Song of the Day 9/1: Len Barry, “1-2-3”
Here’s some blue-eyed soul one for your Friday night dance party. Len Barry was the lead singer for the Dovells, the Philadelphia doo-wop group who reached No. 2 in 1961 with the “Bristol Stomp.” He left for a solo career in 1963 and scored another No. 2 hit in 1965 with this tune by John Madara and David White of Danny and the Juniors. It was also a big hit in the UK, where Barry was a major attraction for several years.
He gave up performing the ’70s and did some production work, but by the late ’70s the guy born Len Borisoff, son of a bar manager, was was tending bar at Philadelphia’s Khyber Pass pub, where Big Daddy Graham said Barry gave him his first gig. Barry died, age 78, in 2020.
Though the song was credited to Madara, White and Barry, they were sued by Motown for supposedly plagiarizing the Holland-Dozier-Holland song “Ask Any Girl,” the B-side to “Baby Love.” They settled the suit by giving Motown 15% of the royalties. Legitimate? You be the judge.
I’d say 15% sounds about right to my admittedly tin ear.
Len, then known as Len Borisoff, was a reserve on what Ted Silary called the best high school basketball team in US history, Overbrook in 1958, with a starting lineup of Wayne Hightower, Richie Richman, Wali Jones, Walt Hazzard and Ralph Heyward.
Heyward was a high school all-American, Hightower, Jones and Hazzard had significant pro careers, and Richman was the best athlete in Villanova history.