Back Off Boogaloo

Ringo Starr identified his initial inspiration for "Back Off Boogaloo" as having come from Marc Bolan, the singer and guitarist with the English glam rock band T. Rex. When discussing the composition on VH1 Storytellers in May 1998, Starr explained: "[Bolan] was an energised guy. He used to speak: 'Back off, boogaloo ... ooh you, boogaloo.' 'Do you want some potatoes?' 'Ooh you, boogaloo! Starr also recalled having to take the batteries out of his children's toys that night, in order to power a tape recorder and make a recording of the new song. The lyrics to the middle eight of "Back Off Boogaloo" came to Starr while watching London Weekend Television's football show, The Big Match. According to Starr biographer Alan Clayson, "T Rex devotees" claimed that Bolan had ghost-written "Back Off Boogaloo". Starr later acknowledged that George Harrison co-wrote the song by adding some chords and finishing the melody. As on Starr's 1971 hit single "It Don't Come Easy", Harrison was not credited for his songwriting contribution. Starr originally offered "Back Off Boogaloo" to his fellow Liverpudlian Cilla Black to record, but she declined, hoping instead to record another new Starr–Harrison composition, "Photograph". ==Composition==

Commentators have regularly interpreted the song as an attack by Starr on his former Beatles bandmate Paul McCartney. In author Andrew Grant Jackson's interpretation, Starr, having composed few songs in the past, was goading himself to "finally write a 'tasty' song", yet "at the same time, he was probably castigating McCartney". Starr had publicly criticised McCartney and its 1971 follow-up, Ram, Rodriguez writes that the mention of "sound[ing] wasted" could also be a reference to McCartney's overindulgence with cannabis. disconsolate after John Lennon had told him and Starr that he wanted a "divorce" from the Beatles. In addition to these supposed messages in "Back Off Boogaloo", observers have viewed the song title as Starr's rebuke to McCartney to abandon his legal stand against the Beatles and Apple Corps, Author Keith Badman writes that "Boogaloo" had "long been cited as Paul's nickname" from his former bandmates Starr, Harrison and Lennon. When tailoring his 1970 composition "I'm the Greatest" for Starr to record on the 1973 album Ringo, Lennon referenced the song title with the lines "Now I'm only thirty-two / And all I want to do is boogaloo". ==Recording==

Having earmarked the song as his next single, The sessions took place at Apple Studio in central London, with Harrison producing, as he had on "It Don't Come Easy". The recording reflects the influence of glam rock on Starr through what authors Chip Madinger and Mark Easter term "its big drum sound and repetitious nature". in 2011 Rodriguez describes Starr's "martial-sounding opening" as a rare "showcase for his own drumming", Starr later said that he incorporated a hook he had come up with for the Beatles song "Get Back" into his drum part on "Back Off Boogaloo". Further overdubs on the track included contributions from three backing vocalists, filming for which Starr had interrupted in order to perform at the Concert for Bangladesh. The song was passed over for inclusion in the film, Starr produced the track with Voormann. The recording sessions took place at Apple on 18–19 August, Like the film, "Blindman" was not held in high regard by critics. Spizer describes it as "a muddy-sounding dirge with little to recommend". By contrast, director and author Alex Cox believes that the song "works well, in the context of the film" compared to Cipriani's score, which he considers "lazy". ==Release==

Apple Records issued the single on 17 March 1972 in Britain, as Apple R 5944, with a US release taking place three days later, as Apple 1849. It was Starr's first release since "It Don't Come Easy", a year before. in films such as 200 Motels and Blindman. Further aligning himself with Britain's glam rock movement, Starr made his directorial debut with Born to Boogie, a film starring Bolan that included Starr's footage of a T. Rex concert held at Wembley on 18 March 1972. and achieved Starr's best position on the UK Singles Chart, where it reached number 2. A promotional film for "Back Off Boogaloo" was shot on 20 March at Lennon's Tittenhurst Park residence while Starr was looking after the property. Re-releases for "Back Off Boogaloo" include Starr's 1975 greatest hits album, Blast from Your Past, and, along with "Blindman", as a bonus track on the 1992 reissue of his Goodnight Vienna album. "Back Off Boogaloo" also appeared on his 2007 compilation Photograph: The Very Best of Ringo Starr, the collector's edition of which included the 1972 promotional film. ==Critical reception==

