Gloomy Tunes: Five shots of “Bang Bang”

“Bang Bang (She Shot Me Down),” despite not being much more than a novelty song, has endured to become something of standard. Why?  We figure that the chorus is instantly memorable, but its appeal is probably due as much to  the song’s high sense of melodrama, combined with a simple chord progression, which makes it a perfect tune for musicians who want to stretch out.

Written by Sonny Bono for this then-wife, Cher (we’re not going to even imagine the psychological implications here), it became one of her biggest hits. Soon covered Nancy  Sinatra, it’s her Lee Hazlewood-produced version (with that ominous tremolo-drenched guitar played by Billy Strange) that opened up Quintin Tarantino’s “Kill Bill, Vol 1.”

Fifteen years after the fact, Frank Sinatra recorded the song (another decision we’re going to pass on psychological parsing). It was a poor choice regardless, turning the song into a lachrymose ballad, a “September of My Years” set in a one-horse town.

We’re including two other notable covers in this playlist: Terry Reid’s recorded the song on his 1968 debut, “Bang, Bang, You’re Terry Reid.” And performed it memorably as one of the opening acts for the Rolling Stones on their 1969 American tour. We gave Vanilla Fudge the last shots, and they do their Vanilla Fudge all over the song, slowing it down, amping up the mood with extended Hammond organ swells, glowering guitar vamps, faux-operatic vocals, even throwing in a little “ring around the rosie” for reasons that, even forty years after the fact, defy explanation, other than, “it’s heavy, man.”

Steven Mirkin

Steven Mirkin’s diverse career has taken him from politics to pop culture to high art, offering him a front row seat to some of the most fascinating events and personalities of our time: writing speeches, fundraising appeals and campaign materials for Ed Koch, John Heinz and independent presidential candidate John B. Anderson; chronicling the punk/new wave scenes in New York and London; interviewing musicians such as Elton John, John Lydon and Buck Owens; profiling modern masters Julian Schnabel, Paul Schrader and Jonathan Safran Foer; and writing for TV shows including 21, The Chamber, Let's Make A Deal, and Rock Star: INXS.