). It has to be heard to be believed.
