Chad and Jeremy - "I'm In Love Again" (1965)

When it comes to creepy songs, they just don’t make ‘em like they used to. What mainstream songs pass for creepy these days? ICP? R. Kelly? That’s absolutely nothing compared to Gary Pucket or Serge Gainsbourg. Even the wholesome artists of yore naively slipped into darker territory every now and then: Stevie Wonder comes off as a stalker on My Cherie Amour (“In a cafe or sometimes on a crowded street / I've been near you, but you never notice me.”) and Brian Wilson sounds a tad incestuous when giving advice to his sister’s boyfriend on “Don’t Hurt My Little Sister” (“Why don’t you love her / like her big brother?”).

But Pucket’s pedophilia or Stevie’s stalking doesn’t really compare to the ironically or otherwise accidentally disturbing songs from the 60s. Usually, these are AM Gold tracks by artists like Sergio Mendes or The Association. These are tracks so sincere that they sound as if the artist’s trying to slip you a sonic love knife. Hollywood’s used such songs to add an edge to a number of big budget horror movies (off the top of my head, 1408 borrows “We’ve Only Just Begun” by the Carpenters and Final Destination 3 uses The Vogues’ “Turn Around, Look At Me”), but the songs don’t need a scary atmosphere to do the trick. Case in point? Within seconds of playing Chad and Jeremy’s “I’m In Love Again” for a friend, he immediately shot me a confused look and said, “You know this is psycho killer music, right?”

The song seems innocuous enough. It’s a warm, 60s pop ballad about love. Sure, these gents are a bit melodramatic at times, but most songs from this era are, yeah? The thing that rubs me the wrong way about this song is the diction. They openly admit they “can’t help [themselves],” and the delivery on “Can’t you see / I’m more than just a friend” sounds as if they’re trying too hard to convince this girl that she should love them. I see it as the kid in sweatpants that sat behind you in Chemistry class who told you that marriage was in your future after you let him borrow a sheet of paper. The lines “Never mind / the other girls I left behind / One look at you, and now I find / I can’t live without you” seems a bit ominous, too. Are you picturing a pile of murdered ex-girlfriends piled up in Jeremy Clyde’s basement? Maybe I’m alone on that one.

I’d be lying if I said my only appreciation of the song was based around this offbeat interpretation of the lyrics. There’s a reason that this group had a string of hits in the early 60’s: they’ve got amazing voices backed by Chad Stuart’s brilliant arrangements.

Also, they truly understand how to shape a pop song. There are a number of elements (the strings, horns, acoustic guitar, drums, vocals), and each is given its moment to shine without having to struggle to get your attention. The guitar run at 1:01 is a perfect example: it’s squeezed into a tight little space just at the end of the verse, but it doesn’t sound forced or thrown away. It’s a wonderful display of musicianship that helps to calm the song down from the almost bombastic chorus to the sedated verse.

So is this song the next Catcher In The Rye? Will this song end up on the iPods of future high-profile assassins? I hope that this song doesn’t actually become the stuff of psycho killing, but if it does, I’ll have to commend those killers for having such good musical taste.

YouTube Link: Chad And Jeremy - I'm In Love Again