Get Bach to Where You Once Belonged

From Guardian Unlimited:

Joe Queenan on Procol Harum's bizarre 1967 hit A Whiter Shade of Pale, cited by one source as the single most-played song in UK radio history

Procol Harum's 1967 hit A Whiter Shade of Pale is shrouded in so much mystery that even by the standards of things that are shrouded in mystery it still seems remarkably mysterious. For starters, there has always been intense debate about whether the band's name is mangled Latin meaning "beyond these things," or simply the name of somebody's cat.

Then there is the whole issue about Johann Sebastian Bach. Ever since the song rocketed to the top of the charts in June 1967, aficionados have debated the extent of the band's indebtedness to the 18th century titan. Is the tune a direct lift from something Bach actually wrote? No. Well, not exactly. Well, let's just put it this way: If organist Matthew Fisher could win a lawsuit against vocalist Gary Brooker, demanding a co-writing credit for the song, there's literally no telling what a picnic Bach could have in court with these guys. No Whiter Shade of Bach, no Whiter Shade of Pale.

Though some have cited the similarity between the single and Percy Sledge's When A Man Loves a Woman - a huge hit one year earlier - the similarity resides almost exclusively in the fact that both songs rely on a mournful Hammond organ. That's about it. There is simply no telling what rock music would sound like today if Procol Harum, continuing in the same idiosyncratic direction they started in, had become as famous and influential as the Beatles or Mariah Carey or the Darkness. Well, actually, there is: Procol Harum is the fun-loving sign of the coin whose hideous reverse side is Yes, Genesis and Emerson, Lake & Palmer. One thing is indisputable: A Whiter Shade of Pale is among the weirdest pop songs ever.

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