• Source: Goodnight Vienna

Goodnight Vienna is the fourth studio album by Ringo Starr. It was recorded in the summer of 1974 in Los Angeles, and released later that year. Goodnight Vienna followed the commercially successful predecessor Ringo, and Starr used many of the same players, including Billy Preston, Klaus Voormann, Robbie Robertson, Harry Nilsson, and producer Richard Perry. The title is a slang phrase meaning "it's all over".




Background and recording


While all three other former Beatles had contributed to Ringo (1973), only John Lennon contributed to Goodnight Vienna.
On 17 June 1974, Starr called Lennon, who was about to record his Walls and Bridges album, and asked him to write a song he could include on his next album. Lennon wrote what became the title track, "Goodnight Vienna". A demo of "(It's All Down to) Goodnight Vienna" was recorded by Lennon on 28 June, with the session musicians from Walls & Bridges and sent to Starr in advance of the sessions. Besides writing and playing piano on the title track, Lennon suggested Starr cover The Platters' hit "Only You (And You Alone)" playing acoustic guitar and providing a guide vocal for Starr to follow. Starr's versions of both "Only You (And You Alone)" and "(It's All Down to) Goodnight Vienna" were recorded at a session produced by Lennon. Elton John also contributed a track, "Snookeroo", co-written with Bernie Taupin. Harry Nilsson gave Starr the track "Easy for Me", which he later recorded his own version of for his Duit on Mon Dei album.




Release


"Only You (And You Alone)", backed with "Call Me", was issued as an advance single from the album in the US on 11 November 1974, before the album was released. In the US the song reached number 6 on the Billboard Hot 100. Goodnight Vienna was released on the same day as the "Only You (And You Alone)" single in the UK on 15 November. The album reached only number 30 in the UK, and would be Starr's last chart album in his homeland until 1998. The album was released in the US on 18 November, and peaked at number 8, ultimately going gold, and its reviews were generally favourable. It was also originally released in quadrophonic. A promo film for "Only You (And You Alone)" was aired on Top of the Pops on 19 December. On 27 January 1975, "No No Song", backed with "Snookeroo", was released in the US, reaching number 3. Nearly a month later, on 21 February, "Snookeroo" was released as a single in the UK, backed with "Oo-Wee".
On 2 June, a special edit of "(It's All Down to) Goodnight Vienna" and "Goodnight Vienna (Reprise)" was released as a single, backed with an edit of "Oo-Wee", in the US. The cover artwork for Goodnight Vienna was based on a still from the classic 1951 science fiction film The Day the Earth Stood Still, with Starr's head replacing that of actor Michael Rennie shown standing behind the robot Gort. Rennie's character was the alien Klaatu.
A television commercial, which featured a voiceover from Lennon, depicted the album cover's flying saucer (with Starr) over Los Angeles—landing on the roof of the Capitol Records Building in Hollywood. The commercial was produced by Vidtronics Company Inc. and directed by Stanley Dorfman. Starr returned the favour and did the voiceover for the commercial for Lennon's Walls and Bridges album. Immediately after filming the commercial, on 14 November 1974, the promo film for "Only You (And You Alone)" was filmed. During the video Starr and Nilsson mimed to the song, on top of the Capitol Records Building. A lightweight flying saucer and a forty-foot robot named 'Gort' were placed on the building, accompanied by Starr in a spacesuit, and Nilsson sitting in a rocking chair smoking a cigarette in a brown dressing robe, reading that morning's Los Angeles Times, with a front-page photo showing Starr in his space costume. An orange-clad marching band, and forty actors (who formerly played Munchkins in The Wizard of Oz) danced below them at street level. The video aired on BBC TV's Top of the Pops show, on 19 December.
Goodnight Vienna was reissued in the US, this time by Capitol in February 1981. The album was remastered and reissued on CD on 30 November 1992 in the UK, and on 23 March 1993 in the US, with three bonus tracks: 1972 hit single "Back Off Boogaloo", its B-Side "Blindman" and an extended version of the McCartney-penned "Six O'Clock", a shorter version of which had earlier appeared on the LP version of Ringo.




