Song:The Beat Goes On
Album:The Beat Goes On: The Best Of Sonny & Cher
I think most folks remember Sonny & Cher more for their 70s variety show than anything else. It turns out that in the 60s they only had two top ten hits, I Got You Babe and The Beat Goes On. And though I Got You Babe was a bigger hit, The Beat Goes On is considered to be Sonny Bono's signature song. It was played at his funeral. They also had a couple of top ten hits in the early 70s. I thought they had more hits than that. Salvatore "Sonny" Bono was born Feb. 16, 1935 in Detroit and went to high school in Inglewood, CA. After one of his songs was recorded by Sam Cooke, Bono worked for Phil Spector and co-wrote Needles and Pins with Jack Nitzsche which was a hit for Jackie DeShannon and then The Searchers. Meanwhile he met Cherilyn Sarkisan in a Los Angeles coffee shop in 1962. They married and he brought her in to sing backup on Phil Spector records. They started out recording as Caesar and Cleo. When that didn't take off, they recorded Baby Don't Go and that was a regional hit. Sonny also had a solo hit with Laugh At Me. They signed with Atco Records and their first single I Got You Babe topped the Billboard Hot 100 in 1965. They seemed to have trouble following that. A couple of singles reached the top 20 but The Beat Goes On was their only other top ten hit in 1967. It reached #6 on the Billboard Hot 100. Things went south at Atco when they made the 1967 film Good Times. The film bombed and Atco dropped them in 1968. Sonny & Cher became big stars in Las Vegas and then in 1970, CBS programming head Fred Silverman saw them host The Merv Griffin Show and offered them a variety show. It ran for three years until their marriage fell apart. They also signed with Kapp Records and had top ten hits with All I Ever Need Is You and A Cowboy's Work Is Never Done in 1972. Cher also started recording solo and of course she has had a long career. This budget comp has their Atco recordings only. Rhino did release a 2CD comp containing Atco and Kapp recording but it is no longer in print. Sonny & Cher divorced in 1975 and reunited occasionally. Sonny Bono did some acting on TV before he became a California congressman and died on Jan. 5, 1998 as the result of a skiing accident. Here's Sonny & Cher performing The Beat Goes On on a French TV show 1967.
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