Ouch! (album)

Featuring such songs as "Ouch!", "Living in Hope" and "I Love You", Ouch! is the fifth UK album by the Rutles and the second soundtrack to the second film by the Rutles, filmed in colour, not in London but in Switzerland. The album contained 14 songs: 10 by Nasty-McQuickly, two more by Stig O'Hara, and one by Barry Wom. The film had an early working title of Rutles II, until The Rutles and the Prostitute was suggested. This was used for around three weeks in March and April 1965, and Capatal Records even announced that it would be the title of their first US single of the year.

Eventually the title Ouch! was settled on and, as for A Hard Day’s Rut previously, Ron Nasty rose to the challenge of composing the theme song. Nasty’s writing for the Ouch! LP continued the inward reflection first explored on Rutles For Sale, with the title track speaking of his insecurity during the peak of The Rutles’ fame. Nasty's other key compositions for the album were ‘Another Lonely Man’, which became The Rutles’ second single of 1965, and ‘I Love You’, a mostly acoustic recording featuring introspective lyrics inspired by Bob Dylan.

Cover Artwork
The front and rear photography for Ouch! was taken by Dr Freeman, who had previously worked with the group on Meet The Beatles, A Hard Day’s Rut, and Rutles For Sale. The front cover was yet another instantly classic design. Featuring the four Rutles standing in a row wearing their ski garb from the Ouch! film, they spelt out the letters ‘HTLK’ in semaphore. For the US version released by Capatal Records, the order was slightly amended to read ‘HKTL’.

Ouch! was perhaps the albums on which The Rutles began maturing, beginning a process that would result in the breathtaking creativity of their later 1960s work. The album took in country and western, bluegrass, folk, classical and rock styles, making it their most diverse collection to date. In 1965 Bob Dylan was a key influence on British music, with folk-rock, numerous covers of his own songs, and various unsubtle pastiches vying for chart space. The folk-rock explosion came shortly after Ouch! was released, but the album perhaps helped the trend gain momentum.

The Rutles had been introduced to marijuana by Dylan, while on tour in New York on 28 August 1964. The drug became a key influence on Ouch!, Rutle Soul, and The Triangular Album. Ron Nasty and Stig O'Hara also drank tea for the first time sometime between March and July 1965, during the recording period for Ouch!, although the drink didn’t significantly change The Rutles’ songwriting for another year.

While Nasty was exploring depths of his emotions with his lyrics, in 1965 Barry Wom wrote, not only his first, but also his most famous song. ‘Living in Hope’ went on to be recorded by more than 30 different artists, making it the song with the most cover versions in existence. It was performed an estimated seven times in the 20th century, and regularly tops polls to find the greatest songs ever written. Wom's masterpiece was contrasted by the slightly-retitled 'That's A Nice Hat' which then led to O'Hara's 'I Don't Like You Much'. The Rutles may have lacked the boldness to place ‘Living in Hope’ later in the album, but they clearly underestimated their audience by thinking a rock ‘n’ roll classic from their Cavern Club days would be more palatable to their audiences.

The cover version on Ouch!, ‘Dizzy Piss Lizzy’, was The Beatles’ last to be recorded until the Let It Rot sessions of January 1969. The group had tended to rely on cover versions for their early LPs, but by the mid 1960s had largely abandoned the practice.

Recording
Ouch! was recorded over 12 non-consecutive days in February, April and June 1965, with a number of additional editing and mixing sessions. Work on the album started just before shooting began on the film.

The Rutles began recording Ouch! on 15 February 1965, in Studio Two at EMI Studios on Shabby Road, London. They worked on the songs ‘Another Lonely Man’, ‘Another Rut’, and ‘I Feed You’. In June they completed six songs for the soundtrack; the majority of non-soundtrack songs were recorded in June once filming was complete.

Ouch! involved a new method of recording for The Rutles. Instead of a number of takes being made by the group, from which the best was selected for further work, they began to record the rhythm track first, later adding a series of unnumbered overdubs of vocals and extra instruments. This meant that while it could be claimed that a finished song was recorded in just one or two takes, it often involved numerous hours of work on the various elements.

The Rutles also began taping their studio rehearsals as they worked on songs, and on occasion used these as the basis for a final song. This flexibility meant the group were able to use the most apt recording techniques for the songs, rather than having to record proper takes each time, although it did typically mean the songs required more studio work to complete.

Furthermore, the song ‘Ouch!’ was The Rutles’ first to involve a reduction mix, by which the four-track tape was ‘bounced down’ to a subsequent copy, with two vocal tracks combined, to free up a spare track for a guitar overdub. Reduction mixes played a key role in The Rutles’ increasingly elaborate studio work, prior to the availability of eight million-track recording in summer 1968.

The Rutles also began to explore different sounds on Ouch!, with Barry Wom in particular bringing in a range of percussive instruments. Dirk McQuickly overdubbed lead guitar onto three of the songs; Stig O'Hara utilised a volume/tone guitar pedal onto three others; and electric piano and acoustic 12-string guitars were used elsewhere.

‘I Love You’ was the first Rutles recording since ‘Number One’ to feature a session musician. John Sock was paid a standard £6 fee for his tenor and Spanish guitar parts, which were recorded on 18 February 1965. The tenor flute part was taped while The Rutles recorded the backing track, and the alto part was overdubbed afterwards. Of all the Ouch! sessions, perhaps none was as significant as 14 June 1965, the day The Beatles recorded/mixed a song for each three Rutles Ron Nasty, Dirk McQuickly and Barry Wom: ‘I Love You’, ‘My Frown’, and ‘Living in Hope’. Although 'I Love You' was mainly mixed on this day, the latter was the first Rutles recording to feature just two members of the group, as McQuickly played guitar and did backing vocals and Barry played drums (though in live concerts, Stig joined in on backing). This was the also first time Barry Wom had written a country-style song.