Track listing



Side one

"(It's All Down to) Goodnight Vienna" (John Lennon) – 2:35
"Occapella" (Allen Toussaint) – 2:55
"Oo-Wee" (Vini Poncia, Richard Starkey) – 3:45
"Husbands and Wives" (Roger Miller) – 3:34
"Snookeroo" (Elton John, Bernie Taupin) – 3:27
Side two

"All by Myself" (Poncia, Starkey) – 3:21
"Call Me" (Starkey) – 4:07
"No No Song" (Hoyt Axton, David Jackson) – 2:33
"Only You (And You Alone)" (Buck Ram) – 3:26
"Easy for Me" (Harry Nilsson) – 2:20
"Goodnight Vienna (Reprise)" (Lennon) – 1:20
1992 bonus tracks

"Back Off Boogaloo" (Starkey) – 3:22
"Blindman" (Starkey) – 2:46
"Six O'Clock (Extended Version)" (Paul McCartney, Linda McCartney) – 5:23




Personnel






Charts






Notes






References






External links


Goodnight Vienna at Discogs (list of releases)
JPGR's Goodnight Vienna site
• Source: Goodnight, Vienna

Goodnight, Vienna is a 1932 British musical film directed by Herbert Wilcox and starring Jack Buchanan, Anna Neagle and Gina Malo. Two lovers in Vienna are separated by the First World War, but are later reunited.
Based on a radio operetta written by Eric Maschwitz, it features the song "Good-night, Vienna". Wilcox reportedly cast Neagle, whom he would later marry and direct in many films, after discovering her by chance in a stage show.




Plot


Max is an Austrian officer in the army and son of a highly placed general. His father wants him to marry a Countess but he has fallen in love with Vicki. Attending a party given in his honour, they are informed that war has broken out. Max writes a note to Vicki and goes off to war. Unfortunately the note is lost. Some time after the war, Max is just a shoe shop assistant while Vicki is now a famous singer. They meet and at first she snubs him but then falls in love with him again.




Cast


Jack Buchanan - Captain Maximilian Schletoff
Anna Neagle - Vicki
Gina Malo - Frieda
Clive Currie - General Schletoff
William Kendall - Ernst
Joyce Bland - Countess Helga
Gibb McLaughlin - Max's Orderly
Herbert Carrick - Johann
Clifford Heatherley - Donelli
O. B. Clarence - Theatre Manager
Peggy Cartwright - Greta
Muriel Aked - Marya
Aubrey Fitzgerald - Waiter




Production


Herbert Wilcox was played the score by Eric Maschwitz and George Posford. He liked it and bought the rights. Within a week Wilcox persuaded Jack Buchanan to play the lead. He wanted Lea Seidl or Evelyn Lane to play the female lead but neither was available. He went to tell Buchanan that the film was going to be postponed; Buchanan was playing in a show Stand Up and Sing with Anna Neagle. Wilcox was impressed by Neagle and cast her at a fee of £150. The film was shot in three weeks before Buchanan had to leave to appear in Stand Up and Sing at Liverpool. During the making of the film, Wilcox and Neagle fell in love




Reception


The film was Wilcox's most commercially successful until that time.




Cultural references


In the TV Series Rising Damp the lead character Rigsby often puts his cat Vienna out with the phrase "Goodnight, Vienna".
The phrase is used in the TV Movie Housewife, 49 when someone passes away.
Goodnight Vienna is the title of the fourth album by ex-Beatle Ringo Starr.
In the opening scene of the Jeeves and Wooster episode The Purity of the Turf, Hugh Laurie, in the character of Bertie Wooster, sings fragments of the film's title song.
In the BBC's Sherlock, "The Great Game" (Series 1: Episode 3), Benedict Cumberbatch's Sherlock examines a corpse, saying, "Nasty wound. Tetanus bacteria enters the bloodstream... Good night, Vienna."
In the video game Bloons Tower Defense 6, upon seeing a B.A.D, the hero Benjamin will simply say "Goodnight, Vienna."




References


Notes

Bibliography
Street, Sarah. British National Cinema. Routledge, 2009.




External links


Goodnight, Vienna at IMDb

Kata Kunci Pencarian:

• Ringo Starr
• Daftar perwakilan Austria untuk Film Internasional Terbaik pada Academy Award
• 2023
• Pendaftaran Rekaman Nasional
• Kematian tahun 2023
• Goodnight Vienna
• Goodnight, Vienna
• Goodnight Vienna (disambiguation)
• Peter Kay
• (It's All Down to) Goodnight Vienna
• Vienna (Ultravox song)
• Phoenix Nights
• No No Song
• Snookeroo
• Ringo Starr