It's My Life (The Animals song)
Encyclopedia
"It's My Life" is a song written by Brill Building
songwriters Roger Atkins and Carl D'Errico. The song was originally performed by British
rock
band the Animals
, who released it as a single
in October 1965 (see 1965 in music
) and was one of three songs that the Animals recorded by Brill Building songwriters.
The song became a hit in several different countries and has since been recorded by multiple artists, including Bruce Springsteen
.
s associated with the greater Brill Building
scene in New York City
. By 1965 they were working for Screen Gems Music.
"It's My Life" was written specifically for The Animals as their producer
Mickie Most
was soliciting material for the group's next recording sessions. (Other Animals hits to come out of this Brill Building call were "We Gotta Get Out of This Place
" and "Don't Bring Me Down".)
As laid down "It's My Life" was a natural fit for The Animals. It was propelled by a bass guitar
riff from Chas Chandler
, soon joined by a ringing electric
twelve-string guitar riff from Hilton Valentine
. Then lead singer Eric Burdon
's classic low growl entered with lyrics seemingly direct from his native working class
Northern England
:
The song then built up to a climax in the chorus, with Burdon complemented by response vocals from Chandler and keyboardist Dave Rowberry
. By the second verse, the song's themes of class
-based misanthropic rebellion have grown even stronger:
"It's My Life" was visually premiered on the U.S. television show Hullabaloo in fall 1965, where in true mixed-up 1960s fashion the group sang live vocals against canned music on a den-type set that featured attractive young women sticking their heads through holes in the wall, where normally animal heads would be mounted.
began performing "It's My Life" during his Born to Run tours
. Preceded by the first iteration of Springsteen's archetypical spoken narrative about how he and his father never got along about anything, the tempo of the song itself was greatly slowed down to further bring out the tense themes; renditions could easily run over ten minutes overall in duration, and lyrics were varied somewhat across almost every performance. Never released in any live album or box set collection, Springsteen's take on the song has become part of his concert lore and fans' bootleg collections.
The song next cropped up as the closing part of ex-New York Dolls
singer
David Johansen
's Animals medley from his 1982 live album Live It Up
. Here done following "We Gotta Get Out of This Place" and "Don't Bring Me Down" in an appreciative rendition faithful to The Animals' arrangement and Burdon's vocal, it attracted album oriented rock airplay and considerable MTV
video play at the time.
Later on, in 1986 American hard rock band Alcatrazz
recorded the song on their last studio album Dangerous Games
. It failed to chart.
In 1992, Bon Jovi
performed its own Animals medley for an MTV show later released on video as Keep the Faith - An Evening with Bon Jovi. "It's My Life" led off with an impassioned performance featuring octave
jumps from singer Jon Bon Jovi
, which then flowed into "We Gotta Get Out of This Place". In 1995, they performed the medley live with Eric Burdon
.
Burdon performed the song live with Roseanne Barr
on her The Roseanne Show
in 2000.
songs that shared the same title: Talk Talk
's "It's My Life
" (1984), later redone as an even bigger hit by No Doubt
(2003), and Bon Jovi with their own "It's My Life
" (2000).
Brill Building
The Brill Building is an office building located at 1619 Broadway on 49th Street in the New York City borough of Manhattan, just north of Times Square and further uptown from the historic musical Tin Pan Alley neighborhood...
songwriters Roger Atkins and Carl D'Errico. The song was originally performed by British
British people
The British are citizens of the United Kingdom, of the Isle of Man, any of the Channel Islands, or of any of the British overseas territories, and their descendants...
rock
Rock music
Rock music is a genre of popular music that developed during and after the 1960s, particularly in the United Kingdom and the United States. It has its roots in 1940s and 1950s rock and roll, itself heavily influenced by rhythm and blues and country music...
band the Animals
The Animals
The Animals were an English music group of the 1960s formed in Newcastle upon Tyne during the early part of the decade, and later relocated to London...
, who released it as a single
Single (music)
In music, a single or record single is a type of release, typically a recording of fewer tracks than an LP or a CD. This can be released for sale to the public in a variety of different formats. In most cases, the single is a song that is released separately from an album, but it can still appear...
in October 1965 (see 1965 in music
1965 in music
-Events:*January 4 – Fender Musical Instruments Corporation is sold to CBS for $13 million.*January 12 – Hullabaloo premieres on NBC. The first show included performances by The New Christy Minstrels, comedian Woody Allen, actress Joey Heatherton and a segment from London in which Brian Epstein...
) and was one of three songs that the Animals recorded by Brill Building songwriters.
The song became a hit in several different countries and has since been recorded by multiple artists, including Bruce Springsteen
Bruce Springsteen
Bruce Frederick Joseph Springsteen , nicknamed "The Boss," is an American singer-songwriter who records and tours with the E Street Band...
.
The Animals original
D'Errico, who wrote the music, and Atkins, who wrote the lyrics, were professional songwriterSongwriter
A songwriter is an individual who writes both the lyrics and music to a song. Someone who solely writes lyrics may be called a lyricist, and someone who only writes music may be called a composer...
s associated with the greater Brill Building
Brill Building
The Brill Building is an office building located at 1619 Broadway on 49th Street in the New York City borough of Manhattan, just north of Times Square and further uptown from the historic musical Tin Pan Alley neighborhood...
scene in New York City
New York City
New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...
