Ted Rogers - I Can't Stop Thinking Of You/ All I Need's The Baby

 

Label: Piccadilly
Year of Release: 1965

Only truly lucky famous people get to choose what they're famous for. Talent doesn't always help - even the very talented usually only have one breakthrough moment which resonates with the public and defines them forevermore.

Ted Rogers was a man of many light entertainment skills, performing on the Billy Cotton Band Show, hosting Sunday Night At The London Palladium, and touring and singing alongside Bing Crosby. To most British people, however, he's probably best known as the host of the mind-bendingly complicated quiz show "3-2-1", a programme filled with riddles so obtuse they even caused my father, a keen crossword solver, to throw his newspaper to the floor with exasperation. 

Was Ted then the host of one of the few intellectual quiz shows of the seventies and eighties, or the captain of a crooked ship with fixed prizes? Answering that question would involve an analysis of multiple episodes of "3-2-1", and if you've got the time to do that, be my guest and submit your dissertation to the usual email address by 5th January 2024. All essays which are more than 2,500 words long will not be accepted.

Naturally, Ted's days with Dusty Bin also overshadowed his talents as a singer which, to be blunt, were serviceable but never exceptional. He released three singles in the sixties, of which this was the first. It's exactly as you'd expect, except with a deep depressive streak - Ted closes his eyes and croons away to his ex, telling her that he's essentially obsessed with her and will cry to infinity and continue to keep "hurting himself". Put the razor blades away, Ted, she's bound to come back to you when you have your own hit show on Yorkshire TV.

According to the credits, Ted also wrote the B-side here "All I Need's The Baby", which by contrast is a song so chipper it could only be performed by someone while wearing a top-hat at a slight angle. 

All the angst and merriment was for nought, though. Ted never scored a hit single, even with 1982's 3-2-1 cash-in single "Dusty Bin", and his records have become so poorly remembered that it's doubtful many people are aware of their existence. 

Despite this, there's little doubt that his huge success as a comedy performer, and the respect he had among his peers in America, was more than adequate compensation.

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