Share this site - Email/Facebook/Twitter/Pinterest

Best Selling Products at Amazon.com

#4 1972 Lyrics Icon Videos Icon

"Brand New Key"
Melanie
Neighborhood 4201

Melanieelanie Safka was born in Astoria, New York, where she learned to play the ukulele at the age of four. There was always music around the house -- her uncle sang folk songs; her mother, jazz and blues.

At sixteen, Melanie was already singing in nightclubs and coffeehouses. She also studied drama for a while, at New York's Academy of Fine Arts.

One day in 1967, she went to a building on Broadway, looking for an acting audition. The doorman, seeing she was carrying a guitar, misdirected her instead to the offices of Peter Schekeryk, a producer for Columbia Records. Schekeryk auditioned her and signed her to the label, and in the process, Melanie met her future producer and husband. Melanie recorded four songs with Columbia, including a single called "My Beautiful People." When the record failed to sell and Melanie was dropped by Columbia, she and her husband signed with Buddah Records.


THE TOP FIVE
Week of December 25, 1971

1. Brand New Key
Melanie


2. Family Affair
Sly & the Family Stone

3. American Pie
Don McLean

4. An Old Fashioned Love Song
Three Dog Night

5. Got to be There
Michael Jackson

Not much happened until the fall of 1969, when Melanie sang at the famous Woodstock festival. As it began to rain, hundred of candles suddenly appeared, glowing in the darkness. From that experience came her first hit, "Lay Down (Candles in the Rain)," which she recorded with the Edwin Hawkins Singers. Later in 1970, she made the Top 40 again, with "Peace Will Come (According to Plan)."

In 1971, Melanie and Peter formed their own label, Neighborhood Records. The first release was a single -- "Brand New Key."

"I like all kinds of music," she said, "but what I like best is to blend different styles so well in one song that both the song and I transcend categories. I hate being pegged as anything -- country, pop, whatever. The trick is to become a timeless musical being, with timeless musical songs.

"'Brand New Key' I wrote in about fifteen minutes one night. I thought it was cute; a kind of old thirties tune. I guess a key and a lock have always been Freudian symbols, and pretty obvious ones at that. There was no deep serious expression behind the song, but people read things into it. They made up incredible stories as to what the lyrics said and what the song meant. In some places, it was even banned from the radio.

"My idea about songs is that once you write them, you have very little say in their life afterward. It's a lot like having a baby. You conceive a song, deliver it, and then give it as good a start as you can. After that, it's on its own. People will take it any way they want to take it."

Beautiful People: The Greatest Hits of Melanie

Buy from Amazon.com
Buy from CD Universe
Search on Alibris

"Brand New Key," the first single from her album Gather Me, broke on American radio in October 1971 and reached the top of the charts in December. For nearly four months, confused record buyers flooded the stores asking for "The Roller Skate Song," "I've Got a Brand New Pair of Roller Skates," and even "The Bicycle Song." Fortunately, all finally were steered to the right record.

"I used to love singing 'Brand New Key,'" said Melanie, "at first. It had great shock value, dropped in the middle of one of my concerts. I'd be singing along about Suffering and the Trials of Man, and then suddenly, 'I've got a brand-new pair of roller skates...' It had a great effect. After it became a hit, though, the fun kind of wore off, at least for me. Some things, I think, are better left a surprise."

A few years after the success of "Brand New Key," Melanie's eldest child, Leilah, was born on October 3, 1973. The story goes Melanie was listening to tapes during childbirth and decided to name her firstborn after the song that was playing at the time, the classic rock standard "Layla" by Derek & the Dominos.

During the eighties, Melanie changed both musical direction and record labels several times. In 1993, she released a double CD called Silver Anniversary Unplugged, to celebrate her 25 year recording career. In August 1994, she performed at the gathering at the original Woodstock site. Although not as successful as before, Melanie still maintained a secure fan base and did sold out gigs all over the world, playing live into the 2010s. "Brand New Key" would have several revivals in the decades since it was released, being featured in the '70s-themed film "Boogie Nights"

On November 26, 2010 Melanie's longtime husband Peter Schekeryk, who produced all but one of her albums, passed away while holiday shopping in Framingham, Mass., at the age of 68. On her blog, Melanie spoke eloquently about her 45-year-long marriage, the circumstances of finding out about Peter's death and the talk she had with the store employee who was helping him when he became ill, and a planned book: "So Peter wanted me to write a book and I never could start or rather, I could start and never continue... [This book] will be Peter's story, immigrant refugee to number one producer of Melanie, the love of his life. That crazy Peter, sometimes you can't see it's a story 'till it ends, the greatest love story never told."

Melanie's later successes include winning a Primetime Emmy (in tandem with Lee Holdridge) for outstanding achievement in music and lyrics for the ballad "The First Time I Loved Forever" for the CBS series Beauty and the Beast. In 2010 and 2011, she performed at 40th anniversary editions of famous festivals she had performed at originally -- Isle of Wight and Glastonbury, respectively. She also played a big part in the revival of the Woodstock festival in 1989. She passed away at her home in central Tennessee on January 23, 2024 at age 76, shortly after beginning work on a new album of covers called Second Hand Smoke. "She was one of the most talented, strong and passionate women of the era and every word she wrote, every note she sang reflected that," Melanie's three children posted on social media. "Our world is much dimmer, the colors of a dreary, rainy Tennessee pale with her absence today, but we know that she is still here, smiling down on all of us, on all of you, from the stars."
 

 Reader's Comments

No comments so far, be the first to comment.




Mushrooms Icon  Main Page | Top 100 Singles Intro | Singles By Month | Seventies Almanac | Search The RockSite/The Web