. By 1965 they were working for Screen Gems Music.
"It's My Life" was written specifically for The Animals as their producer
Record producer
A record producer is an individual working within the music industry, whose job is to oversee and manage the recording of an artist's music...
Mickie Most
Mickie Most
Mickie Most was an English record producer, with a string of hit singles with acts such as The Animals, Arrows, Herman's Hermits, Donovan, Suzi Quatro and the Jeff Beck Group often issued on his own RAK Records label....
was soliciting material for the group's next recording sessions. (Other Animals hits to come out of this Brill Building call were "We Gotta Get Out of This Place
We Gotta Get out of This Place
"We Gotta Get out of This Place", occasionally written "We've Gotta Get out of This Place", is a rock song written by Barry Mann and Cynthia Weil and recorded as a 1965 hit single by The Animals...
" and "Don't Bring Me Down".)
As laid down "It's My Life" was a natural fit for The Animals. It was propelled by a bass guitar
Bass guitar
The bass guitar is a stringed instrument played primarily with the fingers or thumb , or by using a pick....
riff from Chas Chandler
Chas Chandler
Bryan James "Chas" Chandler was an English musician, record producer and manager of several successful music acts....
, soon joined by a ringing electric
Electric guitar
An electric guitar is a guitar that uses the principle of direct electromagnetic induction to convert vibrations of its metal strings into electric audio signals. The signal generated by an electric guitar is too weak to drive a loudspeaker, so it is amplified before sending it to a loudspeaker...
twelve-string guitar riff from Hilton Valentine
Hilton Valentine
Hilton Valentine is an English musician, who was the original guitarist in the The Animals.-Biography:Valentine was influenced by the 1950s skiffle craze...
. Then lead singer Eric Burdon
Eric Burdon
Eric Victor Burdon is an English singer-songwriter best known as a founding member and vocalist of rock band The Animals, and the funk rock band War and for his aggressive stage performance...
's classic low growl entered with lyrics seemingly direct from his native working class
Working class
Working class is a term used in the social sciences and in ordinary conversation to describe those employed in lower tier jobs , often extending to those in unemployment or otherwise possessing below-average incomes...
Northern England
Northern England
Northern England, also known as the North of England, the North or the North Country, is a cultural region of England. It is not an official government region, but rather an informal amalgamation of counties. The southern extent of the region is roughly the River Trent, while the North is bordered...
:
- It's a hard world, to get a break in -
- All the good things have been taken
- But girl there are ways to make certain things pay,
- Though I'm dressed in these rags
- I'll wear sable, some day
The song then built up to a climax in the chorus, with Burdon complemented by response vocals from Chandler and keyboardist Dave Rowberry
Dave Rowberry
Dave Rowberry was an English piano and organ player, most known for being a member of the rock and R&B group The Animals in the 1960s....
. By the second verse, the song's themes of class
Social class
Social classes are economic or cultural arrangements of groups in society. Class is an essential object of analysis for sociologists, political scientists, economists, anthropologists and social historians. In the social sciences, social class is often discussed in terms of 'social stratification'...
-based misanthropic rebellion have grown even stronger:
- Takin' all I can get, no regrets
- When I ... openly lie
- And live on their money, believe me honey, that money -
"It's My Life" was visually premiered on the U.S. television show Hullabaloo in fall 1965, where in true mixed-up 1960s fashion the group sang live vocals against canned music on a den-type set that featured attractive young women sticking their heads through holes in the wall, where normally animal heads would be mounted.
Charts
| Chart (1965) | Peak position |
|---|---|
| Canadian Singles Chart | 2 |
| US Billboard Billboard (magazine) Billboard is a weekly American magazine devoted to the music industry, and is one of the oldest trade magazines in the world. It maintains several internationally recognized music charts that track the most popular songs and albums in various categories on a weekly basis... Hot 100 Billboard Hot 100 The Billboard Hot 100 is the United States music industry standard singles popularity chart issued weekly by Billboard magazine. Chart rankings are based on radio play and sales; the tracking-week for sales begins on Monday and ends on Sunday, while the radio play tracking-week runs from Wednesday... |
23 |
Later versions
During the mid-1970s Bruce SpringsteenBruce Springsteen
Bruce Frederick Joseph Springsteen , nicknamed "The Boss," is an American singer-songwriter who records and tours with the E Street Band...
began performing "It's My Life" during his Born to Run tours
Born to Run tours
Born to Run was Bruce Springsteen's last, best hope for fortune and fame. As such it became a torturous recording process, and to make ends meet Springsteen and the E Street Band toured constantly during the first set of recording sessions for it, performing his new songs as he developed them...
. Preceded by the first iteration of Springsteen's archetypical spoken narrative about how he and his father never got along about anything, the tempo of the song itself was greatly slowed down to further bring out the tense themes; renditions could easily run over ten minutes overall in duration, and lyrics were varied somewhat across almost every performance. Never released in any live album or box set collection, Springsteen's take on the song has become part of his concert lore and fans' bootleg collections.
