Twice recently I have heard well respected music broadcasters, Johnnie Walker and then Paul Gambaccini play Mouldy Old Dough by Lieutenant Pigeon, the only chart topping single in the UK to feature a mother and son together, No1 for 4 weeks in the autumn of 1972 and the second best selling single of that whole year.

This song confuses me. I've never been able to work out if I'm listening to a genuinely magnificent composition or some novelty tat, not many tracks can manage that dilemma. I'm not even sure if I like it or hate it! But the sales don't lie and it still gets regular plays by presenters who I doubt would play rubbish.

So what is the real Mouldy Old Dough, classic or crap?

youtu.be/O465enGz03w?si=RgAskfux0q3BXPQY

I thought it was crap even as a kiddiewink.

I know it's played a lot at dirt tracks.

A lot of decent prog rock albums came out in 72 so it wasn't a terrible year. I do think Phoenix is the worst Grandfunk Railroad album.

Its a good catchy song. A song from an unknown group doesn't come from nowhere and go to N0.1 in the charts for nothing, particularly in 1972, one of the best years for music when you had to sell 100,000s to get to no.1. Obviously its not cool, but people still remember it 53 years later. It was revived in the 1990s with Fat Les with "Vindoloo" for the England World cup or Euros. Whats not to love about a mother and son in a pop group together.

People were easily pleased back as it seems. Puppy Love was a Number 1 and some of the best selling albums were compliations made by K-Tel or other crappy labels like that.

How the fuck did Long Haired Lover From Liverpool become a hit?!

I think on balance I am inclined to agree with Green Man here and good points about the compilations that sold bucket loads.

Mouldy Old Dough was almost an instrumental, not quite, but as good as, and the track that beat it to the best seller of 1972 was an instrumental, Amazing Grace, I hate bagpipes and find it unlistenable, so 1972 sits very strange in terms of big sellers.

My personal favourite instrumental from 1972 would be Popcorn which I got around that time as a toddler on some kind of 4 track EP single called Top Of The Tots which were a series of odd very young childrens records but at least it got us into music pre-school.

Perhaps the best thing in answering my own question is that it's so bad it's good. People have always been prepared to cough up hard earned cash to pay for very bad records through the ages. I was with someone from school in May 1986 and saw them hand over hard cash for The Chicken Song and feel proud of it!

Rich wrote:
I think on balance I am inclined to agree with Green Man here and good points about the compilations that sold bucket loads.

Mouldy Old Dough was almost an instrumental, not quite, but as good as, and the track that beat it to the best seller of 1972 was an instrumental, Amazing Grace, I hate bagpipes and find it unlistenable, so 1972 sits very strange in terms of big sellers.

My personal favourite instrumental from 1972 would be Popcorn which I got around that time as a toddler on some kind of 4 track EP single called Top Of The Tots which were a series of odd very young childrens records but at least it got us into music pre-school.

Perhaps the best thing in answering my own question is that it's so bad it's good. People have always been prepared to cough up hard earned cash to pay for very bad records through the ages. I was with someone from school in May 1986 and saw them hand over hard cash for The Chicken Song and feel proud of it!

Did they go to a special school?

If you wanted instrumental could you of asked for a copy of Caravanserai by Santana?

I'm not quite sure how Mouldy Old Dough tapped into the nation's collective consciousness to the extent it did. Popcorn by Hot Butter was far superior and incredibly catchy. Mouldy Old Dough just sounds like a pub record to me, the kind of thing knocked out by someone for a quick plonk on the keyboard on an ancient old piano inn the corner of a smoke filled room. Much the same as Roulette and Side Saddle by Russ Conway, both those singles hit the top spot too back in 1959, so there is something about this type of piano playing that used to appeal.

I can't define the music genre Mouldy Old Dough would belong to but it's an interesting track with surprising endurance.

Other better ones that slightly compare are On The Rebound by Floyd Cramer and Nut Rocker by B.Bumble and The Stingers, also both chart toppers from 1961 and 1962 respectively.

From the autumn winter of 1972/3 era of Mouldy Old Dough I'd go more for something like Sylvia or Hocus Pocus by Focus.

Never forget Winifred Atwell!

Kevin wrote:
I'm not quite sure how Mouldy Old Dough tapped into the nation's collective consciousness to the extent it did. Popcorn by Hot Butter was far superior and incredibly catchy. Mouldy Old Dough just sounds like a pub record to me, the kind of thing knocked out by someone for a quick plonk on the keyboard on an ancient old piano inn the corner of a smoke filled room. Much the same as Roulette and Side Saddle by Russ Conway, both those singles hit the top spot too back in 1959, so there is something about this type of piano playing that used to appeal.

I can't define the music genre Mouldy Old Dough would belong to but it's an interesting track with surprising endurance.

Other better ones that slightly compare are On The Rebound by Floyd Cramer and Nut Rocker by B.Bumble and The Stingers, also both chart toppers from 1961 and 1962 respectively.

From the autumn winter of 1972/3 era of Mouldy Old Dough I'd go more for something like Sylvia or Hocus Pocus by Focus.


Thank you for the Jive Bunny flashback Kevins.

However, Focus were an amazing band

JK2006 wrote:
Never forget Winifred Atwell!




I was almost typing her name out in my original comment and then didn't!

Infact I heard Gambo play Poor People Of Paris by her on his show just a few days ago, another chart topper of the kind from 1956. For some reason this song reminds me of something that could have been a theme tune to some programme back in the 1970s as the credits roll.


youtu.be/eY_PabVEUbY?si=2J2eu7twoPq1oUq1

When it first came out I asked my grandmother to give me a copy for my birthday. I loved it then and I still have, and still play, my 7inch as well as occasionally listening to it on youtube etc.
I like it because it sounds good and still makes me smile so, in my opinion it is a good song.