On release, Chris Welch wrote in Melody Maker: "A Number One hit could easily be in store for the maestro of rock drums. There's a touch of the Marc Bolans in this highly playable rhythmic excursion ... It's hypnotic and effective, ideal for jukeboxes and liable to send us all mad by the end of the week." Alan Clayson writes of reviewers criticising "Back Off Boogaloo" for being repetitious, leading Starr to respond in a 1973 interview: "Play me a pop song that isn't." Writing in 1981, NME critic Bob Woffinden commented on Starr's success in establishing himself in the first two years after the Beatles' break-up, and said that the single "confirmed that he and Harrison, dark horses both, were the ones who had managed their solo careers more purposefully and intelligently" compared with McCartney and Lennon. Woffinden described "Back Off Boogaloo" as "every bit as ebullient" as "It Don't Come Easy", although "slightly inferior", In a 1974 article for the NME, Charles Shaar Murray highlighted "Back Off Boogaloo" as a "great radio and juke-box tune". Among Beatle biographers, Simon Leng terms it "a rocking, soccer crowd chant that suited Starr's talents well", Guitar World editor Damian Fanelli includes the song on his list of Harrison's ten best post-Beatles "Guitar Moments", saying of the recording: "the main event is clearly Harrison's slightly wild, wacky – and very bouncy – slide guitar solo, which includes an alternate melody line that's even catchier than the melody Ringo is singing." Andrew Grant Jackson features "Back Off Boogaloo" in his book Still the Greatest: The Essential Solo Beatles Songs. He says that Starr's mood on the track, while short of the rage that American rapper Tupac Shakur vented against his rival Biggie Smalls in "Hit 'Em Up", "no doubt helped make the tune a staple of football and soccer matches". He comments that the song has "been appropriated" by several artists, including the glam-metal band Warrant, in their hit single "Cherry Pie", and Franz Ferdinand, in "Take Me Out". ==Subsequent recordings==

Stop and Smell the Roses version Starr recorded a new version of "Back Off Boogaloo" for his 1981 album on Boardwalk Records, Stop and Smell the Roses. The song was produced by Starr's friend, singer Harry Nilsson, and features a musical arrangement by Van Dyke Parks. the remake incorporates lyrics from a number of the band's songs – in this case, "With a Little Help from My Friends", "Help!", "Lady Madonna", "Good Day Sunshine" and "Baby, You're a Rich Man", as well as Starr's "It Don't Come Easy". In a further reference to his past, the 1981 version of "Back Off Boogaloo" opens with the same guitar riff that Harrison had played on "It Don't Come Easy" ten years before. Starr taped the basic track at Evergreen Recording Studios in Los Angeles on 4 November 1980, with additional recording taking place on 1–5 December at Nassau's Compass Point Studios. Among the large cast of musicians supporting Starr were Nilsson (vocals), Jim Keltner (drums), Jane Getz (piano), Dennis Budimir and Richie Zito (guitars), and a four-piece horn section led by saxophonist Jerry Jumonville. Starr overdubbed his vocals on 4 December, four days before the murder of John Lennon, who had been due to record his contributions to Stop and Smell the Roses in January 1981. Contrasting with his success as a solo artist in 1971–73, the album continued Starr's run of commercial and critical failures since 1976. Rodriguez writes that "[m]ost people either love or hate the revamping" of "Back Off Boogaloo". Produced by Starr, which he rediscovered when he and his wife, Barbara Bach, were moving house. Starr recalled his surprise at hearing the tape again: "It's me singing 'Back Off Boogaloo' with this great guitar. I'm thinking who the hell is that playing? Then I realise, I'm on guitar!... the reel-to-reel captures the song coming [through]." The track includes guitar overdubs by Jeff Lynne and Joe Walsh. ==Live performance==

Starr has performed "Back Off Boogaloo" in concert with his All-Starr Band, beginning with the band's debut tour of North America in July–September 1989. The song was dropped from the concert setlist early in that tour, however, in favour of the 1963 Lennon–McCartney composition "I Wanna Be Your Man". Live versions of "Back Off Boogaloo" have appeared on the multi-disc compilation The Anthology... So Far (2001) and King Biscuit Flower Hour Presents Ringo & His New All-Starr Band (2002). The latter version was recorded during a US tour in August 2001, at which point the All-Starr line-up was Starr (vocals), Mark Rivera (saxophone), Ian Hunter (guitar), Roger Hodgson and Howard Jones (keyboards), Greg Lake (bass) and Sheila E. (drums). Starr also played the song live with "Ringo and the Roundheads", a band he formed to promote his 1998 studio album Vertical Man. A version recorded on 13 May that year at Sony Music Studios, New York, The personnel on this performance included Starr (vocals), Walsh and Mark Hudson (guitars), Jack Blades (bass) and Simon Kirke (drums). Another live version with the Roundheads, recorded for PBS Television's Soundstage in August 2005, was issued on the album Ringo Starr: Live at Soundstage (2007) and on DVD in 2009. ==Personnel==

The following musicians played on the original version of "Back Off Boogaloo": • Ringo Starr vocals, drums, percussion, backing vocals • George Harrison slide guitars, acoustic guitar • Gary Wright piano • Klaus Voormann bass, saxophone • Madeline Bell, Lesley Duncan, Jean Gilbert backing vocals ==Chart performance==

Weekly singles charts Year-end charts ==Notes==