The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance is a 1962 American Western film directed by John Ford starring James Stewart and John Wayne. The black-and-white film was released by Paramount Pictures. The screenplay by James Warner Bellah and Willis Goldbeck was adapted from a short story written by Dorothy M. Johnson. The supporting cast features Vera Miles, Lee Marvin, Edmond O’Brien, Andy Devine, John Carradine, Woody Strode, Strother Martin, and Lee Van Cleef. In 2007, the film was selected for preservation in the United States National Film Registry by the Library of Congress as being “culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant”. (More from Wikipedia)
In any case, there is so much to like about Dr. Crow: Can it really be as long ago as 2002 when this album came out? What is basically the title song is called “When Dr. Crow Turns on the Radio” – according to the lyrics, “you won’t hear nothing” when this happens – and it is a good old-fashioned stomping rock number. There is a cover of “The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance”, a Burt Bacharach/Hal David song that is based on the Western film of the same name, The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance that came out in 1962 (but it was not used in the soundtrack). Gene Pitney had a Top 10 hit with “The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance”, though he was asked not to record it before the movie came out. In their version, the Deviants include a clip of some dialogue from the movie – apparently Lee Marvin as the title character – and between the verses, Mick Farren talks about how rare it is for the villain’s name to appear in the title of a movie. One of their original songs on Dr. Crow, “The Murdering Officer” sounds ancient enough that pirates might have known about it; the lyrics talk about (among other things): “But snarling like dogs, we all went so willing / When the murdering officer paid us a shilling”.
(August 2013)
