“Downtown” is a pop song composed by Tony Hatch which, as recorded by Petula Clark, became an international hit – No. 1 in the US and No. 2 in the UK – at the end of 1964.

Tony Hatch had first worked with Petula Clark when he assisted her regular producer Alan Freeman on her 1961 #1 hit “Sailor”. In 1963 Freeman had asked Hatch to take over as Clark’s regular producer: Hatch had subsequently produced five English-language singles for Clark none of which had charted.

In the fall of 1964 Hatch had made his first visit to New York City seeking material from music publishers for the artists he was producing. Hatch would recall: “I was staying at a hotel on Central Park and I wandered down to Broadway and to Times Square and, naively, I thought I was downtown. Forgetting that in New York especially downtown is a lot further downtown getting on towards Battery Park. I loved the whole atmosphere there and the [music] came to me very, very quickly”. Hatch was hoping to pitch the song to the Drifters.

Shortly afterward Hatch visited Paris to present Clark with possible material – none of it written by him – for a London recording session scheduled for October 16 1964: Hatch – “she was not very enthusiastic about [the material] and asked me if I was working on anything new myself. Reluctantly (because the [lyric] was still so unfinished) I played her the tune of my New York inspiration and slipped in the word ‘Downtown’ in the appropriate places. ‘That’s the one I want to record,’ she said. ‘It just needs some great lyrics.'”

“Downtown” was recorded 16 October 1964 at the Pye Studios in Marble Arch. Thirty minutes before the session was scheduled, Hatch was still touching up the song’s lyrics in the studio’s washroom. Hatch always insisted on recording all the personnel on his productions actually performing together as would be heard on the finished track: the large number of personnel contributing to the “Downtown” session necessitated that two studios be utilized for the track’s recording, with a closed-circuit television connection allowing Hatch to conduct the personnel in both the studio in which he was physically present and the auxiliary studio. The session personnel on “Downtown” included guitarists Vic Flick, Jimmy Page and Big Jim Sullivan, and also drummer Bobby Graham and the Breakaways vocal group. “Downtown” entered the UK Top 50 dated the week 14 November 1964 ending a virtual two-year UK chart absence for Clark; of the ten singles she’d had released in the UK during that period only one: “Chariot”, #39 the spring of 1963, had appeared in even the lower charts. “Downtown” rose to #2 that December remaining there for three weeks, kept out of the #1 position by the Beatles’ “I Feel Fine”. Certified a Gold record for sales in the UK of 500,000, “Downtown” also reached #2 in Ireland and #1 in Australia, New Zealand, Rhodesia and South Africa, and was also a hit in Denmark (#2), India (#3), the Netherlands (#3) and Norway (#8).

However “Downtown” had its greatest significance in the reception it was afforded in the US. Warner Bros. A&R man Joe Smith was scouting in London for records with American hit potential, the musical British Invasion of the US then going strong. Smith wanted to release Clark’s “Downtown” in the US and when a surprised Hatch asked if Smith didn’t consider “Downtown” to be “a very English record” he recalls Smith’s reply as: “It’s perfect. It’s just an observation from outside of America and it’s just beautiful and just perfect.”

Warner Bros. released “Downtown” in the US in December 1964: the track appeared near the bottom of the national charts the week before Christmas and despite the Christmas season traditionally being the worst time to break a new hit “Downtown” shot up to the Top Ten in five weeks and the next week – 23 January 1965 – was #1. “Downtown” retained that position a further week before being overtaken by the ascendancy of the Righteous Brothers’ “You’ve Lost That Lovin’ Feelin'”. Clark became the first UK female artist to have a US #1 hit during the rock and roll era and the second in the annals of US charted music, Vera Lynn having hit #1 US with “Auf Wiederseh’n Sweetheart” in 1952. “Downtown” also made Clark the first UK female artist to have a single certified as a Gold record for US sales of one million units. “Downtown” would be the first of fifteen consecutive hits Clark would place in the US Top 40 during a period when she’d have considerably less chart impact in her native UK, there reaching the Top 40 eight times.

Clark, who had been playing to her French speaking fans in small venues in Quebec when “Downtown” entered the US charts, swiftly cut non-English versions of the song for the markets in France, Italy and Germany; the absence in each region’s language of a two-syllable equivalent of “downtown” necessitated a radical lyric recasting for the versions aimed at France (“Dans le temps”), Italy (“Ciao Ciao”) and Spain (“Chao Chao”) which respectively charted at #6, #2 and – for three weeks – #1: “Dans le temps” also reaching #18 on Belgium’s French-language chart. The title and lyric “Downtown” was retained for an otherwise German version which was the most successful foreign language version reaching #1 in Germany and also reaching #3 in Austria and #11 on the charts for the Flemish region of Belgium.

By Petula Clark

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FKCnHWas3HQ

Lyrics

When you’re alone And life is making you lonely, You can always go downtown When you’ve got worries, All the noise and the hurry Seems to help, I know, downtown
Just listen to the music of the traffic in the city Linger on the sidewalk where the neon signs are pretty How can you lose?
The lights are much brighter there You can forget all your troubles, forget all your cares and go Downtown, things’ll be great when you’re Downtown, no finer place for sure Downtown, everything’s waiting for you (Downtown)
Don’t hang around And let your problems surround you There are movie shows downtown Maybe you know Some little places to go to Where they never close downtown
Just listen to the rhythm of a gentle bossanova You’ll be dancing with ’em too before the night is over Happy again
The lights are much brighter there You can forget all your troubles, forget all your cares and go Downtown where all the lights are bright, Downtown, waiting for you tonight, Downtown, you’re gonna be alright now (Downtown downtown)
Downtown (Downtown)
And you may find somebody kind to help and understand you, Someone who is just like you and needs a gentle hand to Guide them along
So, maybe I’ll see you there We can forget all our troubles, forget all our cares and go Downtown, things’ll be great when you’re Downtown, don’t wait a minute more Downtown, everything’s waiting for you
Downtown (downtown) downtown (downtown) Downtown (downtown) downtown (downtown) (repeat and fade out)

“Downtown” is a pop song composed by Tony Hatch which, as recorded by Petula Clark, became an international hit – No. 1 in the US and No. 2 in the UK – at the end of 1964.