Blue Turns to Grey

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The Mighty Avengers formed in Coventry in 1962 and came under the management of Andrew Loog Oldham, who managed the Rolling Stones. Mick Jagger and Keith Richards wrote the group’s only hit, So Much In Love, which reached 46 in the UK charts at the end of 1964, though it should have gone higher. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E6K6gmLvZiA

The next year they recorded another (and better) Jagger/Richard number, Blue Turns to Grey. Inexplicably it sank without trace.

An American duo, Dick and Dee Dee, released the song at the same time. Both this and the Mighty Avengers version were produced by Oldham, and the backing tracks are very similar (there is a rumour that the Stones prpvided some of the instrumentals). Unfortunately Dick and Dee Dee couldn’t sing. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M44ElQkoIm0

The Stones recorded it themselves twice in 1965. The first version finds Jagger struggling with the complex melody he and Richards wrote https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ATwVHTsPw5Q  but he is more confident on the second. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_EWsiORMvKo

Unlikely as it might seem, Cliff Richard and the Shadows had a hit with it in 1966, reaching 15 in the UK charts.https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4Ij7bEX5B9o

All these years I have thought it was called Blue Turns to Grey but now I see that the Mighty Avengers and D  and D D versions are entitled on the records When Blue Turns to Grey. Odd because the line is ‘Then blue turns to grey’.

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