1965
MOHAIR SAM * CHARLIE RICH * PHILIPS 1432 * UK
Many a young Mod would not have known at the time of this records release that Charlie Rich was a Country singer (nothing wrong with that in itself) and took this for a Soul record, which to them it will always be. There are mitigating circumstances of course, the number one being the mention of Mohair! The very word Mohair, later to become Tonic, was in essence Mod, and along with a canon of words like: the Block, Purple Hearts, Discothèques, Tamla and so on, were the cultural capital by which an individual gained entry and secure a position in that social circle, and helped construct his or her subjectivity. These words used as codes or ciphers in a conversation were, like, say, the actions in Crumping, subject to change and redundancy, but unlike the aforementioned Crumping the time scale of change was much slower, and a word like Mohair would have had currency for a period of some years from the early sixties until around the time of Charlie Rich's song; which along with The In Crowd was one of the few really pertinent Mod anthems of the time. Incidentally the sound of this record is more club than dance hall.