Eric Burdon was the heart of the Animals and a few incarnations of that famous group over the years. Young Eric, from the northeast of England, loved the blues and, as a ten-year-old, he was entranced by a folk song by African-American blues legend Josh White. That old record was called The House of the Rising Sun. The words, about a house of ill-repute in New Orleans, did not make much sense to the boy but he sure liked the sound.
Move ahead several years and we find the Animals recording their version of The House of the Rising Sun. The original words had previously been modified, read that as cleaned-up, by Bob Dylan. The Animals used the Dylan recording as a model. Burdon, who is short in real life, really belted out that vocal. The song was over four minutes long and deejays were used to playing two and a half minute songs, so the label was reluctant to release the cut. Finally, they went ahead with it and it became a smash in the UK and the USA in 1964, spending three weeks at #1 in the states.
Years later, Burdon had some interesting comments on this classic #1 hit and, in those comments, he threw ice water on the legitimacy of the music charts. He wrote about that in his book, Don't Let Me Be Misunderstood. He recounted a story. It seems that the band was in a car with a record executive. The guy, from their label, said (some words censored): " You guys feel like your ---- is gold. You are on the top of the world. Well just remember that we put you there. The record company bought back enough copies of House of the Rising Sun to make it go #1. We put you on top and we can tear you down again."
Burdon went on to explain that he learned, in fifty years in the high-flying music business, that this was done all the time -- record companies routinely bought up their own product to make it chart higher. I saw similar things in my radio days and I think that anyone who puts too much stock in the charts is naive and needs to understand that they are largely manipulated by record companies with the goal of creating hits. The charts and big hits are interesting for me to write about, and they do provide perspective and insight into what was considered to be a hit and what was "made" popular, but that is about as far as it goes. Does it mean that they were all great songs, NOT! Record companies and the music industry are big business. If they want to make a hit, they set about doing so.
If you have an interest in hearing the original version of House of the Rising Sun, the cut that inspired Burdon, click below to hear Josh White.
For more "Stories Behind the Music" click on the guitar 
Steven L. Smith
Bellingham WA Home Inspections
Check out "This Day In History" -- music and vintage television from the 1950's through the 1980's. I enjoy writing these articles because they take me back to my days in radio broadcasting. Click on Elvis' gold record, below, to revisit those golden hits of yesteryear.
Steven - As a former musician in the industry, I know there's lots of trickery to the charts and more. I remember in our early days, when we had no money, we used to get paid to do some of the "dirty" work for various labels. Remember the video channel "The Box"? I'm not even sure if it exists anymore, but the premise was that kids could call a 900 number, request a song and it would get played on the channel. Interactive MTV basically. We used to get lists of every Box channel in the country, their call in line and a code for a specific video. We would sit around for hours making the calls. Sometimes you had to call certain markets 100 times in one day. I think the cost of the call was 75 cents and we got paid $1.50 for each call. It paid the bills, but made a lot of artists look more popular then they really were (including myself). We used The Box's charting to get our foot in the door and if a video was performing well enough, bands got record deals, radio play, and MTV play out of it. Rock N' Roll isn't about who's liked, but about making the consumer like who you want to succeed. Sure there are plenty of unknowns who have made it based on hard work, but many artists were just in the right place at the right time with the right cheerleader behind them.
Parked..........I shall be back................I worked in the industry and would like to see what pearls of wisdom you have to share............read "the hit men".....tip of the iceberg
Matt, Interesting.
John, Glad to hear your side. Most of my stories behind the music do not get into controversy, just tell stories about artists but I had to pop in the chart controversy since Burdon brought it up talking about his own biggest hit ever.
Thanks Steve - Of course, it was all about money, what wasn't.
Steve, Always loved House of the Rising Sun. Danced face to face at the street dance with a really cute girl back when I was in the 8th grade. Thought I was in love. It is amazing the history shows that rock and roll is just blues redone. Had a chance to visit Sun Records and then the Memphis Rock and Blues Museum last summer. I could have spent another 8 hours in there. Great stuff.
List and Sell (and grind out some blues for Christmas too) Gary @ RentonHomeFinder.com
Gary,
Thanks for stopping by. How is it in Renton. We got more snow last night, yet it is melting at the moment.
Steven, I have a story about the Animals or more accurately a member of the group, Hilton Valentine.
He lives here in CT, actually in Wallingford CT. The town may sound familar because that is where I live. I did the inspection on his house here in Wallingford just over three years ago.
The man is very quiet and left the inspection in the hands of his wife Germaine. She was great to work for. A very sharp lady. I found more than a few problems with the house, some were fairly serious, and she was able to get them resolved. She wrote me a very nice testmonial which is on my web site.
I have Hiltons "autograph" on the contract for the inspection. Do you suppose it's worth something? I'm kidding! He performs in the area and I see from his web site he has gotten back with Eric Burden.
James,
That IS interesting. From what my info shows, he played lead guitar on House of the Rising Sun. So I guess that is him in the video. His appearance has changed over the years but he should be there. I also have, somewhere, a video of the group on Sullivan doing that. Anyway, you got an original there, not just one of the guys from Burdon's various incarnations.
Yes that is him in the video. He as well as the other original Animals are in the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame. I believe there is a link on his web site to the RRHF web site page for the Animals.
Maybe when Nutsy visits you an autograph could be arranged. Chances are that Hilton would want Nutsy's autograph.