The song next cropped up as the closing part of ex-New York Dolls
New York Dolls
The New York Dolls is an American rock band, formed in New York in 1971. The band's protopunk sound prefigured much of what was to come in the punk rock era; their visual style influenced the look of many new wave and 1980s-era glam metal groups, and they began the local New York scene that later...
singer
David Johansen
David Johansen
David Roger Johansen is an American rock, protopunk, blues, and pop singer, as well as a songwriter and actor. He is best known as a member of the seminal protopunk band The New York Dolls and also achieved commercial success under the pseudonym Buster Poindexter.-Early life:Johansen was born in...
's Animals medley from his 1982 live album Live It Up
Live It Up (David Johansen album)
Live It Up, released in 1982, was the first live album released by David Johansen as a solo artist. However, by the time Live It Up was released, various bootlegs of Johansen's first band, the New York Dolls, were being heavily traded...
. Here done following "We Gotta Get Out of This Place" and "Don't Bring Me Down" in an appreciative rendition faithful to The Animals' arrangement and Burdon's vocal, it attracted album oriented rock airplay and considerable MTV
MTV
MTV, formerly an initialism of Music Television, is an American network based in New York City that launched on August 1, 1981. The original purpose of the channel was to play music videos guided by on-air hosts known as VJs....
video play at the time.
Later on, in 1986 American hard rock band Alcatrazz
Alcatrazz
Alcatrazz is an American heavy metal band formed in 1983 by Graham Bonnet, Jimmy Waldo and Gary Shea.-History:The band's initial line-up consisted of former Rainbow frontman Graham Bonnet, young Swedish guitarist Yngwie Malmsteen who had recently left American band Steeler, Gary Shea and Jimmy...
recorded the song on their last studio album Dangerous Games
Dangerous Games (album)
Dangerous Games was the third and final studio album released by Alcatrazz. This album marked a drastic departure from the bands two previous albums with its heavily Japanese influenced style...
. It failed to chart.
In 1992, Bon Jovi
Bon Jovi
Bon Jovi is an American rock band from Sayreville, New Jersey. Formed in 1983, Bon Jovi consists of lead singer and namesake Jon Bon Jovi , guitarist Richie Sambora, keyboardist David Bryan, drummer Tico Torres, as well as current bassist Hugh McDonald...
performed its own Animals medley for an MTV show later released on video as Keep the Faith - An Evening with Bon Jovi. "It's My Life" led off with an impassioned performance featuring octave
Octave
In music, an octave is the interval between one musical pitch and another with half or double its frequency. The octave relationship is a natural phenomenon that has been referred to as the "basic miracle of music", the use of which is "common in most musical systems"...
jumps from singer Jon Bon Jovi
Jon Bon Jovi
Jon Bon Jovi is an American musician, singer, songwriter, and actor, best known as the founder, occasional rhythm guitarist, and lead singer of rock band Bon Jovi, which was named after him...
, which then flowed into "We Gotta Get Out of This Place". In 1995, they performed the medley live with Eric Burdon
Eric Burdon
Eric Victor Burdon is an English singer-songwriter best known as a founding member and vocalist of rock band The Animals, and the funk rock band War and for his aggressive stage performance...
.
Burdon performed the song live with Roseanne Barr
Roseanne Barr
Roseanne Cherrie Barr is an American actress, comedian, writer, television producer and director. Barr began her career in stand-up comedy at clubs before gaining fame for her role in the sitcom Roseanne. The show was a hit and lasted nine seasons, from 1988 to 1997...
on her The Roseanne Show
The Roseanne Show
The Roseanne Show is a syndicated talk show hosted by American actress Roseanne Barr following the end of her long-running sitcom. The show featured Roseanne interviewing a mixture of quirky guests along with Roseanne's signature style of brassy, in-your-face, domestic goddess comedy.The Roseanne...
in 2000.
By the same name
Much of the assertive spirit of the song resurfaced later in two completely different hitsongs that shared the same title: Talk Talk
Talk Talk
Talk Talk were an English musical group, active from 1981 to 1991. The group had a string of international hit singles including "Today", "Talk Talk", "It's My Life", "Such a Shame", "Dum Dum Girl", "Life's What You Make It" and "Living in Another World"....
's "It's My Life
It's My Life (Talk Talk song)
"It's My Life" is a song by the British synthpop band Talk Talk. Written by Mark Hollis and Tim Friese-Greene, it was the title track on the band's second album in 1984. The song was released as a single in January 1984, then again in 1985, and a third time in 1990 when it finally became a hit and...
" (1984), later redone as an even bigger hit by No Doubt
No Doubt
No Doubt is an American rock band from Anaheim, California that formed in 1986. The ska-pop sound of their first album No Doubt , failed to make an impact...
(2003), and Bon Jovi with their own "It's My Life
It's My Life (Bon Jovi song)
"It's My Life" is Bon Jovi's first single from the album Crush. It was released on May 23, 2000. It was written by Jon Bon Jovi, Richie Sambora, and Max Martin. The song hit #1 across several countries...
" (2000).