CROON FM
Can't Take My Eyes Off Of You - Andy Williams
This is one of those croon songs that are total floor-fillers (there was a dance version in early 80s) and is a must at any self-respecting wedding or family get-together. It’s so catchy and somehow life- affirming. It was given a new lease of life by Heath Ledger’s rendition in the 90s movie 10 Things I Hate About You. And more recently, it featured in the stage show Jersey Boys – about Frankie Valli. Heath Ledger’s rather slapstick rendition in 10 Things I Hate about You comes in a scene where he serenades Julia Stiles in an attempt to make her go out with him. He sings to her from the stands in a football stadium while she is doing cheerleading practice. The scene ends with two cops trying to arrest him. He successfully dodges them while carrying on singing.
For me, though, the definitive version of the song is this one by Andy Williams. It showcases how beautiful his tenor voice is, and his wide range as a singer. Crucially, he sounds like he’s in pain. And there’s a tenderness and vulnerability there, rather than bombastic self-confidence.
The song is about the moment when you first clap eyes on the Beloved – that thunderbolt moment; when your eyes meet across a crowded room. It’s a love song but the love in question is purely theoretical. It’s also about that moment when love turns you into an idiot – tongue tied and silent. You lose the power to do anything but stare. It’s a mute dumb show – a comic pantomime:
You’re just too good to be true,
Can’t take my eyes off of you.
You’d be like heaven to touch
I wanna hold you so much.
At long last love has arrived
And I thank God I’m alive.
You’re just too good to be true,
Can’t take my eyes off of you.
Pardon the way that I stare.
There’s nothing else to compare
The sight of you leaves me weak,
There are no words left to speak.
But if you feel like I feel,
Please let me know that it’s real.
You’re just too good to be true,
Can’t take my eyes off of you.
The speaker is here trying to persuade The Beloved to look back at him. He is not taking her love for granted. The language of the song reflects that: there’s the exhortative injunction: let me love you. He’s urging her to say yes. He’s asking for permission. The modal auxiliary ‘would’ in you’d be like heaven to touch signals this is a hypothetical situation. And in the chorus, there’s the phrase, and if it’s quite alright, showing the expression of the speaker’s need is entirely conditional on the Beloved’s say so.
Williams’ deliberately soft-pedalled delivery of the first two verse creates a sense hushed reverence. Here the lightness and brightness of Williams’ lower register is shown off to fine effect, creating a strong contrast with the chorus. In the first verse particularly, there’s gentle undulation between a lower register and even lower ones. When Williams sings, At long last love has arrived, the register is slightly higher. Then it goes lower on you’re just too good to be true – then lower still on can’t take my eyes off of you. That last line is a sort of half-whispered confession. Not so much addicted to love as disabled by love.
The chorus is then trailed by the slightly naff yet glorious DAA-DE-DAA-DE-DAA-DE-DAAT-DE-DAA bit delivered by the horn section, which everyone sings along to. What follows vocally - the I love you baby – is one of the great controlled detonations in croondom. There’s a dramatic and seismic shift into a much higher register – yet somehow with Williams it still sounds deep and sonorous. He really rolls and opens out the open vowels in love and baby. It’s high register with no sense of strain or of pushing into falsetto (which is something Williams had in his locker). He’s using his head voice – the voice which feels (if you try it) to the singer like the tone is resonating in your head. It really suggests a suppressed inner voice bursting forth:
I love you, baby, and if it’s quite alright
I need you, baby, to warm the lonely night.
I love you, baby, trust in me when I say
Oh, pretty baby, don’t bring me down, I pray
Oh, pretty baby, now that I found you, stay
And let me love you, baby, let me love you.
It’s a whopping chorus - a giant burst of life juice. It’s gloriously unstoppable and irresistibly singalongable to. The high frequency of run-on lines and the repetition of the vocatives – baby and pretty baby – make the chorus sound like one big continuous utterance. The parallelism of the lines creates a strong sense of rising intensity and increasing emotion. It surely must make huge demands on a singer because it seems as if there’s no pause for breath allowed. The speed of utterance has to increase too. Williams handles it with consummate ease and real controlled power. There’s a beautifully cadenced transition in the last line. The final line, which is more hesitant and slower rhythmically, and contains a significant medial pause, perfectly cues the return to the verses.
What is great about the song is it recognises the way in which love makes fools of us. The chorus, with all its eloquent power, is great only in relation to the inarticulacy, the lameness of the behaviour described in the verses. The song therefore contains a profound recognition of the powerlessness and the inherent comedy of being in love. It illustrates how, romantically, strength comes from vulnerability; triumph stems from defeat.