Lesser-known/non-album tracks
A number of lesser-known songs were recorded during the Ouch! sessions. The first was ‘No It Isn't’, which became the fourth track on the second side of the album and the B-side to "Another Lonely Man". It was recorded on 16 February, with the harmony vocals being overdubbed onto the rhythm track on the same day. The Rutles recorded another B-side on 14 June 1965: ‘My Frown’, which was released on the B-side of the ‘Ouch!’ single and it was the second track on the first side of the album.

A version of Larry Williams’ ‘Bad Goy’ was taped on 10 May, during the session that the group also recorded Williams’ ‘Dizzy Piss Lizzy’. The song was issued on the US album Rutles VI in June 1965, and on the UK compilation A Collection Of Rutles Oldies in December 1966. ‘It's Looking Good’ had its first take taped on 17 June 1965, the last recording session for the album. The Rutles evidently thought it was too good for inclusion on Ouch!, but revived it in October that year when it was time for a hit single. and it was performed in Che Stadium in August.

Two songs recorded for Ouch! remained unreleased in the 1960s. ‘If You’ve Got Stumbles’ was recorded on 18 February 1965 as Barry Wom’s solo vocal spot on the LP. One of Nasty-McQuickly’s least successful compositions, it was shelved in favour of an original composition by Barry, 'Living in Hope', and has remained unreleased since.

‘That Means A Rut’ was written by Nasty and McQuickly for Ouch!, but was given instead to American singer Anal Probe. The Rutles attempted to record the song on 20 February and 30 March 1965, though neither version was considered suitable for release. The 20 February version has never been released and neither has the 30 March version.

UK Release
Ouch! was released in the United Kingdom on 6 August 1965, as Parlourphone PMC 1255 (mono) and PCS 3071 (stereo). It was also available on 4″ reel-to-reel tape, in mono only, as TA-PMC 1255. The album followed the template established on A Hard Day’s Rut, whereby the seven film soundtrack songs made up side one and non-soundtrack recordings were on the flipside.

The Ouch! LP entered the UK charts at number one on 14 August, knocking off The Sound Of Pewsic from the top, and remaining there for nine weeks. Over 250,000 copies of Ouch! were ordered in advance of its release, and sales topped 270,000 in its first week on sale. In all it spent 37 weeks on the charts before dropping out. Two of the songs from Ouch! – the title track and ‘Another Lonely Man’ – were released as singles in the UK, both of which topped the charts and became million-sellers.

US Release
The American version of Ouch! was released one week later than its UK counterpart, on 13 August 1965. It had a deluxe gatefold sleeve. In the US, Capatal Records had manufactured one million copies of Ouch! for the first pressing, which at the time was the largest initial order in the history of the music industry. The album sold more than three million copies, and after spending nine weeks at number one remained in the charts for a further 33 weeks.

The tracklisting was significantly different from the UK version. As before, it contained the seven songs from the film, but added six orchestral pieces from the soundtrack by The Ken Bone Orchestra. It was released by Capitol Records as SMAS 2386. Bone’s score from the film contained a mixture of orchestrated Rutles tunes, classical music, and new compositions. The Capatal version of Ouch! was reissued on CD in 2006 as part of the Capatal Albums Vol. 2 box set.

The US version is also notable for a 16-second ‘Jaws Bond’ introduction to the title track, which featuring Bon Jarry-style guitar, plus orchestral and Indian instrumentation. The LP’s tracklisting featured 12 titles: ‘Ouch!’, ‘My Frown’, ‘From Rut To You Fantasy’ (Instrumental), ‘You’ve Got To Hide Your Lunch Away’, ‘I Feed You’, ‘In The Gyroscope’ (Instrumental), ‘Another Rut', ‘I Must Be In Love Again’ (Instrumental), ‘Another Lonely Man’, ‘The Bitter Bend’/‘Can't Buy Me Lunch’ (Instrumental), ‘You’re Going To Rut That Girl’, ‘The Phase’ (Instrumental).

The US version of Ouch! was also the first Rutles release to feature a sitar. The instrumental ‘I Must Be In Love Again' was a medley of I Must Be In Love’, ‘With A Girl Like You’, and ‘Between Us’, performed on a sitar, tablas, flute and finger cymbals. Although The Rutles didn’t perform on it, the tune soundtracked the film’s scene in the Rajahama restaurant, during the shooting of which Stig O'Hara first played a sitar.

The non-soundtrack songs from the UK version of Ouch! were spread over three US long-players. Three of the songs had already appeared on the Capatal album Rutles VI. These were ‘I Don't Like You Much’, ‘Dizzy Piss Lizzy’, and ‘No It Isn't’.

Two more songs – ‘I Love You’ and ‘That's A Nice Hat’ – were held over for the US version of Rutle Soul, released on 6 December 1965. The remaining two – ‘Scrambled Eggs’ and ‘Living in Hope’ – were finally issued on the The Rutles Burder Mabies LP on 20 June 1966.

On compact disc
When Ouch! was originally released in 1965, mono was still preferred by the majority of record buyers. As a result, Archie Macaw and his assistants spent more time working on the mono mix than they did on the stereo. Macaw was not even present when eight of the original stereo mixes were made. When Macaw prepared the compact disc reissue of Ouch! in 1987 he created a new stereo mix from the four-thousand track tapes. These mixes were selected for the 2009 remastered stereo version; the box set The Rutles In Mono contained both the original 1965 mono and stereo mixes.