Ray Stevens: The "Boogity Boogity" YouTube Playlist

One of the albums in the legendary career of Ray Stevens that will always get a lot of focus happens to be 1974's comedy album, Boogity Boogity. Now, if you look at the album cover, you won't see the album title unless you take a look at the dust clouds on the lower right. The album, particularly on eBay and other online stores, is often mistakenly called Woosh!! given the prominent appearance of that phrase in the airbrushed portion of Ray's photo. The album is officially titled Boogity Boogity which happens to be a recurring phrase heard in "The Streak". In an example of where you'll hear the phrase: "here he comes (boogity boogity), there he goes (boogity boogity)...". The phrase is also performed by his backup singers at the end of almost every line in the song's chorus...and in other places in the song. The album, released in 1974, contains 9 comedy songs. The centerpiece of the album was obviously "The Streak" and much of the publicity surrounded that particular single. It was on this date in 1974 that Barnaby Records issued "The Streak" as a single. The fad of streaking (running around with no clothes on in public) dominated the local and national newscasts for most of 1974 although some archive news reports indicate streaking was something that had been happening randomly in and around college campuses for a few years but it wasn't until 1974, and the airing of the Oscar Awards telecast, that the fad became an almost daily, non-stop national news item. A streaker ran across the stage during a live Oscar telecast as David Niven was speaking at the podium. I've come across websites that debate whether or not the streaking was spontaneous or if it was planned by the production staff as an effort to generate a lot of post-Oscar publicity, not only for the ceremony, but for the Oscar organization itself. 

The argument centers around how the person was able to go from point A to point B, completely naked, with nobody trying to stop him backstage. 

Nevertheless, what happened caught the country by surprise and it launched a series of streaking songs by all types of acts...but, as we all know, it was the Ray Stevens recording that grabbed the attention. Ray has always said that he credits having the hit on streaking simply because he heard of the fad months before it became a national craze and that he had been working on the song prior to putting it out as a single. The actual recording of the song, Ray has often admitted, was rush released since streaking was such a topical issue that they wanted to get it out as soon as possible but the writing of the song, given Ray having had the chance to work on it weeks in advance, was certainly not rushed. "The Streak" hit the top of the Hot 100 in only a matter of weeks and sold more than 5,000,000 copies worldwide. It hit in Canada, The United Kingdom, Australia, and several other English-speaking countries. It was also a hit on the Country music charts and the Adult-Contemporary chart. Practically every mainstream radio format was playing the song at one time or another in the spring of 1974.   

Now, as a longtime fan of Ray, I love all of the songs...not just the ones pushed as single releases. Yes, there was another song on this album that was issued as a single...the wonderful "Moonlight Special", a parody of the television series, Midnight Special. Since it wasn't based on a trend/fad or a topical subject matter it performed as most novelty songs performed in that decade. It sold well but it wasn't embraced in the same manner as "The Streak" happened to be. "Moonlight Special" hit the pop chart for a multi-week run, though. Some of the other songs on the 1974 album are: "Heart Transplant", "Smith and Jones", and "Don't Boogie Woogie". Ray closes the album with a non-comedy song. That song's title, "Just So Proud to Be Here", conjures up thoughts of Minnie Pearl. That was part of her opening line at her performances at the Opry and wherever else she performed. 

When you visit the YouTube playlist of Boogity Boogity you'll find that there's a 1966 video performance of "Freddie Feelgood" among the audio tracks. This 1966 performance from the Dick Clark show, Where The Action Is, was recently uploaded onto YouTube and Ray added it to the playlist. There used to be an audio track there. In keeping with Dick Clark's tradition/preference of lip-sync performances that's what we have in this 1966 appearance by Ray. Freddie's band consists of people playing air-instruments to Ray's vocal track. I don't know where the footage was shot but it's at an outdoors location. Here's the YouTube PLAYLIST. 

Ray Stevens sings "The Streak"...

On March 27, 1974 Ray Stevens released "The Streak". Little did he nor his fan's know that "The Streak" would take on a life of it's own in the 47 years since. Ray got the idea for the song when he was skimming through a weekly news magazine during a flight from Los Angeles to Nashville. In the final pages of a magazine he'd read a small news item where it made mention of a college kid that took off his clothes and ran through a crowd and it was called streaking. According to Ray's recollections he immediately began writing ideas for the song. Once he seen the local newscasts on television all he recalls is seeing stories about streaking and how it's taking over college campuses all over America. Ray wrote "The Streak" and Barnaby Records issued it on March 27, 1974. An international news event occurred at the Academy Awards telecast on April 2, 1974...a streaker ran across the stage behind actor, David Niven. Although there were more than 50 novelty songs out capitalizing on streaking it was Ray's that emerged as the biggest hit. The single debuted on the Hot 100 on April 6, 1974 and thanks to the Academy Awards incident and streaking, in general, "The Streak" literally streaked up the Hot 100 pop chart. It hit the top in it's 7th week, May 18th, and remained at number one for three weeks. It was the number one pop song in America on May 18th, May 25th, and June 1st. It crossed over and hit the Top-10 on the Country chart. It was also an international hit peaking at the top in the United Kingdom and in the Top-10 and Top-40 of other English-speaking countries. The single also sold more than 5,000,000 copies worldwide. 

In recent concert appearances Ray sings "The Streak" almost exactly the way he recorded it but for a number of decades, notably the mid '70s through the early '90s, he elaborated on the song and would perform it in concert with an operatic addition. He would open the song with the action news reporter and the witness but then he'd stop the performance and tell the audience that some humorless critics have often said the song had no class. So, in order to please the critics, he decided to perform the song in operatic fashion. After about a minute of operatic splendor he'd revert back to how the song should be performed. In those performances one of the recurring sight gags was Ray putting on a yellow CAT hat every time he'd play the part of the witness who'd tell his wife, Ethel, not to look. Don't Look, Ethel is one of several catch-phrases synonymous with Ray. However, in this performance from 2015, he performs "The Streak" as it was originally recorded, give or take an added line here or there, but there's no CAT hat involvement.